Changing Cities: Ending Hawaii’s Oil Addiction

ABC News, by Carrie Halperin, Jul 15, 2012

(Carrie Halperin/ABC News)

When you think of the most innovative places around the world for clean-tech, Denmark, where 50 percent of the energy comes from wind, might come to mind. Or maybe you’d think of Iceland, which is almost nearly 100 percent powered off geothermal, or perhaps Germany, which recently set a new world record in power generated from solar, but Hawaii?

U.S. Pacific Command is working closely with Hawaii, the most oil addicted state in the nation, to ensure that the Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative, a plan launched in 2008 to reduce the state’s consumption of fossil fuels by 70 percent by 2030 is a success.

“Pacific Command accounts for 20 percent of the island’s energy demand, so Hawaii needed Pacific Command to sign on to make the Clean Energy Initiative work,” Joelle Simonpietri senior analyst to U.S. Pacific Command Energy Office joint innovation and experimentation division told ABC News.

The military is using the Hawaiian islands as a test bed for new green tech innovation — everything from algae-based jet fuels and hydrogen fuel cell technology to smart-grids that can resist cyber terror.

Some of these efforts will be showcased on July 18, when the Navy tests a carrier strike force using alternative fuels during the six-week, 22-nation Rim of the Pacific exercises, the largest annual global naval maneuvers.

The ships and aircraft will be powered by alternative fuel, either nuclear or advanced biofuel blends. The biofuel blends are 50-50 mixtures of biofuel (made from used cooking oil and algae) and petroleum-based marine diesel or aviation fuel.

The new “Green Fleet” is not without its critics.

Conservative lawmakers came out this month in opposition to the U.S. military’s use of advanced biofuels, claiming that they are concerned about the cost of these new, nonoil fuels. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said, “I don’t believe we can afford it.”

The Navy purchased 450,000 gallons of biofuels for $12 million in 2011 for the maneuver — $26 per gallon.

Pacific Command contends that the need to invest in biofuels is evident.

“The Department of Defense’s military expenditures on fuel is about $15 billion,  3 billion of that was unbudgeted simply because of the change in the price of fuel,” Simonpietri said. “The reasons for using biofuels, from a military utility point of view, is for national economic security, it’s part of the interest of the nation, and really having different options that can address price volatility.”

Connecting the Islands

Beyond the military’s efforts, the state — which currently imports 90 percent of its energy in the form of oil — is proposing a mega-construction project to build an underwater cable connecting renewable energy projects on the islands.

“Hawaii is taking on renewable energy and using that as a solution to really reduce our vulnerability to imported oil,” Mark Glick, Hawaii’s energy administrator, told ABC News.

“Our (current) power generation comes from low sulfur fuel oil powered plants,” Glick said.  “We’re trying to replace power generation which accounts for 30 percent of our energy with renewable energy sources.”

Hawaii Gov. Neil Abercrombie signed the undersea cable bill into law on June 27. The measure puts in place a regulatory framework that would pave the way for the islands to share power through an undersea high voltage network connecting the islands’ renewable energy sources including wind, solar, geothermal and tidal power.

According to a Department of Energy study, the high-voltage undersea cable interconnection project will cost $16 billion to complete, most of which is projected to come from the private sector. To put it into perspective, Hawaii currently spends $5 billion a year importing oil.

Critics of the underwater sea cables between the islands argue it would turn neighbor islands into industrial areas serving Honolulu’s population and that Oahu should look at energy conservation as a first step.

Becoming the Model for Energy Innovation

Since Hawaii’s goals of a 70 percent reduction of fossil fuels was announced, dozens of renewable energy projects have been proposed and employment and jobs in the clean-tech sector have sharply increased.

“Twenty percent of construction jobs in Hawaii are now in the installation of solar photovoltaics,” Glick said.

Several factors have allowed the state to forge ahead. A law that requires all new homes install solar hot water heating, and great tax rebates are helping Hawaii move toward a cleaner energy grid.

Hawaii has the second most solar photovoltaic systems, as well as the most EV’s and charging spots per capita in the country, and it’s also forging ahead on its efforts to increase the percentage of its electrical production with renewable power.

