Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
NNadir
NNadir's Journal
NNadir's Journal
May 13, 2021
I just have one thing to say in a time of rising crisis.
I am extremely grateful the Joe Biden is at the helm.
May 12, 2021
The myriad ways sewage surveillance is helping fight COVID around the world
This is a news item from Nature, which I hope is open sourced:
The myriad ways sewage surveillance is helping fight COVID around the world
Wastewater tracking was used before the pandemic to monitor for polio and illicit drug use, but interest in the field and its applications has now ballooned.
One of my earliest memories as a child was being amazed by toilet bowls, not only how they worked without requiring electricity (that I could see) but also where the "stuff" went.
It appears that fascination never really went away; I find myself thinking about this sewage all the time, not only in the very practical (and sometimes expensive) issue of maintaining my home septic system, but also in connection with broad environmental issues, and equally important, human development goals; about two billion human beings on this planet lack access to improved sanitation, something I find unacceptable in the extreme. Understanding sewage - in many ways one of the worst waste problems in the world - only dangerous fossil fuel waste and biomass combustion waste is responsible for more unnecessary deaths - is extremely important to address the rising fresh water crisis, the collapse of ecosystems in the oceans, and, more subtly, addressing an issue that is going to hit future generations very, very, very hard as a result of our inattention, phosphorous flows.
The extremely advanced development of what has become late in life, my absolute favorite analytical chemistry technique, mass spectrometry, has allowed us to understand things about sewage we never could access previously, in particular the environmental fate of many different kinds of products, not only "personal care products" like soap and cosmetics and pharmaceutical metabolites and unmetabolized excreted pharmaceuticals, collectively abbreviated "PPCP" in the literature, but also the fate of things like paints, flame retardants, fire fighting foams, fabric protection agents...the list goes on and on.
And now the study of sewage is providing insight, using qPCR, the spread of Covid.
Some excerpts from the news item cited at the outset of this brief post:
From the subarctic community of Yellowknife, Canada, to the subtropical city of Brisbane, Australia, scientists in more than 50 nations are now monitoring the spread of SARS-CoV-2 in sewage. The number of sewage-surveillance programmes tracking COVID-19 has exploded during the past year from a dozen or so research projects to more than 200, following the discovery that whole virus particles and viral fragments are shed in faeces.
The information garnered is helping scientists to track down cases, predict surges, identify where to target testing, and estimate overall numbers of infected people in cities or regions. Although sewage surveillance has been used for several decades to identify polio outbreaks and target immunization programmes, and, more recently, to detect illicit drug use, the pandemic has brought new focus and investment in it as a means of tracking public health.
“There was always an interest in wastewater epidemiology, but now it’s taken flight,” says Ana Maria de Roda Husman, an infectious-diseases researcher at the Netherlands National Institute for Public Health and the Environment in Bilthoven.
Since early 2020, SARS-CoV-2 sewage projects have taken off around the world as wastewater experts pivoted to concentrate on the crisis. But the scale and focus of surveillance programmes varies, depending on how severely countries or communities have been hit by the pandemic.
The number of ways sewage surveillance is being used is dizzying. In the United Arab Emirates, researchers have been testing sewage from commercial aircraft to see whether incoming flights were carrying infected passengers1. Scientists in Hong Kong are monitoring sewage in apartment buildings to find undetected infections, and, in Yellowknife, health officials are testing wastewater to discover which viral variants have made it to their city, just 400 kilometres from the Arctic Circle.
Early-warning system
One common application of such surveillance programmes is as an early-warning system. People who are infected start shedding virus fragments a few days before they show symptoms, and de Roda Husman uses this to predict hospitalization numbers a few days ahead of time.
Other groups are using wastewater to find and suppress outbreaks on a much smaller scale...
...Challenges for developing countries
However, more than 70% of sewage-surveillance programmes are in high-income countries2, which have poured resources into wastewater epidemiology. Many researchers in the developing world are struggling.
“Testing in India is incredibly challenging as sewage systems are fragmented,” says Sudipti Arora, an environmental scientist at the Dr. B. Lal Institute of Biotechnology in Jaipur, India. Only about one-third of all towns have sewer networks, she says. “Consequently, slums and rural areas remain largely untested...”
...Many scientists working in the field say that a rare positive outcome of the pandemic might be that it will normalize the use of wastewater to monitor public health — whether for future pandemics or to track other health indicators, such as hormones that indicate stress or levels of caffeine consumption.
