Daily Archives: August 18, 2017

Comment period closes on Trump offshore drilling push – Brunswick News

Posted: August 18, 2017 at 5:36 am

More than 100 South Atlantic coastal communities have come out against it, and it has near-universal opposition from environmental advocacy groups.

Opposition is also bipartisan, creating some uniquely unusual bedfellows. However, the Trump administration, along with many Republican elected officials, support offshore oil and gas drilling. These supporters see drilling and the seismic exploration that leads up to it as a way of expanding national fuel resources and enhancing job growth.

The Trump administration intends to turn back an Obama administration order that declared the coast from Virginia to Florida closed to seismic testing and the subsequent drilling. But there is a structured process to follow, so comments recently submitted come as part of the White Houses request for information on a new five-year regulatory program.

Closing out the comment period, environmental organizations once again reiterated their reasons for pushing back against the Trump administrations efforts.

There is overwhelming opposition to drilling from coastal communities, elected officials across the political spectrum, local businesses and commercial and recreational fishing groups, Southern Environmental Law Center senior attorney Sierra Weaver said in a statement Wednesday. These individuals, communities and businesses have recognized that the risks of drilling outweigh any potential benefits. We will not gamble with our coast.

The SELCs submitted comments in PDF form run more than 30 pages, with footnotes and links to research data, studies and news reports.

Offshore oil and gas production has never been permitted in the Atlantic, and after extensive study and deliberation about the injuries our coast stands to suffer from such activity, it was flatly rejected less than two years ago, according to the SELCs comments. Opening the Atlantic to offshore oil and gas drilling poses a direct threat to the fragile and unique ecosystems of the Southeast coast and to the millions of people whose livelihoods depend on our clean coastal resources.

Georgia municipalities that passed resolutions against offshore drilling and seismic testing include Brunswick, Kingsland, St. Marys, Savannah and Tybee Island, among others.

The decision to deny seismic permits was based on sound science, policy and public input, Alice Keyes, vice president for coastal conservation with One Hundred Miles, said in a July statement. One Hundred Miles represents thousands of coastal advocates who stand together to support that decision.

U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, R-1 who represents the Georgia coast has repeatedly stood by his position favoring offshore drilling, however it is a policy not universal among coastal Republicans. For instance, the practice is opposed by U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford, whose 1st District in South Carolina includes Beaufort, Charleston, Kiawah Island and Hilton Head Island.

Carter, though, defended his environmental policy reasoning during his February town hall at College of Coastal Georgia. He reinforced many of the same points when he returned to CCGA earlier this month. Carter said he grew up along the coast and takes pride in its natural wonder, but said many federal environmental regulations need to be reigned in.

Im not going to ever vote for something thats going to harm our environment, Carter said in February. I get it. I understand that.

The rest is here:

Comment period closes on Trump offshore drilling push - Brunswick News

Posted in Offshore | Comments Off on Comment period closes on Trump offshore drilling push – Brunswick News

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe announces his opposition to offshore drilling – wtkr.com

Posted: at 5:36 am

RICHMOND, Va. Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe announced his opposition Thursday to offshore drilling in the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Virginia.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order in April to begin a five-year plan for offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and off the East Coast of the United States.

Governor McAuliffe submitted a letter to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on the National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program and released the following statement:

Revenue sharing agreement is an essential precursor to moving forward on any offshore oil and gas exploration in Virginia. President Trumps proposal to end the revenue sharing agreement with the Gulf States is a clear indication that we cannot trust the President to give Virginia its fair share of the revenues that would result from offshore exploration. Additionally, the Presidents administration is actively working to cut funding from the very agencies that would be charged with protecting Virginias coastal environment in the event that exploration went forward. For these reasons, I do not support including the Commonwealth of Virginia in the new review of the National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program. My administration will continue to focus on diversifying Virginias economy and using our precious resources in a way that benefits the people of Virginia.

According to the Southern Environmental Law Center, Gov. McAuliffe joins North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper and South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster in voicing their opposition to offshore drilling.

RELATED:

Anti-drilling protestors gather in VirginiaBeach

Trump signs order looking to reverse Obamas ban on off-shoredrilling

37.540725 -77.436048

Here is the original post:

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe announces his opposition to offshore drilling - wtkr.com

Posted in Offshore | Comments Off on Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe announces his opposition to offshore drilling – wtkr.com

The growing movement to celebrate black-owned restaurants – The Outline

Posted: at 5:34 am

Like other cities seeing an influx of residents and, along with them, rising rents, Portland, Oregon is a place that has many food and restaurant festivals. This year alone it will have hosted the Portland Beer and Cheese Fest, the Oregon Fermentation Festival, Portland Burger Week, Portland Pizza Week, the Northwest Food and Wine Festival, VegFest, Feast Portland, The Bite of Oregon, Portland Dining Month, the Portland Seafood & Wine Festival, Chefs Week PDX, and the Portland Bourbon and Bacon Fest, to name a few. And what so many of these festivals have in common, aside from their focus on food, is that without an intentional effort to reach out to communities of color, they often end up being overwhelmingly white-run and -centered affairs.