“Looking at all the options her in Hawaii, we have the sun, we have geothermal, wind, possibly wave, all the resources for us available in Hawaii,” Kekoa Kuluhiwa, director of external affairs for First Wind, a wind power company based in Hawaii told ABC News. “I sincerely hope there will be a day when we are completely free from importing fuel for our energy needs.”

Seven billion people and climbing, but not everywhere

Deutsch Welle, 11 July 2012

More than 7,057,608,000 are expected to be alive on earth by the end of World Population Day this Wednesday. The global population is still growing overall, but demographic discrepancies are widening.

More than 7 billion people inhabit planet earth, with the overall growth continuing unabated on World Population Day.

According to figures from DSW, the German world population foundation, the number of people on earth rises by 2.6 per second, 158 per minute, over 225,000 per day, or almost 83 million per year.

Modern population growth is fueled primarily by Africa, Asia and Latin America, while populations are steady - or even sinking - in much of Europe.

DSW estimates that the number of people in Africa will increase more than threefold this century, reaching around 3.5 billion.

A spokeswoman for the DSW foundation, Ute Stallmeister, told the dapd news agency that this was largely owing to the number of unplanned births in Africa. World leaders will convene in the British capital on Wednesday for the London Summit on Family Planning, which hopes to raise $4 billion (3.25 billion euros) to give an additional 120 million women access to contraception by 2020.

The UN estimates that 220 million women in the developing world do not want children, but also cannot access contraception. The cause has attracted high-profile patrons such as Microsoft mogul Bill Gates.

"Because we didn't have contraception or family planning on the agenda, we weren't putting new money into it," Gates said in an interview with the Reuters news agency. "We weren't saying this is a priority. So this is our moment in time to say this is a priority and we need to fund it."

Countries like Germany, on the other hand, are dealing with lower birth rates and higher life expectancies, with the population dropping slightly even after being bolstered by immigration.

"It's a challenge of historic dimensions, because the number of people of employment age will drop by about 30 percent by 2050," social scientist Steffen Kröhner told Germany's ARD broadcaster in an interview. "I wouldn't class it as a catastrophe. But we will have to say farewell to a lot of things, not least the idea of perpetually increasing wealth. And we will need to come up with totally new ways of thinking when it comes to pensions, healthcare, and infrastructure in more sparsely populated rural areas."

msh/jm (dpad, Reuters)

Related Articles:

Melinda Gates challenges Vatican by vowing to improve contraception

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"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

“…  3 - Longer Life is Going to Happen, But…

Here is one that is a review. We keep bringing it up because Humans don't believe it. If you're going to start living longer, there are those who are frightened that there will be overpopulation. You've seen the way it is so far, and the geometric progression of mathematics is absolute and you cannot change it. So if you look at the population of the earth and how much it has shifted in the last two decades, it's frightening to you. What would change that progression?

The answer is simple, but requires a change in thinking. The answer is a civilization on the planet who understands a new survival scenario. Instead of a basic population who has been told to have a lot of children to enhance the race [old survival], they begin to understand the logic of a new scenario. The Akashic wisdom of the ages will start to creep in with a basic survival scenario shift. Not every single woman will look at herself and say, "The clock is ticking," but instead can say, "I have been a mother 14 times in a row. I'm going to sit this one out." It's a woman who understands that there is no loss or guilt in this, and actually feels that the new survival attribute is to keep the family small or not at all! Also, as we have said before, even those who are currently ignorant of population control will figure out what is causing babies to be born [Kryon joke].

Part of the new Africa will be education and healing, and eventually a zero population growth, just like some of the first-world nations currently have. Those who are currently tied to a spiritual doctrine will actually have that doctrine changed (watch for it) regarding Human birth. Then they will be able to make free choice that is appropriate even within the establishment of organized religion. You see, things are going to change where common sense will say, "Perhaps it would help the planet if I didn't have children or perhaps just one child." Then the obvious, "Perhaps I can exist economically better and be wiser with just one. It will help the one!" Watch for these changes. For those of you who are steeped in the tradition of the doctrines and would say that sounds outrageously impossible, I give you the new coming pope [Kryon smile]. For those of you who feel that uncontrolled procreation is inevitable, I encourage you to see statistics you haven't seen or didn't care to look at yet about what first-world countries have already accomplished on their own, without any mandates. It's already happening. That was number three.….”

