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Potential applications of renewable energy sources


In a world where almost everything is run by machines it not surprising that we are also running out of energy sources what worsens the case is that the energy sources that we use are destroying the world we are living in.  Another dilemma people are now facing is these energy sources are bound to vanish years from now.

The potential of renewable sources is massive as they are expected to meet world’s energy demand.   Renewable energy sources are biomass, hydropower, geothermal, solar, wind and marine energies they can provide sustainable energy services, based on the use of routinely available, indigenous resources.  The renewable resources such as biomass, wind, solar, hydropower, and geothermal can provide sustainable energy services, based on the use of routinely available, indigenous resources are attractive renewable fuel in utility boilers.

Crown Capital Eco Management : Food fraud tackled by forensic scientists

Crown Capital Eco Management : Food fraud tackled by forensic scientists:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/0/19829220

Wine, spirits, meat and even baby food can all be faked, with fraudsters hiding their true origins. Now forensic scientists are clamping down on food fraud, which costs millions in lost revenue and can put the health and safety of the public at risk.

Imagine tucking into a fine fillet of "British" beef, only to learn it actually came from Australia. Or drinking "French" wine that actually came from California.

What if the "Italian" olive oil you pour over the accompanying salad originated in Morocco?

That might not be so bad, you may think.

But what if a bottle of vodka you'd purchased in good faith is tainted with methanol, making it lethal to drink?

Or the baby food you feed your youngest is not what the label on the jar said it is?

As global trade has increased, so has the potential for food fraud, where fraudsters lie or hide the true provenance of produce.

Alongside food safety and health fears, its raises concerns over quality control, reputational damage and lost revenue, and puts the spotlight on illegal activity.

Now some firms are taking to using scientists, a type of food "crime scene investigators", to tackle the issue.

Faking it

In a world where food is exported and imported every day, how do you prove that the origin of a product is legitimate?

A company in New Zealand has developed a scientific origin system which maps and catalogues "food fingerprints".

"What we do needs to be able to stand up in court," says Dr Helen Darling, from Oritain.

Most food supply chains use predominantly paper-based systems to trace the origin of food, such as following barcodes.

But while these show the route a product has travelled and how, and "whatever kind of details you want to capture in that system", says Dr Darling, Oritain's proof of origin "cannot be faked".

Oritain's scientific liaison officer Rebecca McLeod says it ties food and drinks back to their geographic origin, by measuring the geochemical fingerprint of say, an apple, as well as the fingerprint of the soil it grew in, and that of the surrounding atmosphere.

"We look at the concentrations of a whole suite of different metal elements - present in the soil, and get introduced by things like fertilisers, and taken up by plants, and we can trace them to animals that eat plants as well.

Antonio Pasquale is passionate about making sure 100% of his wine is from his winery

"The likelihood of two regions having exactly same soil type and fertilisers is very very slim," she says.

The firm also can analyse some manufactured products, in "batch profiling".

"Something like infant formula or wine produced in a factory incorporates lots of different ingredients. We can characterise each batch of that product, based on the geochemical signature," explains Ms McLeod.

Once the food or drink profile has been developed, it is recorded and safely stored.

"Once we've got that in place, it's a quick process to analyse a suspect sample that is sent to us. The idea is we do all of the groundwork before there's a problem," she explains.

Each product is given a unique number which can be displayed on packaging or stickers.

Dr Helen Darling says it enables quick comparisons to root out any goods that aren't "true to label".

"Whilst our logo itself can be counterfeited, any product with our label on it or our brand on it, we would have authentic data and an authentic archive sample of that product. If we don't, we know immediately that it's a counterfeit product - that in itself is a deterrent to people."

In the Czech republic last month, distilled alcohol was tainted with methanol, causing the deaths of 19 people. The government imposed prohibition as authorities tried to trace the origin of the poisonous alcohol (believed to be vodka), with great difficulty.

