3. This article suggests to live near airport is harmful for health. Also it claims that aircraft's noise is bad not just to irritate people; also it instantly boosts a sleeping person's blood pressure. .Further, High blood pressure can lead to stroke, heart failure, heart attack and kidney failure. My personal experience also says it is very harmful and striking to mental and physical health. My husband house is located just few kilometers far from international airport. I experienced the irritating sound of aircrafts 5 years ago once I got married and came to my husband's house. In the beginning it was very hard to make conversion over telephone because aircraft noise would disturb. Even daily conversation was hard for me. What I think is every country should make policy to localized domestic and international airport far from the resident area.
From: Reuters Published February 13, 2008 12:28 PM Airport noise instantly boosts blood pressures By Michael Kahn LONDON (Reuters) - Living near an airport isn't just irritating, it is also unhealthy, researchers said on Wednesday, in a study that showed loud noise instantly boosts a sleeping person's blood pressure. The louder the noise, the higher a person's blood pressure went, a finding that suggests people who live near airports may have a greater risk of health problems, said Lars Jarup, who led the European Commission-funded study. "Living near airports where you have exposure to night time aircraft noise is a major issue," Jarup, an environmental health researcher at the University of Glasgow, told Reuters. "The reason we did airports is because there was no study that has looked at particular problems of aircraft noise." High blood pressure can lead to stroke, heart failure, heart attack and kidney failure. It affects more than a billion adults worldwide. The research team showed that people living for at least five years near a busy airport and under a flight path have a greater risk of developing chronic high blood pressure, also known as hypertension, than those who live in quieter areas. That study of nearly 5,000 people found that an increase in night time airplane noise of 10 decibels increased the risk of high blood pressure by 14 percent in both men and women. "We know that noise from air traffic can be a source of irritation, but our research shows that it can also be damaging for people's health, which is particularly significant in light of plans to expand international airports," Jarup said. In the four-year study, published in the European Heart Journal, the researchers remotely measured the blood pressure of 140 volunteers every 15 minutes while they slept in their homes near London's Heathrow airport -- one of the busiest in the world -- and three other major European airports. They used digital recorders to determine what noises had the biggest impact on blood pressure, ranging from road traffic to a partner's snoring to an airplane taking off or landing. The Decibel level, not a sound's origin, was the key factor, but airplanes had the most significant impact, Jarup said. "Most of the time you will find road traffic noise is not too bad during the night," he said. "If you live near an airport where there are night flights that are quite another story." http://www.enn.com/health/article/31071
3.This article is about GM's hybridcar chevy volt. I Think GM is still compromizing with oil companies. They have technology to develope full electric car. And I don't understand why this article is calling chevy volt as revival of electric. In korea, we can get Toyota's hybrid cars but they are still very expansive.Goverment subsidy will be needed to promote its use.
----------------------- Bob Lutz: The Man Who Revived the Electric Car Keith Naughton NEWSWEEK Updated: 11:56 AM ET Dec 22, 2007 When General Motors was fingered as the prime suspect in the 2006 documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?" Bob Lutz's inbox filled with hate mail. "I hope you rot in hell," read one missive to the GM vice chairman, known for his love of gas-guzzling sports cars. But now the movie's director wants Lutz to star in a possible sequel, "Who Saved the Electric Car?" "Now that they've done their mea culpa, I'm bullish on GM," says director Chris Paine. "I'd like to include Lutz in my next film."
What explains this turn of events? Lutz—the man who brought us the Dodge Viper muscle car and the 1,000-horsepower Cadillac Sixteen—has become the unlikely champion of the Chevy Volt, a 150mpg plug-in electric car that GM is fast-tracking for production in 2010. GM's car czar now admits he was wrong to dismiss the popular Toyota Prius hybrid as a PR ploy. Though he still loves fast cars (and fast fighter jets, which the ex-Marine flyboy pilots on weekends), Lutz, 75, is undergoing a green conversion in the twilight of his career. "I believe strongly that this country has to get off oil," he says, sitting beside a massive V-16 engine on display in his office. "The electrification of the automobile is inevitable."
Skeptics initially viewed the Volt as Lutz's own PR ploy. But they've come to believe in the plug-in, as GM has poured millions into developing a lithium-ion battery (like those in laptops) that will allow the car to go 40 miles on pure electricity before a tiny gasoline motor kicks in to recharge the battery. (It also can be juiced up by plugging it into a wall outlet for about six hours.)