“Wastewater epidemiology was under the radar,” says Karthikeyan. “Now, it’s come to the forefront.”
The information garnered is helping scientists to track down cases, predict surges, identify where to target testing, and estimate overall numbers of infected people in cities or regions. Although sewage surveillance has been used for several decades to identify polio outbreaks and target immunization programmes, and, more recently, to detect illicit drug use, the pandemic has brought new focus and investment in it as a means of tracking public health.
“There was always an interest in wastewater epidemiology, but now it’s taken flight,” says Ana Maria de Roda Husman, an infectious-diseases researcher at the Netherlands National Institute for Public Health and the Environment in Bilthoven.
Since early 2020, SARS-CoV-2 sewage projects have taken off around the world as wastewater experts pivoted to concentrate on the crisis. But the scale and focus of surveillance programmes varies, depending on how severely countries or communities have been hit by the pandemic.
The number of ways sewage surveillance is being used is dizzying. In the United Arab Emirates, researchers have been testing sewage from commercial aircraft to see whether incoming flights were carrying infected passengers1. Scientists in Hong Kong are monitoring sewage in apartment buildings to find undetected infections, and, in Yellowknife, health officials are testing wastewater to discover which viral variants have made it to their city, just 400 kilometres from the Arctic Circle.
Early-warning system
One common application of such surveillance programmes is as an early-warning system. People who are infected start shedding virus fragments a few days before they show symptoms, and de Roda Husman uses this to predict hospitalization numbers a few days ahead of time.
Other groups are using wastewater to find and suppress outbreaks on a much smaller scale...
...Challenges for developing countries
However, more than 70% of sewage-surveillance programmes are in high-income countries2, which have poured resources into wastewater epidemiology. Many researchers in the developing world are struggling.
“Testing in India is incredibly challenging as sewage systems are fragmented,” says Sudipti Arora, an environmental scientist at the Dr. B. Lal Institute of Biotechnology in Jaipur, India. Only about one-third of all towns have sewer networks, she says. “Consequently, slums and rural areas remain largely untested...”
...Many scientists working in the field say that a rare positive outcome of the pandemic might be that it will normalize the use of wastewater to monitor public health — whether for future pandemics or to track other health indicators, such as hormones that indicate stress or levels of caffeine consumption.
“Wastewater epidemiology was under the radar,” says Karthikeyan. “Now, it’s come to the forefront.”
May 11, 2021
Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh, an incomparable intellectual who fell through the cracks of history
This book review, from Nature is probably open sourced:
An incomparable intellectual who fell through the cracks of history
Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh, worked at the heart of seventeenth-century scientific debates — in the shadow of her brother, Robert Boyle.
Excerpts:
The foundation of the Royal Society of London in 1660 established an institutional focus for experimental science. The society did not admit female fellows until 1945. A glance at its history gives the impression that seventeenth-century natural philosophy was an entirely male enterprise. Fortunately, feminist scholarship over the past few decades has unearthed women such as philosopher Anne Conway and writers Dorothy Moore and Mary Evelyn, who were active in the intellectual ferment of the time.
Now, Michelle DiMeo has produced a portrait of another influential female thinker who has been hiding in plain sight — as a footnote in the story of her more famous brother, chemist and Royal Society co-founder Robert Boyle. DiMeo reveals Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh, as central to political, religious, philosophical and medical discussions, yet destined to be forgotten, because she obeyed the convention that women should not put their thoughts into print. DiMeo, a librarian at the Science History Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has used her archival skills to trawl the papers of Ranelagh’s mostly male contemporaries to uncover her role as a public intellectual...
...Married off to Arthur Jones (later Viscount Ranelagh), Katherine had four children by the time she was 25. In 1642, she fled an uprising of Catholic rebels and settled in London with her children. She lived apart from her husband — a boor and gambler – but kept her title.
In London, she became one of the most active members of the circle of correspondents cultivated by the polymath Samuel Hartlib. The group shared, copied and discussed letters and manuscripts; Ranelagh hosted meetings in her home. Members admired her contributions on politics, religion and natural philosophy, dubbing her “the Incomparable” and citing her frequently. The interests of the circle evolved, converging on new, ‘useful’ knowledge revealed through experimental science, especially chemistry. One letter mentions Ranelagh as an early user of optical instruments such as a telescope.
