Perhaps you’ve noticed that Earth & Sky has a new science news site. It’s very cool - it lets you scan the headlines of over 20 news sources and podcasts. Now you can be informed with the click of a button!
To get you started, I dug deep into the trenches for the juiciest science stories.
The Guardian broke the news about a plan to cover up Britain’s expectations to fall short of EU renewable energy targets. A document leaked to the newspaper revealed that government officials have admitted that the UK will miss the goal of 20% energy from renewables by 2020.
…officials fear that Britain may end up being told to get to 16%, which it describes as “very challenging”. The paper suggests a number of ways ministers could wriggle out of specific commitments. It also suggests ministers lobby certain EU commissioners and countries such as France, Germany, Poland and Italy to agree to a more flexible interpretation of the target, by including nuclear power, for example, or investment in solar farms in Africa.
The news here is that change involves actual change, and not just re-manipulating the bureaucracy.
Plans are in the works for the universe’s first space hotel. Not surprisingly, the cost of a room is sky high: $4 million for a three day stay. And I don’t think there’s a group or extended stay rate. Three days might just be long enough not to get tired of watching the sun rise 15 times per day. According to Reuters, the relative cost of space travel is coming down quickly enough to have the hotel up above the atmosphere by 2012. To counter space pessimism, the news site also leads to a thoughtful essay on why it’s necessary to expand into space.
And continuing my hot summer theme of Arctic ice melting, the New York Times has noted “Simply Incredible Shrinking of Floating Ice in the Arctic”, and the scientifically-proven blog Real Climate provides shocking satellite images and reliable ice linkage.
But you don’t have to take my word for it, read the news yourself!
Wow, cool news page. Like Popurls, but with a point.
Oh, and mad props for the RR link.
-E
It’s pretty hard to resist some sort of hourly-rate comment about the space hotel. Science news is cool.
Saying Real climate.org is “scientifically proven” is like saying “Hitler loved Jews.” Stop being so politically driven that you can’t see your hand in front of your face.
The fact that Britten has not meet its goal for renewables is not science news. If they planned a cover up of that fact (not very successfully since it got into The Guardian) it is even less science news. This is political news. The fact that you want to pretend that this is somehow science news just proves how biased you are.
The only real science would be that it is imposable for Britten to meet its goal. True scientists would have told them that. It makes me believe that the “scientists” who are advising Britten are politically driven. Otherwise they would tell them that it is imposable, and you would highlight that fact.
The space hotel on the other hand is real cool and if it came to be would be real science..
Thomas Trevor - lighten up - the article was also in the BBC - I see nothing political or damning about getting this information out but something very political in a knee jerk reaction and ad hominem attacks on this particular blogger. Politicians who want to assert that science doesn’t have a place at the table are the same ones who deny global warming exists while taking the lion share of their political campaign contributions (bribes)from big oil. The voice of science is needed and this information is vital even if it only increases the urgency for conservation and the move to increase fuel mileage efficiency. By the way the U.S. ranks near dead last in MPG for vehicles. 40 mpg is science (how do you do it, why you need to do it) and political (why we don’t do it)
Since you are such a pure man of science how about a more measured less emotional tone.
I am delighted to see the Science News Page! Previously, I had to log in to so many different sites to look for the latest (or newest) news. With a click of a button, I can scan through one page now, and even compare articles from different sources. I’m very impressed, thank you!