Would an origin system have made it easier?

The EU does have an agricultural product quality policy, which allows foods and drinks to be assigned a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO), Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) or Traditional Speciality Guaranteed (TSG) category.

But this only applies to certified products and would not have helped in the case of counterfeit alcohol.

However, Rebecca McLeod says Oritain's scientists could look at the isotopic content of the water in alcohol products, analyse it and come up with a fingerprint for spirits such as whisky and vodka.

This technique would only work pre-emptively.

She says while it hasn't analysed any top shelf spirits yet, it has catalogued wine for clients.

One of those is Antonio Pasquale, a winemaker based in north Otago, New Zealand.

He has become increasingly frustrated that wine produced in the country is allowed to be mixed with other vineyards' - laws there state if a label says the wine is from a particular grape variety, vintage or area, then at least 85% in the bottle must be from that variety, vintage or area.

Oritain scientists have been working with bee keepers to map honey origins

"The structure of the free market pushes all food companies to standardise the product year in and year out. The lack of differences is destroying the individuality," he explains.

"I had enough of this. They (Oritain) came and sampled two blocks of 40 acres... mapped the chemical structure of my paddocks, and from then on they had freedom to come to my winery and collect samples.

"So I have solid proof that all my wine, as I say it is, comes from my paddock."

In southeast Asia provenance is becoming more important, as "there are million and millions of bottles of falsified wine sold in China," says Mr Pasquale.

"Wine was sold there produced in California but with French wine labels," he says.

China is no stranger to food scandals. But consumers are demanding higher standards of certification and proof of origin after infant formula was sold tainted with melamine in the country.

It has a bad record, in many food areas, including asparagus.

For example, in China, the US and Peru asparagus breeders can be tempted to sell poor quality seed, which can reduce yields by 20-30-%.

Dr Peter Falloon, the managing director of asparagus breeders Aspara Pacific, says his company overcomes this by having the characteristic biochemical profile of his company's seed measured.

High and low grade asparagus seeds can be spotted in the field

That way "growers in developing countries can simply send a suspect sample of 20 seeds to be analysed to see if they match the breeders' stock, and find out for sure if they are buying the real deal."

It is a low-cost option and technological advancement for rural farmers in developing country, meeting one of the key objectives this year of the United Nations' World Food Day on 16 October, which is to promote the transfer of technologies to the developing world.

Honey is another easily faked food.

"Some honeys being sold around the world have had sugars added, there have been honeys supplied with traces of antibiotics in them and some honeys have not been 'true to label' (the pollen source has been different to what has been recorded on the label)," explains Peter Cox, the general manager for New Zealand Honey Specialties.

The company is also asking scientists to profile their produce, which includes single flower honeys such as thyme honey, and honey produced in the beech forests of the south Island, or the lakes in Central Otago.

"Getting from beehive to the palette, we have a real story around authenticity. Certainly it's a rigorous scientific process," he says.

Chevron case may hurt investments: Official – Jakarta Post

http://crude.bpcares.co.uk/2012/10/18/chevron-case-may-hurt-investments-official-jakarta-post/ 

Chevron case may hurt investments: Official

Jakarta Post 

The ongoing investigation over alleged fraudulent practices within energy giant Chevron’s environmental remediation project in Riau province may harm the investment climate in the Indonesia’s oil and gas sector, a top official has said.

Upstream oil and gas regulator BPMigas chief R. Priyono said on Wednesday that the supervisory body had been concerned that the case development would make oil and gas investors “think twice” before signing production sharing contracts (PSCs) in the sector.

 “We are worried because basically all disputes coming up from projects under PSCs should be settled under the civil code instead of the criminal law.

Investors will see [the Chevron case] as a bad precedent,” he told The Jakarta Post in Jakarta.

 The executive was commenting on an investigation at the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) over alleged graft practices in Chevron’s bioremediation

project at its oil fields in Riau. Bioremediation is a method to normalize soil that has been contaminated by waste from oil production activities.

