Category: Categories, Posts & Discussions

This BLOG “sustain-earth” is an In-clusive, Inter-active, Inter-disciplinary and Inter-sectorial platform to implement “Sustainability and Applied Sustainability” in all sectors, on all levels and anywhere. It is, also, a market-oriented platform for transforming “Sustainability and Applied Sustainability”, from individual, narrow and fragmented understanding to a holistic and applied prospective. The search of man for secured living confronted with fundamental life processes on earth and resulted in major threats endangering the land-water resources and the very survival of life.

The “BLOG” is constructed in two parts: Part (1) is a “theoretical and knowledge-based one”; and Part (2) is a “practical and applied one”. Both parts are inter-related and supplement each other where Part (1) “Categories, posts & Discussions” explains the theoretical background upon which Part (2) “Pages & Note-board” is based. Both parts are spanning over all national sectors (private, public and governmental) and involve, also, inter-governmental organizations and relevant international bodies. Furthermore, the structure and built-in dynamics of the “BLOG” seek the integration of individuals, groups, companies, organizations, communities, societies, ….. etc. on both horizontal and vertical levels. The motivation, goal and vision are to bring about coherent sustainable systems through linking together all building blocks. Sustainability, i.e. concepts and knowledge therein, is being explained in Part (1) while Part (2) is devoted to more Applied and practical issues for production, communication and services.

Through its Editorial Board and Guest Bloggers and contact points, the BLOG is acting as “Open Access” instrument for coupling education and research with market and society needs, and thereby supporting professionals, including young ones, for creating, improving and up-dating “Career Development Plans” to suit an ever dynamic and changeable labor market. It is an instrument for enhancing public awareness, promoting capacity building as well as for supporting the development and management of human resources and infra-structures for quality services in public and private sectors.

Technology and Innovation for Rural Sustainability

Appropriate and sustainable rural technologies are very rare as most of the global attention, driven by economical interests, is focused on urbanization. Such technologies are very poorly needed because of several reasons. They are, also, imperative for promoting successful long-term and large-scale sustainable urbanization. This is, even, essential in agricultural regions where rural communities are major parts of the national socio-economic structure, which is the case in many developing countries in particular Africa. This is at least necessary in the transition periods prior to large-scale and long-term transformation to urbanized societies where gradual, appropriate and sustainable integration of rural regions is necessary.

Urbanization has caused an accelerating drain of un-favored groups to mega and large cities (http://www.academia.edu/847075/Mexico_City._The_marginal_communities_social_and_ethnic_segregation_of_the_native_population). The random and rapid expansion of urbanized regions has promoted an ever accelerating pile-up of slum-communities in many regions around the world (http://www.schooljotter.com/showpage.php?id=158173) which indeed is not sustainable both from the economic and environmental perspective.

Some parts of the problem are associated with the negative impacts from global education, research and technology driven-policies around the world by being supported by national and international institutes and organizations including the United Nations and World Bank. Management of research, education and development programs fails to involve people from the developing countries to contribute in solving problems and difficulties in their native countries or at least to find partners from the developed countries willing to participate in solving the enormous problems and difficulties in this respect.

Fortunately, the global community started to recognize such problems and to take steps and  efforts, though limited in extent, for achieving successful socio-economic development that is very much related to reducing poverty and the associated impacts of environment and climatic threats. An innovative example “Ecological System Designs for the Indigenous Community of Maruata, Michoacan, Mexico” is given here where researchers from the developing countries are demonstrating how to bring about successful ecological designs for living better, cheaper and ecologically sustainable.

file:///Users/farid/Desktop/Indigenous%20Community%20of%20Maruata,%20Mexico%20(Design%20Example).webarchive

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World Largest Power Station – How Huge is Huge in River’s Technology?

The Three Gorges Dam represents the accumulated knowledge and know-how from all previous worldwide advances in dam technology including finding solutions for a wide-range of side effects apart from the main goal of generating power. It is the world’s largest power station in terms of installed capacity (22,500 MW), a hydroelectric dam that spans the Yangtze River by the town of Sandouping, located in Yiling District, Yichang, Hubei province, China. It has several innovations and integrated solutions. Except for a ship lift, the dam project was completed and fully functional as of July 4, 2012, when the last of the main turbines in the underground plant began production. The dam has 32 main turbines, each with a capacity of 700 MW,  and two other smaller generators (50 MW each), with total electric generating capacity of the dam is 22,500 MW. The dam is intended, also, to increase the Yangtze River’s shipping capacity and reduce the potential for floods downstream by providing flood storage space. A partial solution for problems associated with the transport of nutrients because of silting behind the dam is, also, taken in consideration. Chinese government regards the project as a historic engineering, social and economic success, with the design of state-of-the-art large turbines, and a move toward limiting greenhouse gas emissions.