"The Recalibration of the Perception of the Future"– Jun 23, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll)

"The Recalibration of Awareness – Apr 20/21, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll)(Subjects: Old Energy, Recalibration Lectures, God / Creator, Religions/Spiritual systems (Catholic Church, Priests/Nun’s, Worship, John Paul Pope, Women in the Church otherwise church will go, Current Pope won’t do it), Middle East, Jews, Governments will change (Internet, Media, Democracies, Dictators, North Korea, Nations voted at once), Integrity (Businesses, Tobacco Companies, Bankers/ Financial Institutes, Pharmaceutical company to collapse), Illuminati (Based in Greece, Shipping, Financial markets, Stock markets, Pharmaceutical money (fund to build Africa to develop)), Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Women, Masters to/already come back, Global Unity.... etc.)

Australia declares Tanami 'largest' conservation zone

BBC News, 11 July 2012

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The endangered bilby, a marsupial,
can be found in Australia's Tanami
Desert

Australia has declared more than 10 million hectares (24.71 million acres) of Aboriginal land as its largest conservation zone.

The southern Tanami Desert in the Northern Territory is home to the country's most endangered species.

The survival of these animals has come under threat from pests like feral cats and foxes. Fires are also a threat to the area.

Indigenous rangers will now work to protect the area.

The new conservation zone - said to be Australia's largest - encompasses deserts and savannas.

The designation follows four years of discussions between the government, Aboriginal organisations and environmentalists.

Aboriginal groups are tasked with managing the Indigenous Protected Area (IPA). Their duties include protecting endangered species like the bilby, a small marsupial, and the great desert skink, a burrowing lizard.

Aside from boosting employment, tribal leaders say the conservation agreement will also help sustain their way of life, says the BBC's Phil Mercer.

Land lies at the heart of Aboriginal culture, where the Earth is considered to be the mother of creation, our correspondent adds.

Related Article:

Southern Africa form biggest conservation area

AP IMPACT: Building costs rise at US nuclear sites

Associated Press, by Ray Henry, Jul. 10, 2012

FILE- In this Feb. 15, 2012 file pool photo, the Unit 3 nuclear island where a new
 nuclear reactor will sit is seen before a visit by U.S. Secretary of Energy  Secretary
Steven Chu at the Vogtle nuclear power plant in  Waynesboro,  Ga. Vogtle initially
estimated to cost $14 billion, has run into over $800 million in extra charges related 
to licensing delays. A state monitor has said bluntly that co-owner, Southern Co.
 can’t stick to its budget. The plant, whose first reactor was supposed to be operational
 by April 2016, is now delayed seven months.(AP Photo/David Goldman, Pool, File)

ATLANTA (AP) — America's first new nuclear plants in more than a decade are costing billions more to build and sometimes taking longer to deliver than planned, problems that could chill the industry's hopes for a jumpstart to the nation's new nuclear age.

The Process: From Atom to Outlet

Licensing delay charges, soaring construction expenses and installation glitches as mundane as misshapen metal bars have driven up the costs of three plants in Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina, from hundreds of millions to as much as $2 billion, according to an Associated Press analysis of public records and regulatory filings.

Those problems, along with jangled nerves from last year's meltdown in Japan and the lure of cheap natural gas, could discourage utilities from sinking cash into new reactors, experts said. The building slowdown would be another blow to the so-called nuclear renaissance, a drive over the past decade to build 30 new reactors to meet the country's growing power needs. Industry watchers now say that only a handful will be built this decade.

"People are looking at these things very carefully," said Richard Lester, head of the department of nuclear science and engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Inexpensive gas alone, he said, "is casting a pretty long shadow over the prospects" for construction of new nuclear plants.