But the biggest naysayers Lutz faced were inside his own company. After being burned by the failure of its EV1 electric car in the '90s (the subject of Paine's film), GM was gun-shy about plugging in again. When Lutz first proposed creating an electric car in 2003, the idea "bombed" inside GM, he says. "I got beaten down a number of times." After pouring billions into engineering futuristic fuel-cell cars (still years away from production), GM engineers didn't want to switch gears to a plug-in electric, which they insisted couldn't be run on lithium-ion batteries. The turning point came when tiny Tesla Motors, a Silicon Valley start-up, announced in 2006 that it would produce a speedy electric sports car powered by those same laptop batteries. "That tore it for me," says Lutz. "If some Silicon Valley start-up can solve this equation, no one is going to tell me anymore that it's unfeasible."
So in 2006, Lutz formed a skunkworks team of engineers and designers to quickly cobble together the Chevy Volt concept car, which became the star of the 2007 Detroit Auto Show. And then he persuaded the brass to greenlight the Volt for production by arguing that they must try to seize the green high ground from Toyota, which is battling GM for the title of the world's No. 1 automaker. "We saw Toyota getting highly beneficial rub-off from their Prius success, which permitted them to cloak themselves in the mantle of total greenness," says Lutz. "This was starting to hurt because it was one reason for a sudden surge in Toyota's market share."
Now Lutz envisions selling hundreds of thousands of Volts a year, probably priced below $30,000. Detroit's horsepower jockey insists the Volt will be his crowning achievement—and his swan song. "This is like JFK's call for the moon shot," he says. "I want to stick around to see the Volt come to market. Then I'll pack it in around 80." And ride off into the sunset on electric power. ----- URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/81580
3. This article is showing that consumers don't concern much about Environment Friendliness when they choose a car. Sometimes we misunderstand products as to poor funtioned ones if it have Environment Friendliness features.
From this article, i found out one fact that i've never thought of. Vehicles that run on ethanol are being produced by GM now. I heared the U.S. government is giving subsidies to consumers who want to buy ethanol car because they think this new energy is eco friendly. However those ethanol cars are not efficient as much as oil cars . And they are not environment friendly because coal is needed to produce ethanol from corns. I think this is so irony that we need to grow food to run cars.
------------------------- Most Environmentally Friendly Car Brands
The results of Consumer Reports’ latest car brand perception survey are in, featuring a whole section on green cars. While eco-friendliness is only the fifth most important feature to consumers, Toyota scored well with almost half of consumers associating it with being a green brand.
The survey represents over 2,000 adults from around the nation, and had respondents rank the most important features in a car’s brand and then whether a company was effective in that category.
Environment Friendliness ranked behind safety, quality, value and importance, but ahead of design/style and technology innovation. Behind Toyota (49 percent) in the green category, Honda measured green with 26 percent of consumers, followed by Ford (16 percent), Chevrolet and GMC (11 percent each).
Chevrolet and GMC are both General Motors brands, which has been producing more vehicles that run on ethanol, a renewable source of energy made from corn. GM’s CEO said at this week’s Consumer Electronics Show that the U.S. should have 10 times more ethanol gas stations; there are about 1,400 currently.
All other cars on the list are known for their hybrid technology, with Toyota producing the ever-popular Prius and several other hybrid models, Honda selling hybrid Civics and (the soon to be discontinued) Accords and Ford developing the first hybrid SUV Escape
3. Ecological modernization suggests for positive sum solutions such as new efficiencies through pollution reduction and the development of profitable pollution control tecnologies. I think GE is a good example of ecologically innovating corporate sector mentioned at ecological modernization. According another article I searched, GE has released its 2005 ecomagination report, showing that revenues from the sale of energy efficient and environmentally advanced products and services hit a great amount of dollars.
-----------------------
By Nadia Saleem, Staff Reporter Published: April 19, 2008, 00:33
Dubai: Ecomagination, a green initiative of General Electric (GE), is looking to expand in the Middle East's construction and infrastructure sectors as the US firm seeks to bolster its credentials in energy-efficient and water conservation products.
GE, which heavily deals in conventional energy systems, said its green initiative, launched more than two years ago, provides efficient sources of energy or technologies that are cost effective and safe.
Lorraine Bolsinger, vice-president of Ecomagination, said the company has made significant investments in clean energy projects, passing the $1billion mark in such technologies.
The company has been increasing its investment $200 million a year and hopes to continue the trend.
"Our commitment is to double our investment in clean technology from $700 million annually to $1.5 billion annually by 2010," Bolsinger said.
The company has lowered its carbon footprint by 200,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide and saved a $100 million in energy costs simultaneously, according to Bolsinger.
A very down to earth* kind of guy. I'm an environmental sociologist interested in establishing material and organizational sustainability worldwide. I'm always looking for interesting materials/technologies, inspiring ideas, or institutional examples of sustainability to inspire others to recognize their choices now. To be fatalistic about an unsustainable world is a sign of a captive mind, given all our options.
*(If "earth" is defined in a planetary sense, concerning comparative historical knowledge and interest in the past 10,000 years or so anywhere...) See both blogs.
