View from Westminster - September 29, 2011
4:00pm Wednesday 28th September 2011
READERS will not be in the slightest bit surprised to read that the biggest issue in my postbag concerns the gypsy and traveller site proposals in Wyre Forest.
Eight of the 15 communities, who feared the location of these sites near their homes, welcomed the meeting last week where the district council cabinet decided which sites to take forward for consultation: seven of those communities were disappointed.
Actually, I say ‘disappointed’ but from the tone of the letters in my postbag, ‘devastated’ would be a better adjective.
I talked about this issue a few weeks back in my Shuttle column and I will repeat now the general gist of what I said then.
I am deeply concerned that the analysis being used to establish how many sites we need in Wyre Forest is being based on the now discredited Regional Spatial Strategy. This document was prepared by the previous government and has since been thrown out as nonsense by the current government.
The reason we have traveller sites is so that we can accommodate all types of residents.
When planning for a district, all needs are looked at, be they homes for families, single occupancy, retirement homes or whatever. Ethnic minorities are taken into account and that is the right thing to do.
If the council does not provide enough traveller pitches, then a travelling family, if it owns a property or has permission of the landowner, can set up an encampment anywhere it likes and this then becomes subject to a long and tedious legal process.
The 10-year legal battle over Dale Farm is one such case, but we have seen this locally in Churchill only recently. So in order to avoid any further confrontation between the travelling and the settled communities, the council is looking to find more sites.
But whilst I agree that this is, in the broadest sense, the right thing to do, I am completely sympathetic with those communities who feel they are being dumped on by the council.
Not only am I questioning the number of sites that are being sought. I am also very concerned that the Baker Associate report commissioned by the council may be wrong.
The little evidence that has been presented to me suggests that this was not undertaken with as much care as I would expect given that it cost £17,500.
I will be replying to every letter and e-mail sent to me (as we do with every communication), but in the meantime, for those residents being affected, please do continue to get in touch and share with me your thoughts, and please do let the council know your thoughts by way of the consultation process.
CONTACT YOUR MP
Email: mark.garnier.mp@parliament.uk
Telephone: 020 7219 7198 or 01562 746771.
Write to: 9a Lower Mill Street, Kidderminster, DY11 6UU, or House of Commons, Westminster, London SW1A 0AA
Friday, 30 September 2011
View from Westminster - September 29, 2011 (From Kidderminster Shuttle)
Degree holder to hang for drugs
KUALA TERENGGANU: A 29-year-old degree holder burst into tears after he was sent to the gallows for drug trafficking.
Judge Datuk Mohd Yazid Mustapa sentenced Mohammad Abdul Rahman after he was found guilty under Section 39b of the Dangerous Drug Act 1952 for trafficking 1.4kg of cannabis at a house in Kampung Tok Jamal, Wakaf Mempelam here on Oct 3 last year.
Justice Mohd Yazid said Mohammad was regarded as an excellent student with a degree in business management but he used his intelligence for quick gains and now he had to pay the price.
He also said the prosecution, led by DPP Mohd Jazamudin Ahmad Nawawi, had proven a prima facie case against the accused.
Thursday, 29 September 2011
iPhone 5: 'Most Revolutionary User Interface in History' - Forbes
Apple’s plans to introduce the iPhone 5 on Oct. 4 have spawned a huge wave of the typical informed speculation, trendy rumor, and uninformed innuendo that precede every Apple announcement, but I want to share the most-intriguing report I’ve heard.
What makes it worth repeating is that it comes from an Apple follower and investor named Jason Schwarz, whose commentary over the past few years about Apple and its strategy, products, and financial performance have been exemplary. Not long after the original iPhone debuted in 2007—and this was way back in the days before Apple had become the most highly valued company on the planet—Schwarz was perhaps the first advisor to proclaim (and he did so loudly and repeatedly) that Apple’s breakthrough smartphone was triggering an enduring wave of mobile innovation that would push Apple’s stock price up to and past $300.
With that backdrop, I’ve come to place a fair amount of trust in Schwarz’s analyses of Apple, which this time around include some jaw-dropping claims about the power of the iPhone 5’s new voice technology (and before I insert this excerpt from Schwarz’s analysis, bear in mind that this guy is an investor and investment advisor and that he holds long positions on Apple):
At the original iPhone event in January 2007, Steve Jobs stated, ‘We are all born with the ultimate pointing device-our fingers-and iPhone uses them to create the most revolutionary user interface since the mouse.” Well, I would add that we’re also born with the ultimate communication tool-our voice-and iPhone is about to create the most revolutionary user interface in the history of technology (emphasis added). I expect that this voice assistant will quickly make its way into laptops and desktops as well. Apple’s competitive advantage is widening by the day. (End of excerpt.)