The AP's review of pending projects found:

— Plant Vogtle in eastern Georgia, initially estimated to cost $14 billion, has run into over $800 million in extra charges related to licensing delays. A state monitor has said bluntly that co-owner Southern Co. can't stick to its budget. The plant, whose first reactor was supposed to be operational by April 2016, is now delayed seven months.

— The long-mothballed Watts Bar power plant in central Tennessee, initially budgeted at $2.5 billion, will cost up to $2 billion more , the Tennessee Valley Authority concluded this spring. The utility said its initial budget underestimated how much work was needed to finish the plant and wasted money by not completing more design work before starting construction. The project had been targeted to finish in 2012, but has been postponed until 2015.

— Plant Summer in South Carolina, expected to cost $10.4 billion, has seen costs jump by $670 million; but with lower interest rates and cheaper-than-expected labor; the owners assert the project is still on or under budget. A deadline to put the first new reactor online has been delayed from 2016 to 2017; the second reactor is now eight months ahead of schedule, targeted for early 2018.

Southern Co. and others in the nuclear business say cost overruns are expected in projects this complex, and that they are balanced out by other savings over the life of the plant. Southern Co. expects Plant Vogtle will cost $2 billion less to operate over its 60-year lifetime than initially projected because of anticipated tax breaks and historically low interest rates.

Regulators have been trying to make it easier to build, encouraging the use of off-the-shelf reactor designs that get approval in advance. New construction techniques are supposed to require less in-the-field assembly, making building quicker and reducing human error. Interest rates and labor costs have been down after a bruising recession.

"It's a down environment economically," said Steve Byrne, president of generation and transmission for SCANA's South Carolina Electric & Gas Co., one of the utilities building Plant Summer's reactors. "It's terrible for the country, but it's a great time to be building" a nuclear facility.

But the economy is also working against progress on new construction. The next company in line to build, Progress Energy, has pushed back construction plans for two reactors in Florida because of the economy, low demand and extremely cheap natural gas. It expects its first new reactor to be finished in 2024.

The plants burning natural gas are far cheaper to build than nuclear power plants. But utility executives say they need a diversified mix of power plants, including nuclear, because relying too heavily on a single fuel like natural gas backfires if prices go up.

The rising construction costs hit an industry already under financial pressure, after meltdowns last year at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant after a tsunami in Japan. NRG Energy wrote off a $481 million investment in two planned reactors in Texas shortly after the accident, citing uncertainties after the Japanese disaster. Other utilities still seeking to build have said they expect the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission will adopt new safety rules in response to the accident; they cannot predict the exact costs.

Industry leaders say the soaring costs could threaten projects that are worth the investment, and send the wrong message to the public.

"It's important to get this project done right because if every time we build a nuclear plant we go substantially over budget, ratepayers will begin to believe we can't do a nuclear project on budget," said Tim Echols, a nuclear power proponent who chairs Georgia's Public Service Commission.

An earlier push to expand the reach of nuclear power in the 1970s was thwarted by a number of obstacles: Electric companies overestimated demand and designed plants they didn't need. They had trouble managing massive construction workforces. Utilities designed nuclear plants as they built, leading to mistakes and slowdowns. Interest rates skyrocketed and the 1979 meltdown at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania forced plant operators to meet new rules at additional costs.

To win approval to build at Plant Vogtle, Southern Co. had to promise it would build its plant on budget, particularly as state officials remembered the massive cost overruns that occurred when it built the plant's two existing reactors, said Robert Baker, a former utility regulator who has criticized the project.

The utility has been authorized to spend just over $6.1 billion as its share of the estimated $14 billion project, which was tracking under budget at the end of last year.

Southern Co. is about seven months behind schedule, mostly because of the federal approval process for the reactor, according to company executives and filings. Southern Co. also faced delays in getting an important license allowing it to start building the guts of the plant.

Another, less exotic problem at Vogtle: At one point, workers built metal bars straight rather than curved, as regulators had directed, so Southern Co. had to rip them out and replace them. Crews in South Carolina, watching the progress at Vogtle, have halted the construction of those bars.