Ranelagh introduced her teenage brother Robert to the circle after he returned from a tour of Europe in 1644; she became his spiritual and intellectual mentor. As he focused on chemistry, she equipped a laboratory at his Dorset home. He thanked her: “the delights I taste in it, make me fancy my laboratory a kind of Elysium” (spelling modernized). In 1668, he moved permanently into Ranelagh’s home in London’s fashionable Pall Mall...
Now, Michelle DiMeo has produced a portrait of another influential female thinker who has been hiding in plain sight — as a footnote in the story of her more famous brother, chemist and Royal Society co-founder Robert Boyle. DiMeo reveals Katherine Jones, Lady Ranelagh, as central to political, religious, philosophical and medical discussions, yet destined to be forgotten, because she obeyed the convention that women should not put their thoughts into print. DiMeo, a librarian at the Science History Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has used her archival skills to trawl the papers of Ranelagh’s mostly male contemporaries to uncover her role as a public intellectual...
...Married off to Arthur Jones (later Viscount Ranelagh), Katherine had four children by the time she was 25. In 1642, she fled an uprising of Catholic rebels and settled in London with her children. She lived apart from her husband — a boor and gambler – but kept her title.
In London, she became one of the most active members of the circle of correspondents cultivated by the polymath Samuel Hartlib. The group shared, copied and discussed letters and manuscripts; Ranelagh hosted meetings in her home. Members admired her contributions on politics, religion and natural philosophy, dubbing her “the Incomparable” and citing her frequently. The interests of the circle evolved, converging on new, ‘useful’ knowledge revealed through experimental science, especially chemistry. One letter mentions Ranelagh as an early user of optical instruments such as a telescope.
Ranelagh introduced her teenage brother Robert to the circle after he returned from a tour of Europe in 1644; she became his spiritual and intellectual mentor. As he focused on chemistry, she equipped a laboratory at his Dorset home. He thanked her: “the delights I taste in it, make me fancy my laboratory a kind of Elysium” (spelling modernized). In 1668, he moved permanently into Ranelagh’s home in London’s fashionable Pall Mall...
May 11, 2021
The fantasy that "coal is dead" is very prominent in the United States because of the popularity of replacing it with "transitional" natural gas. In reality, on the planet as a whole, irrespective of the fantasies of the US bourgeoisie in the provinces, coal has been the fastest growing source of energy on the planet as a whole in the 21st century.
The US "coal is dead" fantasy is driven by the willingness to destroy the ground water and much of the surface water of the entire continent by fracking, leaving permanent holes that will be oozing "God knows what" pollutants into the environment of all future generations.
No matter what one hears, natural gas is not clean; it is not sustainable, nor is it transitional. The use, in terms of energy, not the hollow lie of peak capacity, which may be available for a few minutes a day, of dangerous natural gas is rising far faster than is so called "renewable energy," the latter of which would collapse in a New York minute without access to dangerous natural gas.
Unlike all other coal phase outs in the US, by replacing coal with reliable 24/7 nuclear energy - which has the highest capacity utilization of any form of energy on the planet - the TVA is being sensible, not that humanity is being sensible.
Many people think so called "renewable energy" is driving coal phase outs. One hears this garbage thinking all the time. This belief is a form of ignorance, inattention, delusion, etc. Those steel posts in all those wind turbines we're constructing in our effort to convert all remaining wilderness into industrial parks are made using coke, which is coal heated to high temperatures using heat provided by the combustion of coal. Pretty much every wind turbine now operating will be landfill in about 20 to 25 years.
Modern nuclear plants are designed to operate for 60 to 80 years.
I trust you're safe and well.
TVA, Eyeing Coal Phaseout by 2035, Will Rely on Nuclear
TVA, Eyeing Coal Phaseout by 2035, Will Rely on NuclearThe Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) expects to phase out its coal generation by 2035, but achieving net-zero carbon emissions without raising power prices or adversely affecting reliability will require substantial investments in energy storage and carbon capture and sequestration (CCS). TVA also will need to extend the lifetime of its nuclear power, and adopt the use of small modular reactors (SMRs), said Jeffrey Lyash, its president and CEO.
During a fireside chat with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va) on April 28 hosted by the nonprofit international think tank the Atlantic Council—an event focused on the future of low carbon generation in the Appalachian region—Lyash noted the self-funded U.S. corporate agency has already retired 60% of its coal generation. “Our coal units will continue to retire over the next 15 years because they’ve reached the end of life,” he said.
