cryptogon.com

The project task force, led by Chen Fa-lin — director of Energy and Environment Research Laboratory under Hsinchu-based Industrial Technology Research Institute, is currently working on fine-tuning the guidelines, which will be presented to CEPD senior officials in August or September.

After the project is green-lighted, the possible first step should be setting up a five-megawatt marine turbine off Taiwan’s east coast on a trial basis, with the goal of testing both related technologies and power-generating efficiency, CEPD officials, adding that hopefully, the project can enter the next stage in three years.

“Current power generation is not a new idea, ” officials noted. “Countries like Britain, Canada, Norway, and Australia all have experience in deploying offshore marine turbines with capacities ranging from one megawatt to eight megawatts to support the electricity demand of hundreds to thousands of households.”

“The problem is not the technology itself but how to locate a suitable site — with a current strong enough, an undersea shelf not too deep, and a distance short enough to achieve power supply efficiency,” they added.

However, they explained that based on the surveys done by National Taiwan University (NTU) , the sea area of some 6,000 square kilometers between the eastern county of Taitung and the outlying Green Island in the Pacific Ocean appears to meet all the requirements, and that the maximum potential capacity there exceeds 1.68 trillion kilowatt- hours per year — while Taiwan’s current annual demand of electricity is only about 98 billion kilowatt-hours.

According to the estimates of the project task force, a given site of 25 square kilometers located in the “shallow, high-speed zone” could support the deployment of 1,000 one-megawatt marine turbines, which would have a peak capacity of 1,000 megawatts: equal to the output of Taiwan’s second nuclear power plant.

A federal jury unanimously found Tommy Cryer not guilty this week on two misdemeanor counts of failure to file.

And according to Cryer, the prosecution dismissed two felony charges of tax evasion prior to trial.

Attempts by The Times on Thursday to reach U.S. Attorney Donald Washington or Bill Flanagan, first assistant U.S. attorney, were not successful. Calls made to the two were not immediately returned.

“The court could not find a law that makes me liable or makes my revenues taxable,” Cryer said. “The Supreme Court has ruled that the government cannot impose an income tax on anything but the profits and gains. When you work for someone you give your service and labor in exchange for money, so everything you make is not profit or gain. You put something into it.”

Cryer was indicted last year on two counts of tax evasion. The indictment alleged he evaded payment of $73,000 in income tax to the Internal Revenue Service during 2000 and 2001.

Cryer created a trust listing himself as the trustee, and received payments of dividends, interest and stock income to that trust, according to the indictment. He also was accused of concealing his receipt of the sources of income from the IRS by failing to file a tax return on behalf of that trust.

“I determined that my personal earnings were not 100 percent profits, some were income,” Cryer said. “I refuse to file, I refuse to pay unless they can show me I have a lawful reason to pay.”

“What I earned was my own personal labor. I am giving something in exchange. I’m giving my property and I don’t belong to anyone else.”

The order empowers Treasury, in consultation with the State and Defense Departments, to target those individuals or organizations that either “have committed, or … pose a significant risk of committing” acts of violence with the “purpose or effect” of harming the Iraqi government or hindering reconstruction efforts. It applies to “U.S. persons,” a category including American citizens. It had not previously been disclosed — and still hasn’t — that U.S. persons are abetting the Iraqi insurgency, nor that Iraqi insurgents have property in the United States, raising questions about who in fact the order targets.

“The part where they reserve lots of discretion to themselves is the list of conditions that goes beyond determination of acts of violence. ‘Threatening the peace or stability of Iraq or the Government of Iraq,’ that could be anything,” says Ken Mayer, an expert in executive orders and a University of Wisconsin political scientist. “Think of the possibilities: it could be charities that send a small amount of money (to groups linked to) the insurgency, or it could be the government of Iran that has assets in the U.S. and has money that flows through a U.S. bank or something like that.”

The order permits the targeting of those who aid someone else whose assets have been blocked under the order — wittingly or not. And under Section Five, the government does not have to disclose which organizations are subject to having their assets frozen:

For those persons whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order who might have a constitutional presence in the United States, I find that, because of the ability to transfer funds or other assets instantaneously, prior notice to such persons of measures to be taken pursuant to this order would render these measures ineffectual. I therefore determine that for these measures to be effective in addressing the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13303 and expanded in Executive Order 13315, there need be no prior notice of a listing or determination made pursuant to section 1(a) of this order.

The scope of the order has raised civil-liberties concerns. “Certainly it is highly constitutionally questionable to empower the government to destroy someone economically without giving notice,” says Bruce Fein, a Justice Department official in the Reagan administration. “This is so sweeping it’s staggering. I’ve never seen anything so broad that it expands beyond terrorism, beyond seeking to use violence or the threat of violence to cower or intimidate a population. This covers stabilization in Iraq. I suppose you could issue an executive order about stabilization in Afghanistan as well. And it goes beyond even attempting violence, to cover those who pose ‘a significant risk’ of violence. Suppose Congress passed a law saying you’ve committed a crime if there’s significant risk that you might commit a crime.”

