Eideard

Cetti’s Warbler

Once heard only rarely outside the north Kent marshes, the loud voice of the Cetti’s warbler is now delighting a whole new set of listeners, from the isle of Anglesey to the banks of the Humber. The bird has moved 150 kilometres further north within the UK in the last 40 years, in response to the changing climate.

Cetti’s warbler is not alone – the little egret has now colonised Britain, which had previously been too cold for the bird; and the comma butterfly can now be found in Edinburgh, at least 220 kilometres north of its former central England home.

These changes, in response to global warming, have happened two to three times faster than was previously expected, according to a new study from the biology department of York University, published…in the peer review journal Science. Although such responses to global warming have been predicted, the study is the first to show that animal and plant species have moved furthest in the regions where the climate has warmed the most.

Species have tended to move towards the poles, fleeing in search of their more accustomed temperatures as climate change has resulted in warming of their normal habitats, according to the new research. The phenomenon is one of the clearest examples of climate change in action.

Chris Thomas, professor of conservation biology at York University and leader of the project, said: “These changes are equivalent to animals and plants shifting away from the equator at around 20 centimetres per hour, for every hour of the day, for every day of the year. This has been going on for the last 40 years and is set to continue for at least the rest of this century. “

RTFA. Lots of details, lots of examples. No doubt the article in Science – as it becomes available free on the Web – will add a great deal more.

In recent years, I’ve noted several examples from local observations here at Lot 4. Redwing Blackbirds which used to pass through spring and fall on migrations – now stay for the winter. We acquired mockingbirds here this year – for the first time – no surprise at this latitude; but, in combination with the altitude, it’s new. I’ve noted a new species of lizard typically found closer to Sonoran desert – but, not in New Mexico’s high desert plains – that showed up here about three years ago. I was really worried about that one – afraid they might push out our native Blue Tail Skinks; but, they seem to be competing OK.

 
With whisper-quiet electric cars set to proliferate, the motor industry is under pressure to give them an artificial noise for safety purposes, but should they sound like traditional petrol vehicles?

It is an unsettling experience watching a car drive around, hearing little more than the whisper of the wind it generates as it glides down the road.

There would have been little time to get out of its way had it gone unseen.

Such a moment is the essence of the debate over how electric and hydrogen fuel cars should sound in the future.

The answer could determine how different cities could sound in 10 or 20 years. The rise of the electric car presents a rare opportunity to tackle the persistent roar of traffic that many city dwellers are used to.

Electric and hydrogen fuel vehicles are inherently quiet. The sound of the tyres on the road is noisier than the engine and this could prove lethal at slow speeds for pedestrians and cyclists. Which is a specious argument. Since there already any number of well-made cars quieter than tyre noise at low speeds.

Motor manufacturers acknowledge there is a problem. Some, like Nissan, are already fitting speakers under the bonnets of these vehicles to emit sounds for the safety of other road users…

So why not just stick with the current sound of a conventional combustion engine?

“That would be losing a huge opportunity,” says Prof Paul Jennings from Warwick University who leads a project looking into alternative vehicle noises…

He says: “The challenge is to create sounds that are as safe as possible but also ones that are much more pleasing for the urban environment…”

“It’s important that the sound is associated with transport and a lot of how people interpret sound is based on their experiences,” says Prof Jennings. “For electric vehicles and futuristic vehicles a lot of those experiences are from the media, from games and from science fiction films.”

We don’t get to have that discussion in the U.S.. Congress already passed a law requiring electric cars and hybrids to make a certain amount of noise. Some offer a range of sounds – including a Star Trek sound.

Nanny State fools in both parties supported that one. Idiots.

This is a preview of the XM25 recorded a year ago

A new gun the US military hopes will help take on the Taliban has been unveiled. Called the XM25 it has been described by the US Army as a ‘game changer’.

It uses a laser guidance system and specially developed 25mm high explosive rounds which can be programmed to detonate over a target.

Richard Audette helped develop it for the US Army and says it’s a big leap forward because it’s the first small arms weapon to use smart technology. “The way a soldier operates this is basically find your target, then laze (laser) to it, which gives the range, then you get an adjusted aim point, adjust the fire and pull the trigger.

“Say you’ve lazed out to 543 metres… When you pull the trigger it arms the round and fires it 543 metres plus or minus one, two or three metres.”

It means the weapon can be used to target insurgents hiding behind walls or in ditches without the need to call in air strikes.

Haven’t yet read comments on effectiveness – though it surely sounds like solid technology. The prime consideration, as always, is how well does it hold up under combat conditions

With all of the reveals and partnership announcements here at the New York Auto Show the most important thing we’ve heard is a number: $25,280. That’s the price that Nissan said yesterday it will sell the Leaf for when it goes on sale later this year (full production starts in 2011), and it’s much lower than rumors we’ve heard from competitors in the plug-in vehicle space. We sat down with Mark Perry, Nissan’s director of product planning, to talk about this price – how it came to be, what the reaction has been, etc. – because we’re pretty sure readers would like to know more details about Nissan’s strategy.