However, TVA’s 2035 coal phaseout is still an “aspirational target” that will depend on environmental impact studies, and ultimately, a board-approved recommendation by the company, spokesperson Jim Hopson told POWER. While TVA does not intend to invest in its coal plants to extend their lifetimes and it “knows the path that it generally wants to take,” environmental impact statements “sometimes can take years to fully prepare and to complete all the necessary studies, so it is unlikely that the board will receive a recommendation for all the plants simultaneously.” he explained. “It’s possible, but more than likely, coal will be phased [out] over a period of a few years.”
The declaration is still a noteworthy development for TVA, which federal legislation created in 1933. As the nation’s largest public power supplier today, the entity has a footprint that serves 10 million people, including in most of Tennessee, northern Alabama, northeastern Mississippi, and southwestern Kentucky and portions of northern Georgia, western North Carolina, and southwestern Virginia...
...Coal Carried TVA for Decades
Last week, Lyash highlighted the TVA’s original mission to spur economic development in the Tennessee Valley and Appalachia, but he noted the entity is also committed to environmental stewardship. Both aspects have driven a significant change in its power generating portfolio (Figure 1), he said.
1. TVA’s changing power portfolio. Source: TVA
While TVA began its coal-fired construction program in the 1940s, the majority of its coal units were placed in service between 1951 and 1973. Just 10 years ago, TVA produced 74,583 GWh—or about 52% of its total generation—from 53 active units at 11 coal plants. Increasingly stringent regulatory requirements over the past decade, along with environmental agreements with several states and environmental groups, forced the company to retire 18 coal units by 2017...
During a fireside chat with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va) on April 28 hosted by the nonprofit international think tank the Atlantic Council—an event focused on the future of low carbon generation in the Appalachian region—Lyash noted the self-funded U.S. corporate agency has already retired 60% of its coal generation. “Our coal units will continue to retire over the next 15 years because they’ve reached the end of life,” he said.
However, TVA’s 2035 coal phaseout is still an “aspirational target” that will depend on environmental impact studies, and ultimately, a board-approved recommendation by the company, spokesperson Jim Hopson told POWER. While TVA does not intend to invest in its coal plants to extend their lifetimes and it “knows the path that it generally wants to take,” environmental impact statements “sometimes can take years to fully prepare and to complete all the necessary studies, so it is unlikely that the board will receive a recommendation for all the plants simultaneously.” he explained. “It’s possible, but more than likely, coal will be phased [out] over a period of a few years.”
The declaration is still a noteworthy development for TVA, which federal legislation created in 1933. As the nation’s largest public power supplier today, the entity has a footprint that serves 10 million people, including in most of Tennessee, northern Alabama, northeastern Mississippi, and southwestern Kentucky and portions of northern Georgia, western North Carolina, and southwestern Virginia...
...Coal Carried TVA for Decades
Last week, Lyash highlighted the TVA’s original mission to spur economic development in the Tennessee Valley and Appalachia, but he noted the entity is also committed to environmental stewardship. Both aspects have driven a significant change in its power generating portfolio (Figure 1), he said.
1. TVA’s changing power portfolio. Source: TVA
While TVA began its coal-fired construction program in the 1940s, the majority of its coal units were placed in service between 1951 and 1973. Just 10 years ago, TVA produced 74,583 GWh—or about 52% of its total generation—from 53 active units at 11 coal plants. Increasingly stringent regulatory requirements over the past decade, along with environmental agreements with several states and environmental groups, forced the company to retire 18 coal units by 2017...
The fantasy that "coal is dead" is very prominent in the United States because of the popularity of replacing it with "transitional" natural gas. In reality, on the planet as a whole, irrespective of the fantasies of the US bourgeoisie in the provinces, coal has been the fastest growing source of energy on the planet as a whole in the 21st century.
The US "coal is dead" fantasy is driven by the willingness to destroy the ground water and much of the surface water of the entire continent by fracking, leaving permanent holes that will be oozing "God knows what" pollutants into the environment of all future generations.
No matter what one hears, natural gas is not clean; it is not sustainable, nor is it transitional. The use, in terms of energy, not the hollow lie of peak capacity, which may be available for a few minutes a day, of dangerous natural gas is rising far faster than is so called "renewable energy," the latter of which would collapse in a New York minute without access to dangerous natural gas.