That’s quite a claim. And Schwarz makes such an audacious forecast because he believes the iPhone 5’s new capabilities will create for Apple a breakthrough level of competitive advantage in its battle with Google: “Voice search, rather than browser based search, could prove to be a real threat to Google’s dominance,” he writes. And here’s how that could play out, thanks to Apple’s acquisition last year of the Siri voice-assistant technology:
The Siri voice control system allows users to instruct the iPhone to ‘send a text message to Jason Schwarz asking him meet me for lunch’. Think about this capability in terms of safety. We all know that too many drivers send and receive text messages, now they will be able to safely operate an iPhone in the car. The voice assistant adds a layer of intelligence as well. If I ask my iPhone to ‘call Dad’ it might ask me whether it should dial his home phone or his mobile. It is also able to perform Web based search functions such as ‘book a table for two at 9:00 tonight’ or ‘send a taxi to my house’. Siri worked with Citysearch, Opentable and Taxi Magic before the Apple acquisition.(End of excerpt.)
For CIOs and the mobile workforces trying to deliver real-time insight and decision-making to the point of the customer, any additional layer of intelligence can truly be a game-changer as rapidly growing numbers of professionals begin to rely on smartphones and tablets as their primary computing device.
In fact, with these reported new capabilities for the iPhone 5, we shouldn’t be surprised if Apple, during its earnings call on Oct. 18, is able to report that it’s come even closer to having 100% of the Fortune 500 testing or deploying its mobile products. The most-recent corresponding numbers reported by Apple in late July were in the mid-80’s.
But even having made his claim that iPhone 5 will include “the most revolutionary user interface in the history of technology,” Schwarz made yet another remarkable forecast in his piece called ‘Let’s Talk’ iPhone 5 Is a Game Changer. After touting the iPhone 5’s implications for Apple’s iCloud business and highlighting how trends in mobile retention rates are favoring Apple over its competitors, Schwarz says he expects Apple to double the total number of iPhones it sells in the fourth quarter of this year compared to last year’s Q4:
After witnessing 142% unit growth for the iPhone in Apple’s most recent quarter, we believe that the upcoming iPhone 5 will command a similar growth trajectory in the holiday quarter. Last year Apple sold 16.24 million iPhones, this year we expect they will sell at least 32.48 million units. (End of excerpt.)
Meg Whitman - 50 Most Powerful Women in Business 2011 - FORTUNE on CNNMoney.com
Hewlett-Packard
2010 rank: Return
Age: 55
She’s back! In late September the losing California gubernatorial candidate -- and former No. 1 MPW -- was named CEO of HP, America’s largest tech company by revenue. While her ascent to the role is a sure sign of her power, it remains to be seen if she can fix the computer maker and bring order to its dysfunctional board.
Reuters - Oracle and Autonomy escalated their war of words
Oracle and Autonomy escalated their war of words on Thursday, sparring publicly over whether the British software firm had ever been shopped to the U.S. technology giant.Autonomy, which Hewlett-Packard this year agreed to buy for $12 billion, is at the center of a debate on Wall Street over the tenure of fired HP CEO Leo Apotheker and the future direction of the company he once ran. The spat comes at an inopportune time for HP, fighting to salvage its reputation with investors.
Entrepreneur, venture capitalist and HP board member, Marc Andreessen, referred to Oracle as an "oldline" software company and took a jab at outspoken CEO Larry Ellison: “Larry is one of my idols,” Andreessen said. “I wouldn’t quite say my role model.”
Despite losing two more senior executives, BlackBerry maker Research In Motion brushed off suggestions on Thursday that it would discontinue production of its PlayBook computer tablet as "pure fiction."
Fortune's annual ranking of the "50 Most Powerful Women in Business" was released on Thursday and former Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz was a noticeable omission. HP's new CEO Meg Whitmen made the list at No. 9 and Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg came in at No. 12. Google was well-represented with two women: Susan Wojcicki (No. 28) and Marissa Mayer (No. 38).
Travel search provider Kayak is the latest Web company to delay its IPO plans, reports AllThingsD's Tricia Duryee.
