Scottish Government spared €3,5 million and decreased CO2 emissions by reducing air travel

In 2011, the Prime Minister, Pedro Passos Coelho, promised that he would travel in economy class, as well as other elements of the Government, so as to reduce the expenses of the Executive. However, couldn't the Portuguese Government further decrease the air travel, not only to save on public budget but to also reduce emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2)?

Well, that's what made the Government of Scotland. According to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in Scotland, the Scottish Executive has approximately €3,5 million and reduced CO2 emissions by 28% by replacing the travel of its members for face-to-face meetings, videoconferences. The data indicate that the Scottish leaders were held under three thousand trips a year between 2007 and 2012, decreasing the distance travelled in 1.8 million kilometres.

As a result, the Government avoided the 650 tonnes of CO2 emissions, saving €693,2 thousand per year, an invoice amounting to approximately €2,2 million. In 2010, the WWF estimated that if the Governments of the United Kingdom and administrations of large British companies eliminate unnecessary flights could save more than €120,1 million and 59 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

According to the Scottish Minister for environment and climate change, Paul Wheelhouse, the Government invested in new technologies that allowed the meetings occur via videoconference or by telephone rather than face-to-face. "This is a small part of our environmental strategy to reduce our ecological footprint, and we aim to increase the use of videoconferencing for meetings and to encourage the use of more sustainable travel options," said the King, quoted by BusinessGreen.

Foto:  Senator Mark Warner / Creative Commons

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As businesses are the hide appliances repair manuals

We live in the information age, where knowledge is at a distance of a click. However, there are more and more ways of keeping the information hidden from the public. One of these ways is the copyright-the right to copy.

Are these rights that the major technology companies are using to hide in the public domain the repair manuals, that enable the consumer or repair centers repair a product. The concealment of these practical guides is having consequences, since it affects the circular economy, which is based on a logic of reuse.

Without the repair manuals, the life cycle of equipment becomes smaller since they cannot be repaired and reused. Is this logic of descartelização that appeals to companies, since it increases profits.

This phenomenon, called planned obsolescence-decision of a producer to develop, manufacture and distribute a product purposely for consumption that quickly becomes obsolete or non-functional, so as to force the consumer to acquire the product new generation â€" was created in the 1920, having its greatest expression in the decades of 1940 and 1950 and re-emerged recently with the big push of the technological age.

Using the right to copy, organizations advocating that the instruction manuals are own creations, protecting them from public access, soon available for consultation and the copy. The copyright violation is punished legally in most countries.

The use of the copyright allows that feed the planned obsolescence of the large companies. Two major technological don't provide access to their repair manuals are Apple and Toshiba.

Last year, Toshiba made news by thanks Tim Hicks, a computer repairman, erasing all repair manuals Toshiba products from your site, writes The Guardian. The page since young Australian â€" Future Proof â€" contains several laptops repair manuals, which can be consulted free of charge.

According to Japanese technological giant, repair manuals belong exclusively to Toshiba and contain information that only the brand and repair technicians can access. Such as Apple, Toshiba and many other companies do not allow access to these guides-Acer, Sony ... There are few technology companies that provide the manuals to consumers and between these brands include companies such as Dell or HP.

If the repair manuals that the companies conceal are disclosed on the internet, trademarks are the copyright to remove copies from circulation.

The circular economy

The circular economy is an economic model which is opposed to the linear model. The industrial linear model is based on the premise "to buy, use and dispose". The circular model is based on the premise of Lavoisier's Law-"nothing is lost, everything is transformed"-since it assumes a reuse of products, where the biological and technical are combined cycle recycle and reuse products, allowing you to create new capital.

The concept of circular economy has several decades and cannot be assigned to a single author. The concept evolved over the years and studied by several schools. However, it was in the late 1970 that its practical effects in modern economic systems and in industrial processes began to be fleshed out by a small number of academics.

The circular economic model is interconnected with the sustainability of the planet. To assume the reuse of products it is expected that the production processes require less raw material and it's not created so much waste.

Foto:  gingerpig2000 / Creative Commons

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Pastor younger of the United Kingdom is a two-year-old boy with cerebral palsy

Arthur Jones mends fences, feeds and comes to sheep. Normal work of a pastor. However, Arthur is the pastor of United Kingdom, with only two and a half years. With this age, the boy already has a herd of six sheep breed, always under the watchful eye of Grandma â€" Nicky Jesse, one of the few English shepherds-which teaches.

Among the circle of British Ministers, Arthur is a kind of celebrity. Is the youngest member of Poll Dorset and Dorset Horn Sheep Breeder's Association, has already won three prizes with his sheep and until I was introduced to members of the British Royal family.

