Lethal Heating: 09/09/17

09/09/2017

This Solar-Powered RV Runs Without Fuel Or Charging Stations

GreenMatters - Nicole Caldwell

The cross-country road trip is as American as apple pie. Which is why it’s so ironic that the latest motorhome innovation comes from overseas in Germany, where a new, electric motorhome has been unveiled by RV company Dethleffs.
This motorhome is built for the open road, with a sleek design and head-to-toe solar panels so you never have to worry about finding the next charging station.
That's right: The open road is officially calling.

Dethleffs with solar cells everywhere. It is a prototype.

Where we’re going, we don’t need charging stations
The transportation industry is being flipped on its head by taking two of the most basic essentials—the driving experience and fuel—out of the equation entirely.
Self-driving vehicles and rechargeable technology is changing the landscape of driving.
That market has been expanding beyond everyday vehicles with advances in things like electric-powered semi trucks.
And we’ve seen the rise (and possible peak) of the tiny home market, where solar panels and other green technology is often utilized.
But motorhomes have been largely left out of this discussion.
That’s for understandable reasons.
A vehicle synonymous with the wide-open road (and, inherently at odds with the idea of frequent EV charging stations) has no obvious place in the electric market.
Until now.

Perhaps not in the real form, but definitely the future!

This is not just any electric vehicle
The popular RV company Dethleffs has its new “e.home” on display at this year’s Caravan Salon Düsseldorf 2017 through Sept. 3.
The unveiling comes just in time to steal the thunder from Volkswagen’s Kombi van announcement.
Keeping a motorhome and all its components powered up requires an extensive amount of energy.
To meet that requirement, Dethleffs has covered virtually every inch of the e.home with solar panels, similar to the European school with solar panels slathered on all its exterior walls.
The RV is built on the company’s Iveco Daily Electric chassis with a 107-horsepower electric motor.
The motorhome would have a range just shy of 100 miles if it wasn’t covered in solar panels, but it is.
Those babies can make up to 3,000 watts of electricity for its 228-Ah battery.
In other words, you’re all good to just keep on going.

The e.home is covered in solar panels and stars
The e.home utilizes Victron Energy products for the solar kit, including solar charge controllers, an inverter/charger for AC electricity and to charge the lithium batteries, ancillaries, and a DC-DC converter to supply charge stations for phones, laptops and the like.
The motorhome also features a sleek and modern design; circular wireless charging station; infrared heating panels on interior floors, furniture and walls; windows with darkening film between the panes; and a heating system that captures outside air on days warmer then 79 degrees, then sends it into the main cabin when the evening’s cooler air sets in.
Oh yeah—and a starlight projection system over the alcove bed.
“Dethleffs know this means a lot more than just putting bodywork on an electrically driven chassis,” Dethleffs Managing Director, Alexander Leopold, said in a Victron Energy release.
“By implementing a fully electric powertrain there are many challenges and equally opportunities for the entire vehicle.
“One significant opportunity is to do without any additional type of energy sources for the vehicle.
“This means that a motorhome with electric drive will also supply all the onboard services with electricity for the living area instead of gas, for example – and that is why solar power production becomes very important.”
No word yet on pre-orders or estimated cost, but this is absolutely an exciting step in the right direction.

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First Harvey, Then Irma and Jose. Why? It’s the Season.

New York Times - Henry Fountain

Heavy surf and dark clouds in Luquillo, P.R., signaled Hurricane Irma’s approach on Wednesday. Credit Ricardo Arduengo/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

First came Hurricane Harvey, which barreled into Texas on Aug. 25. Now Irma, one of the most powerful hurricanes on record, is battering the Caribbean and has Florida in its sights.
Jose, currently a tropical storm, trails behind in the mid-Atlantic. And early Wednesday, a coalescing weather system in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico became tropical storm Katia — the fourth named storm in two weeks.
What’s going on?
Hurricane experts say that the formation of several storms in rapid succession is not uncommon, especially in August, September and October, the most active months of the six-month hurricane season.
“This is the peak,” said Gerry Bell, the lead seasonal hurricane forecaster with the Climate Prediction Center, a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “This is when 95 percent of hurricanes and major hurricanes form.”
As to whether climate change has somehow made this year worse, the links between climate change and hurricane activity are complex and there are still many uncertainties.
Part of the problem, scientists say, is that there are just not that many storms: A dozen or so each year over the decades that good records have been kept do not form a huge data set to work with.
Some climate change impacts seem more certain than others. As the planet warms the atmosphere can hold more moisture, so hurricanes, like other rainstorms, could be expected to produce more rain on average than in the past. And as sea level rises, the impact of storm surges from hurricanes would be expected to worsen, because the surges are on top of a higher baseline.
Dr. Bell and his team at NOAA had forecast that this season would be a busy one, and that is how it is playing out, he said.
“With above normal seasons, you have even more activity mainly in August through October,” he said. “We’re seeing the activity we predicted.”
Since the season began on June 1 there have been 12 named storms, four of which strengthened into hurricanes, with maximum sustained winds above 73 miles per hour. Jose and Katia may well reach hurricane strength in the next few days.