Plant Vogtle's designers and builders — Westinghouse Electric Co. and The Shaw Group Inc. — want Southern Co. to pay an additional $400 million for the licensing delays, according to a May report filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Southern Co. subsidiary Georgia Power, which owns nearly half the new plant, denies responsibility for those costs and is negotiating on behalf of all the owners. Financial information divulged by three companies who own 98 percent of the project show $838 million in potential charges.

It is unclear how much this could cost the utility's 2.4 million customers. Southern Co. earlier estimated typical residential customers would see a $10 increase in their monthly bills when both reactors are producing power in 2018. Utility regulators ultimately set the rates.

Similar issues have played out in central South Carolina, where SCANA Corp. and Santee Cooper won permission to build two reactors at Plant Summer, about 25 miles north of Columbia. SCANA agreed to pay $138 million in March to settle claims over licensing delays raised by the companies designing and building the reactor. Santee Cooper will pay nearly $113 million as its share of those costs, company officials said.

In May, SCANA asked utility regulators to raise its base spending on the project by $283 million, which includes the settlement related to licensing delays and extra costs for cyber security and staffing. However, the company said it will stay within its existing budget because it expects other expenses to be lower.

Supplying parts efficiently for the new reactors has also proved difficult. William Jacobs Jr., the state monitor hired by Georgia utility regulators, has publicly questioned whether a factory run by The Shaw Group can master quality control rules and deliver parts on time. NRC inspectors have faulted the facility for failing to maintain accurate records on the qualifications of workers. SCANA Corp. raised similar concerns.

Shaw spokeswoman Gentry Brann said the company has addressed the NRC's concerns.

In Tennessee, internal reviews faulted the Tennessee Valley Authority for not providing enough oversight on the project and for allowing a culture to develop that discouraged the sharing of bad news, for example, site problems that led to delays. Not enough engineering work was finished before construction started, meaning construction workers sometimes did not have enough work to do.

In an embarrassing episode, the TVA temporarily stopped work at the site in January after two mishaps revealed safety problems. No one was injured, and the operating plant did not experience any problems. In one case, workers removed a cable connected to equipment in the working reactor. In another, they cut out valves before getting proper clearance and verifying the system was safe.

Changes have been made to bring the project under control, said Mike Skaggs, who became the authority's senior vice president of nuclear construction in October. He said the TVA has carefully evaluated the remaining work on the reactor, slimmed down its workforce and made instructions to work crews easier to understand.

Skaggs has been involved in building two other nuclear plants and said the project requires constant monitoring.

"If you've got a good estimate, you use the estimate as a roadmap to complete the project," Skaggs said. "What I'm most worried about is the assumptions we've made in the estimate — are they ringing out true?"

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"Update on Current Events" – Jul 23, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: The Humanization of God, Gaia, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Benevolent Design, Financial Institutes (Recession, System to Change ...), Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Nuclear Power Revealed, Geothermal Power, Hydro Power, Drinking Water from Seawater, No need for Oil as Much, Middle East in Peace, Persia/Iran Uprising, Muhammad, Israel, DNA, Two Dictators to fall soon, Africa, China, (Old) Souls, Species to go, Whales to Humans, Global Unity,..... etc.)

"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Lose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.)

German town turns wind power into a community business

Deutsche Welle, 4 July 2012

Germany’s shift toward alternative energy has seen wind parks pop up around the country. Not everyone wants a power plant in their own backyard. But in Schlalach, the wind park has become a part of town life.

In Schlalach-Mühlenfließ, a small town in the German region of Brandenburg, 16 gigantic wind turbines stretch into the air. Every tower has huge, rotating blades and a height of close to 180 meters. Elsewhere in Germany, locals have complained that new wind parks are ruining the scenery. In Germany, critics often compare wind turbines to asparagus rising into the sky. There have been massive protests as local communities have tried stop turbine construction projects from going ahead. 