The two-year-old boy is also the proud parent: was born prematurely with cerebral palsy. According to the doctors, the little Arthur couldn't walk before the four years. However, in September this year the boy took his first steps unaided. The family believes that this progress is due to animals, in particular the Twinkle â€" a cordeira, which like Arthur was born prematurely.

The boy and the sheep have developed an unusual friendship: it seems that Twinkle, who was breastfed the bottle by Arthur, understands the needs of the boy. If Arthur's fall, the animal knows that the boy doesn't get up alone and go to him, serving as support to raise.

"The Twinkle fought for life, such as Arthur", explains the grandmother. "She was very ill when he was born and was rejected by his mother. So I began to suckle her with a bottle. When Arthur saw what I was doing, asked if he could feed too, "he says. Arthur fed Twinkle for four months and the sheep became his pet.

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Was abandoned for a thousand years rediscovered in Spain

Spanish archaeologists have discovered traces of a vineyard abandoned for over a thousand years in Zaballa, a medieval Roundup that disappeared in the 15th century. Basque Country researchers are working on this and other 300 gatherings, abandoned as people migrated from rural areas to the towns and cities

Thus, and in accordance with the International Quaternary, archaeologists were able to identify a series of terraces on site as vineyards â€" they studied the seeds, pollen and tools left behind to come to this conclusion.

Metal tools discovered at the site will not have been used for crops of cereals, like wheat, but for wine crops. The venue will again be studied to give historians and scientists more insight into the daily life of the people of a thousand years ago. The objective is to understand how the medieval society changed in response to political and economic pressures of the time.

Foto:  Michal Osmenda / Creative Commons

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Scientists discover gene that causes asthma

American scientists have discovered the human gene that causes asthma, which will enable new treatment or even curing the disease.

If the gene in question has deficiencies, the lining of the Airways can be weakened, which makes people more vulnerable to respiratory disease.

In the long term, scientists hope that gene therapy can provide a hope for patients. "The discovery provides hope for individuals with severe asthma, since the gene seems to play an important role for people with this specific condition," said Hakon Hakonarson, of children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

To reach this conclusion scientists compared the DNA of 1,173 children with severe asthma with the genetic code of 2,522 healthy people and found that those affected by asthma were more likely to have a particular genetic variation. The gene in question controls the way the cells lining the walls of the Airways are linked. The abnormal gene-bearing cells are less interconnected, which makes them more vulnerable to irritation that trigger asthma attacks. Researchers believe that this gene is the main factor that triggers the disease in at least one in every five cases of asthma.

"Nearly twice as many people who have severe asthma have this genetic variant that healthy individuals", indicates Hakonarson. "There's a subset of people with asthma, between 15% and 20%, where this gene has a greater impact," he adds.

Photo: new ' s/Creative Commons

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Scottish castle on sale for €450 thousand

The world has changed a lot in five centuries â€" and some of the priorities have been largely modified. That explains that a 16th-century Scottish castle is for sale for €450 thousand (R $ 1.4 million) and a parking space in Kensington, London, at the cost of about €480, 000 ($ 1.54 million).

Kilmartin Castle, with three bedrooms, situated north of Lochgilphead, in stunning Scotland, and includes several turrets and a land size of 0.4 hectares. According to Knight Frank, the estate agent who is selling this piece of history, the castles are usually valued between € 6.6 million ($ 19.5 million) and €7,1 million ($ 23.2 million), but the castle of Kilmartin is the cheapest I have at hand â€" extremely cheap, let it be.

According to the Research Department of Knight Frank, the price of this castle is equivalent to the area of a closet in Knightsbridge, Hyde Park, or the ground floor of a small house in Guildford, in Surrey.

Kilmartin Castle was purchased by the current owners, an elderly couple who uses it as a second residence in the years 80. Then, he was in ruins and turned out to be extensively rebuilt and restored.

Moreover, owners are enthusiasts of the castles. At one point, owned three castles: two in Scotland and one in Cumbria. In addition to an impressive interior and stunning surroundings, the property has easy access to salmon and trout fishing and golf. The village of Kilmartin has a school, post office, Church and a hotel.

Here are some pictures of the Château low cost.

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10 environmental themes for 2014 (with LIST)

Yesterday, we published the list of the best and worst environmental facts of 2013 for the non-governmental organization Quercus. Today, let's talk about what awaits us in 2014. The ONGA made the list of the most pressing issues for 2014 â€" the absence of a National Mobility Plan the entry into force of the new community support framework for Portugal.

Keep the list of themes that, over the next 12 months, will be on the table for the environmental sector.

