Culturgest receives Conference "Cities for people"

The Green Project Awards (GPA) performs tomorrow a conference devoted to the theme of "Cities for people". The initiative will take place in Culturgest in Lisbon, and will be chaired by the Secretary of State for spatial planning and nature conservation, Miguel Castro Neto.

The Conference will consist of two panels of debate. The first panel dedicated to the theme of urban regeneration will count with Ricardo Guimarães, will participate in the Confidential real estate, Rui Fragoso, of Adene-Agency for energy, Kings, of the Association of Industrial Fields of Civil construction and public works, Salvador Malheiro Ferreira da Silva, of the municipality of Ovar, Isabel Santos, the Ecochoice, and Pedro Rutkowski, the real estate consultant Worx.

In the second panel discussion on the theme of Sustainable Mobility will intervene Luis Reis, Portuguese electric vehicle Association, Mário Alves, consultant in mobility, Paulo Rodrigues, João Dias, Abimota's of EMEL, Xavier Martinet, the Renault Portugal, Luís Paulo, CTT, and Rui Vasques, creator of the Eco-Village Community. Between the two panels there will also be a space for reflection on the theme "Sustainable Mobility: the challenges of an integrated approach", to be addressed by Franco Caruso, the breeze. See the program here.

During this Conference, participants will have the opportunity to participate in "Electric Renault Experience". Between the 8:30 and the 04:00 pm, Renault Portugal will be at Culturgest with ZOE and the TWIZY, symbols of a new era, to get to know more about these electric vehicles. Join the Conference and schedule your test drive here.

The Conference "Cities for people" has the sponsorship of Renault and ADENE support, Breeze and SPV.

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Boom Festival: more than 80% of the building materials are reused

Between 4 and 11 August, the Herdade da Granja, in Idanha-a-Nova will receive another edition of the Boom Festival, which is held every two years, by the time of the full moon. Awarded and recognized for its ecological component, this year's event will be similar to previous editions with regard to sustainability.

More than 80% of the materials that the Organization will use in the construction of the festival, which extends over an area of 150 hectares of land, are reused or natural origin. In total, there are more than 15 thousand tons of wood, 50 thousand tons of plastic and 600 tons of recycled metal that will be used in the construction of the facilities and structures. Most materials is reused from previous editions of Boom or courtesy of other festivals like Rock in Rio.

The reuse of these materials allowed prevent 2012 Edition of the festival were sent 315 tons of garbage to landfills, the corresponding to 800 tons of carbon dioxide, refers to the Organization in a statement.

Throughout the various editions, the organisation has been to use sustainable energy resources, water treatment systems, the reuse of building materials, regenerating habitats and ecosystems, promote recycling and composting, as well as public transport and car-sharing and implement composting toilets.

"With the aim of sharing a concrete example of the fun and sustainability can coexist in a festival, and bearing in mind that the construction industry is responsible for 25% of CO2 emissions, the Boom Festival opts for alternative methods such as bio-construção, minimizing the use of materials that require a great deal of energy in its manufacture or transport", reads the statement. In this way, the event draws on natural products, such as straw bales, Earth, wood, bamboo, reeds and stones to build the enclosure.

In 2012, the Boom Festival recycle about nine tons of trash and the organization expects to surpass this value at this year.

The Boom has been distinguished by its ecological component and has already received awards as "Outstanding Greener Festival" and the "Green 'n' Clean Festival of the Year" in 2010, and even the "Green Inspiration", in 2012.

Foto: yvette Soler / Creative Commons

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Solved mystery of matter out of black holes supermaciços

One of the oldest mysteries about the dynamics of black holes supermaciços, and their impacts on galactic evolution, was revealed by an international team of astrophysicists.

Through the ESO Very Large Technical (VLT), located in the Atacama desert, in northern Chile, researchers from the United Kingdom, Netherlands and United States have studied the nucleus of a nearby galaxy of the milky way with great detail. The Galaxy, called IC5063, has a black hole supermaciço which seems to have central jets of fast exit of molecular hydrogen. The IC5063 is a very active Seyfert Galaxy with bright core.

Many active galactic nuclei were observed with these jets of hydrogen and, once the molecular hydrogen is key to the formation of stars, astronomers have concluded that his ejection has impacts on star formation and, as such, in galactic evolution.

Supermaciços black holes are the largest type of black hole, with solar masses in the hundreds of thousands of millions. It is believed that all, or almost all, of the galaxies have a supermaciço black hole at its Center. Thus, the activity of these super black holes can control the amount of gas supplied to the regions of star formation.

But how is that black holes propel this hydrogen thousands of miles per hour? Until now, scientists have not realized how was the process. On the basis of the comments made by the VLT, astrophysicists found that the output of hydrogen is propelled by jets of relativistic electrons, which are ejected from the dynamic environment of the black hole. Whenever highly energetic electrons pass through the clouds of molecular hydrogen, the gas is transported out of the Galaxy, serving of food to the nurseries of stars.