So when I got an invitation to observe the citys first Support Black-Owned Restaurant Days two years ago, I was excited. It seemed like a way for residents of the city that is contending with its past and present of displacing residents of color to mitigate a tiny bit of that harm and show support for local black restaurateurs. And amid the plethora of restaurant weeks and food festivals for any and every palette, black restaurant weeks, which have taken place all over the country, are created with civil rights in mind. They offer a type of consumer resistance that goes deeper than selling products like soaps and T-shirts to focus on investing in not only black businesses, but visible ones at that, owned by neighbors and friends.

Support Black Owned Restaurants Days was inspired by a similar event in the Bay Area. In 2014, National Black Business Month creators John William Templeton and Frederick E. Jordan Sr. ended the annual, August-long celebration of black businesses with Hands Up|Shop Black Week, inspired by protests in Ferguson following the police killing of Michael Brown. That week and the month were topped off with Black Restaurant Day, on which consumers were encouraged to patronize one of the nations many black-owned restaurants in support of their local black communities. The San Francisco Chronicle published a list of black-owned restaurants in the Bay area to promote the celebration.

Portlanders continue to observe what is now called Support Black Owned Restaurants Week every August, and each year residents of more and more cities are dedicating week or weekend to local, black-owned restaurants. In 2016, black restaurant weeks popped up in Madison, Memphis, Houston, Washington state, Chicago, and Milwaukee. By the end of this year, at least 15 city and region-wide black restaurant weeks and days will have been observed across the country.

Servers at MacArthur's Restaurant in Chicago hold a photo featuring then-senator Barack Obama. Templeton credits Obama with drawing attention to black-owned restaurants. Pigi Cipelli / Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images

Event planner and community advocate Cynthia Daniels organized Black Restaurant Week in Memphis in 2016. Originally from Atlanta, she saw an opportunity to use her professional skills to support black-owned restaurants in food-destination city. Through the event, Daniels says the eight participating businesses were able to bring in $80,000 in profit. The events second year was even more successful, with 14 participating restaurants. Additionally, the increase in business gave some restaurants the opportunity to temporarily recruit and then permanently hire on additional staff and reinvest profits back into their businesses. One [restaurant owner] invested in a catering van. Now she has the additional capital to expand her business, said Daniels. So hearing those types of stories were really truly amazing to be able to help their businesses grow.

Daniels said she had never heard of other black restaurant weeks before she created her own, but she applauded the spreading movement to support black businesses. Templeton, on the other hand, believes annual celebrations of National Black Business Month, now in its 14th year, are to thank for increased focus on black-owned restaurants and other businesses. Speaking to The Outline via phone, he stressed the importance of situating the rise of black restaurant weeks in the larger, older nationwide movement to promote and celebrate black-owned businesses and black entrepreneurs in the U.S.

According to Templeton, the real pioneer of festivals celebrating black food in particular was George W. Davis, who started the Black Cuisine Festival in San Francisco in 1979. Davis, who died in 2010, founded the Bayview-Hunters Point Multipurpose Senior Center and started the festival as a way of showing off the culinary talents of the centers clients and sharing black food heritage with younger generations. So that's sort of the seed that got planted three decades ago, said Templeton. Now other people are saying, Oh I need to recognize black food in my city and that sort of thing. But he is the person that started that you know, because he saw that food was the connecting link for the community.

Newer black restaurant weeks build on the influence of longer-running, more localized black food festivals, responding to a cultural moment in which gentrifying cities are holding more lucrative food festivals and black entrepreneurs are persevering despite receiving fewer U.S. Small Business Administration loans and relying more heavily on personal finances. According to the Census Bureaus 2012 Survey of Business Owners, there are about 2.6 million black-owned businesses in the U.S., a 34 percent increase from 2007. But the number of black-owned eating and drinking businesses grew even more sharply, by 49 percent in those years alone, compared to other types of black-owned businesses. Nevertheless, black-owned restaurants remain underrepresented in local foodie scenes. If all of the current city- and region-wide black restaurant weeks, as well as those centered on immigrant communities of color, continue and thrive, they could help, in a small but meaningful way, address those discrepancies and shortcomings in the cities they serve. The most effective civil rights strategy has always been the dollar, said Templeton. Black restaurants and other black businesses are a mechanism to aggregate consumer spending. And so every effort that encourages people to visit them is useful.

Sylvia's restaurant in Harlem, founded in 1962, is one of the U.S.'s most famous black-owned restaurants. Raymond Boyd / Getty Images

Sylvia's restaurant founder Sylvia Woods died in 2012. In 2014, the corner of W. 126th St. and Lenox Ave was co-named Sylvia P. Woods Way. Mario Tama / Getty Images

Sylvia's restaurant in Harlem, founded in 1962, is one of the U.S.'s most famous black-owned restaurants.

Sylvia's restaurant founder Sylvia Woods died in 2012. In 2014, the corner of W. 126th St. and Lenox Ave was co-named Sylvia P. Woods Way.

