The 100 Best Climate Change Management Solutions

Link to the list.

A Paragraph to Ponder

From MIT Technology Review:

"When Lois Seed wakes up in the morning, one of the first things she says is “Alexa, what is the weather?” Seed, who is 89 and has low vision because of macular degeneration, finds it convenient to get weather information by speaking to the Alexa voice-activated assistant on her Amazon Echo. She also asks her Echo to tell her the time and to play classical music from her former hometown radio station.

“Life is more enjoyable [with Alexa],” she says, proving that the recent Saturday Night Live spoof about Alexa and seniors couldn’t be further from the truth."

The Future of Retailing?

Amazon's Bricks and Mortar https://t.co/Lzxrl3xb1w via @BlowhardEsq

— Dr.Steven D.Sanders (@DocEngineering) June 9, 2017

Car Code

From the New York Times - -

 

"Twenty years ago, cars had, on average, one million lines of code. The General Motors 2010 Chevrolet Volt had about 10 million lines of code — more than an F-35 fighter jet.

 

Today, an average car has more than 100 million lines of code. Automakers predict it won’t be long before they have 200 million."

Voting for Trump and Renewables

From the New York Times:

"Two years ago, Kansas repealed a law requiring that 20 percent of the state’s electric power come from renewable sources by 2020, seemingly a step backward on energy in a deeply conservative state.

Yet by the time the law was scrapped, it had become largely irrelevant. Kansas blew past that 20 percent target in 2014, and last year it generated more than 30 percent of its power from wind. The state may be the first in the country to hit 50 percent wind generation in a year or two, unless Iowa gets there first.

Some of the fastest progress on clean energy is occurring in states led by Republican governors and legislators, and states carried by Donald J. Trump in the presidential election.

The five states that get the largest percentage of their power from wind turbines — Iowa, Kansas, South Dakota, Oklahoma and North Dakota — all voted for Mr. Trump. So did Texas, which produces the most wind power in absolute terms. In fact, 69 percent of the wind power produced in the country comes from states that Mr. Trump carried in November."

One Reason for Our Infrastructure Woes

From economist Matthew Kahn - - 

"Yes, NYC has an old subway system but that doesn't explain the interesting fact presented in the NY Times today that the C trains are over 53 years old.   Binding budget constraints provide the explanation for why this rich city (that relies on public transit) isn't investing in public capital.  As we document in this NBER Paper,  progressive big cities generously pay unionized public sector workers.   Due to the Buy America Mandate, such cities also pay more than the international price for pieces of capital (read our 2015 JUE paper).  The combination of paying public labor a very high salary and benefits plus high capital purchase costs means that there is little $ left for investing in capital replacement and upgrading.  #budget_contraints_matter"

Should Engineers Study Seussism?

The Bank of England studied Dr. Seuss books to make its writing clearer and more accessible https://t.co/etEQCsZwCP via @clusterstock

— Dr.Steven D.Sanders (@DocEngineering) June 7, 2017