6 comments:
1. Madhabi Bhatta
2. Airport noise instantly boosts blood pressures
3. This article suggests to live near airport is harmful for health. Also it claims that aircraft's noise is bad not just to irritate people; also it instantly boosts a sleeping person's blood pressure. .Further, High blood pressure can lead to stroke, heart failure, heart attack and kidney failure.
My personal experience also says it is very harmful and striking to mental and physical health. My husband house is located just few kilometers far from international airport. I experienced the irritating sound of aircrafts 5 years ago once I got married and came to my husband's house. In the beginning it was very hard to make conversion over telephone because aircraft noise would disturb. Even daily conversation was hard for me.
What I think is every country should make policy to localized domestic and international airport far from the resident area.
From: Reuters
Published February 13, 2008 12:28 PM
Airport noise instantly boosts blood pressures
By Michael Kahn
LONDON (Reuters) - Living near an airport isn't just irritating, it is also unhealthy, researchers said on Wednesday, in a study that showed loud noise instantly boosts a sleeping person's blood pressure.
The louder the noise, the higher a person's blood pressure went, a finding that suggests people who live near airports may have a greater risk of health problems, said Lars Jarup, who led the European Commission-funded study.
"Living near airports where you have exposure to night time aircraft noise is a major issue," Jarup, an environmental health researcher at the University of Glasgow, told Reuters.
"The reason we did airports is because there was no study that has looked at particular problems of aircraft noise."
High blood pressure can lead to stroke, heart failure, heart attack and kidney failure. It affects more than a billion adults worldwide.
The research team showed that people living for at least five years near a busy airport and under a flight path have a greater risk of developing chronic high blood pressure, also known as hypertension, than those who live in quieter areas.
That study of nearly 5,000 people found that an increase in night time airplane noise of 10 decibels increased the risk of high blood pressure by 14 percent in both men and women.
"We know that noise from air traffic can be a source of irritation, but our research shows that it can also be damaging for people's health, which is particularly significant in light of plans to expand international airports," Jarup said.
In the four-year study, published in the European Heart Journal, the researchers remotely measured the blood pressure of 140 volunteers every 15 minutes while they slept in their homes near London's Heathrow airport -- one of the busiest in the world -- and three other major European airports.
They used digital recorders to determine what noises had the biggest impact on blood pressure, ranging from road traffic to a partner's snoring to an airplane taking off or landing.
The Decibel level, not a sound's origin, was the key factor, but airplanes had the most significant impact, Jarup said.
"Most of the time you will find road traffic noise is not too bad during the night," he said. "If you live near an airport where there are night flights that are quite another story."
http://www.enn.com/health/article/31071
1.yoonjung kim
2.Does GM really tries to revive electric car?
3.This article is about GM's hybridcar chevy volt. I Think GM is still compromizing with oil companies. They have technology to develope full electric car. And I don't understand why this article is calling chevy volt as revival of electric. In korea, we can get Toyota's hybrid cars but they are still very expansive.Goverment subsidy will be needed to promote its use.
-----------------------
Bob Lutz: The Man Who Revived the Electric Car
Keith Naughton
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 11:56 AM ET Dec 22, 2007
When General Motors was fingered as the prime suspect in the 2006 documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?" Bob Lutz's inbox filled with hate mail. "I hope you rot in hell," read one missive to the GM vice chairman, known for his love of gas-guzzling sports cars. But now the movie's director wants Lutz to star in a possible sequel, "Who Saved the Electric Car?" "Now that they've done their mea culpa, I'm bullish on GM," says director Chris Paine. "I'd like to include Lutz in my next film."
What explains this turn of events? Lutz—the man who brought us the Dodge Viper muscle car and the 1,000-horsepower Cadillac Sixteen—has become the unlikely champion of the Chevy Volt, a 150mpg plug-in electric car that GM is fast-tracking for production in 2010. GM's car czar now admits he was wrong to dismiss the popular Toyota Prius hybrid as a PR ploy. Though he still loves fast cars (and fast fighter jets, which the ex-Marine flyboy pilots on weekends), Lutz, 75, is undergoing a green conversion in the twilight of his career. "I believe strongly that this country has to get off oil," he says, sitting beside a massive V-16 engine on display in his office. "The electrification of the automobile is inevitable."
Skeptics initially viewed the Volt as Lutz's own PR ploy. But they've come to believe in the plug-in, as GM has poured millions into developing a lithium-ion battery (like those in laptops) that will allow the car to go 40 miles on pure electricity before a tiny gasoline motor kicks in to recharge the battery. (It also can be juiced up by plugging it into a wall outlet for about six hours.)
