Down to Earth meets the CIA

posted by Carl Flatow on Friday, March 19. 2010

It started off with the obvious joke. The Director tells the attendees in his introductory remarks that he's the head of that OTHER CIA, the Culinary Institute of America. The less obvious joke about the jeering demonstrators, chanting against Sodexo's treatment of their workers which welcomed this afternoon's visitors, brought a more uncomfortable murmur.

In fact this was taking place on that other campus of this CIA, in the heart of the wine country in California's Napa Valley. After returning from a wonderful tour of two local wineries on a gorgeous March day, my head was still spinning from too much great wine (plus, just a sip of Grappa). It's amazing what I do for science. Note to self: the science of winemaking deserves a closer look.

But the introductory remarks and the first few presenting chefs made it clear to the assembled doctors and other health professionals at the sixth presentation of the CIA's "Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives" conference, co-sponsored by Harvard Medical School and the CIA, that there was plenty of science in healthy eating while healthy eating was clearly main-stream.

I was favorably impressed, not only by some great food during this introductory evening which might have made Michael Pollan quiver (as it was delivered by the likes of Kellog's, Nestle's and the National Peanut Board, among others) and feel proud at the same time (his name was invoked more than once, along with his advice, "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants") but also by the bigger picture.

Thursday evening's events left me very optimistic. Aside from hearing from one attendee about what sound like inspirational cooking, food preparation and healthy eating classes she runs for folks in Raleigh, NC, in which she includes lessons in science and math, I like the recipes the CIA has shared. It really is healthy food and they are providing doctors and other health professionals with great direction and ammunition.

I'll just have to "take another one for the team" at lunch tomorrow. Somebody's got to do it.

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Posted by Carl Flatow on Friday, March 19, 2010, 2:50 AM | Comments (0)

Wind power's underground plot revealed!

posted by Neil Wagner on Friday, March 19. 2010

The scheme to use caves as a means of storing wind power is subversive—er, I mean subterranean.

A big stumbling block in making widespread use of wind and solar power is lack of storage. The wind doesn't always blow and the solar panels don't always get enough direct sunlight. As a result, utility companies can't afford to have renewable power be too big a part of their portfolio.

Battery technology is expensive and limited. Enter compressed air. Windmills spin when the wind blows and some of the power generated is used to compress air into a giant chamber—the chambers being built in the caves Bebbo and Kito are visting each have the capacity of the Empire State Building. When the power is needed and the wind isn't blowing, some natural gas aids in releasing the compressed air to spin turbines and generate electricity. There are currently two functioning commercial-scale compressed air power plants; one is in in Bremen, Germany, one is in Alabama. Several are under development in the United States—including Utah.

Compressed air is actually a very effective means of storing electricity—plants using the technology are more efficient than traditional power plants.

I've dug up some information for you…

Developer plans to carve out Utah salt caverns for natural gas, compressed air or CO2

Renewable Energy to Be Stored in Underground Caves

How Compressed Air Could Power the Future

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Posted by Neil Wagner in Comic strips on Friday, March 19, 2010, 1:00 AM | Comments (0)

Loco for local

posted by Neil Wagner on Friday, March 12. 2010

Bebbo is crazy about the idea of locally produced food—with good reason. But is there a right way and a wrong way to "do local"?

Less gas is used and you support food producers in your community (or one that's nearby). But if your goal is to reduce global warming, be sure to understand what "local" means and how the food is produced.

Food for thought…

What is locally grown food?

Is local food better?

"It takes, by one estimate, 127 calories of fossil fuel energy to produce every calorie in lettuce…According to the World Watch Institute, food hauled long distances requires the use of four to 17 times more petroleum than food produced locally."

Buying local may be, but is not always, climate-friendly.

On average, our food has clocked from 1,500 to 2,500 miles to get to us, estimates the World Watch Institute; that's 25 percent farther than two decades ago.

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Posted by Neil Wagner in Comic strips on Friday, March 12, 2010, 1:00 AM | Comment (1)

This Just In: We Want More Science News

posted by Ira Flatow on Monday, March 8. 2010

Those doyens of the digital world have just discovered something that you already know:

We Want MORE Science News!

Because you are on this web site and listent to SciFri audio and watch our Pick o' The Week videos this news does not come as much of a surprise. A new Pew Research Center report found that of all the news subjects folks wanted more of, SCIENCE was at the top of the list:

Courtesy: Pew Research Center

Science even beat out religion and spirituality.

Hello!! Where have you pollsters been all these years? Maybe now you'll add a question or two about science and technology to those clip boards or phone surveys when polling the "important" issues.

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Posted by Ira Flatow on Monday, March 8, 2010, 5:20 PM | Comments (0)

White is the new green.

posted by Neil Wagner on Friday, March 5. 2010

Snow, ice and Bebbo's roof help fight global warming.

Greenhouse gases are not a man made gimmick conjured up by climate scientists. Nope. They're all natural, baby! Without them, this planet would be mighty chilly and we wouldn't be able to live here.

As Bebbo was saying, the sun's ultraviolet light comes to earth, passing right through our atmosphere's greenhouse gases, which don't give a hoot about UV light. If those rays hit something like snow, ice or Bebbo's white roof, the rays reflect right back out of the atmosphere where they are again ignored by the greenhouse gases up there. Ice, snow and white roofs have a high albedo--that means they reflect a LOT of the light that hits them.

If the UV rays hit something like water or land, the rays are first absorbed, then some of the absorbed heat is radiated out as infrared rays. Land and sea have low albedo. But greenhouse gases absorb infrared rays then radiate heat out in all directions; as you might guess, about half the heat is sent out of the atmosphere and the other half is sent back into the atmosphere where it keeps us all toasty warm.

So far, so good. That pattern has worked well for millenia. Unfortunately, we've been adding a lot of additional greenhouse gases to earth's atmosphere (BOOOOO!), so there is a lot more absorbin' and radiatin' going on. As a result, things are getting warmer.

What Bebbo was starting to say at the end of today's strip was that if every roof in every city on earth were painted white, estimates say there would be an average drop in temperature of .7 degrees Farenheit.

Some additional information for you...

Albedo definition 1, Albedo definition 2

If every roof in every city of the world were white, there would be an average temperature reduction of .7 degrees Farenheit.

"U.S. energy secretary Chu backs a novel idea: to whitewash roofs and highways. It could save lots of money and highlights an increasingly proactive agency."X