"Much of the gas that comes out is in the form of molecular hydrogen, which is fragile in the sense that it can be destroyed with relatively low energies," says Clive Tadhunter, University of Sheffield, who led the research, cites the Discovery News.  "It is extraordinary that the molecular gas can survive the acceleration of electron jets that move at speeds close to the light", indicates the astrophysicist.

The research was published in Nature and provides a little clue of what may happen to the milky way when it collides with the nearby Andromeda, in five billion years. The merger of the two galaxies will inject material into the Centre of black holes supermaciços, giving rise to powerful jets of molecular hydrogen. When this occurs, the matter for the formation of new stars will occur by changing the evolutionary result of the milky way.

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Ex-spy station is a new hotel in the middle of the Arctic

Some people like to spend their holidays in tropical climates and warm. Others prefer colder locations or even snow and locations more coy. For the latter there is a new retreat halfway of the Arctic â€" the Isfjord Radio.

This hotel is located in the Svalbard archipelago, which belongs to Norway, located between the Mainland and the North Pole. During the cold war, the building of the Isfjord Radio was a spy station and an important center of telecommunications between the archipelago the continent.

The only way to reach the place is by snowmobile or dogsled, during the winter, or by boat through ice fjord-a trip of a few hours where you can see Arctic birds, walruses and even whales. Visit the hotel during April and August you can experience the midnight sun, since the Sun during the day 12:0 am is also sometimes possible to see polar bears, although it is rare. It is estimated that 3,000 live polar bears in Svalbard, referred to the Daily Mail.

The hotel can accommodate 49 people and has 23 rooms available and even your own wine. The Isfjord Radio is open between the beginning of February and the end of September, with prices ranging from € 234 and €288 per person with dinner and breakfast included.

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USA: plastic Microspheres can be banned from personal care products until 2018

Last month, Congressman Frank Pallone proposed a new legislation in the House of representatives of the United States that could end the sale and products containing plastic microspheres in the country until 2018. The microspheres are small plastic pieces used as exfoliants on a wide range of beauty products and toiletries, including SOAP, toothpaste and facial creams.

The microspheres are too small to be properly separated from the wastewater treatment stations. As such, these little pieces of plastic ends up in rivers, lakes and oceans. Additionally, this form of pollution through the plastic is extremely difficult to remove and can be ingested by fish and other animals.

"We have a responsibility to put an end to this unnecessary plastic pollution," Pallone said in a statement, quoted by the Tree Hugger. "The fasearmos the extinction of these plastic microspheres and use no synthetic alternatives can protect the waters of the United States before it's too late".

Most are plastic microspheres of petroleum origin, such as polyethylene and polypropylene. However, there are many biodegradable alternatives already used by producers of cosmetics, including sea salts or almonds.

Photo: Markus Eriksen/Tree hugger

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The solution for a cheaper energy

New discoveries within the silicon solar cell design allowed the three companies break the record for energy efficiency, established 20 years ago. During the Conference, IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists in Denver, Panasonic, Sharp and SunPower presented new photovoltaic cells that exceeded the old barriers to efficiency. It is expected that this increase will enable the solar energy efficiency compete commercially with fossil fuels.

Traditional silicon solar cells have the positive poles in contact with the surface of the Panel, which actually creates shadows on the surface, reducing the efficiency of the unit as a whole. When transferring the poles for the reverse side of the Panel, where are the negative poles, the efficiency is increased. The discovery was fair by SunPower.

Another improvement was introduced by Panasonic. Most of the Silicon cells, the electrons become trapped by the superficial imperfections of joints of crystalline silicon cells. To avoid this the Panasonic added thin film of silicon to the verses of the cells. This new improvement allows to achieve an efficiency rate of 25.6%, as the new design of SunPower untrapassou the barrier of 25%, referred to Inhabitat. Despite the theoretical level advances don't look sizable, at a practical level the amount of energy produced is much better.

New advances are not yet ready to be produced commercially, but open doors for new advances in this field, horizon reduce the ultimate cost to the consumer.

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Hotel de Londres has an Apiary for 300 thousand special guests

The St Ermin's Hotel, in James Park, London, created his own Apiary, which houses more than 300 thousand bees. Located on the third floor balcony, space is the first of its kind in the city and the hotel already has an entire wall devoted to insects.

Designed by expert and bee Wrangler Camilla Goddard, the hotel offers accommodation in the form of suites purple hex, a wide variety of species of bees visitors. The Apiary is still a colony of buckfast bees â€" a species created by humans in the early 20th century, at Buckfast Abbey, England, to combat a disease that was decimating bee colonies locations.

The hotel also offers special spaces for other beneficial insects, like the terrestrial isopods, ladybugs, spiders and Earwigs.

"The bees are facing a massive decline and facing great challenges today, including the reduction of natural forage, as wildflower meadows. I want to encourage people to help create more forage for bees, "said Camilla Goddard to the British press.

Additionally, the beekeeper hotel guests still teaches how to collect honey and take care of bees and will guide future workshops on the treatment of bees at St Ermin's Hotel. The honey produced by bees visitors is collected and marketed under the brand name of the hotel.

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