Lack of access to capital, and by extension marketing dollars, are very real obstacles black restaurant owners face. While black neighborhood restaurants used to thrive on organic foot traffic in their communities, gentrification and other types of forced displacement have broken apart such neighborhoods. As such, another reason black restaurant weeks are having a moment right now may be that they employ a collective effort to leverage visibility for existing black-owned businesses while at the same time highlighting them as new centers for community. The restaurants actually fulfill the function that the churches used to do, said Templeton. And both he and Daniels mentioned that its not only black folks flocking to black restaurants during these promotional events. The first year we did [Memphis Black Restaurant Week] it was the most diverse clientele my restaurant owners had ever seen, said Daniels. They saw Caucasian, Hispanic, and Asian customers, and they have been able to keep a lot of them and that's something they'd never seen before.

Templeton emphasized his reluctance to focus on black restaurant weeks in particular, fearing consumers could then have license to somehow write off black-owned restaurants as novelties and the weeks as fads. Black businesses don't get covered in business news. But in San Francisco [the media has] been conditioned to know there's a lot of black restaurants [and] a lot of different kinds of black restaurants, he said. So that's kind of where we're trying to get to, where the black restaurant week is where you sum up things that you've been writing about all year. Business and food writing critiques aside, black restaurant weeks are exercises in local black community visibility in cities drowning in white-centered foodie scenes. And at a time when Americans want their spending to match their values, black restaurant weeks offer the convenience of consumerist resistance with resistance of direct action. Beyond that they involve good food. Youd have to be racist not to like them.

Original post:

The growing movement to celebrate black-owned restaurants - The Outline

Posted in Intentional Communities | Comments Off on The growing movement to celebrate black-owned restaurants – The Outline

Likely NASA Administrator Has Big Space Ambitions But Trump May Hinder Them – Houston Press

Posted: at 5:33 am

Thursday, August 17, 2017 at 10:54 a.m.

Illustration by Matt Griesmyer

An Oklahoma Congressman is President Donald Trumps choice to be the next NASA administrator, according to reports, but his plans for space may be pulled back to Earth by the man who hired him.

NASA Watch, a niche news organization that focuses on the space industry, reported Wednesday that Rep. Jim Bridenstine will be NASAs next leader. A Rice University graduate, Bridenstine is an aviator in the Navy Reserve and has served in Congress since 2012. He has not commented on speculation that hell soon join NASA.

In his five years in Congress, Bridenstine has shown an enthusiasm for space exploration, and said he wants the United States to reinvest in space and NASA, including more moon missions to explore the possibility of establishing a base there.

In 2016, the congressman sponsored the American Space Renaissance Act, which aims to project military strength through an American presence in space, spur commercial space innovation and provide clear goals and deadlines for NASA. In a website he created to promote the legislation, Bridenstine noted how often technology created for space travel has benefited the everyday lives of Americans and argued that the United States may cede influence over space by neglecting NASA.

Unfortunately, continued socioeconomic growth from space technology maturation and increased space access is no longer assured, Bridenstine wrote. Space is becoming more congested, contested, and competitive. We must establish responsible governance that will prevent mishaps, misperceptions, and mistrust, while assuring the use of space for all responsible parties. As a military pilot, I can attest that our national security and our very way of life require both military and commercial space capabilities.

The bill did not make it out of committee and received just a single co-sponsor, highlighting the struggle NASA has had finding the money it needs for its missions. Since the glory days of NASA, government investment in the space agency has dwindled. In 1966, in the middle of the Apollo Program, NASA spending accounted for 4.5 percent of the federal budget. Now, that figure is less than half a percent. Since the end of the shuttle program in 2011, American astronauts have had to hitch a ride with Russian cosmonauts to the International Space Station.

Despite his ambitions for NASA and the American space industry, Bridenstine may be hamstrung by the administration that hired him. President Trumps FY 2018 budget includes $19.1 billion for NASA, a $561 million decrease from present levels that CBS News reported would eliminate some Earth science missions and put the kibosh on NASAs plan to retrieve a piece of an asteroid, an exercise that would prepare astronauts for the challenges of flying to Mars.

Where the president himself stands on NASA remains a mystery. In 2012, he criticized the Obama administration for cutting NASAs budget and forcing astronauts to hitchhike from Kazakhstan but he has yet to offer an alternative travel arrangement.

Trump did not articulate a clear vision for NASA during his presidential campaign. During a call with astronauts aboard the International Space Station, Trump asked astronauts to reach Mars "during my first term or, at worst, during my second term," after those same astronauts told him this would not be possible until the 2030s. Plus, they'd need more money.

So Bridenstine may soon inherit a problem shared by leaders across the government: a president with grand plans unwilling to invest the time, expertise or investment to reaching them.

Read the rest here:

Likely NASA Administrator Has Big Space Ambitions But Trump May Hinder Them - Houston Press

Posted in Space Travel | Comments Off on Likely NASA Administrator Has Big Space Ambitions But Trump May Hinder Them – Houston Press

Teen bitcoin millionaire Erik Finman is launching Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ into space – TechCrunch

Posted: at 5:33 am

Erik Finman made headlines earlier this summer for becoming a bitcoin millionaire at the tender age of 18. He now tells TechCrunch hes working on a project with NASA to launch a mini satellite into space with the recordings of regular folks, tech leaders and top artists including pop idol Taylor Swift.