Unlike all other coal phase outs in the US, by replacing coal with reliable 24/7 nuclear energy - which has the highest capacity utilization of any form of energy on the planet - the TVA is being sensible, not that humanity is being sensible.
Many people think so called "renewable energy" is driving coal phase outs. One hears this garbage thinking all the time. This belief is a form of ignorance, inattention, delusion, etc. Those steel posts in all those wind turbines we're constructing in our effort to convert all remaining wilderness into industrial parks are made using coke, which is coal heated to high temperatures using heat provided by the combustion of coal. Pretty much every wind turbine now operating will be landfill in about 20 to 25 years.
Modern nuclear plants are designed to operate for 60 to 80 years.
I trust you're safe and well.
May 10, 2021
Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Demonstration
I'm not a TRISO kind of guy, but any reactor capable of high temperatures is fine with me.
We will need high temperature nuclear reactors if we're even going to have a poor shot at addressing climate change. Without nuclear reactors we have no chance of addressing climate change.
TVA, Kairos Partner to Deploy Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Demonstration
This looks like Per Peterson's design:
In a notable, dedicated effort by a major U.S. utility to boost the development of an advanced reactor technology, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and Kairos Power, developer of a novel fluoride salt-cooled, high-temperature nuclear reactor, on May 6 said they will team to demonstrate Kairos’ Hermes test reactor at the East Tennessee Technology Park (ETTP) in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.
As part of their agreement, TVA will provide engineering, operations, and licensing support to help California-based Kairos Power deploy its “low-power” demonstration reactor. According to Kairos, Hermes is a 50-MWth test reactor that will integrate the Kairos Power Fluoride Salt-Cooled High-Temperature Reactor (KP-FHR) as part of a cost- and risk-reduction–focused development pathway that ultimately envisions commercial deployment of a 140-MWe “KP-X” plant.
“Kairos Power’s singular objective for deploying the Hermes Reactor is to demonstrate the capability to deliver an advanced reactor at the costs necessary to make nuclear power the most affordable source of dispatchable electricity in the United States,” it said on Thursday.
The KP-FHR concept, which bagged a $303 million federal award under the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) risk reduction pathway last December, essentially uses molten fluoride salt as a low-pressure coolant (rather than water, which is used in conventional nuclear reactors). The design also uses fully ceramic tri-structural ISOtropic (TRISO) particle fuel in pebble form, and a high-temperature superheated steam cycle to “convert heat from fission into electricity and to complement renewable energy sources,” the company says...
As part of their agreement, TVA will provide engineering, operations, and licensing support to help California-based Kairos Power deploy its “low-power” demonstration reactor. According to Kairos, Hermes is a 50-MWth test reactor that will integrate the Kairos Power Fluoride Salt-Cooled High-Temperature Reactor (KP-FHR) as part of a cost- and risk-reduction–focused development pathway that ultimately envisions commercial deployment of a 140-MWe “KP-X” plant.
“Kairos Power’s singular objective for deploying the Hermes Reactor is to demonstrate the capability to deliver an advanced reactor at the costs necessary to make nuclear power the most affordable source of dispatchable electricity in the United States,” it said on Thursday.
The KP-FHR concept, which bagged a $303 million federal award under the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) risk reduction pathway last December, essentially uses molten fluoride salt as a low-pressure coolant (rather than water, which is used in conventional nuclear reactors). The design also uses fully ceramic tri-structural ISOtropic (TRISO) particle fuel in pebble form, and a high-temperature superheated steam cycle to “convert heat from fission into electricity and to complement renewable energy sources,” the company says...
Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Demonstration
I'm not a TRISO kind of guy, but any reactor capable of high temperatures is fine with me.
We will need high temperature nuclear reactors if we're even going to have a poor shot at addressing climate change. Without nuclear reactors we have no chance of addressing climate change.
May 9, 2021
Good news...
Data from Qatar: Pfizer COVID vaccine protects against worrying coronavirus variants
This is a news item from Nature. I don't have much time today, as my wife and I will be visiting my son to celebrate mother's day, so I won't access or excerpt anything other than the news item, which should be open sourced.
Link to the news item: Pfizer COVID vaccine protects against worrying coronavirus variants (Ewen Callaway Nature May 6, 2021) Data from Qatar provide strongest evidence yet that COVID-19 vaccines can stop strains thought to pose a threat to immunization efforts.
