In July, a helicopter pilot flying over arctic Russia’s Yamal Peninsula noticed an odd sight: a roughly 100-foot-wide crater in the permafrost. Images of the crater went viral online, sparking theories of its formation: Was it a meteorite? A missile strike? A botched alien landing?
Continue reading Geologists Solve Mystery of Siberian Crater
Category Archives: Formats
Barcelona’s Smart City Ecosystem
Gardeners making their rounds through Barcelona’s Parc del Centre del Poblenou these days are as likely to carry tablets as trowels. The city recently moved 178 of its irrigation points to an Internet-controlled system. While it is handy to manage watering at the keyboard instead of turning a knob on a pipe, much of the advantage is in the data that the new system sends back to a central software system the city has built. Continue reading Barcelona’s Smart City Ecosystem
Mexico’s Renewables Revolution Creates Tension
Men died in gun battles over the installation of windmills in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico, three years ago. Opponents argued that energy companies misled them and that community leaders rented out collective lands without consulting everyone they should have. Today, protests continue, but the growth of wind farms and other renewables seems assured: Mexico boasts almost 2 gigawatts of installed wind power capacity and plans to install perhaps another 12 GW by 2022. All that clean energy is a big change for this country, which is the world’s ninth-biggest oil producer and perhaps the 11th-biggest emitter of carbon dioxide. Continue reading Mexico’s Renewables Revolution Creates Tension
When Evidence Melts Away
On a recent visit to Crystal Ice Cave in Idaho, climate and cave researchers had to wade through frigid, knee-deep water to reach the ice formations that give the cave its name. Cavers are good-humored about the hardships of underground exploration, but this water was chilling for more than one reason: it was carrying away some of the very clues they had come to study. Continue reading When Evidence Melts Away