 

For comparison with the largest twenty dams in the world a global and historical survey is summarized  in this document: http://largest-dams.blogspot.se

Published on 31 May 2013
Largest Dams in The World

 

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How Amazing is Amazing? – The Most Amazing Lakes In The World

10. Dead Sea (Bordered with Jordan, Israel and Palestine), its water is 9.6 times saltier than the ocean. No macroscopic living things can thrive in it and the high salinity makes life impossible to form with the exception of a very few bacteria and fungi. Because of the high salt concentration, the buoyancy of the water is so strong that a person cannot swim underwater and will push the body to float. The sea is also believed to have therapeutic powers to cure certain skin diseases.

9. Lake Berryessa Glory Hole, California. It is very important not only a tourist attraction but more so, it generates hydroelectricity. What makes it amazing is the bell-mouth spillway “Glory Hole” which is the largest of its kind with a diameter of 72 feet, a vertical drop of 200 feet and shrinks down to 28 feet. Once the water level reaches the maximum level, the spillway becomes submerged and it swallows excess water at unbelievable rate of 48,800 cubic feet per second.

8. Crater Lake, Oregon. It is formed during the collapse of Mount Mazama 7,700 years ago, 2,148 feet deep. It is considered the deepest in the United States and 7th or 9th deepest lake in the world. There are no rivers or any other bodies of water connected to the lake. Because of this, the water in the lake is considered one of the purest because of the absence of pollutants. The water is very clear and it has a visibility of up to 43.3 meters.

7. Lake Baikal, Siberia. Lake Baikal is a rift lake formed through continental crust being pulled apart. It is the deepest lake in the world with a depth of 1,642 meters (5,387 ft). Underneath the lake floor there is 7 kilometer of sediments placing the rift floor some 8-11 kilometers below the surface. Americans and Russian scientists studied the sediments with detailed climactic records dating as far back as 250,000 years. One of the most ancient lakes, its age is 25-30 million years.

6. Abraham Lake, Alberta, Canada. It is man-made lake in Alberta Canada. It is really beautiful during summer but what make it amazing is the frozen bubbles found underneath the lake during the winter season. These frozen bubbles are actually methane gas that is produced when bacteria at the bottom of the lake decomposes organic matter like animals, plants, and trees that died and sank to the bottom.

5. Taal Lake, Batangas, Philippines. It is a freshwater lake; it cradles the world’s smallest active decade volcano, the Taal volcano. The lake fills the Taal caldera which is a remnant and the spot where historical eruptions occurred dating back to 100,000 to 500,000 years ago. Within the Main crater lake is also a small island known as the Vulcan point. At 40 meters, Vulcan point is the world’s largest island within a lake (Main crater lake) on an island (Volcano Island) within a lake (Taal Lake) within an island (Luzon Island). It is confusing but that what makes it amazing…

4. Five Flower Lake, China. The Five-flower lake is one of the most popular and most beautiful lake among the lakes found in the Jiuzhaigou National Park in China. It is renowned worldwide and thousands of tourists visit it everyday. It lies at the end of the Peacock River at a height of 2,472 meters above sea level and has a depth of 5 meters only. This shallow lake reflects multiple colors and definitely a great sight to feast your eyes with. The bottom of the lake is littered with ancient trunks of trees crisscrossed everywhere.

3. Spotted Lake in British Columbia, Canada. The most notable feature of the lake is the multi-colored spots that are very visible and prominent even when viewed from the highway. The lake contains the world’s highest concentration of different minerals most notably, magnesium sulfate, calcium and sodium sulfates. The lake evaporates and during summer only the minerals remain and they form natural walkways in between and around the spots. It is also therapeutic and known to cure diseases. Fences preventing direct access protect the lake.

2.Lake Hillier (Pink lake) in Western Australia. It is famous for its pink color. It is really amazing in that it’s color is not derived from beta-carotene released by an algae when light penetrates the water; which is actually the case for Lake Retba in Africa and the Pink lake in Western Australia. These two lakes derive its color from the red pigment being produced by Dunaliella Salina and Halobacteria that use sunlight to create more energy. Unlike these two, the pink water of Lake Hillier is permanent even if water is taken from the lake and transferred to a different container.