The launch is in celebration ofthe 40th anniversary of Carl Sagans Golden Recordsentonboard Voyager in 1977. Sagan is a personal hero of Finmans and he says he wanted to do something akin to the Golden Record to remind us about this time in world history.

Since almost everyone has a camera and an internet connection, we can now represent the world in a whole new way and showcase how the United States has changed since 40 years ago. Finman said.

Project DaVinci satellite

Finman wanted to get involved in space travel ever since he saw Elon Musk launch his reusable rockets. But his interest in the stars goes far back into his familys history. Finmans mother was involved in the NASA space program in the 80s and he says she was set to go as part of the crew on the fated spaceship Challenger. However, she ended up finding out she was pregnant with Finmans oldest brother and unable to go.

Though Challenger was a serious tragedy, his mother remained involved in the space program for many years. Her love for the stars instilled in him a desire to get involved himself. So, earlier this year, he submitted for and won a NASA grant enabling him to organize the endeavor, called Project DaVinci.

The government space program will handle the costs of the launch and provide materials for the satellite project. Meanwhile, Finman will gather the materials through a website,launching today, and has already employed a team of high school students from his hometown of Coeur dAlene, Idaho, and engineers in Los Angeles and Scotland to build the mini satellite.

Other artists and tech leaders already onboard include Vineographer Logan Paul, XPRIZEs Peter Diamandis, renowned aerospace engineer Burt Rutan and YouTube personality Casey Neistat.

Swifts album 1989 will head up into the stars, along with media from the previously listed participants and what he hopes will be something submitted from all 196 countries around the globe.

NASA has not yet set a date for the launch, but it should be sometime in Q1 of 2018, according to Finman.Those interested in submitting something in hopes it goes into space can do so by heading over to Finmans website and uploading a video, image or sound for free.

View post:

Teen bitcoin millionaire Erik Finman is launching Taylor Swift's '1989' into space - TechCrunch

Posted in Space Travel | Comments Off on Teen bitcoin millionaire Erik Finman is launching Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ into space – TechCrunch

NASA’s Rocket to Nowhere Finally Has a Destination – WIRED

Posted: at 5:33 am

On a Thursday afternoon in June, a 17-foot-tall rocket motorlooking like something a dedicated amateur might fire offstood fire-side-up on the salty desert of Promontory, Utah. Over the loudspeakers, an announcer counted down. And with the command to fire, quad cones of flame flew from the four inverted nozzles and grew toward the sky. As the smoke rose, it cast a four-leaf clover of shadow across the ground.

This was a test of the launch abort motor, a gadget built to carry NASA astronauts away from a rocket gone wrong. Made in Utah by a company called Orbital ATK, it's part of the Space Launch System : the agency's next generation space vehicle, meant to ferry humans and cargo into deep space . NASA has tasked Orbital ATK and other contractors like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Aerojet Rocketdynewith building SLS and its crew capsule for the kinds of missions NASA hasnt undertaken since the Apollo days. But for much of the program's six years, NASA didn't know exactly where SLS would go. The agency spent billions of dollars on what critics called a rocket to nowhere.

In June, hundreds of spectatorsrocket scientists, astronauts, locals who line the highway for every scheduled testcame to watch the fireworks of the launch abort motor test. Charley Bown, a program manager, had warned it would be very short, very powerful, and very loud. Despite his prep talk, the crowd jumped at "fire." During tests like this one, Bown actually turns from the rocketry and watches the watchers, taking pictures of their faces. Some people just smile, he says. Some have a look of amazement.

Bown has been to a lot of these shows in his decades here. And Orbital ATK has done other test fires, lighting up the boosters that will launch the SLS. But this one was different. Because back in late March, Bill Gerstenmaier, the associate administrator for NASAs Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate gave a flashy presentation detailing the agency's Deep Space Gateway and Transport Planwith proposed missions through the 2030s. Finally, the builders and testers could envision not just that their creations would go but that they would go to lunar orbit .

The tapestry of SLS's fate was always tangled. In 2010, before the shuttle was even in its grave , Congress told NASA to build the rocket using reappropriated shuttle parts. First, they thought the system might take astronauts to an asteroidyou know, practice for Mars. But maybe SLS could send a robot to tug an asteroid from its natural orbit and into the moon's orbit ? Also practice for Mars, of course.

With the 2016 transition of presidential power, NASA abandoned what little agenda it had. Which isn't unusual. The agencys mandates are always subject to the US's four-year flip-flop, despite the fact that decades-long mission plans require, believe it or not, decades. Since Trump took office, officials have debated whether to scrap missions to asteroids, whether to favor the moon over Mars, and whether to put humans aboard the very, very first mission, called EM-1 (it was a bad idea, and they won't).

Through all this, the contractors kept constructing and testing, keeping their focus simply on finishing . Until Gerstenmeier's March presentation. Finally, here was a roadmap. The first mission, according to this plan, will go to the moon's orbit in 2018.

