BLUE CRUDE

Recently Audi has come up with a synthetic diesel that is made from water and carbon dioxide. The combustion of this fuel would generate the same amount of carbon dioxide that went into the its production. The carbon dioxide required for the production of Blue Crude is obtained from atmosphere. Thus the net addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere is zero making this fuel a real carbon neutral fuel.

This diesel does not contain any sulphur so the combustion of this fuel would produce no suspended particulate matter. 

With huge amount of water available in the oceans around the world and ample amount of carbon dioxide available from atmosphere , if such factories producing Blue Crude which uses easily available resources are setup around the world then the dependence on crude oil would come down further. 

The proportion of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has gone up since the industrial revolution because of burning of fossil fuels. This has been the cause of global warming since carbon dioxide is a gas that traps heat. If this continues then the glaciers at the poles will melt and that would result in sea levels going up, submerging many coastal regions and small islands across the world. Use of fuel like Blue Crude will prevent the occurrence of this situation. 

The below video gives an description as to how the fuel is synthesised at the moment the price is likely to be between Euro 1 to Euro 1.5 per litre .

https://youtu.be/55Edq_Irstk

Non Flying Birds

There are some birds in nature who cannot do things for which their bodies were originally designed. One of them is the Hen and other one is the Ostrich. Both the birds have wings but they cannot fly at all. Their bodies are too heavy for them to fly. The fact that they do have wings implies that their ancestors did use them and flew in open skies.

But down the line as there was free availability of food, their subsequent generations somehow stopped flying. According to a research this birds got lazier and fatter with the extinction of dinosaur, the threat on the ancestors of these birds came down so they just kept eating getting bigger and ultimately lost their ability to fly.

For humans they were easy prey and we humans started rearing them and use their and their eggs as food products. Humans also used their feathers for for decoration.

The following is an example of an ostrich egg and a chicken egg . An interesting fact about Ostrich egg is the shell is very very hard. The egg is consumed by humans but one cannot break the shell of ostrich egg like the egg of chicken. In fact a drill is used to pierce a hole in the shell. The egg of Ostrich is the largest among all birds it weighs around 1.4 kilograms.

Ostrich Egg vs Chicken Egg

There are other birds as well like Ostrich and Hen that cannot fly like Emu, Kiwi, turkey. 

Nature follows a rule "If you don't use it you lose it". There are parts in the human body that are no longer used like the appendix. When the appendix is infected it is very painful and has to be removed surgically. 

However the inability of chicken to fly has been of great advantage to us , it is bird that can be easily reared and gives lots of eggs. Especially the layer chicken that are bred for their eggs. The broilers that are bred for meat take just 40 days to reach the stage of maturity where it can be culled and used as food. 

Ostrich has its utility in its meat, skin and feathers both these birds today are of great commercial value to human civilization. 

Steam from sun without boiling

Recently scientists have come up with interesting new ways to convert water directly into steam without having to boil it. This techniques uses nanoparticles that are capable of absorbing photons , when solar energy is concentrated on these nanoparticles they would absorb the rays. 

When these nanoparticles come in contact with water the absorbed energy converts the water directly into steam. Steam has multiple uses -- One of them is  generating electricity. The other use can be purifying water you can simply collect the steam and condense it to get pure water. This would be very useful for people who don't have access to clean water. 

Imagine you live by the side of the sea or you are travelling on ship. This technology can be used to produce pure water from sea water without having to boil it. The efficiency is pretty high 80 -90% of the energy absorbed is ultimately transformed into heat energy that results in steam. It is much higher as compared to steam engines and steam turbines.

The Rice University video shown below gives a demonstration of how water can be converted into steam directly without having to boil it the only thing you need are those nanoparticles that are capable of absorbing solar spectrum . 

While initially the researchers expect this breakthrough to be used in sanitation but one is sure that it will ultimately expand to water purification and energy generation as well. 

Flying with the sun

Many of you maybe aware of the Solar Impulse planes . Solar Impulse-1 has already flown across Europe and from the east cost to the West Coast of the US. The next version of Solar Impulse , Solar Impulse -2(SI-2) has started its flight, that would encircle the entire world from Abu Dhabi, UAE on 9th March 2015.

It travelled from Abu Dhabi to Muscat, from Muscat(Oman) to Ahmedabad(India) , from Ahmedabad to Varanasi(India) and then to Mandalay(Burma) and is finally at Chongquing(China). The Solar Impulse planes are powered by the Sun. Its wings comprises of solar panels that generates the electricity that fuels the airplane. No other source of energy is used other than solar energy.

In a similar way Google and Facebook plans to use solar drones which are similar to these planes except for the fact that they will be unmanned. They will stay airborne for long periods of time, for months maybe years. 

The drones will be stationed at Stratosphere i.e - 20 kilometres above the surface of the earth. The would be used to beam Internet across the world. According to Google Loons website each drone or balloon(Google originally planned to use atmoshperic  balloons for this project) can provide Internet access to an area of diameter 40 kms. 

This drones will save the cost of lying fibre optic cables which is quite expensive and because of them , we can have access to Internet even in obscure places of the planet. Say in the jungles of Amazon, or in the mountains of Himalayas. 