Excerpt:
Qatar’s second wave of COVID-19 was a double whammy. In January, after months of relatively few cases and deaths, the Gulf nation saw a surge driven by the fast-spreading B.1.1.7 variant, which was first identified in the United Kingdom. Weeks later, the B.1.351 strain, which is linked to reinfections and dampened vaccine effectiveness, took hold.
Amid this storm, researchers in Qatar have found some of the strongest evidence yet that current vaccines can quell variants such as B.1.351. Clinical trials in South Africa — where B.1.351 was first identified — had suggested that vaccines would take a hit against such variants. But this study offers a fuller picture of what countries battling such variants can expect.
People in Qatar who received two doses of the Pfizer–BioNTech vaccine were 75% less likely to develop a case of COVID-19 caused by B.1.351 than were unvaccinated people, and had near-total protection from severe disease caused by that strain.
The findings — published on 5 May in The New England Journal of Medicine1 — suggest that current RNA vaccines are a potent weapon against the most worrisome immune-evading variants...
Amid this storm, researchers in Qatar have found some of the strongest evidence yet that current vaccines can quell variants such as B.1.351. Clinical trials in South Africa — where B.1.351 was first identified — had suggested that vaccines would take a hit against such variants. But this study offers a fuller picture of what countries battling such variants can expect.
People in Qatar who received two doses of the Pfizer–BioNTech vaccine were 75% less likely to develop a case of COVID-19 caused by B.1.351 than were unvaccinated people, and had near-total protection from severe disease caused by that strain.
The findings — published on 5 May in The New England Journal of Medicine1 — suggest that current RNA vaccines are a potent weapon against the most worrisome immune-evading variants...
Weaker protection
Researchers in South Africa identified B.1.351 in late 2020, and it’s now the predominant strain there. Laboratory studies show that the variant harbours mutations that blunt the effects of virus-blocking antibodies, and trials suggest that some COVID-19 vaccines are significantly less effective against the strain than against others.
Early lab research suggested that RNA vaccines, including the Pfizer–BioNTech jab, would be weakened by B.1.351, but probably not fully compromised. In April, the companies announced that a small trial in South Africa had found the vaccine to be fully effective against B.1.351, but the study of 800 people recorded a total of just 6 infections caused by B.1.351 in the placebo group, so efficacy might have been much lower.
First evidence that COVID vaccines protect people against new variants
Abu-Raddad’s team analysed tens of thousands of COVID-19 cases that occurred between the start of Qatar’s vaccination campaign in late December and the end of March. Genome sequencing showed that B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 were the predominant coronavirus lineages during this period and, from mid-February, each accounted for about half of the country’s cases...
Researchers in South Africa identified B.1.351 in late 2020, and it’s now the predominant strain there. Laboratory studies show that the variant harbours mutations that blunt the effects of virus-blocking antibodies, and trials suggest that some COVID-19 vaccines are significantly less effective against the strain than against others.
Early lab research suggested that RNA vaccines, including the Pfizer–BioNTech jab, would be weakened by B.1.351, but probably not fully compromised. In April, the companies announced that a small trial in South Africa had found the vaccine to be fully effective against B.1.351, but the study of 800 people recorded a total of just 6 infections caused by B.1.351 in the placebo group, so efficacy might have been much lower.
First evidence that COVID vaccines protect people against new variants
Abu-Raddad’s team analysed tens of thousands of COVID-19 cases that occurred between the start of Qatar’s vaccination campaign in late December and the end of March. Genome sequencing showed that B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 were the predominant coronavirus lineages during this period and, from mid-February, each accounted for about half of the country’s cases...
Qatar, where more than one-third of the population has received at least one dose of the vaccine, might provide an early glimpse at how the worst coronavirus variants can be controlled. Abu-Raddad says there is evidence that the Pfizer–BioNTech vaccine might also be highly effective at blocking transmission of B.1.351. And after cases of the variant peaked in mid-April, he says, “things have been going extremely well, the numbers are going down very, very rapidly”.
Good news...
May 8, 2021
Mr. Bojangles.
May 5, 2021
I have a number of colleagues born in India. In the last month, two had their mothers die...
...from Covid.
One of the mothers was elderly; her husband (my colleague's father) also had it but is expected to survive.
The other colleague is probably in her late 20's; I don't know much about her family, but presumably her mother might have been middle aged.