It’s Not Your Imagination. Summers Are Getting Hotter.

Summer temperatures have shifted toward more extreme heat over the past several decades.

Of the four hurricanes, Harvey and Irma are considered major, of Category 3 or higher, with winds above 110 m.p.h.
The Climate Prediction Center’s forecast, which was updated in August, predicted 14 to 19 named storms and five to nine hurricanes, including two to five major ones.
Dr. Bell said that in the late summer and early fall, conditions in the tropical Atlantic off Africa become just right for cyclonic storms to form. Among those conditions, he said, are warming waters, which fuel the growth of storms, and a relative lack of abrupt wind shifts, called wind shear, that tend to disrupt storm formation.
“There’s a whole combination of conditions that come together,” he said.
Storms that form in the Gulf of Mexico, as Katia did this week, are also not uncommon, Dr. Bell said.
Dr. Bell said his group does not consider climate change in developing its forecasts.
Instead, he said, they consider longer-term cycles of hurricane activity based on a naturally occurring climate pattern called the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation, which affects ocean surface temperatures over 25 to 40 years.
“We’ve been in an active era since 1995,” Dr. Bell said, as ocean temperatures have been generally higher. But from 1971 to 1994, he said, temperatures were generally lower, and hurricane seasons were quieter.

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Climate Change Could Wipe Out A Third Of Parasite Species, Study Finds

The Guardian - Damian Carrington

Parasites such as lice and fleas are crucial to ecosystems, scientists say, and extinctions could lead to unpredictable invasions

An assortment of specimens from the Smithsonian’s parasite collection. Photograph: Paul Fetters for the Smithsonian Institution/Courtesy of Science Advances

Climate change could wipe out a third of all parasite species on Earth, according to the most comprehensive analysis to date.
Tapeworms, roundworms, ticks, lice and fleas are feared for the diseases they cause or carry, but scientists warn that they also play a vital role in ecosystems. Major extinctions among parasites could lead to unpredictable invasions of surviving parasites into new areas, affecting wildlife and humans and making a “significant contribution” to the sixth mass extinction already under way on Earth.
The new research, published in Science Advances, used the collection of 20m parasites held at the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum of National History in the US to map the global distribution of 457 parasites. The scientists then applied a range of climate models and future scenarios and found that the average level of extinctions as habitats become unsuitable for parasites was 10% by 2070, but extinctions rose to a third if the loss of host species was also included.
“It is a staggering number,” said Colin Carlson at the University of California, Berkeley, who led the new work. “Parasites seem like one of the most threatened groups on Earth.” The severity of the impact varied with the different climate scenarios. For example, a 20% loss of parasite native ranges in scenarios where carbon emissions are rapidly cut in the future rises to 37% if emissions continue unchecked.
“Parasites are obviously a hard sell,” said Carlson. “Even if you are grossed out by them – and there are obviously downsides for individual hosts and for humans – parasites play a huge role in ecosystems.” They provide up to 80% of the food web links in ecosystems, he said. Having a wide range of parasites in an ecosystem also means they compete with one another, which can help slow down the spread of diseases.
“If parasites go extinct, we are looking at a potential massive destabilisation of ecosystems [which] could have huge unexpected consequences,” Carlson said, with other parasites moving in to take advantage. “That doesn’t necessarily work out well for anyone, wildlife or humans.”
One example of the complex role parasites can play is a hairworm that lives in grasshoppers in Japan and tends to lead its host to jump into water, where the grasshoppers become a major food source for rare fish. “In some subtle ways, parasites are puppeteers,” Carlson said.
The research analysed more than 50,000 records of the 457 parasite species, which the researchers believe provides a representative picture. But, with more than 300,000 species of parasitic worms alone known to exist, working out the specific impact of parasite extinctions on diseases is complex and remains to be done.
“It is difficult to summarise the net consequence, as we know so little about most parasites,” Carlson said. “Climate change will make some parasites extinct and make some do better. But we would argue the overall phenomenon is dangerous, because extinctions and invasions go hand in hand.”
Anna Phillips, the curator of the Smithsonian’s parasite collection, said: “As long as there are free-living organisms, there will be parasites. But the picture of parasite biodiversity in 2070 or beyond has the potential to look very different than it does today based on these results.”

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