1. Plitvice Lake in Croatia. It is inside the Plitvice National Park in Croatia, the largest national park in the country and the oldest in southeast Europe. It is considered the most beautiful lake worldwide because of it’s spectacular display of colors at different times of the day, at different angles of light and at different seasons. It was inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage in 1979 among the First Sites worldwide. Every year, more than 1.2 million tourists from all over the world visit it. It is most famous for its 16 lakes arranged in cascades.

http://purpleshadow13.hubpages.com/hub/10-Most-Amazing-Lakes-in-the-World

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Best Beaches, Water Quality and Wellbeing – Information, Pictures and Criteria.

Water quality is central for wellbeing of humans or at least for protection of health and preservation of quality of all forms of life. Water resources are not only an economic and industrial resource and the uses of water don’t stop for indoor household activities. Indeed, the urbanization of water as forced by economic, industrial and indoor household activities is forcing an ever-accelerating promotion of “production and consumption”. On global long-term perspective, this is posing an ever increasing degradation of the quality of natural water resources with severe negative impacts on the quality of life not only what regards inland freshwater water bodies but, also, all maritime coastal and offshore waters. Conservation and protection of the global water resources is a global long-term investment for many generations to come.

“Sustain-earth.com” will continue the describe the dimensions and threats of the ongoing urbanization of water resources where demonstrations will be given to the existing unlimited needs for taking in consideration the role of water for the wellbeing of humans in terms of health and recreation as well as conservation and protection of all forms of life on the planet.

Access and affordability of good water quality for recreation is among growing needs where the pressures and competition on water resources are enormous. Best Beaches in the world are very expessive and not easily accessible. Compact information and pictures of the world’s best beaches are given here in terms of criteria, weather, water, sand, facilities, access, visitor numbers, ….. etc : http://www.bugbog.com/beaches/best_beaches.html

We give few examples on efforts made for raising public awareness on the existing needs. The US “Guide to Finding a Clean Beach”: How to find out if a beach is tested for pollution and what authorities do if they find it; finding help online and at the local or state health departments; avoiding polluted beaches; ……. etc: “http://www.nrdc.org/water/oceans/ttw/guide.asp”. According to CNN 10% of water samples collected from U.S. beaches failed to meet the government benchmark for swimmer safety. It’s an icky thought, especially considering the popularity of several of the failing beaches included in the Natural Resources Defense Council’s “Testing the Waters”: http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/25/travel/beaches-water-quality-report/

For the UK, find out how clean the water is on beaches, in other bathing in England and Wales, and if there is a problem with pollution: https://www.gov.uk/quality-of-local-bathing-water. For Canada, Toronto has some of the best beaches in the world, this is verified by the Blue Flag Program. This internationally recognized program awards “blue flags” is directed to communities committed to maintaining high standards for water quality: http://app.toronto.ca/tpha/beaches.html

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Urbanization and Future Impacts of Water Treatment on Natural Waters

Without proper water treatment healthy life in out cities wouldn’t be possible. To further couple the importance of water treatment to other sectors in the society we need some background information. This is described at http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_treatment

Also, how drinking water is made and how water treatment plants function is explained in:

With this background information and with the expected prognoses that 70% of world population will be gradually moving to cities during the twenty first century it is not clear how water treatment plant would cope with the increasing waste that is generated from human consumption, i.e. household, agriculture and industry. Unlike solid waste, which is subject to sorting in some parts of the world, wasted water from urbanized areas carry an increasing number and amounts of pollutants in their end products, i.e. effluents and sludge. Though water treatment plants may be effective to provide good quality of water, wastewater treatment plants however are not as effective in removing whatever exist in wastewater. This means that the net effect of urbanization is an increasing production and injection of waste and pollution that is delivered to natural aquatic water systems. This would, of course, provide large-scale and long-term threats on ecological water, and life quality, and will have negative feedback effects on “raw” water that will be later used in water treatment plants.

In summary we have an accelerating internal urbanization of water that generates waste and pollution as end products to be injected and delivered to the main natural global water cycle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Urbanized Water – Evolution, Threats and Feedback Impacts on Natural Water

Natural fresh water, does it exist? We used to have high quality natural waters but this was probably more than a couple of thousand of years ago, i.e. just before the Roman Empire. Natural fresh waters are very hard to find nowadays, only in remote regions far away from human impacts, e.g. frozen water in polar areas or some fossil water somewhere underground.

The Romans invented the culture of urban water systems that exist today in our cities around the world. Gravity-fed systems distribute water, from water treatment plants, around cities and ultimately dispose wastewater in underground sewer networks. From the Romans time until today urban water systems went through major transformation forced difficulties originated from: water shortages during the Romans; cholera outbreaks in the Industrial Revolution; and most recently polluted surface water systems (lakes, rivers, …… ), e.g. in Europe and the US that accelerated shortly after WWII. We are now facing more and more complex web of serious threats on natural waters due to the rapid technological and economical advances of the past century, the growing world population and an accelerating “production-consumption” wheel as a result of many emerging economies. Climate change, pile-up of pollution and waste, aging urban water systems (both water and wastewater), various types of peaks in particular energy- and water-related ones, constrains in world economy and geo-political conflicts. You name it.