Another colleague has a brother in the early 50's who's been in and out of the hospital, but as a medical professional, happens to own an oxygen generator.
It's bad over there.
The government there sounds rather Trumpian.
May 2, 2021
Week beginning on April 25, 2021: 420.01 ppm
Weekly value from 1 year ago: 416.95 ppm
Weekly value from 10 years ago: 393.48 ppm
Last updated: May 2, 2021
Up-to-date weekly average CO2 at Mauna Loa
The increase in carbon dioxide concentrations when compared to the same week in 2020 is "only" 3.04 ppm. (If one keeps track as I do, there is a fair amount of statistical noise in these measurements, but the trends are consistent.) The highest weekly increase over 2020 this year, 2021, was 3.90 ppm, observed in the week beginning February 28, 2021.
In my spreadsheet, I keep records of the increases over 10 year periods, in this case, a comparison of the reading this past week, with the last week of May in 2011. Using Excel functions, I can sort them by values high to low and do a lot of other things. The value for the 10 year increase is the highest ever recorded, 26.53 ppm.
The 12 month running average for increases over a ten year period, week to week, 2021 to 2011, is 24.37 ppm, 2.44 ppm per year and rising.
If any of this troubles you, don't worry, be happy. Head on over to Benny Sovacool's paper in Environmental Science and Technology about how so called "renewable energy" could save as many lives as nuclear energy saves, and could prevent as much carbon dioxide emissions as nuclear energy has been doing consistently for decades if only...if only...if only...if only...
If only what, exactly?
Positive Externalities of Decarbonization: Quantifying the Full Potential of Avoided Deaths and Displaced Carbon Emissions from Renewable Energy and Nuclear Power (Benjamin K. Sovacool and Chukwuka G. Monyei, Environmental Science & Technology 2021 55 (8), 5258-5271.
I discussed "Benny boy's" paper last night, with my head about to explode, because I'm sick and tired of hearing what so called "renewable energy" could do. I've been hearing it for half a century, and here we are...here we are...
The anti-nuke squad tries to steal Jim Hansen's thunder and manages to look stupid again.
At least it does seem that "Benny Boy" finally may have conceded, after spending his entire adult life bashing nuclear energy, that it saves lives.
That doesn't stop him from repeating his cult mantras that so called "renewable energy" is the bestest bestest best yet, even if we have to put dredging mines to haul up metal ores from the seafloor to get materials to convert our last wilderness into industrial parks for wind turbines.
Guess what? So called "renewable energy" hasn't done anything. It isn't doing anything. It won't do anything, where "anything" is saving human lives from air pollution and addressing climate change.
It's not "we could hit 420 ppm concentrations of the dangerous fossil fuel waste carbon dioxide in the planetary atmosphere;" It's "we did hit 420 ppm concentrations of the dangerous fossil fuel waste carbon dioxide in the planetary atmosphere." We did this after half a century of cheering wildly for wind and solar energy.
The history of the reactionary attempt to go to a so called "renewable energy" powered world like the one abandoned by humanity in the 19th and early 20th century, this on a planet with 1/7th the population it supports now, is filled with conditional "could" statements. And it's not about money, because we've been throwing oodles of money at so called "renewable energy" for this entire century, on a scale of trillions of dollars:
The amount of money "invested" in so called "renewable energy" in the period between 2004 and 2018 is over 3.036 trillion dollars; dominated by solar and wind which soaked up 2.774 trillion dollars.
Source: UNEP/Bloomberg Global Investment in Renewable Energy, 2019
The result of spending all of this money has had no result with respect to addressing climate change, other than the result that as a result of this squandering on stuff about which we liked to talk but didn't work - that's the only word for it, "squandering" - we're at 420 ppm.
That's a fact.
Facts matter.
This isn't a popular statement, necessarily, among my fellow Democrats - and I've gotten in lots of trouble for making it even as I insist it is true - but the reality is that opposing nuclear energy is rapidly morphing into a crime against humanity.
Have a nice Sunday afternoon.
Well, folks, we "got there:" The first weekly average CO2 concentration over 420 ppm at Mauna Loa.
As I've indicated several times I somewhat obsessively keep a spreadsheet of the weekly data at the Mauna Loa Carbon Dioxide Observatory, which I use to do calculations to record the dying of our atmosphere, a triumph of fear, dogma and ignorance that did not have to be, but nonetheless is.