Critics say the turbines 

destroy the landscape

But that’s not the case in Schlalach-Mühlenfließ. Here, locals are proud of their wind park, which produces 60 times more electricity than the town of 1,000 inhabitants needs for its own purposes. "We are fine, there is hardly any tension here," says Peter Hahn, who lives in the town and co-founded a local group called ‘Wind Power in Schlalach’. He says that getting everyone to agree on the wind park took a lot of hard work.

Promoting community power

Right at the beginning of the project, recalls Peter Hahn, they encountered their biggest challenge. "In 2002, this area here was declared suitable for wind energy projects," he says, pointing at vast fields that lie between the village and a motorway.

"About ten operating companies suddenly arrived. They wanted contracts with the people who owned the patches of land." But they realized that the best land for wind turbines wasn’t owned by large-scale farmers. The best plots belong to about 100 small farms in this region. "We had to find some sort of agreement," explains Hahn. 

Members of Wind Power in Schlalach

That’s how the ‘Wind Power in Schlalach’ working group came to life. Anyone who wanted to discuss the pros and cons of building a wind park in Schlalach could join. "We asked all the owners not to sign any contracts. We went for a proper call for tenders instead," says Hahn.

Hartmut Höpfner, another member of the working group, approached wind park development companies. He received 20 replies and the group set to work looking for the most suitable candidate. "Half the developers wouldn’t have been able to go through with their plans if you look at the difficulties of such a project, such as electricity transfer from the turbines and the long years of getting clearance for it,” he explains.

Setting up 16 wind turbines between 2010 and 2011 cost some
62 million euros

Ten of the firms which originally showed interest have since ceased to exist. "You have to carefully choose who you want to work with," is Hahn’s advice to anyone planning a similar project.

Locals help out

In the end, Schlalach opted for Enercon, the biggest manufacturer of wind power plants in Germany. Setting up 16 wind turbines between 2010 and 2011 cost some 62 million euros. Enercon founded a new subsidiary, in charge of both building and running the park. Vera Sibler, the project manager, came to visit the town every three months to meet with the wind power working group. Sibler says it was important "for the people to have the feeling that they were part of the process". 

Project developer Vera Sibler,
right, attended a wind park party
in Schlalach

People in Schlalach played an important role in planning the wind park. They even decided on the wind turbine model together. "Our local car mechanic gave us an assessment of which plants are the best," says Hahn proudly. Project developer Sibler supports citizen participation. "It makes the work more strenuous," she says, "but you also get more satisfaction from it."

The real challenge for the Schlalach working group was convincing land owners that a wind park was a good idea. They developed a what is called a ‘pooled space model’. It guarantees that the leasing income from the wind turbine locations is distributed fairly between property owners. The operating company pays an annual leasing fee of around 18,000 euros for a plant with a 2 megawatt capacity. 

Peter Hahn spent years
building community support

The people of Schlalach decided this sum wouldn’t be paid out to each individual, but put into a common fund. Over the coming years, the annual sum flowing into the fund will amount to more than 300,000 euros. Anyone owning a patch of land that belongs to the wind park receives a fixed share of the lease, in relation to the size of their property. The pooled space model guarantees that every single property owner receives an annual leasing income of about 3,000 euros.

Everyone benefits

But this clever system alone wouldn’t have guaranteed the success of the wind park. Not all people in Schlalach are property owners. So, Peter Hahn, Hartmut Höpfner and their working group tried to get those people on board who aren’t directly involved in the wind park but who have to look at buzzing rotor blades.

They set up a citizens’ foundation, which receives a small share of the income generated by the wind park. These funds go into local projects such as youth programs and road repairs. In addition, the community will benefit from the taxes generated by the wind park. 

Schlalach will benefit from taxes
generated by the park

“We made sure that the taxes are paid here in our community,” says Hahn. If all goes according to plan, during their 20 years’ running time, the 16 plants will account for some 3.3 billion euros of tax income. Regional companies are to take over the maintenance of the wind turbines and look after the surrounding fields they stand on.

Once the income is secured for both property owners and the community, the members of Wind Power in Schlalach have a dream for the future. With their own capital of 800,000 euros per wind turbine, they plan to buy into the operating company Enercon. That would guarantee even more direct income for this small town, where turbines are welcome.