In this post “Sustain-earth.com” gives some background information of the evolution of urbanized waters and problems associated with wastewater treatment. In coming posts other urbanization-related issues will be given, in particular water treatment processes and the importance of the quality of natural waters on such processes.

Here is some description of how urbane water systems developed and the situation many cities are facing today. Urban water systems are starting to break down with these problems: 1) water infrastructure needs costly upgrades; 2) many sewer systems are becoming overloaded; 3) water scarcity appearing in drought-prone areas. Some possible fixes are, also, given: Water recycling, desalination, decentralization: http://www.vox.com/2014/10/6/6900959/water-systems-pollution-drinking-water-desalination

Wastewater Treatment Plants have impacts on the water quality of natural waters and there are growing fears that they are acting as pollution factories: http://www.riles.org/musings.htm

Also additional background information on how typical wastewater treatment plants work: http://water.usgs.gov/edu/wwvisit.html see also this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OocKzAowo_0&app=desktop

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Bottled Water And Tap Water – How Good is Good? How Clean Is Clean?

Quality of drinking water, and the water for household uses, is constantly and frequently showing up as daily public concern around the world and it is indeed a serious problem of increasing dimensions.

It is a historical daily pain in Africa where people spend long time searching, collecting and also transporting water long ways. It is not only a headache and troublesome issue for millions of people in Africa but a constant source of threat as water is an effective media for conveying and spreading diseases. What is much more serious is the degradation in the quality of the natural water resources. If the “raw” water in natural systems, e.g. rivers, lakes and marine coasts, and to some extent groundwater, is contaminated then how would it be possible to get access to, at least, affordable drinking water? How would it be possible to manage other household uses?

What happens, and still happening, in Africa started to be a global concern of growing importance. Water quality is a problem that is gradually and slowly emerging in many places around the world. There are increasing number of reports on the degradation of both tap water and bottled water around the globe even in the best countries in Europe (but in very much limited extent), not to mention Asia and in particular China. Some examples are given here while others were previously addressed for discussions in different Blog posts in “sustain-earth.com” and LinkedIn groups, e.g. “Africa and MENA Sciences and Technologies” as well as Facebook and Twitter.

http://africacheck.org/reports/false-claim-that-sa-one-of-only-twelve-countries-with-safe-tap-water/

http://m.thelocal.com/20130913/tap-water-less-risky-than-bottled-water-swiss-study

The impacts of increasing deterioration in natural water systems and water for household uses are, also, showing up in the public health records because of the growing threats from resistant bacteria. Anti-biotic and other pharmacological remains keep injected out in nature from wastewater treatment plants, also other known and unknown sources can be expected.

http://www.riles.org/musings.htm

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/10/invincible-bacteria-in-the-middle-east/381671/

 

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Role of Human-Computer Interaction – From Awareness and Education to Sustainability

WWW (World Wide Web) is a system of interlinked hypertext documents, intended to provide global and effective communication systems through the Internet. Webpages can be viewed for their content of text, videos, and other multimedia where hyperlinks allow the navigation between different contents. The inventor of WWW, Tim Berners-Lee, realized in 1989 that his proposal for a more effective CERN communication system could be implemented throughout the world through hypertext “to link and access information of various kinds as a web of nodes in which the user can browse at will”. This was jointly done in 1990 with Robert Cailliau.

Douglas Engelbart already in 1968 demonstrated the invention of “human-computer interaction” where “The Mother of All Demos” retrospectively illustrated the complete computer hardware and software system of all known fundamental elements of modern personal computing. It was the first to publicly demonstrate all features, elements and capabilities of modern computers as communication and information-retrieval machines where the previous idea of Vannevar Bush for a Memex was turned into reality. Memex was visioned by Vannevar Bush, in 1945, that it could implement what is known today by hypertext with the aim to help humanity to have a collective memory and to avoid the use of scientific discoveries for destruction and war, probably an early starting point for sustainability.

