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Blackstone, Windland in North Sea wind farm project
U.S. investment group and German energy company forms partnership to construct one of the North Sea’s largest wind farms
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Important deals in the chemical sector
Ashland acquires Hercules, and Dow announces its plans to acquire Rohm and Haas; Ashland values Hercules at $3.3 billion; Dow is willing to pay $18.8 billion for Rohm and Haas
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WHO, IAEA is simulated nuclear accident drill
The World Health Organization and the International Atomic Energy Agency collaborate in a nuclear accident drill at the Laguna Verde nuclear power plant in Mexico
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Midwest floods to create record dead zone in Gulf of Mexico
Each year, an influx of nutrients — mainly nitrogen — which come from fertilizers flushed out of the Mississippi basin creates dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico — zones where there is not enough oxygen to sustain life; the summer’s Midwest floods flush record levels of nutrients into the Gulf, creating a dead zone the size of New Jersey
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New way to purify water
Water-attracting materials seem to repel impurities, thus leaving a layer of pure water near their surface; making tubes from these particle-excluding materials would allow for a new way to purify water — if, for now, in relatively small quantities
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Better picture of what lies beneath the Earth's surface
A tool which measures minute changes in the planet’s gravity field from the air allows a cheaper alternative to seismic surveying
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Cybercrime gangs highly structured
The chain of command of a cybercrime gang is not unlike the Mafia, an evolution which shows how online crime is becoming a broad, well-organized endeavor
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Criticism of delays in coordinating national emergency communication
Congress criticizes DHS for delays in coordinating a national emergency communications plan for first responders
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The crisis of U.S. infrastructure, III
The crisis of U.S. infrastructure is one of political will — the will, that is, to vote for money to maintain this elaborate infrastructure; the true political divide lie between Americans who are willing and able to pay up front for the nation’s needs — whether through taxes or tolls — and those who would rather skimp or burden their children
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Draft security publication looks at cell phones, PDAs
PDAs are offering more and more features, and more people now use them; NIST publishes a draft guidelines on security considerations for cell phones and PDAs
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The crisis of U.S. infrastructure, II
The U.S. infrastructure is elaborate — 4 million miles of roads, 600,000 bridges, 26,000 miles of commercially navigable waterways, 11,000 miles of transit lines, 500 train stations, 300 ports, 19,000 airports, 55,000 community drinking water systems, and 30,000 wastewater plants; maintaining this infrastructure costs money
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AMEC-led consortium to clean up Sellafield
Treating and cleaning nuclear waste is part and parcel of nuclear power generation; The U.K. government, a proponent of greater reliance on nuclear power, takes steps to deal with legacy waste problems
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GAO strongly criticizes DoE over Hanford clean-up
More than 210 million liters of radioactive and chemical waste are stored in 177 underground tanks at Hanford in Washington State; most are more than fifty years old; GAO says there now “serious questions about the tanks’ long-term viability”
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Smart-card manufacturers sues to suppress security flaw information
NXP Semiconductors is suing Radboud University Nijmegen to prevent university researchers from presenting a paper in an October conference on IT security; paper in question details serious security flaws in the company’s RFID chip
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Alternative fuels for the aviation industry
Rolls-Royce, British Airways collaborate on developing and testing alternative fuels for aviation; testing is expected to be complete by the end of March 2009, after which the results will be analyzed and reported
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The long view
Virtual Models Paving the Way for Advanced Nuclear Reactors
Computer models predict how reactors will behave, helping operators make decisions in real time. The digital twin technology using graph-neural networks may boost nuclear reactor efficiency and reliability.