The National Motor Vehicle Title Information System was created in 1992 to thwart motor vehicle thefts, but it remains a patchwork repository at best.

Authorities say the system, which has the potential to track every car or truck in the country by its vehicle identification number, has languished because of years of local government inattention, a lack of urgency among state motor vehicle departments, and inconsistent federal funding.

“A car bomb is the absolute favorite delivery method of terrorists,” said Special Agent Ryan Toole of the FBI’s Major Theft Unit in Washington, who is working to get the database completed. “Tracing that VIN is very, very important” to identifying where the vehicle originated or determining how it ended up in terrorist hands.

Toole said American-made vehicles are particularly attractive to terrorists in places such as Iraq. Forensics specialists there have identified some bomb-rigged cars as vehicles that were swiped off American streets and sold overseas by criminal gangs and organized crime syndicates.

Terrorists desire a “vehicle like a Suburban because it can hold a lot but it also blends in,” said Toole, who is leading the FBI’s efforts to complete the database.

Total’s decision covered half the oil pumped at the offshore field, which had produced 240,000 barrels a day, said Patricia Marie, a company spokeswoman. A generator failure caused the problem. Oil also gained because the U.S. government said gasoline stockpiles fell last week as imports plunged and demand climbed.

The Total news has pushed oil higher “because it’s a serious supply cut,” said Jon House, a crude oil trader with Macquarie Bank Ltd. in London. The U.S. “stats were bullish.”

Crude oil for August delivery gained as much as 66 cents, or 0.9 percent, to $75.71 a barrel in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It traded at $75.55 at 11:59 a.m. in London.

Oil companies working in Africa have faced a series of disruptions in the past year. Militant attacks shut down about a quarter of the production in Nigeria, the continent’s biggest producer. A fire cut output from Total’s N’kossa field in the Republic of Congo, which was due to resume on Aug. 1.

Steve Hanke, fellow of the Cato Institute and professor at Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins University, said New Zealand should abandon its free-floating exchange rate and peg it to a key larger currency such as the US dollar, or a basket of currencies.

His comments come as the New Zealand dollar continues to soar towards US80c, a record since it was floated 22 years ago. It has risen 27 per cent this year alone, crippling many exporters.

The kiwi peaked around 4am at US79.45c but later slipped back and was at US79.26c at 11.57am.

Finance Minister Michael Cullen cause a storm when he hinted yesterday he could use emergency powers to suspend the Reserve Bank’s sole focus on inflation.

Most economists expect the Reserve Bank to put further upward pressure on the exchange rate next week by hiking interest rates for the fifth time this year and economists from at least two leading banks said a sixth hike is probable in August.

Prof Hanke, an adviser to the late former president Ronald Reagan, told Radio New Zealand today the currency cannot be allowed to continue its violent fluctuations.

The current framework left New Zealand “like a dog chasing its tail”.

To fight inflation the Reserve Bank hiked interest rates, but because New Zealand had higher interest rates than other developed countries because it is a small economy, that attracted a flood of capital from offshore where rates are lower, which pushed up the exchange rate.

He said that aggravated the inflation problem and the central bank then had to increase rates again and start the whole cycle again.

“In a way it’s a kind of death spiral you’re in.”

Prof Hanke said it was inappropriate in a small, open economy to have a system of inflation targeting and a free, floating exchange rate.

If the project pans out the small and relatively new New Zealand company could lead the world in environmentally sustainable aviation fuel.

It’s understood Air NZ is undertaking risk analysis. If everything stacks up it will make an aircraft available on the Tasman to test the biofuel.

The fuel is essentially derived from bacterial pond scum created through the photosynthesis of sunlight and carbon dioxide on nutrient-rich water sources such as sewage ponds.

Air NZ would most likely test the fuel on one engine while normal aviation fuel would drive the other engine. Fuel is held in cells on the aircraft that can be directed to a specific engine.

None of the parties involved will talk about the joint venture development because of confidentiality agreements but whispers about the project were circulating at the roll-out of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner in Seattle in the US last week.

Local Marlborough media reported a visit by Boeing to Aquaflow earlier this year and Boeing has stated publicly since then that it believes algae is the airline fuel of the future.

…

Aquaflow director Vicki Buck said yesterday that she couldn’t talk about any ventures with anyone because to do so would compromise projects on the drawing board.

But she did say a $5 million capital-raising had been successful and the company now had a major international cornerstone shareholder.