Hypertext, including tables, images and other presentational content forms, is displayed on a computer display and other smart devices (mobiles, tablets, …..) with interaction to other text which the reader can immediately, or progressively at multiple levels, access via hyperlinks. An innovation of extreme importance for effectively and globally promoting communication, with high speed never known anywhere expect the speed of light, in all sectors and on all levels with tectonic changes and shifts within and between know and unknown boarders. Apart from economic, scientific and technical importance; populations around the world can easily access and afford sharing information, also for professional to produce and market products and services. Human-computer interactions are now advancing with unprecedented importance for public awareness and education on all levels especially for empowering individuals, groups and association in a wide spectra of new activities for engagement and shaping socio-economic sustainability on micro-levels, at any time and in regions and remote places that were never reached before. What we though was virtual yesterday is in fact very real today.

Since the birth of WWW an accelerating interest in human-computer interactions in all sectors of modern societies has emerged with tectonic changes in the flora of social media, public awareness and educational tools such as blogs and MOOCs “Massive Open Online Courses” focusing on Sustainability on different levels, specialities and content. Blogs and MOOCs are internet based and generally free of charge a matter of increasing importance for achieving socio-economic sustainability. They don’t have any entry requirements and are open to anyone anywhere in the world with an internet connection. MOOCs are linked to universities, may lead to certificates/diplomas and some universities give packages of MOOCs leading to degrees but this may be subject to fees.

https://www.mooc-list.com/tags/sustainability; is a general link with MOOC-list on sustainability issues with technical information, short specifications and descriptions of the courses. Some examples are given below:

https://www.coursera.org/course/susdev provides an introduction to the interdisciplinary field of sustainable development. It describes the complex interactions between the world economy and the Earth’s physical environment. Ecological processes and constraints significantly shape the patterns of economic development, demography, and wealth and poverty. At the same time, human activities change the physical environments, increasingly in dangerous ways.

http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20140511172841978 is a free MOOC course on “The age of sustainable development” that gives students an understanding of the key challenges and pathways to sustainable development – that is, economic development that is also socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable.

https://open.sap.com/course/sbi1; Conducting business in more sustainable ways is becoming increasingly relevant today and a “must-have” in the future. The sustainability megatrend is driven by a growing population, accelerating urbanization, resource intensity, government regulation, climate change, and – most importantly – by the fact that consumers are increasingly demanding healthy, affordable, as well as socially and environmentally responsible products.

https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/sustainability-society-and-you; it provides the knowledge and skills to do this by investigating sustainability from multiple angles and exploring what small steps you can take to have a real impact upon all our future. It gives an introduction to the values and principles associated with sustainability and some of the knowledge and understanding required to make sustainable decisions in personal and professional life.

http://50plus20.org/archives/2952; is a Collaborative MOOC on Responsibility, Sustainability and Ethics for Business and Leadership. The emerging model of offering Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) could pose a major threat to traditional model of management education with some estimating that up to 60% of traditional teaching could be disrupted or in part replace by MOOC offerings. Early adopters of online learning platforms will however find a limited choice of material and courses focused on the broad topic of “Sustainability, Ethics and Responsibility in Business and Leadership”.

Http://sustain-earth.com will continue reporting on sustainability and emerging global trends.

 

 

 

 

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AGWA Management of Water Resources – What About Pollution and Waste?

The Alliance for Global Water Adaptation founded in 2010 and involving regional and global development banks, government agencies and ministries, diverse non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and the private sector is focusing on managing water resources in a sustainable way.  Though climate change is a major driver altering the global hydrological cycle still pollution and water are other man-made drivers influencing the global quality of natural waters. Water provides coherence to climate change adaptation and mitigation, integrating energy, water, food production and agriculture, and ecosystems and the environment. At the same time, the interaction with environmental changes in terms of increasing pollution and waste has strong threats on all life forms on earth with huge impacts on the quality of food and the health of ecosystems in general. Though AGWA is focused on how to help experts, decision makers, and institutions in the water community work more effectively, however there are still needs to consider sustainability in much wider perspective especially what regards the threats and impacts of pollution and waste, arising from production and consumption, on the hydrosphere, ecosphere and biodiversity.

http://alliance4water.org/

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Quality of Natural Water – Peak Water Quality and Best Tap Water

Many countries around the world suffer from increasing degradation in the quality of their natural land-water and aquatic water resources, e.g. lakes, rivers, coastal maritime and in some cases groundwater, because of growing net accumulation of pollution and waste in the environment. As explained in separate post (http://sustain-earth.com/2014/10/life-on-planet-earth-until-2100-double-e-global-collapse-in-economy-and-ecology/) the net global waste is expected to peak sometime at the end of this century.

