Remarkable indeed!
In a new paper published Jan. 9 in the journal Nature, they say an overlooked group of organic compounds, called quinones, can be used to create an inexpensive battery capable of charging and discharging renewable electricity much more rapidly than existing metal batteries can.
Harvard Study Of Quinones Flow Battery – Business Insider
A wonderful map created by William Samari, Ray Yamartino, and Rafaan Anvari of DogHouseDiares illustrates what every country does better than every other country.
What Countries Are Best At – Business Insider
Forget mindfulness meditation, computerized working-memory training, and learning a musical instrument; all methods recently shown by scientists to increase intelligence. There could be an easier answer. It turns out that sex might actually make you smarter.
How Sex Affects Intelligence – Business Insider
When I first started using Samsung’s Galaxy Note 3, almost everything about its enormous size annoyed me. I couldn’t text with one hand. It barely fit in my pocket, or didn’t at all. I felt silly holding it up to my ear to talk on the phone. It was the least subtle or elegant phone I’d ever seen.
What It’s Like Using The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 – Business Insider
The JVC DLA-X700R delivered the best overall picture quality of any projector we’ve ever tested, as deep, inky black levels and brighter highlights lead to superb contrast. It has extremely accurate, well-saturated color; comprehensive video processing, calibration, and setup options; whisper-quiet operation in Low lamp mode; no-nonsense minimalist design; and optional RF 3D emitter compatible with cheaper third-party glasses.
Now Samsung is adding its 110-inch version, model UN110S9, to the series. The massive TV was first shown at CES 2013, but never shipped. Now it’s official, and as of March 2014 it has an official price: $150,000. Cue more of those awesome fake Amazon user reviews!
Samsung UNS9 series Preview – CNET
Consider, as Exhibit A, the Bush tax cuts. Bush did cut the top tax rate on earned income from 39.6 to 35 percent, a 12 percent reduction. But he cut the rate on capital gains from 21 to 15, a 28 percent reduction; he cut the rate on dividends from 39.6 (because dividends were previously taxed as ordinary income) to 15, a reduction of more than 60 percent. And he put the estate tax on a path toward zero — a 100 percent reduction.
Favoring Wealth Over Work – NYTimes.com
The most important paper at the Brookings Panel was probably Krueger et al on the long-term unemployed, which basically confirmed what we’re learning from a number of sources: it’s really hard to get employers to look at people who have been out of work for an extended period, so any sustained increase in long-term unemployment tends to become permanent.
The Crime of 2010 – NYTimes.com
In 2010, the Chicago Bar Association held a “What Not to Wear Fashion Show” that convened a group of judges, law professors, and law students to nitpick (mostly) female courtroom fashions as amateur models sashayed down the runway. And at a Seventh Circuit Bar Association meeting in 2009, a panel of judges and lawyers convened to gripe about all of the sexy ladies in their midst.
Female Lawyers Dress Too ‘Sexy’ – Business Insider
Russian forces gathering on the border with eastern Ukraine may be poised to invade, the White House warned on Sunday, as the government in Kiev said that the prospect of war with Moscow was continuing to grow after the annexation of Crimea.
Russian Troops May Invade Ukraine – Business Insider
Shake Shack, a burger chain with locations in Florida, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C. as well as international locations in the Middle East, Russia, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, pays starting workers $9.50 an hour outside of New York City and $10 an hour for New Yorkers, CEO Randy Garutti told ThinkProgress. It also offers full-time employees health, dental, vision, retirement, and disability benefits plus paid time off. But on average, workers get $10.70 an hour thanks to a program it calls Shack Bucks. Every month, it gives employees a percentage of the company’s top-line sales. “It’s sort of immediate revenue sharing, not a long-term program,” he noted.
Shake Shake Is Successful And Pays Above Minimum Wage – Business Insider
After examining 72 academic studies involving more than 600,000 participants, the study, funded by the foundation, found that saturated fat consumption was not associated with coronary disease risk. This assessment echoed a review in 2010 that concluded “there is no convincing evidence that saturated fat causes heart disease”.
Diet And Nutrition Advice Has Been Wrong – Business Insider
Google has opened its redesigned headquarters in Amsterdam, and the company has not failed to deliver on the quirky aesthetic it has come to be known for.
Google Amsterdam Offices – Business Insider
Alvin Hansen introduced the notion of “secular stagnation” in the 1930s. Hansen’s hypothesis has been brought back to life by Larry Summers in his November 2013 secular stagnation speech. The speech generated a huge amount of discussion, and for good reason. Summers’ provocative hypothesis is that the Great Recession was symptomatic of a longer-term problem: persistently inadequate demand that is evidenced by low real interest rates.
Secular Stagnation and Wealth Inequality | House of Debt
In our view, what is missing from the secular stagnation story is the crucial role of the highly unequal wealth distribution. Who exactly is saving too much? It certainly isn’t the bottom 80% of the wealth distribution! We have already shown that the bottom 80% of the wealth distribution holds almost no financial assets.