This week's reading is the first in the history of weekly average readings, going back, to 1975 posted by the Mauna Loa is the highest ever recorded at the Mauna Loa carbon dioxide observatory, 420.01 ppm.
Generally, each year, these measurements peak in late May or early June. We probably haven't seen the worst measurement of 2021 yet, despite all the enthusiasm for the idea that Covid lockdowns would slow climate change. If they did, it's imperceptible.
The figures for this past week:
Week beginning on April 25, 2021: 420.01 ppm
Weekly value from 1 year ago: 416.95 ppm
Weekly value from 10 years ago: 393.48 ppm
Last updated: May 2, 2021
Up-to-date weekly average CO2 at Mauna Loa
The increase in carbon dioxide concentrations when compared to the same week in 2020 is "only" 3.04 ppm. (If one keeps track as I do, there is a fair amount of statistical noise in these measurements, but the trends are consistent.) The highest weekly increase over 2020 this year, 2021, was 3.90 ppm, observed in the week beginning February 28, 2021.
In my spreadsheet, I keep records of the increases over 10 year periods, in this case, a comparison of the reading this past week, with the last week of May in 2011. Using Excel functions, I can sort them by values high to low and do a lot of other things. The value for the 10 year increase is the highest ever recorded, 26.53 ppm.
The 12 month running average for increases over a ten year period, week to week, 2021 to 2011, is 24.37 ppm, 2.44 ppm per year and rising.
If any of this troubles you, don't worry, be happy. Head on over to Benny Sovacool's paper in Environmental Science and Technology about how so called "renewable energy" could save as many lives as nuclear energy saves, and could prevent as much carbon dioxide emissions as nuclear energy has been doing consistently for decades if only...if only...if only...if only...
If only what, exactly?
Positive Externalities of Decarbonization: Quantifying the Full Potential of Avoided Deaths and Displaced Carbon Emissions from Renewable Energy and Nuclear Power (Benjamin K. Sovacool and Chukwuka G. Monyei, Environmental Science & Technology 2021 55 (8), 5258-5271.
I discussed "Benny boy's" paper last night, with my head about to explode, because I'm sick and tired of hearing what so called "renewable energy" could do. I've been hearing it for half a century, and here we are...here we are...
The anti-nuke squad tries to steal Jim Hansen's thunder and manages to look stupid again.
At least it does seem that "Benny Boy" finally may have conceded, after spending his entire adult life bashing nuclear energy, that it saves lives.
That doesn't stop him from repeating his cult mantras that so called "renewable energy" is the bestest bestest best yet, even if we have to put dredging mines to haul up metal ores from the seafloor to get materials to convert our last wilderness into industrial parks for wind turbines.
Guess what? So called "renewable energy" hasn't done anything. It isn't doing anything. It won't do anything, where "anything" is saving human lives from air pollution and addressing climate change.
It's not "we could hit 420 ppm concentrations of the dangerous fossil fuel waste carbon dioxide in the planetary atmosphere;" It's "we did hit 420 ppm concentrations of the dangerous fossil fuel waste carbon dioxide in the planetary atmosphere." We did this after half a century of cheering wildly for wind and solar energy.
The history of the reactionary attempt to go to a so called "renewable energy" powered world like the one abandoned by humanity in the 19th and early 20th century, this on a planet with 1/7th the population it supports now, is filled with conditional "could" statements. And it's not about money, because we've been throwing oodles of money at so called "renewable energy" for this entire century, on a scale of trillions of dollars:
The amount of money "invested" in so called "renewable energy" in the period between 2004 and 2018 is over 3.036 trillion dollars; dominated by solar and wind which soaked up 2.774 trillion dollars.
Source: UNEP/Bloomberg Global Investment in Renewable Energy, 2019
The result of spending all of this money has had no result with respect to addressing climate change, other than the result that as a result of this squandering on stuff about which we liked to talk but didn't work - that's the only word for it, "squandering" - we're at 420 ppm.
That's a fact.
Facts matter.
This isn't a popular statement, necessarily, among my fellow Democrats - and I've gotten in lots of trouble for making it even as I insist it is true - but the reality is that opposing nuclear energy is rapidly morphing into a crime against humanity.
Have a nice Sunday afternoon.
Profile Information
Gender: MaleCurrent location: New Jersey
Member since: 2002
Number of posts: 33,518