Environmental perspectives for 2014

1. National Mobility Plan

"Still does not exist a national mobility plan, which focuses on serious issues unresolved in major urban centres and in metropolitan areas and also in connection with the interior.

The Country continues to drift to the individual road transport, aggravating its foreign energy dependence and failing dismally the need for an adaptation to a post-oil reality. Urge the strengthening and the reinvention of the railway and maritime transport of passengers and of alternative forms of transport and slight in major cities. There are timid initiatives, but much remains to be done. "

2. Arrangement of Albufeira in the new planning cycle

"We are now in the middle of the second planning cycle in the area of water resources. The second river basin district management plans are being prepared and will be soon put into public discussion. At the same time, Spain shall act unilaterally to proceed to further Transfer Tejo-Safe, expeditiously and without inclusion in their plans. How then can a shared management of common water basins-Minho, Douro, Tagus and Guadiana? There is an urgent need to renegotiate the Arrangement of Albufeira and impose ecological flows, urgency as more urgent as the water resources tend to decrease significantly address climate change. "

3. entry into force of the new community support framework for Portugal

"Lying on the backstretch the negotiations for the agreement of partnership for European Structural funds and investment 2014-2020, between Portugal and the European Commission, Quercus expects that this will not be another missed opportunity to tackle some of the problems which remain inexplicably to subsist in our country. Some of these environmental problems that need solving through lack of treatment of wastewater from villages and by environmental liabilities resulting from industrial activity, but also because of the lack of investment on the railway and on sustainable mobility, renewable energy and energy efficiency, the promotion of recycling of waste to acceptable levels, and on the conservation of natural values, with special focus on conservation of Classified Areas (protected areas, Natura 2000 and RAMSAR sites), avoiding also the public funding of projects harmful to the environment. "

4. crisis, energy and climate

"In context of crisis, pollutant emissions, including greenhouse gases, have been declining, since the transport sector to the industrial sector as well as domestic. However, it is vital that in 2014, with an eventual economic recovery, we are prepared to promote a development betted on consumption reduction, energy efficiency, in parallel with the improvement of the quality of life. 2014 will also be a crucial year for a future climate agreement in 2015, and it is crucial that Portugal take on political positions more suitable for a sustainable development. "

5. effective monitoring of the pós-avaliação phase of projects subject to EIA for public authorities.

"The monitoring of the pós-avaliação phase of projects subject to Environmental impact assessment (EIA) by public authorities, in particular on the part of APA-Portuguese Agency for environment and Nature Conservation Institute â€" ICNF and forests, has been embarrassing. It is expected that, with the publication of new legislation which establishes the legal regime of environmental impact assessment, last October, there is a greater concern for public authorities with one of the most important areas of public policy environment. "

6. stability and firmness of environmental policies in Portugal

"About two and a half years after this Government has initiated functions, the results achieved in the area of the environment are falling short of expectations. They took two years in preparation, restructuring and adaptation on a bet in a MAMAOT that was won, not only due to logistical and bureaucratic issues, but also due to a number of decisions taken in the wrong direction. "

7. forest fires

"With the adoption of the new legal Regime of Afforestation and reforestation, the prospects of sustainable development of the Portuguese forest in terms of public policies are almost non-existent, with the likely expansion of monocultures of eucalyptus, and the absence of fire containment tracks with other species more resistant, so it can be expected that the environmental impacts of forest fires continue to be of concern."

8. Privatization of the company General of Fomento (EGF)

"Despite the Government's determination to move towards privatization of EGF, sub-holding of Águas de Portugal for the business of municipal solid waste, it is expected that in 2014 can common sense prevail and that the proposal would be better assessed, to the extent that beyond the inability shown by the Ministry of environment in managing the issue, there are significant environmental risks associated with a privatization of this type."

9. international year of the family agriculture

"In what will be the international year of the family agriculture, expected in 2014 to increase the visibility of family agriculture and small farmers, and sensitize the world population to such important aspects of this type of agriculture, that pass through the role it plays in eradicating hunger and poverty, the improvement of the livelihood of the people, for the proper management of natural resources, and for the protection of the environment and sustainable development. "

10. strengthening of national agricultural production but I sustainably

"According to the intentions announced by the Government, 2014 is expected to be a year in which the national agricultural production should continue to have an increase, as a way the country overcome many of the shortcomings that reveals the level of food production and increase our exports. And this is certainly one of the areas where we can and should invest, is however essential to protect the environment impacts, both in the short and the medium/long term and as such adopted demanding criteria of which should be to develop production, with quality products, environmentally friendly and preferably in less intensive production methods and more sustainablein particular the organic production method. "

Foto:  Rev Stan / Creative Commons

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