 In March, the AGO initially suspected the program to be “fictitious”, causing Rp 200 billion (US$23.4 billion) in state losses due to the reimbursement from BPMigas to Chevron to repay the latter’s costs for the program under the costs recovery scheme.

After further investigation, the AGO concluded that the bioremediation program was not successfully implemented as planned because the soil at Chevron’s oil fields in Riau was still polluted.

Earlier, law enforcement extended the detention period of four Chevron employees named as suspects in the case. Four of them, identified only by their

initials include ER, W, K and BAF. They were arrested on Sept. 27.

Separately, Chevron Pacific Indonesia (CPI) vice president for government policy and public affairs Yanto Sianipar said the firm “respectfully requested”

for its employees to have their detention suspended. “CPI and its employees have cooperated and will continue to cooperate during the AGO investigation, and our people pose no threat to the ongoing investigation,” he told the Post. In addition, Yanto said the firm would continue to respect the laws of Indonesia and cooperate during the AGO investigation and any further court hearings.

Flooded summer season, Atlantic Ocean blames : Crown Capital Eco Management

Flooded summer season, Atlantic Ocean blames

http://blog.crowncapitalmngt.com/flooded-summer-season-atlantic-ocean-blames/

Northern Europe picks on the Atlantic Ocean because of its wet summer according to a new study. The rising and falling of ocean temperature or the so called cyclical deception is seen as a major extortion on the weather. The said pattern reported will last long as the Atlantic warming persists. The research was carried out at the University of Reading and is published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The cycle of scheme investigated was known as the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. This change sees the waters warm or cool over a period of several decades. The researchers compared three periods in this cycle: a warm state from 1931-60, a cool period from 1961-90 and the most recent warm period starting in 1990 and continuing now. The paper notes that conditions in the last warm period in the Atlantic are broadly similar to those pragmatic now.

So the study compared weather conditions in Europe during the two warm Atlantic phases with those oppressed in the cool phase. One conclusion is that a warmer-than-usual Atlantic “favors a mild spring (especially April), summer and autumn, in England and across Europe.”

Another finding – of greatest relevance to the search for a cause of rainy summers – is that the warmth of the ocean also tends to make northern and central Europe abuse than usual. By contrast southern Europe, from Portugal to Turkey, makes victim of far less rain than normal.

Giant mammoth carcass in Siberian frost : Crown Capital Management Jakarta Indonesia

Giant mammoth carcass in Siberian frost

http://blog.crowncapitalmngt.com/giant-mammoth-carcass-in-siberian-frost/

Yevgeny Salinder, an 11-year old Russian boy, is the one who discovered the massive remains of the mammoth in August.

The mammoth, estimated to be at its 16 year when it died measured 2 meters and weighed 1,000 pounds, was excavated from the Siberian permafrost last month.

”It is the mammoth of the century,” said Professor Alexei Tikhonov of the Zoological Museum in St Petersburg.

According to a Russian scientist, the well-preserved mammoth could be attacked by another mammoth or an Ice Age man. It was best preserved remains of a mature mammoth but its DNA was already damaged and would be difficult to use for cloning.

The International Mammoth Committee working to recover and protect ancient remains: “We had to use both traditional instruments such as axes, picks, shovels as well as such devices as this ‘steamer’ which allowed us to thaw a thin layer of permafrost. Then we cleaned it off, and then we melted more of it. It took us a week to complete this task.”

A group of researchers from different countries have visited the site in September and they were surprised to see that the remains were not only made up of bones but in fact, complete with hair, one tusk and soft tissues.

“We can see that this animal was very well adapted to the northern environment, accumulating massive amounts of fat. This animal likely died during the summer period as we can’t see much of its undercoat, but it had already accumulated a sufficient amount of fat,” said Aleksey Tikhonov from the Russian Academy of Sciences .