In parallel to this there is a gradual and increasing degradation in the global quality of natural land-water and aquatic water resources with serious negative feedback impacts on the quality of all life forms on the Earth. So sometime at the turn of this century or early twenty-second century we may expect peak ecological water quality (http://pacinst.org/issues/sustainable-water-management-local-to-global/peak-water/) to materialize. This of course assuming that trends in waste production/recycling will follow the scenarios of the “Nature” paper given in the mentioned post. Also, this is assuming that the collapse of life on earth will not occur already before peak ecological water quality and the delay-effects will give some space to perform remediation and correction measures. There are observations and data in literature illustrating that the degradation in ecological water quality and the associated collapse (frequency and intensity) in ecological systems have already taken place in a growing number of geographical regions. Peak “ecological” water is defined as the point beyond which the total costs of ecological disruptions and damages exceed the total value provided by human use of that water. Unfortunately, the quality of tap water is very much related to the quality of “raw” water, i.e. the natural water of aquatic systems. We have already seen that achieving suitable tap water quality, even acceptable quality bottled water, are not any longer an easily affordable task.

Water Quality – Top 10 Countries With Best Tap Water.

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A Note from “sustain-earth” on Artificial Recharge of Groundwater

Water management is an important part of landscape architecture of increasing importance in rural areas where appropriate and sustainable technologies are highly lacking due to un-coordinated and random expansion in urbanization. Rural areas especially in the developing countries are of crucial importance not only for agriculture, agro-industries and production of food but also for generation of jobs, maintaining socio-economic and cultural heritages in these regions. Integration and engagement of the rural population in water management are imperative for successful long-term and large-scale implementation of such policies.

Appropriate and sustainable management of water resources involves developing supplementary Key Performance Indicators “KPI” for monitoring and assessing the consequences of the interference of man in the environment and possible feedbacks impacts on water quality status and changes through short-term and long-term approaches. This would require net-work of sensors, field-work, sampling and modeling activities and can provide effective tools for rehabilitation, conservation and protection of water resources.

http://sembraragua.blogspot.com.es/2011/06/introduccion-la-recarga-artificial-de.html

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Artificial Recharge of Groundwater – Increasing Security, Availability and Quality of Water Resources

Water harvesting is among important water management instruments and can take different forms. Artificial recharge of groundwater, as explained in “sembraragua.blogspot” by Professor em Rafael Fernández Rubio, plays a very important role for the availability of water resources for meeting the increasing demands on water resources especially in arid and semi-arid regions. It allows storage of excess surface water, mitigates evaporation losses and enhances the performance and functionality of aquifers in a number of ways, e.g. capacity, availability, security and quality of water resources. It can, also, add other environmental and water conservation benefits, through creation of pressure barriers.

Professor em Rafael Fernández Rubio, gives an interesting and full introduction the subject of Artificial Recharge including: Definitions and Objectives; Conditioning factors (characteristics of recharge water, characteristics of the receiving aquifer, hydro-climatological features, environmental characteristics of the environment, alternatives recharge facilities); Resetting Devices (surface devices, deep devices); Water Treatment by Recharge; Clogging System. Professor em Rafael Fernández Rubio ends by Bibliography of Interest for further reading. An additional feature of “sembraragua.blogspot” is that it provides supplementary translation from Spanish to other languages with varying qualities for languages other than European ones.

http://sembraragua.blogspot.com.es/2011/06/introduccion-la-recarga-artificial-de.html

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Sustainability A New Goal But Why the UN-Goals Come So Late?

The United Nations seems to recognize things so late that solutions become complicated, very difficult to manage and in panic things get turned up side down. What are supposed to be “scientific instruments”, available for decades, to implement became suddenly and urgently “political goals”. Yet not all science is realized as important in politics, policy-makers select and it is generally based on short-term election-driven, economy and competition-based market policies.

After more than a century of advances, progress and innovation in science and technology, the UN is suddenly asking the engagement of science. I would agree that science could have contributed much better. But this is, again, related to socio-economic political priorities. It looks like science can fix things over-night, fix everything alone and for all other sectors and for everyone in the society? We shouldn’t mix science with politics though they are inter-dependent. Were we all blind during such a long-time or were we just ignoring the failing reality and hoping “business-as-usual” will make things better. Sustainability requires early engagement of ALL SECTORS in a coherent, collective collaborative and interactive manner. What happened was an increasing fragmentation and isolation in “within” and “between” sector activities where individuals were lost in failing reality and an increasing complexity without unified holistic vision “Life on Earth”.