Author: Richard A. Fuchs / nh

Editor: Saroja Coelho

Related Article:

The global boom in wind energy

Higgs boson: it's unofficial! Cern scientists discover missing particle

'God particle' that gives mass to the universe thought to have been found in Large Hadron Collider, announce scientists

guardian.co.uk, Ian Sample at Cern, Geneva, Wednesday 4 July 2012

A representation of traces of a proton-proton collision in the search for the
 Higgs boson, released by the European Organisation for Nuclear Research
(Cern). Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

There comes a time in a scientist's life when the weight of evidence can no longer be ignored. That moment came today for physicists at Cern, near Geneva, home of the Large Hadron Collider, who announced overwhelming evidence for the obscure but profoundly important Higgs boson, the particle that sparked the greatest hunt in modern science.

In presentations given to a packed auditorium at the laboratory on Wednesday morning, and webcast around the world, the leaders of two research teams, who worked independently of each other, said they had spotted a new particle amid the microscopic flashes of primordial fire created inside the world's most powerful atom smasher.

Cern stopped short of claiming official discovery of the Higgs boson, even as many physicists conceded the evidence was now so compelling they had surely found the missing particle.

Formal confirmation of the discovery is expected within months, though it could take several years for scientists to work out whether they have found the simplest kind of Higgs particle that theories predict, or part of a more complex picture: for example, one of a larger family of Higgs bosons. The discovery of more than one kind of Higgs particle would open the door to an entirely new realm of physics.

"Is it a Higgs boson or not? Well, it has been found using techniques tuned for the Standard Model Higgs. A different object might have stepped in, but it is quite unlikely in my humble opinion," said Tommaso Dorigo, a scientist on the CMS experimental team at Cern. The Standard Model Higgs boson is the most simplest proposed version of particle.

The queue for the auditorium left some physicists struggling for a seat to hear the announcement. Those inside broke into applause when Peter Higgs, the 83-year-old father of the particle, entered the room. "Cern should really build a larger auditorium. The present one is nice and cosy, but it is embarrassing and sad to see many distinguished colleagues queueing up at five in the morning knowing that they have a slim chance to get a seat, after working for 20 years on finding the Higgs boson," said Dorigo.

Scientists and engineers at the lab, many exhausted from working round the clock in recent weeks, clapped and whistled as Joe Incandela and Fabiola Gianotti, the respective heads of the Large Hadron Collider detector teams called CMS and Atlas, presented their results for the first time. Both teams saw the particle, which has a mass of around 125 to 126 GeV, about 130 times the mass of a proton.

"It's hard not to get excited by these results," said Cern research director, Sergio Bertolucci.

The lab's director general, Rolf Dieter Heuer, said: "We have reached a milestone in our understanding of nature." He later added: "As a layman I would now say I think we have it" – meaning the Higgs.

They have worked hard and long for this day. The particle, which is unlike any other known to exist, was proposed 48 years ago, when physicists worked on the laws of nature with pen and paper instead of the sleek, high-end laptops they carry around today. The hunt has spanned decades and occupied thousands of researchers from tens of countries. For some, this has been their life's work.

There is never a bad time for good news, but Cern will be relieved to have made the breakthrough before the machine shuts down for almost two years at the end of 2012, when engineers move in to carry out work for the accelerator to run at its full design energy.

The discovery of the Higgs particle ranks as one of the most important scientific advances of the past 100 years. It proves there is an invisible energy field that pervades the vacuum of the known universe. This field is thought to give mass to the smallest building blocks of matter, the quarks and electrons that make up atoms. Without the field, or something like it, there would be no planets, stars, or life as we know it.

While scientists work to understand the new particle, the discovery raises a quandary for the Nobel committee that must now decide who deserves credit for the work. Traditionally, Nobel prizes go to no more than three people, but six physicists published papers on the theory in 1964, and others laid important groundwork beforehand or developed the theory later.