Principal analysis on the creature’s remains has disproved that the big humps on mammoths depicted in cave paintings in European countries were not actually extension of their bone structure but great reserves of fat that helped them manipulate their body temperature during long winter seasons.

The mammoth, named as Zhenya after the 11-year old boy, is set to be the main exhibit in the Taimyr Regional Museum and will be transferred to the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Crown Eco Management A solution for Asian carp infestation | Crown Eco Management

A solution for Asian carp infestation

http://blog.crowncapitalmngt.com/a-solution-for-asian-carp-infestation/

Brought from the East to aid in managing aquatic plants in aquaculture industries, Asian carp has been unwittingly introduced to freshwater sources of the US. Today, they are seen as a big problem in the fishing industry for their big appetite and fast breeding, overshadowing other fish for space and food in lakes.

Asian carp presence has been recorded in around 18 states and are already established in the areas of Missouri and Illinois. The fish threatening to mess with the USD 7 billion sport and commercial fishing industry of the Great Lakes can grow up to 100 pounds and measure over 4 feet.

Some are saying that the easy solution for this is closing the canal systems and any other point of entry of asian carps. However, such a step will certainly cost billions, not only in construction but also in lost profit from boat traffic that uses the canal system.

Last resort options to prevent upsetting the marine biodiversity in the Great Lakes are harmful to other industries and would also worsen the road traffic, ergo an increase in carbon emissions.

The Asian Carp Control Strategy Framework of the government is set to allocate USD 51.5 billion to protect the Great Lakes from the asian carp infestation. This program apparently involves methods to kill or drive them away, from poison pellets to soundwave-shooting underwater guns.

A more permanent and beneficial solution seems to be to catch the asian carps and turn them into foodstuffs like what Schafer Fisheries in Illinois is doing. Schafer has been selling 10 million lbs of asian carp across the world, satisfying a demand for them in other parts of the world while helping their locality get rid of a major headache. Asian carps can be processed into food products like sausage, jerk, hotdogs and can also be included in fertilizers. Even if this one industry will not be enough to totally stop the proliferation of Asian carp, it can at least be a major step in finding a solution.

Asian carp is a collective term for several species of carp: grass carp, black carp, silver carp and bighead carp.

Guiding Principles | Crown Capital Eco Management

Guiding Principles                                                    

http://crowncapitalmngt.com/gprinciples.html

Independence
Although Crown cooperates with various organizations, we maintain our being an independent body, free from control of any particular government, state or institution and unimpaired by their own respective interests.

Public Awareness
Educating and enlisting the public to secure and maintain the quality of our natural resources is one of our priorities. We believe that by having well-informed and knowledgeable people, especially in the government sector will make it possible to maximize the benefit of existing legislation, and creating more, in order to preserve our e nvironment.

Sustainability
A long-term responsibility of preserving resources for future generations that cover economic and environmental factors. Sustainability enables the environment to be productive and diverse enough to host humanity along with other living organism through effectively managing human impact on the ecosystem based on information provided experts.

Taking steps towards sustainability is a difficult challenge as it entails international and local law, individual lifestyles and urban planning. Measures should be implemented on re-evaluating work practices, altering general living conditions and making new technologies in order for a sustainability goal to be accomplished.

Accountability
Crown Capital Eco Management also aims to raise awareness of our society getting trapped in progress with only the short-term concerns in mind for failure to protect and conserve our natural resources could lead to irreversible consequences not only in the future civilization but to the whole ecosystem itself.

Along with the recognition that the environment is needed for us to survive is the realization that we must answer for its sustainability and be responsible for managing the great resources we are entrusted with.

Independence
Our group strives to make every sector of our society, especially the public, recognize the need for transparency in what is and will be happening to our natural resources in the future. Every individual leaves his mark in the environment and unfortunately, not all of us leave a beneficial one. Therefore, we must be consistent and united in our efforts as a civilization to preserve our nature.