It is not any longer SUSTAINABLE to let it burn first then come to extinguish the fire, life on earth does not function this way. This has been more or less how WE were acting or reacting on world problems.

http://www.scidev.net/index.cfm?originalUrl=global/mdgs/feature/jeffrey-sachs-sdgs-big-science.html

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Life on Planet Earth until 2100 – Double “E” Global Collapse In Economy and Ecology

There are many scenarios and prognoses as well as data and observations supported by an increasing number of peer reviewed publications (in top journals such as Nature) that illustrate that planet Earth is heading to severe and double global collapse, i.e. in terms of economy and most importantly of ecology. Shrinking economy means increased poverty and degradation in ecology means increasing diseases. It is not hard to comprehend: wealthy and healthy environment means high quality of life; unwealthy planet with unhealthy environment means death or in best cases poor quality of life. It is already a growing and severe inconvenient reality in many parts around the world, just tens or hundred meters away from luxury hotels and beaches, there are densely populated slums in mega cities.

Affordable, accessible, safe and clean energy that can support the growing population and the increasing needs of consumption is an ideal painting of a rather gray reality facing a common fate for our planet. With expected future production and consumption of “net” energy and the considerable pressures on the natural “capital” resources, the global production of waste and pollution due to an accelerating urbanization keeps doubling. According to the UN Inter-Agency Mechanism on all freshwater related issues (including sanitation) it has been an increase of 20%, during the period 2000 to 2008, in the number of individuals in cities and towns of all sizes in the world who lack access to basic water and sanitation facilities.  In 2011, a reported of 2.5 billion people in the world did not use improved sanitation facilities and this number keeps increasing. Urban settlements are also a growing main source of point-source pollution even in best countries around the world including Scandinavia where anti-biotic keep injected from wastewater treatment plants to natural surface water systems with serious impacts on the flora and frequency of resistant bacteria. It is not strange that humans will face an increasing number of threats from known, such as Ebola virus disease, and yet other unknown diseases to emerge.

http://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/88380/energy-economics-crash-course-chapter-19

http://www.nature.com/news/environment-waste-production-must-peak-this-century-1.14032

http://www.unwater.org/topics/water-and-urbanization/en/

Would life on planet Earth survive to the end of this century? Follow sustain-earth.com to hear more about sustainability issues.

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Global Trends in Education – Sustainability Is Imperative Part In Higher Education Curriculum

To counteract the increasing threats from the abuse of energy, water and natural resources and mitigate the accelerating negative impacts of “produce and consume” on quality of life, all education stages have to seriously consider weaving sustainability issues in all educational components. This has to involve applied sustainability instruments and solutions as well as building appropriate interactive links between education, politics, society and the market. There are huge information and data worldwide on continuous and increasing degradation in the atmosphere (air quality), the hydrosphere (water quality), land-water resources, the biosphere and ecosphere (biodiversity, degradation in agro- and animal production, …. ).

“Sustainability” is not only of political and social concern, it is also a natural part of modern high-quality education especially what regards higher education and research where future innovations, engineers, professionals, teachers, policy-makers, scientists, ….. etc, are being shaped and prepared to take care of the planet in much more sustainable manner. The collapsing quality of life reflects severe gaps in education and technology management structures with enhanced fragmentation and isolation within and between society sectors in terms of production, consumption and service. The main responsibility for achieving sustainable socio-economic developments anywhere in the world is through shaping education and research institutions and organizations to meet future sustainability requirements.

http://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/blog/2011/oct/13/sustainability-in-higher-education

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ICT and Market Transition – From Connecting People to Connecting Machines

Information Communication Technology “ICT” is changing very fast, as everything else around us. “ICT” is not any longer a matter of social media where Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, … etc. are instruments for connecting people, it will continue to expand its innovations to connecting machines and users of technologies. In this context, it is not only about connecting machines to machines but machines to users so even the wheels of production, consumption and communication spins even faster and faster by coupling technology and engineers to people and customers and not only people to people in much passive and “business-as usual” manner. Every one of us can imagine changing the Internet communication and traffic from having 3 billion people interacting to involving over 50 billions machines with interactive communication.

Bringing technology and engineers near to the customers and consumers is something that is need, so as technology can be better understood especially what it is best needed for, also when, where and why.

Visit, share and contribute in “sustain-earth.com”

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Polution And Waste – Without Clean Air and Water All Forms Of Life Will Disappear

Two most important spheres for existence of life, and the only life in the whole universe, on earth are suffering from severe and increasing degradation. The ATMOSPHERE with remarkable changes in its global composition that has caused global warming and an accelerating deterioration in the air quality in cities around due to urbanization (70% of world population is planned to live in cities in coming decades. The HYDROSPHERE with an ever increasing degradation in the quality of natural waters with accelerating threats on the whole ecosphere and enhanced negative impacts on drinking water and food production. Though ENERGY is the primary cause of all pollution in these two spheres still much attention and resources are given to it with very little left to protect, cure and rehabilitate WATER, and to enhance its accessibility and affordability in clean forms. Follow how energy-water nexus is shaping the life on the earth http://sustain-earth.com

https://www.dropbox.com/s/atcq7lm7iv4rrlt/Water%20vs%20Energy.jpg?dl=0

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North America and The Middle East – Would Unconvential Fossil Fuel Become A Global Priority?