Peter Higgs at Edinburgh University was the first to point out in 1964 that a new particle, the eponymous boson, was a by-product of the mass-giving field. That was a crucial step, because it gave scientists a smoking gun to hunt for in their experiments. One of the original gang of six, Robert Brout at the Free University in Brussels, died last year. The others are Francois Englert from Belgium, Tom Kibble from the UK, and Dick Hagen and Gerry Guralnik in the US.

Peter Higgs said: "I am astounded at the amazing speed with which these results have emerged. They are a testament to the expertise of the researchers and the elaborate technologies in place.

"I never expected this to happen in my lifetime and shall be asking my family to put some champagne in the fridge."

According to the theory, all of the particles in the newborn universe were massless and hurtled around at the speed of light. But one trillionth of a second after the big bang, the Higgs field switched on, turning the vacuum of space into a kind of cosmic glue.

Some particles feel the Higgs field more than others. The quarks that make up atomic nuclei feel a lot of drag from the field, and become heavy for subatomic particles. Others, such as electrons, feel less drag and gain much less weight. Particles of light, called photons, feel no drag at all, and so remain massless and keep moving at the speed of light.

To find the Higgs particle, physicists at Cern sifted through the subatomic debris of more than 1,000 trillion proton collisions inside the Large Hadron Collider. Occasionally, these collisions might create a Higgs boson, which immediately disintegrates into more familiar particles. To spot the boson, the scientists have to look for unusual excesses of the particles it decays into, which appear as bumps in their data.

Particle physicists use a "sigma" scale to rank the certainty of their results which ranges from one to five. One and two sigma results come and go and are often no more than statistical fluctuations in the data. A three sigma result counts as an official "observation", but five sigma is usually needed to claim a discovery, amounting to less than a one in a million chance that it is wrong.

Evidence for the Higgs boson has risen sharply in the past seven months. In December, the Atlas and CMS teams at Cern reported what appeared to be hints of a Higgs particle weighing about 125gigaelectronvolts (GeV), roughly 130 times heavier than a proton.

On Wednesday, that evidence became overwhelming. The Atlas team reported a particle at 126.5GeV with a confidence of five sigma, while the CMS team found a particle with a mass of 125.3 GeV with a 4.9 sigma confidence.

At the end of the announcement, the room erupted into a standing ovation of whoops, cheers and whistles. Peter Higgs, reached for a tissue and wiped a tear from his eye.

Higgs boson: The poetry of 

subatomic particles

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"Spiritual Logic" - Oct 15 2011 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) 

(Subjects: Benevolent Design, Channelling, Holy scriptures, Higher self, (Old) Souls, Universes, Big Bang, Galaxy/Solar system build for life, Astronomy, Life on Earth tried to start 5 times/ 5th time life started, Large Animals/No Humans,  Asteroid belt, 7 Sisters / 100.000 year ago Pleiadian Brothers and Sisters seeded Humans on earth, DNA, Humans Ascensiont with Pleiadian DNA, Lemuria (Hawaii), 21-12-2012, 26.000 years cycle, 1987 - Harmonic Convergence (11:11), Shift of Human Consciousness, Gaia, The Humanization of God, 1991 Russia falls, 1994 started 36 years galactic window (Precession), Mid point on 21-12-2012, Lemuria (Hawaii) center of the Earth time,  Love (Mother & Child),  Religion, Higher self, Global Unity,..... etc.)

"Recalibration of Knowledge" – Jan 14, 2012 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: Channelling, God-Creator, Benevolent Design, New Energy, Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Reincarnation, Gaia, Old Energies (Africa,Terrorists, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela ... ), Weather, Rejuvenation, Akash, Nicolas Tesla / Einstein, Cold Fusion, Magnetics, Lemuria, Atomic Structure (Electrons, Particles, Polarity, Self Balancing, Magnetism, Higgs Boson), Entanglement, "Life is necessary for a Universe to exist and not the other way around", DNA, Humans (Baby getting ready, First Breath, Stem Cells, Embryonic Stem Cells, Rejuvenation), Global Unity, ... etc.) - (Text Version)

"All About the Grids"– Apr 14, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll)

"Advanced Concepts"– Apr 15, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll)

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