Four years later, the rocket will launch a mission to Europa, that mystery moon on which moviemakers imagine oceanic aliens. Then, crews will shuttle to lunar orbit to build a deep-space habitat and staging area for longer-distance travel. Trips there will continue through 2029, building up the outer-space infrastructure. Four lucky people will spend a year hanging out in the ether around the moon, to see how they and the hab fare. And eventually, other astronauts will undock part of the space town and swivel it on a path toward Mars.

With those goalposts in place, NASA's contractors finally have somewhere to aim. Orbital ATK is currently proving that its hardware meets NASA's previously-established specs for safety and performance. And contractor Lockheed Martin continues to test the human capsule for NASA's deep-space forays: Orion.

As of late July, the Lockheed crew was in the throes of testing a full-size mockup of Orion . Off a road called Titan Loop in Colorado, Lockheed engineers test how the capsule fares in all kinds of weather, blasting it with sound waves to see how it handles vibration, shocking it to see if its components come out OK, putting pressure on it to see if its structure survives. It tests all the systems in various kinds of badness, says Christopher Aiken, an integration and test engineer.

The mockup isnt just a shell: Its electronics and controls are silicon copies of final product. When we fly this, it doesnt know its sitting on the ground, says Paul Sannes, manager of the test lab. The idea is that this model will feel and behave like the real thing under those same conditions, a voodoo doll of space travel. Last week, four Lockheed interns did an AMA on reddit. Getting to see a full mock-up of the capsule every day is pretty awesome, wrote Bailey Sikorski. Plus I get to touch it, which is even cooler.

Six hundred miles northwest, back at Orbital ATK, the biggest task is bureaucratic: a design certification review of the company's solid rocket boosters, which will power 80 percent of SLS's first few minutes of flight. Cast inside space-shuttle casings, the propellant's final form has the consistency of a pencil eraser. Technicians mix the solution in 600-gallon KitchenAids209 of them per boosterand pour that liquid into the five segments that make up each booster. Then they'll cure, trim, and X-ray them to make sure they're defect-free.

Emma Grey Ellis

If We're Going to Get to Mars, These Rockets Need to Work

Peter Juul

NASA's Human Spaceflight Program Can't Afford Another Reset From the Next President

Wired Staff

The 12 Greatest Challenges for Space Exploration

When SLS goes up, it will eat through 1,385,000 pounds of that artisanal propellant in two minutes. And although the first flight wont happen till 2019, Orbital ATK has all the booster segments finished. The design certification will stretch through the end of this year. We provide to NASA all of the certification paperwork, all the drawings, all the test data, says Bown. And then? Assuming all's well? Ship, assemble, and fly, he says.

All that prep work means more now that SLS has real, concrete plans for launching astronauts to the moon's orbit. When the space shuttle Challenger broke apart in 1986, Bown worked at this Utah site. Engineers there, then as now, built NASAs rocket boosters. And it was a booster that failed, that cold Florida morning, 73 seconds after launch, when it was just higher than a commercial airliner. Seven astronauts died.

Bown kept working here, through decades and acquisitions and mergers and a whole lot of propellant work. I got to go from feeling horrible to feeling good about it again, he says.

Today, for major tests like that of the launch abort motor, NASA always sends at least one astronaut to observe. That presence means a lot: The astronauts get to meet the people theyve trusted to make the 177-foot-tall erasers that will fire them to space. And those engineers get to meet the people that propel their work.

The two types stand side by side at the testsboth jumping involuntarily, both perhaps in the frame of one of Bowns photos.

See more here:

NASA's Rocket to Nowhere Finally Has a Destination - WIRED

Posted in Space Travel | Comments Off on NASA’s Rocket to Nowhere Finally Has a Destination – WIRED

12 Companies That Are Making the World a Better Place – Singularity Hub

Posted: at 5:32 am

The Singularity University Global Summit in San Francisco this week brought brilliant minds together from all over the world to share a passion for using science and technology to solve the worlds most pressing challenges.

Solving these challenges means ensuring basic needs are met for all people. It means improving quality of life and mitigating future risks both to people and the planet.

To recognize organizations doing outstanding work in these fields, SU holds the Global Grand Challenge Awards. Three participating organizations are selected in each of 12 different tracks and featured at the summits EXPO. The ones found to have the most potential to positively impact one billion people are selected as the track winners.

Heres a list of the companies recognized this year, along with some details about the great work theyre doing.

LuminAID makes portable lanterns that can provide 24 hours of light on 10 hours of solar charging. The lanterns came from a project to assist post-earthquake relief efforts in Haiti, when the products creators considered the dangerous conditions at night in the tent cities and realized light was a critical need. The lights have been used in more than 100 countries and after disasters, including Hurricane Sandy, Typhoon Haiyan, and the earthquakes in Nepal.

BreezoMeter uses big data and machine learning to deliver accurate air quality information in real time. Users can see pollution details as localized as a single city block, and data is impacted by real-time traffic. Forecasting is also available, with air pollution information available up to four days ahead of time, or several years in the past.

Aspire Food Group believes insects are the protein of the future, and that technology has the power to bring the tradition of eating insects that exists in many countries and cultures to the rest of the world. The company uses technologies like robotics and automated data collection to farm insects that have the protein quality of meat and the environmental footprint of plants.

