Lifeboat Foundation

I guess the idea works, but there’s one little snag.

Putting solar panels into our roads isn’t the craziest idea, but we may as well admit that it poses some unique challenges. For instance, people may want to walk away with pieces of it. That’s what happened in China, anyway, just five days after authorities opened up what they claim is the world’s first solar panel-paved highway.

As reported by the Qilu Evening News (and noted by TechNode), the experimental kilometer-long stretch of road in Shandong is covered in more than 10,000 solar panels, sandwiched between an insulating layer on the bottom and a durable, transparent one on top — less than 3 cm thick all told. There are coils that can charge electric cars as they drive over it, and the system can even warm up in order to melt snow and ice. It opened to use on December 28.

Continue reading “Someone stole a piece of China’s new solar panel-paved road less than a week after it opened” »

All animals need to breathe oxygen and we know that regions of the ocean that are losing oxygen are becoming more and more common. We’re seeing the marine animals leaving those areas.

Almost two dozen marine scientists from around the world have issued a warning about an often-overlooked side effect of climate change and pollution.

In a paper published this week in Science, they say oxygen is disappearing from increasingly large areas of ocean and threatening marine life.

Continue reading “Oxygen disappearing from world’s oceans, including Canada’s” »

Has anyone used the app?

The Department of Labor has released an innovative, business-focused mobile app that supports private-sector efforts to eradicate forced labor from global supply chains.

During National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, we recommit ourselves to eradicating the evil of enslavement. Human trafficking is a modern form of the oldest and most barbaric type of exploitation. It has no place in our world. This month we do not simply reflect on this appalling reality. We also pledge to do all in our power to end the horrific practice of human trafficking that plagues innocent victims around the world.

Continue reading “President Donald J. Trump Proclaims January 2018 as National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month” »

Best of 2017: A breath of fresh air.

Can anyone suggest how we can prevent this from happening to us?

Summary: Air pollution and global warming will ascend to the top cause of death in the next three decades, say researchers from the University of Southern California. The scientists add that the polluted air will lead to a rise in lung disease, heart attacks, and strokes. [This article first appeared on the LongevityFacts.com website. Author: Brady Hartman.]

A pair of expert scientists from the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles says that global warming and air pollution will ascend to the top cause of death due to “ischemic heart disease, stroke, cancer, chronic lower respiratory disease.”

Continue reading “Scientists Say Air Pollution Will Be Our Top Killer by 2050” »

“To adventure and fellowship.”

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[This article is drawn from Ch. 8: “Pedagogical Love: An Evolutionary Force” in Postformal Education: A Philosophy for Complex Futures.]

“There is nothing more important in this world than radical love” as Paolo Freire told Joe Kincheloe over dinner.

- Joe Kincheloe. Reading, Writing and Cognition. 2006.

Continue reading “What’s Love got to do with Education?” »

Research on solar cells has been going on at a breakneck pace. However, with the advent of organics based cells, solar energy will be ‘greener’ than ever.

But the dream of the nanofabricator is not yet dead. What is perhaps even more astonishing than the idea of having such a device—something that could create anything you want—is the potential consequences it could have for society. Suddenly, all you need is light and raw materials. Starvation ceases to be a problem. After all, what is food? Carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, phosphorous, sulphur. Nothing that you won’t find with some dirt, some air, and maybe a little biomass thrown in for efficiency’s sake.

Equally, there’s no need to worry about not having medicine as long as you have the recipe and a nanofabricator. After all, the same elements I listed above could just as easily make insulin, paracetamol, and presumably the superior drugs of the future, too.

What the internet did for information—allowing it to be shared, transmitted, and replicated with ease, instantaneously—the nanofabricator would do for physical objects. Energy will be in plentiful supply from the sun; your Santa Clause machine will be able to create new solar panels and batteries to harness and store this energy whenever it needs to.

Continue reading “How a Machine That Can Make Anything Would Change Everything” »