Archive for the 'Economy' Category
Pennsylvania Ordered Its Health Workers to Never Discuss Fracking
June 25th, 2014Via: Grist: In the heavily fracked Keystone State, the economic interests of frackers trump the health concerns of residents. That much is abundantly clear in the wake of an extraordinary story by StateImpact Pennsylvania, which interviewed two retired state health department workers. The former workers say they were ordered to not return the phone calls […]
FAA Bans Use of Drones to Deliver Packages
June 24th, 2014Via: Ars Technica: The Federal Aviation Administration has said that online shopping powerhouse Amazon may not employ drones to deliver packages, at least not anytime soon. … In Monday’s announcement, published in the Federal Register, the FAA named Amazon’s December proposal as an example of what is barred under regulations that allow the use of […]
Australia: Genetically Modified Grass for Dairy Cows Sparks Concern
June 24th, 2014The issue with GM crops polluting neighboring farms in Australia is particularly grim. See: Steve Marsh: The future of organic and non GM food in Australia is uncertain after a WA farmer today lost his legal battle with a neighbouring farmer. Steve Marsh lost organic certification on his Kojonup farm – and most of his […]
New Zealand: Peria School’s New Solar Power System
June 24th, 2014Update: The Story Was Finally Broadcast on Television Show Seven Sharp This finally aired on a show called Seven Sharp on 27 June 2014. Fast forward to about the 15 minute mark. — Here’s a little slice of life from rural Northland New Zealand, for anyone who’s interested. Yesterday, I went along to Peria School […]
5KW Grid-Tie Solar Power System
June 23rd, 2014Update and Correction, 30 June 2014 The Q-Cells and SMA special mentioned in this post is now over. All of those systems have sold out. Also, Solar King operates in the North Island and the top of the South Island (Nelson). — We pay NZ$47.7 cents (including GST) per kilowatt hour for electricity. That’s robbery. […]
Prison Inmates Offer Captive Market for Gadget Makers
June 23rd, 2014Via: NBC: Even in the cooler, Americans are hot for tech. U.S. inmates are increasingly buying gizmos from prison commissaries, including MP3 players and flat-screen televisions — spending about $750 million annually on their gadget habits as several companies quietly seize this massive, captive audience and take niche marketing to an entirely different place. Sign […]
WikiLeaks Publishes Secret Draft Text for the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) Financial Services Annex
June 21st, 2014Via: WikiLeaks: Today, WikiLeaks released the secret draft text for the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) Financial Services Annex, which covers 50 countries and 68.2%1 of world trade in services. The US and the EU are the main proponents of the agreement, and the authors of most joint changes, which also covers cross-border data flow. […]
Thousands of Illegal Immigrants Being Housed in FEMA Facilities and Military Bases; Hundreds of Unaccompanied Children Arriving in U.S. Daily
June 20th, 2014Is the U.S. on the way to becoming a failed state? Losing control of borders is one of the primary characteristics of failed states. See the Wikipedia page for failed states and compare the following criteria to what’s happening in the U.S. right now: Mounting Demographic Pressures [Yes] Massive Movement of Refugees or Internally Displaced […]
Elon Musk Needs a Very Big Factory for His New Solar Technology
June 19th, 2014Via: MIT Technology Review: Billionaire, Tesla founder, and private space entrepreneur Elon Musk announced yesterday that Solar City, the solar installation company where he is chairman, plans to acquire a startup called Silevo for $200 million (plus up to $150 million more if the company meets certain goals). And with typical bravado, he also said […]
Global Peace Index 2014
June 19th, 2014Keep scrolling down to find the U.S. at position 101. Via: Guardian: The top five most peaceful nations were completely unchanged from the previous year’s study, with Denmark, Austria, New Zealand and Switzerland again runners up to Iceland. Europe remained the most peaceful region as a whole although the United Kingdom ranked 47th, France 48th […]