Rafiki Power acts as a rural utility company, building decentralized energy solutions in regions that lack basic services like running water and electricity. The companys renewable hybrid systems are packed and standardized in recycled 20-foot shipping containers, and theyre currently powering over 700 household and business clients in rural Tanzania.

MakeSense is an international community that brings together people in 128 cities across the world to help social entrepreneurs solve challenges in areas like education, health, food, and environment. Social entrepreneurs post their projects and submit challenges to the community, then participants organize workshops to mobilize and generate innovative solutions to help the projects grow.

Unima developed a fast and low-cost diagnostic and disease surveillance tool for infectious diseases. The tool allows health professionals to diagnose diseases at the point of care, in less than 15 minutes, without the use of any lab equipment. A drop of the patients blood is put on a diagnostic paper, where the antibody generates a visual reaction when in contact with the biomarkers in the sample. The result is evaluated by taking a photo with an app in a smartphone, which uses image processing, artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Egalite helps people with disabilities enter the labor market, and helps companies develop best practices for inclusion of the disabled. Egalites founders are passionate about the potential of people with disabilities and the return companies get when they invest in that potential.

Iris.AI is an artificial intelligence system that reads scientific paper abstracts and extracts key concepts for users, presenting concepts visually and allowing users to navigate a topic across disciplines. Since its launch, Iris.AI has read 30 million research paper abstracts and more than 2,000 TED talks. The AI uses a neural net and deep learning technology to continuously improve its output.

Hala Systems, Inc. is a social enterprise focused on developing technology-driven solutions to the worlds toughest humanitarian challenges. Hala is currently focused on civilian protection, accountability, and the prevention of violent extremism before, during, and after conflict. Ultimately, Hala aims to transform the nature of civilian defense during warfare, as well as to reduce casualties and trauma during post-conflict recovery, natural disasters, and other major crises.

Billion Bricks designs and provides shelter and infrastructure solutions for the homeless. The companys housing solutions are scalable, sustainable, and able to create opportunities for communities to emerge from poverty. Their approach empowers communities to replicate the solutions on their own, reducing dependency on support and creating ownership and pride.

Tellus Labs uses satellite data to tackle challenges like food security, water scarcity, and sustainable urban and industrial systems, and drive meaningful change. The company built a planetary-scale model of all 170 million acres of US corn and soy crops to more accurately forecast yields and help stabilize the market fluctuations that accompany the USDAs monthly forecasts.

Loowatt designed a toilet that uses a patented sealing technology to contain human waste within biodegradable film. The toilet is designed for linking to anaerobic digestion technology to provide a source of biogas for cooking, electricity, and other applications, creating the opportunity to offset capital costs with energy production.

Image Credit: LuminAID via YouTube

Visit link:

12 Companies That Are Making the World a Better Place - Singularity Hub

Posted in Singularity | Comments Off on 12 Companies That Are Making the World a Better Place – Singularity Hub

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation v2.4 update adds Vulkan support – PC Gamer

Posted: at 5:32 am

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation is receiving a pretty big update that, among other things, will introduce support for Vulkan, a low-level cross-platform API. In doing so, Vulkan continues to grow its street cred among developers.

This comes just a few months after Cloud Imperium Games developer Ali Brown decided to drop DirectX support in Star Citizen in favor of Vulkan, which is maintained by the Khronos Group, the same industry group in charge of the older OpenGL API. In that case, Brown made the decision because Vulkan enables single-API support for older versions of Windows (and Linux) without sacrificing performance and features.

The same motivation is likely behind Oxide Games and Stardock deciding to bring Vulkan support to Escalation. That and a desire to lead the charge by bringing new technology to its playersAshes of the Singularity was one of the first DX12 games.

According to Guru3D, this is not a one-and-done affair. The latest v2.4 update is just the first step, with further optimizations and better compatibility planned with future updates.

To enable Vulkan, you need to right-click on Escalation in your Steam library, select properties, and then select the 2.4 opt-in under the betas tab.

Here are the full highlights for the 2.4 update:

There are a total of nine maps included in the free co-op map pack DLC. This is all due out on August 24.

Excerpt from:

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation v2.4 update adds Vulkan support - PC Gamer

Posted in Singularity | Comments Off on Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation v2.4 update adds Vulkan support – PC Gamer

Risk Takers Are Back in the Space Raceand That’s a Good Thing – Singularity Hub

Posted: at 5:32 am

In a fight between Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, who would win? Peter Diamandis asked Blue Origins Erika Wagner to kick off a conversation with a panel of space entrepreneurs at Singularity Universitys Global Summit this week in San Francisco.

So, Peter, let me tell you about what were doing at Blue Origin, Wagner answered rather diplomatically, eliciting chuckles from the audience. Were really looking towards a future of millions of people living and working in space. The thing I think is really fantasticis that the universe is infinitely large, and so, we dont need any fisticuffs.

Were all going to go out there and create this future together.

Diamandis is no stranger to the private space race. Hes long been a passionate investor in and driver of the new space industry. The first private suborbital flight in 2004incented by his $10 million Ansari XPRIZE competitionhinted at how much could be built outside of government space agencies. But really, only the last few years have begun to deliver on the promise.