Many universities and research institutes around the world have huge investments in energy-related R&D “Research and Development” programs. Much of such R&D programs are primarily related to Renewable Energy Resources that can meet future demands for lowering the emissions of GHG “Green House Gases”, for mitigating the impacts of global warming and for achieving sustainable socio-economic development around the world.

However, the world energy market in terms of demand and supply is forcing other realities where the use of conventional fossil fuel resources will be gradually shifting towards increasing utilization of unconventional fossil resources. With such trends the world is facing “tectonic” challenges for “safe-clean-secure” shifts towards new extraction techniques from the so-called UHRs “Unconventional Hydrocarbon Resources” with minimal environmental impacts. It is believed that UHRs is the future of the fossil fuel industry not only in North America, with the major part of UHRs, but likely globally as well. UHRs are composed of heavy oil, oil sands, unconventional gas, light-tight oil and liquid-rich shale. While, the Middle East is facing up to end ‘Easy Oil’ it is, also, turning to a much tougher and complex reality to tap their huge heavy-oil reserves (http://m.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704436004576299421455133398?mobile=y). A wide-range of investments and pilot studies are being carried out to develop appropriate technologies to boost heavy-oil production in several places in the Middle East. Such trends will expand to other regions around the world with gradual transformation to a worldwide utilization of the global UHRs.

The technology to tap heavy-oil, and to make use of, is not a new one and has already started in the US several decades ago. However it needs to be up-dated, developed and refined to meet not only the environmental and economic demands but also the diversity of UHRs in the complex geo-formations, including coupled litho- and hydrospheric ones. The University of Calgary has clear strategic direction to become one of Canada’s top five research universities by year 2016 where research and innovative teaching go hand in hand with full engagement of the communities they both serve and lead. Among the six research themes of the university’s roadmap to achieve its future goals is “Energy Innovation for Today and Tomorrow”.

https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=119453290&goback=

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Life Quality in Europe 2003-2011- How Happy is the Citizen?

Levels of optimism and happiness has declined. Public health determines the level of happiness and the satisfaction is mostly found in family life and accommodation, while the least satisfaction is being with the standard of living. The trust in key institutions (governments and parliaments) has fallen across the EU. Large differences in member states are being found what regards satisfaction. The social exclusion is dependent on unemployment, while activities in associations and voluntary work makes people feel more socially included. The gap between racial and ethnic groups is growing across the EU as the tensions between rich and poor. Difficulties from coming homes too tired to do household jobs has increased where single parent-household are disadvantaged in most domains of life quality.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bOT5MA3Xeo&feature=player_embedded

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CSP – Affordable Friendly Renewables For Creating Life in Deserts

DESERTEC Foundation has achieved new milestone for replication with potential for promoting the global transition to renewable energy in desert regions. It has been demonstrated in Spain, the Puerto Errado 2 (PE2) project that joined the grid already in 2012 with much more power added to the Spanish grid in 2014. PE2 is the world’s largest Fresnel CSP “Concentrated Solar Power” Plant that uses 375 000 square meters to heat water and create steam to derive turbines for generation of electricity. A revolutionary technology with clear advantages for many desert regions where PE2 uses innovative cleaning robots, air-cooled condensers for emission-free power supporting 12 000 Spanish homes.

Development of DESERTEC vision worldwide for using the efficient CSP-technology (for more information visit http://energy.gov/articles/top-10-things-you-didnt-know-about-concentrating-solar-power) with less water and air-cooling systems, is an example of how to involve local communities in providing jobs, during construction and maintenance, and creating green economy and living environments. Puerto Errado 2 shows the positive impacts of renewable power plants on local economy, how economies across the earth’s sun belt can benefit as Novatec and others move into new markets around the world. A technology with advantages for sustainable socio-economic developments, lower cost than oil and similar cost as gas, an affordable and friendly energy for emission-free production and green services.

CSP technology is being widely commercialized with much added power in the past seven years especially in Spain and United Arab Emirates (Shams-I, Masdar in Abu Dhabi). This technology has huge potential in many desert regions around the world especially South America and the MENA region. However, availability of water for turning deserts to green living environments is a major limiting resource. Would it be possible to get double benefits in coastal regions where this technology can be used for desalination as well?

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