But the biggest naysayers Lutz faced were inside his own company. After being burned by the failure of its EV1 electric car in the '90s (the subject of Paine's film), GM was gun-shy about plugging in again. When Lutz first proposed creating an electric car in 2003, the idea "bombed" inside GM, he says. "I got beaten down a number of times." After pouring billions into engineering futuristic fuel-cell cars (still years away from production), GM engineers didn't want to switch gears to a plug-in electric, which they insisted couldn't be run on lithium-ion batteries. The turning point came when tiny Tesla Motors, a Silicon Valley start-up, announced in 2006 that it would produce a speedy electric sports car powered by those same laptop batteries. "That tore it for me," says Lutz. "If some Silicon Valley start-up can solve this equation, no one is going to tell me anymore that it's unfeasible."
So in 2006, Lutz formed a skunkworks team of engineers and designers to quickly cobble together the Chevy Volt concept car, which became the star of the 2007 Detroit Auto Show. And then he persuaded the brass to greenlight the Volt for production by arguing that they must try to seize the green high ground from Toyota, which is battling GM for the title of the world's No. 1 automaker. "We saw Toyota getting highly beneficial rub-off from their Prius success, which permitted them to cloak themselves in the mantle of total greenness," says Lutz. "This was starting to hurt because it was one reason for a sudden surge in Toyota's market share."
Now Lutz envisions selling hundreds of thousands of Volts a year, probably priced below $30,000. Detroit's horsepower jockey insists the Volt will be his crowning achievement—and his swan song. "This is like JFK's call for the moon shot," he says. "I want to stick around to see the Volt come to market. Then I'll pack it in around 80." And ride off into the sunset on electric power.
-----
URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/81580
1. se kyoung, jeoung
2. Most Environmentally Friendly Car Brands
3. This article is showing that consumers don't concern much about Environment Friendliness when they choose a car. Sometimes we misunderstand products as to poor funtioned ones if it have Environment Friendliness features.
From this article, i found out one fact that i've never thought of.
Vehicles that run on ethanol are being produced by GM now. I heared the U.S. government is giving subsidies to consumers who want to buy ethanol car because they think this new energy is eco friendly. However those ethanol cars are not efficient as much as oil cars . And they are not environment friendly because coal is needed to produce ethanol from corns.
I think this is so irony that we need to grow food to run cars.
-------------------------
Most Environmentally Friendly Car Brands
The results of Consumer Reports’ latest car brand perception survey are in, featuring a whole section on green cars. While eco-friendliness is only the fifth most important feature to consumers, Toyota scored well with almost half of consumers associating it with being a green brand.
The survey represents over 2,000 adults from around the nation, and had respondents rank the most important features in a car’s brand and then whether a company was effective in that category.
Environment Friendliness ranked behind safety, quality, value and importance, but ahead of design/style and technology innovation. Behind Toyota (49 percent) in the green category, Honda measured green with 26 percent of consumers, followed by Ford (16 percent), Chevrolet and GMC (11 percent each).
----------------------
http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/29088
Chevrolet and GMC are both General Motors brands, which has been producing more vehicles that run on ethanol, a renewable source of energy made from corn. GM’s CEO said at this week’s Consumer Electronics Show that the U.S. should have 10 times more ethanol gas stations; there are about 1,400 currently.
All other cars on the list are known for their hybrid technology, with Toyota producing the ever-popular Prius and several other hybrid models, Honda selling hybrid Civics and (the soon to be discontinued) Accords and Ford developing the first hybrid SUV Escape
1. Park Daeyun
2. GE's green arm eyes Mideast for expansion
3.
Ecological modernization suggests for positive sum solutions such as new efficiencies through pollution reduction and the development of profitable pollution control tecnologies.
I think GE is a good example of ecologically innovating corporate sector mentioned at ecological modernization.
According another article I searched, GE has released its 2005 ecomagination report, showing that revenues from the sale of energy efficient and environmentally advanced products and services hit a great amount of dollars.
-----------------------
By Nadia Saleem, Staff Reporter
Published: April 19, 2008, 00:33
Dubai: Ecomagination, a green initiative of General Electric (GE), is looking to expand in the Middle East's construction and infrastructure sectors as the US firm seeks to bolster its credentials in energy-efficient and water conservation products.
GE, which heavily deals in conventional energy systems, said its green initiative, launched more than two years ago, provides efficient sources of energy or technologies that are cost effective and safe.
Lorraine Bolsinger, vice-president of Ecomagination, said the company has made significant investments in clean energy projects, passing the $1billion mark in such technologies.
The company has been increasing its investment $200 million a year and hopes to continue the trend.
"Our commitment is to double our investment in clean technology from $700 million annually to $1.5 billion annually by 2010," Bolsinger said.
The company has lowered its carbon footprint by 200,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide and saved a $100 million in energy costs simultaneously, according to Bolsinger.
---
http://www.gulfnews.com/business/Industry/10206811.html
Post a Comment