Category Archives: Around the World

Bears!

Explore Bears: Brooks Falls – Katmai National Park, Alaska powered by EXPLORE.org (live stream on YouTube).

If you watch for a little while, you’ll see salmon jumping up the falls, and a bear or two might appear to catch some. When I started watching, a brown bear nonchalantly walked into the water, caught a salmon with his mouth on the first try and nonchalantly walked out again. Right now there’s a mother with two cubs – amazing! The mom is jumping in the water again and again, but the cubs are just standing in shallow water watching her and not quite sure what to make of the whole thing.

They will adjust the camera angle and zoom depending on where the action is happening.

Link via MetaFilter.

Shhh…

NPR Science: Beyond Sightseeing: You’ll Love The Sound Of America’s Best Parks.

“Every place has its own sound. A small group of scientists is hard at work recording the natural sounds of national parks all across the U.S. — more than 70 soundscapes so far.

For our series on the centennial of the national parks, we traveled to Colorado, to find out how they create these portraits of sound.”

I recommend listening to the seven minute article instead of just reading the (abbreviated, loose) transcript because there are a lot of sound clips.

Brexit

Deutsche Welle: World adjusts to Brexit vote after initial shock. “EU officials have called for the UK to start the exit process ‘as soon as possible’ after voters decided to leave the bloc. But the US president said their decision speaks to the ‘challenges raised by globalization.'”

Merkel calls Brexit ‘a watershed for Europe’. “German Chancellor Angela Merkel has called the UK’s decision to leave the European Union a watershed for Europe and European unity. It’s now up to her and EU leaders to ensure other countries don’t follow suit.”

The Guardian: Is the EU referendum legally binding? “Parliament is sovereign and, if Brexit wins, Cameron will not be legally obliged to invoke the Lisbon treaty to start an EU exit.”

Die Zeit: Wenn Politik am Stammtisch entschieden wird. “Mit Parolen, Drohungen und Lügen haben Populisten die Entscheidung über den Brexit beeinflusst. Bei einem so komplexen Thema hätte es kein Referendum geben dürfen.” Von Tanja Dückers.

Damn! Berlin im Brexit-Schock. “Die deutsche Politik muss sich nach dem britischen Referendum neu sortieren. Mit diesem Ausgang hatte ernsthaft niemand gerechnet. Umso größer ist die Ratlosigkeit.” Von Ludwig Greven, Katharina Schuler und Lenz Jacobsen.

Nuclear Power and Clean Energy

NPR News: California’s Last Nuclear Power Plant To Be Shut Down.

NPR All Things Considered: California To Close State’s Last Nuclear Power Plant.

I remember both the Chernobyl and the Fukushima nuclear disasters and have become much more wary about nuclear power since the latter happened. Japan uses the same kind of reactors that are used in German nuclear power plants, and the disaster there has shown that even if the core doesn’t melt down like it did in Chernobyl‘s graphite-moderated reactor, there’s still a lot that can go wrong even in a water-moderated reactor like the ones used in Japan and Germany (boiling water reactors, pressurized water reactors).

The German government ordered eight of the seventeen reactors to be shut down immediately after Fukushima, and the others will be shut down by the end of the year 2022 at the latest. A few kilometers from where I live is a nuclear power plant that I’ve visited with groups of students several times (in fact I just went two days ago), and while this is of course an interesting excursion, I won’t be sad to see it shut down by the end of 2018 at the latest.

I’m surprised that environmentalists count nuclear power as “clean” like solar and wind because no carbon dioxide is emitted, but what about the tons of radioactive waste? This is an unsolved probleme here in Germany, and I wonder about the situation in other industrial nations like the US, but also Japan or the rest of Europe. Has any country solved this problem for real?