Perry was all smiles when he talked about how Nissan got to the $32,780 price – of course, the headline is that this turns into $25,280 after $7,500 worth of federal tax credits – and we understand why. He told us that this price is the result, in part, of 17 years of work Nissan has done on lithium-ion batteries. By doing everything in-house for so many years, Nissan doesn’t need to charge the customer for battery research like other companies that are freshly bursting into the electric vehicle (EV) market and are just now figuring out how to make EVs that work. Plus, by spreading the research and development over many years, selling the Leaf for just under $33,000 allows the company to make a profit off the car, or at least minimizes early losses.

Of course, the Leaf does not exist in a vacuum, and Perry said that the $33k was most definitely based on market factors. Government incentives played a role in setting the price, Perry said, as did estimating what other companies will price their plug-in vehicles at. Considering we don’t know for sure yet what cars like the Chevrolet Volt or the Ford Focus Electric will be, we can’t say yet how Nissan’s announcement will impact those MSRPs. Still, we assume there was a lot of hand-wringing in offices that didn’t belong to Nissan.

The announcement certainly caught the attention of this household.

If that ever happens, it will be difficult to come with a better solution than the Nissan Leaf.

An unlikely lobbying group is pressing the U.S. Senate to curb greenhouse gas emissions: American hunting and fishing groups who fear climate change will disrupt their sport.

Hunters and anglers are mainly a Republican Party constituency representing tens of millions of votes in the U.S. heartland and could help swing crucial votes as the Senate tries to pass legislation to cut carbon output.

Twenty national hunting and fishing groups urged senators in a letter last month to ensure “the climate legislation you consider in the Senate both reduces greenhouse gas emissions and safeguards natural resources…”

These groups will be going up against powerful Washington lobbies — the coal and oil industries, for example — that are pushing hard to soften any mandatory pollution controls…

Read the rest of this entry »

A week before it shows the world what its new dedicated electric vehicle will look like, Nissan is showing off its latest-generation prototype. The company’s previous iteration was based on the original Cube, but the new test units are based on the Versa/Tiida. A 108 horsepower / 206 pound-feet electric motor designed in-house at Nissan drives the front wheels, while a lithium ion battery pack created by Automotive Energy Supply Corp. stores electricity. The 24 kWh pack is fitted under the floor and is expected to yield a 100-mile range.

Nissan is aiming to make life as stress-free as possible for its EV drivers. To that end, the navigation system will automatically display the driving radius that the current battery state of charge will support. It can also download information about currently available charging stations. Drivers can also access the charging status of their cars remotely via a cell phone, so no doubt an iPhone app will be on the way…

From the press release:

The timer function enables the air-conditioner or battery charging to begin at a specified time. The air-conditioner can be pre-set while the vehicle is plugged-in to cool the cabin to a desirable temperature before driving begins, without taxing the vehicle’s battery. Meanwhile, the battery charging can be set to start at a specified time at night to benefit from more favorable electricity rates…

Nissan plans to unveil the design of the production EV at its new Global Headquarters Opening in Yokohama on August 2nd. A Nissan Zero-emission Website will also go live on Aug. 2nd.

I hope the introduction shows us something more exciting and up-to-date than 95% of Nissan’s design studio products. Yes, I realize that’s meaningless to function; but, if the critter looks as vital as a double pack of chewing gum – sales will suffer. I’d rather see what something like this can achieve in a competitive marketplace.

Nissan says the EV-11 will retail for $30,000 or less. And that’s before the federal tax credit of $7,500.

UPDATED: See the production version today over here.

Scuba divers off the Californian city of San Diego are being menaced by large numbers of jumbo squid.

The beaked Humboldt squid, which grow up to 5ft (1.5 metres) long, arrived off the city’s shores last week.

Divers have reported unnerving encounters with the creatures, which are carnivorous and can be aggressive…

The creatures – also known as jumbo flying squid – do not affect swimmers because they remain deeper in the water…

“The ones that we are getting right now have a big beak on them, like a large parrot beak,” San Diego’s Union-Tribune quoted John Hyde of the National Marine Fisheries Service as saying earlier in the week.

“They could take a chunk of flesh off you…“

Scientists say they do not know why the squid – which usually live in deep waters further south off Mexico and Central America – have come so close in.

But one expert, Nigella Hillgarth of the San Diego-based Scripps Institution of Oceanography, told AP it was possible that the squid had established a year-round population off California.

Maybe we should return to polluting the water?