Elon Musks SpaceX is the best-known new space firm. But 15 years ago, SpaceX didnt exist. Seven years ago, theyd never launched a vehicle. Five years ago, theyd yet to resupply the International Space Station. And two years ago, there was no such thing as a reusable rocket.

Now, the company is routinely delivering satellites to orbit, resupplying the ISS, and recovering the first stages of their rockets. But they arent alone. In fact, Jeff Bezoss Blue Origin recovered a suborbital New Shepard rocket before SpaceX successfully landed their orbital Falcon 9. And Blue Origin aims to go beyond suborbital flight with the upcoming New Glenn rocket.

So, no zero-g fisticuffs yet, but plenty of competition. Which is a good thing. Making space a more affordable place to visit will open other opportunities when we get there.

Planetary Resources, a company Diamandis cofounded, has plans to expand the global economy into space by prospecting and mining asteroids. And another space mining startup and Google Lunar XPRIZE finalist, Moon Express, aims to mine the moon for the same reasons.

Chris Lewicki, CEO of Planetary Resources, and Bob Richards, cofounder and CEO of Moon Express, joined Diamandis and Wagner on stage to talk over the trends making this possible.

The panel said exponential technologiessuch as 3D printing, computing, and roboticsare a big reason feats that were once the sole domain of a few governments are becoming possible for startups with a team of 50 or 100 talented workers.

We always talk about space being a place where spin-offs happen, where we would go spend a lot of money on Apollo and, in exchange, we get Teflon and cordless drills, Wagner said. And it turns out, now were back in a part of the cycle where space is where spin-ins are happening.

Perhaps this is most obvious in the size of satellites. Not too long ago, most satellites had to be the size of a house to include whatever instruments they carried. These days, in some cases, similar capabilities can be shipped to space in a box 10 centimeters to the side.

Very similar to what happened in the computation world from the mainframe era of computers, things that were government-centric and filled a room were transformed into personals PCsThats whats happening in space, according to Richards.

Perhaps less obvious but no less important is the actual computation working under the hood.

SpaceXs reusable rockets arent manually steered into a soft landing by remote pilots back at mission control. No human is capable of that task. Instead, computers take in a flood of information from onboard sensors and make rapid and continuous adjustments to land.

Theyre basically self-driving rockets. The same technologies making autonomous cars possible are involved here too. And there might even be feedback between the twomuch of the work done in space, after all, will continue to be done by robot. And in space, where communications can be sketchy and delayed, the more autonomous the better.

I look at every autonomous car startup out there and think about where they will be in 5 to 10 years, Lewicki said. [I think about] all the sensors and all the technology that they will have commoditized that will make asteroid mining quite easy.

Additive manufacturing has likewise found a niche in aerospace. 3D printers speed up the design-and-test process and also yield finished parts you cant make any other way.

[Blue Origins] New Shepard rocket has literally hundreds of 3D printed parts, Wagner said. It started off as the brackets and the guides and little pieces, and now, theyre increasingly moving into the hot end of the engine and really are part and parcel to how our rockets work.

All this, according to the panel, is reducing the time and cost of space projects.

Our first quotes from an unnamed large aerospace company for our propulsion system in 2010 was $24 million in 24 months. Were now printing our engines for $2,000 in two weeks, Richards said.

The economics matter. Although significant seed money is being put up by billionaires like Musk and Bezos, they wont be able to foot the whole bill forever. Such investments need to show practical value too if the area is going to take off.

This, perhaps, is the most interesting bit of it all.

According to Richards, you dont get giggled at anymore when proposing a space startup. Beyond individuals, strategic corporate partnerships and even sovereign wealth funds are emerging sources of funding. And venture capital firms are interested too.

The opportunity is enormous, according to Diamandis.

Everything we hold of value on Earth: metals, minerals, energy, real estate, are in near infinite quantities in space, he said. And so Ive said this many times, I believe the first trillionaires will be made in space and the resources that were talking about are multitrillion dollar assets.

While space startups arent giggled at anymore, however, neither are they fully mainstream. SpaceX is leading the way, but there hasnt been what the panel called a Netscape moment yet, referring to the first big web browser that opened the internet for business. The new space industry isnt yet irresistible in the same way.

SpaceX is making its reusable rockets look routine, and has lost a few along the way too. Virgin Galactic, the company Richard Branson founded with the ship developed for the original XPRIZE, lost a pilot in a tragic crash over the Mojave Desert a few years ago. There are still many risks and challenges, big visions and ambitions and unforeseen delays.

But if risk is necessary to move forward, the commercial environment is a better place to experiment, take risks, and try new things, according to Lewicki. Theres a reason, he said, that NASAs next Mars rover will use processors built in 1993. They work. Theyll get the job done. The rover will roll across Mars. But it is nowhere near as capable as it could be.

Its a failure-is-not-an-option mentality, Lewicki said. And when failures not an option, success gets really expensive, and you worry about risk everywhere.

For a startup, on the other hand, the risk-averse approach is not an option. They have to draw up a grand vision of something thats isnt yet here and push the envelope to make it happen. Whatever the outcome, they all agreed, this is a special moment.