Secular Stagnation and Wealth Inequality | House of Debt
High salt is essential to that larger-than-life processed food taste. Without salt, and a sub-set of assorted chemical flavour enhancers, processed foods would be exposed for what they are: products that have lost their natural savour and nutritional integrity. Salt-free cornflakes, for instance, would be well nigh inedible.
Shares of First Solar, the largest U.S. solar-panel maker, are soaring this week. The stock jumped nearly 32% in the past five trading sessions, hitting levels not seen since September 2011. What’s behind the move?
Why the run in solar stocks is just beginning | Talking Numbers – Yahoo Finance
First Solar (NASDAQ: FSLR ) was the biggest newsmaker this week when it met with investors to give guidance and a technology roadmap for the future. I took a detailed look at the presentations here, but there are a few takeaways for the whole industry. First, First Solar doesn’t see the large projects it’s relied on recently to continue. Instead, utility scale projects less than 100 MW and commercial installations on large rooftops will be more prevalent because they’re easier to fit close to demand. The changing trend is one reason First Solar is trying to improve the efficiency of its panels to compete in distributed energy.
This Week’s Solar Industry Recap
All of the Antelope wells and Triceratops-2 took about 2 months from the spud date to reach the top of the pay zone. I expect these wells to take about the same amount of time. So we should be down to the limestone by about the first week of May at Wahoo-1 and Bobcat-1.
We could hear about some gas kicks before that at Wahoo-1 if they encounter an over pressured gas filled clastic zone above the limestone. If Raptor gets spudded before March 27th as I expect, we should be down to the top of the limestone there between the end of May and the middle of June. I think all of these wells will find gas in the Puri Limestone but here is some information you can use while you are dreaming about the possibilities.
Bobcat-1 is about 8 miles north-northwest of Puri-1 where the Puri Limestone contained oil and it is also about 16 miles west of Moose-1 and 2 where the Puri Limestone contained oil. Bobcat-1 is closer to Puri-1 than it is to either Triceratops or Antelope.
PET- Best guess on top of formation time
But THiNKnrg, an energy project developer, was able to provide the center with a 50 percent discount and close a deal with a twenty-year solar PPA price at 4 cents per kilowatt-hour. This is a relatively small project — it comprises 398 kilowatts spread across twelve rooftops. And although that doesn’t compare in scale to, say, Austin’s 5-cent-per-kWh, 150-megawatt PPA, the JCC project distinguishes itself by creatively financing a small project while keeping soft costs down.
Anatomy of a Deal: 4-Cent-per-Kilowatt-Hour Solar in Palo Alto : Greentech Media
Major solar companies like Canadian Solar, First Solar, JinkoSolar, SunEdison and SunPower all seem to be investigating the possibilities of launching their own YieldCos. These companies have good reason to be interested: YieldCos have the potential to create value by improving access to cheaper sources of capital and the potential to unlock the value of solar assets that are not being recognized by the market.
Solar YieldCos: Proven Concept or Hype? : Greentech Media
PJM Interconnection, the nation’s largest power transmission grid organization, announced recently that wind and solar power could generate about 30 percent of PJM’s total electricity for its territory covering the Mid-Atlantic region and part of the Midwest by 2026 without “any significant issues.”
America’s Largest Grid Operator: Massive Renewables Push Won’t Be a Problem : Greentech Media
With nearly all S&P 500 names having reported year-end figures, net income grew 14% last year, or 12.8% on an ex-financial basis. This is fairly impressive growth given the lacklustre economic backdrop. So should we be celebrating? Well we?re not so sure, as the source of this growth is not a robust improvement in operating cash flow, but is to be found in the large goodwill write-downs of 2012?.”
Albert Edwards Destroys The “Solid Earnings Growth” Myth | Zero Hedge
OK, listen up: You have been warning about the coming inflation, inevitable collapse of the dollar, why we need a sound currency, blah blah blah for five years. When the dollar plummeted 41 percent from 2001 to 2008 none of you geniuses even noticed. So thanks for the warnings about something that already occurred in the last decade. Please go away. Better yet: keep pouring your capital into gold and bitcoin.
Everything That’s Wrong With This Monday – Bloomberg View
Seven million people died as a result of air pollution in 2012, the World Health Organization estimates. Its findings suggest a link between air pollution and heart disease, respiratory problems and cancer. One in eight global deaths were linked with air pollution, making it “the world’s largest single environmental health risk”, the WHO said.
BBC News – Air pollution linked to seven million deaths globally
His dazzling ascent to Italy’s highest political office is only matched by his prodigious ambitions. With a hyperactivity not seen in Europe since the early days of Sarkozy, for the first 100 days in office he has vowed to deliver one structural reform per month. Few actually believe this breakneck pace can last. For the moment, Renzi has matched his rhetoric with action.