People can actually stay in these places located far away and difficult to reach but still have access to all the information thanks to availability of affordable Internet. 

The combination of  solar power , Internet access will encourage people to move out of cities and live in more relaxing places that are located closer to nature. 

Reducing SPM

One of the best things that is happening in present time is the public focus and tremendous amount of research going on renewable sources of energy. Across the world in US, Germany, China, Japan and India the installation of solar panels is on a rise. Today more than ever the world needs to go back to nature and this is a very important step in that direction .


 Since the Industrial Revolution the burning of fossil fuels has lead to increase in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. CO2 is a greenhouse gas that traps heat and results in global warming. Because of the combustion of fossil fuels the amount of Suspended Particulate Matter in the atmosphere has gone up in cities where population is densely packed and inhalation of this SPM results in diseases of lungs and many others including cancer.

The fall in prices of solar panels and the developments in the field of electric vehicles creates an optimism in our minds that very soon the conventional petrol and diesel car will be replaced by electric cars and this electricity may be obtained from the power of the sun.


Already across the cities of India we have hundreds of thousands of e-rickshaws running . This little vehicles can carry 5 people including the driver, run at moderate speeds. In many cities this is replacing the petrol and diesel rickshaws that were a major cause of pollution. The petrol rickshaw owners mix lot of kerosene with petrol to reduce fuel cost. The ignition of such fuel not only damages the engine but releases poisonous gases into the atmosphere.

 The SPM levels in most large Indian cities are alarming use of electric vehicles will solve the problem. The billions of dollars that are spent importing fossil fuel can be replaced with energy worth billions/trillions of dollars from the sun, from wind and tidal power, from bio-gas obtained from industrial and domestic waste.

NATURE

Have you ever wondered why on earth did some chemicals came together in water and formed units that would replicate itself. Not only it replicated itself but this units evolved in time getting more and more complex with innumerable variations. It reached a point where a particular species ultimately had male and female members and mated for new beings to come into existence. Since there animals were genetically more complex , nature had to divide it into male and female members so that the the defective genes of one animal is condoned by the good genes of the other sex. 

But the question why on earth did this set of chemicals had to come together and form life what was the need? Once the first instance of life was created then why did it started evolving and getting better and better. What is need of this process and what is the ultimate goal of this process?

Another question that comes to mind is that --Is it a case that the chemicals came together by themselves or if there is some other influence at work that engineered this process. If there is indeed such influence what is the cause of the the influence and how did the influencing factors themselves originate?

And finally :- Since there are quadrillions of earth like planets across the universe is it possible that life might have evolved in them. Probably at this point of time the life on some of them maybe more advanced than us in terms of intelligence , technology , scientific and spiritual achievements. 

Importance of Scientific Temperment

Scientific temperament is a must , without scientific temperament humans become prey to superstitions and blind beliefs. We live in a country where fraud babas, fake sadhus and other fake spiritual men or astrologers make tremendous amount of money by fooling people. Sometimes people are anxious to know about their future they go to one of these frauds and these frauds would make some predictions about their future show them some problems and give their solutions and what these solutions are ?They would either ask the person to wear a ring with a precious stone like Gometh,diamond,neela etc or would advise them to do a havan besides a fire or do some sacrifice or do some pooja(worship). For centuries India has been under this poisonous influence of these selfish, dirty men and women who make money from people's fear, blind beliefs and superstitions.

When the first Census of India was done 1900 only about 6% of the population was found to be literate. Now being literate doesn't imply being educated. So one can imagine in those days probably only 1 in 200 was educated most people did not know who their rulers were . Infact in one of his lectures Gandhiji said that when he asked some poor villagers whom did they think was ruling them the villagers replied that it was some god that was ruling over them. Now such a nation where majority of the population is illiterate and doesn't even know what is happening in the country are bound to be enslaved by other countries.

In those days the country was suffering from untouchability and an ugly caste system. There were people who thought themselves to be of some high caste and would avoid touching people of lower caste. The people of lower caste cannot go to schools cannot do higher jobs cannot even drink water from the same well as that of the higher caste. If they did the village kangaroo courts would impose severe punishment on them. This subjugation of a big portion of the population was one of the big reasons for the down fall of the nation.

After independence untouchability and discrimination based on caste, creed and religion was made illegal. It has worked but still today there are people who believe in the ugly caste thing. Even today a good number of people don't want to marry their children to people outside their caste. Although in the cities the condition has changed and caste has become a thing of the past.

Even today you find the educated going to these fake men so that they can make their future better. Temples across the nations run by trusts for making money are raking in the moolah. In recent years lots of fake sadhus are found to be in antisocial activities that include money laundering and rapes. The recent case of Asaram from Gujrat and many others across the nation has somehow made people aware but still millions throng to the fake spiritual men.

It is very important that people start differentiating between fake and real. There are of course genuine people , genuine yogis and sanyasis they would put no superstition into your head . The secret is question everything and find out the truth for yourself. Just because some great man has said something you cannot accept it blindly. Old ideas and thoughts have to be challenged and questioned because with time lot of superstitions might have crept in.