Thousands of years from now whatever we evolve into, whatever we become, were going to look back at these next couple of decades as the moment in time that the human race moved off the planet irreversibly, Diamandis said. Its on our watch. Its right here, right now that were becoming a multiplanetary species, which is an extraordinary thought.

Image Credit: Blue Origin

Read more from the original source:

Risk Takers Are Back in the Space Raceand That's a Good Thing - Singularity Hub

Posted in Singularity | Comments Off on Risk Takers Are Back in the Space Raceand That’s a Good Thing – Singularity Hub

Singularity University Announces New And Updated Programs To Prepare Leaders For Disruptive Times, Identify … – Markets Insider

Posted: at 5:32 am

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Aug. 17, 2017 /PRNewswire/ --Singularity University(SU), a global community with a mission to educate, inspire, and empower leaders to apply exponential technologies to address humanity's grand challenges, has announced new and evolved programs for individuals, startups, and large organizations. The announcement was made to 1,600 participants attending this week's SU's second annual Global Summit in San Francisco.

As advanced or exponential technologies (such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality, digital biology, and robotics) continue to develop at faster rates, it is becoming more challenging for organizations of all sizes to see far enough into the future to plan for how technologies and trends will disrupt as well as create opportunities for businesses and world markets. SU is dedicated to helping people learn to break free of the assumptions they have today, delivering the tools, partner and community networks, and exponential mindset they need to be successful and solve the global challenges we face.

"The world is changing faster than our linear-thinking brains can keep up," said Carin Watson, EVP, Learning & Innovation at Singularity University. "Exponential technologies and new business models enabled by digitization and democratization are impacting every industry in unprecedented ways. SU aims to help leaders better understand, anticipate, and respond to the future. The pace and approach that got us here aren't sufficient to get us there. Our wide range of programs, diverse faculty network, and global community of change agents help individuals and organizations learn to embrace an exponential mindset, develop new skills and tools, and pursue unexpected collaborations that result in both bottom line and social impact."

Enterprises and Large Organizations Require Leaders Who Know How to Succeed in a World of Disruption Caused by Exponential Technologies

The enterprise programs announced this week as new or evolved underscore SU's commitment to deepening the support to help drive organizational transformation. They include:

Impact-Driven Startups Need Long-Term Support to See Them Through

Recognizing that it takes time to solve big problems, SU is announcing SU Ventures, to provide end-to-end support for visionary, future-shaping entrepreneurs and startupsfrom concept to prototype to funding to market entry to scale, and beyond. Unlike traditional short-term incubators and accelerators, it's the first and only program dedicated to startups that apply emerging technologies to address the largest challenges facing humanity today. SU Ventures helps startups:

SU's flagship Global Solutions Program (GSP) now also feeds into SU Ventures in a more intrinsic way as many GSP participants ideate solutions leveraging exponential technologies and bold thinking to solve humankind's global challenges: energy, environment, food, water, shelter, security, prosperity, space, governance, and disaster resilience. Out of the GSP ideas come the seeds for moonshot initiativesthose impacting global challenges and making a difference in the lives of 1 billion people around the world within 10 years. Selected teams are invited to participate in the SU Ventures Incubator to evolve their ideas into startups and innovative solutions. The 2017 GSP cohort focused on solving the challenges facing our climate and environment. To learn more about innovative projects developed during GSP 2017, please see Singularity University Completes 2017 Global Solutions Program.

New Immersive Open Enrollment Programs for Everyone

Singularity University has also expanded its portfolio of short programs for individuals, whether they are seeking their first introduction to the world of exponentials, to deepen their expertise in a given technology or global challenge, or to stay abreast of the innovations, players, and issues shaping the future.

ABOUT SINGULARITY UNIVERSITY Singularity University (SU) is a global learning and innovation community using exponential technologies to tackle the world's biggest challenges and build an abundant future for all. SU's collaborative platform empowers individuals and organizations across the globe to learn, connect, and innovate breakthrough solutions using accelerating technologies like artificial intelligence, robotics, and digital biology. A certified benefit corporation headquartered at NASA Research Park in Silicon Valley, SU was founded in 2008 by renowned innovators Ray Kurzweil and Peter H. Diamandis with program funding from leading organizations including Google, Deloitte, and UNICEF. To learn more, visit SU.org, join us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter @SingularityU, and download the SingularityU Hub mobile app.

MEDIA CONTACTS:Jessica Kersey, rel="nofollow">jessica.kersey@su.org 650-868-9295

Adrian Eyre, rel="nofollow">Adrian.Eyre@ogilvy.com 415-677-2708

View original content with multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/singularity-university-announces-new-and-updated-programs-to-prepare-leaders-for-disruptive-times-identify-strategic-opportunities-achieve-high-impact-growth-and-build-a-better-world-300506256.html

SOURCE Singularity University

See original here:

Singularity University Announces New And Updated Programs To Prepare Leaders For Disruptive Times, Identify ... - Markets Insider

Posted in Singularity | Comments Off on Singularity University Announces New And Updated Programs To Prepare Leaders For Disruptive Times, Identify … – Markets Insider