Rocket Stove Design Base - Home
Factory-built rocket stoves available in the US
Factory-built rocket stoves are available in the USA from EcoZoom . Check them out by clicking the image at left. If you are interested in developing a commercial cookstove business in the developing world, or if you would like to join our design team, please visit www.burndesignlab.org.
New Design Tool Launched for Constructing an Institutional Rocket Stove with Chimney
Thanks to funding from GTZ-HERA, Rocket Stove.org and Prakti Design Lab have developed a new automated tool that allows users to build a customized institutional rocket stove. The tool can be used to instantly design a brick or metal institutional rocket stove with or without chimney for any institutional pot (30 L + capacity) .
Click here to start designing your stove.
Due to the coding limitations of the Perl script , the tool can only be used with Firefox.
Many thanks to the individuals that worked on the tool: Julien Fortin wrote the Perl script; Hilawe Lakew wrote the Excel; our Ethos interns (Michael Naleid, Candida Crasto and Michael Braman) worked with GTZ-ECO to beta test and edit the manual in Ethiopia this past summer; and Peter Scott designed the stove and wrote the manual.
Institutional rocket stove test results published in Ethiopia
Click here for the latest test results from Ethiopia of the institutional rocket stove with and without chimney, as well as the tikikil/household rocket stove.
Internships available!
We are currently working on institutional rocket stoves (with chimneys) for Ethiopia, mass-produced household stoves for Kenya, charcoal stoves for Haiti and DRC, food dryers for Malawi, and tobacco curing systems for southern Africa and Asia. If you are interested in volunteering in the U.S. and potentially interning overseas in the next year, please click here to contact us .
Introducing Africa's first mass produced rocket stove: The Jiko Poa
Working with World Vision, Food for Hungry, and our local producers, Fine Engineering and Chujio Ceramics (who have over 20 years experience producing fuel-efficient jiko liners), we have created a stove that is starting a Kenyan cookstove revolution.Feedback from the first 100 hundred sample stoves was very positive. Most of the women using the stove in peri-urban areas have switched from charcoal to wood, reducing their fuel costs by approximately 70%.
The project is producing 4000 stoves per month and on target to produce 6000 stoves per month by the end of the year! This stove is now available for sale in Kenya to outside groups.
Eco-Jiko Stove
The Eco-Jiko stove is the handmade version of the mass-produced Kenyan Jiko Poa stove.Please contact us here to buy a copy or request more information.
Rocket Food Dryer 2.0
The Rocket Food Dryer is a hybrid wood powered/electric food dryer that has a maximum capacity of 100 kg of raw food (such as mangoes, tomatoes, pineapple, bananas, and mushrooms). It utilizes a small wood furnace and two 80 W electric fans. During tests in Malawi this year, the Rocket Dryer used 20 kg of eucalyptus over an 11 hour period to produce 6.9 kg of dried mango (the average wood: dried fruit ratio during trials was 2.94:1). This compares favorably to the existing system, which required ~1000 kg of wood to perform the same task.Please contact us here to buy a copy or request more information.
Manuals for constructing the Eco-Jiko Stove and the Rocket Food Dryer 2.0 are now available upon request
The plans are being updated and should be available in the next few weeks.Rocket stoves featured in New Yorker Magazine article
The December 21, 2009 issue of the The New Yorker magazine features a lengthy article by Burkhard Bilger, titled "Hearth Surgery". In the article, Bilger describes our struggle to bring improved cook stoves to the world, with detailed coverage of Aprovecho Research Center, stove camp, Peter Scott, and others. You can read a summary here.
Institutional rocket stove projects
Peter Scott/Aprovecho and GTZ/ProBEC were Ashdenfinalists in 2006 for their work in promoting institutional rocketstoves in Malawi. The Ashden Foundation produced a video as part of the2006 awards process.
Click the image to the left to view the video.
Rocketstove.org is currently collaborating with GTZ/HERA , GTZ/EAPUganda and GTZ/Sun-Energy Ethiopia to develop and disseminateInstitutional Rocket Stoves throughout Africa and the world.
Institutional rocket stove plans
A number of plans are currently available for constructing institutional rocket stoves:
There are several options for constructing brick or metal institutional stoves. For a complete list of design tools, go to the Institutional Stoves page.
Rocket tobacco curing barn
Although many people are not aware of the scope of the problem, tobacco production and curing is devastating the native forests of Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, and Malawi. It is estimated that over 110,000 ha of forest is lost each year.
Since 2005, we have been developing an improved tobacco curing system for small holder farmers in southern Africa. In 2007, field research conducted by GTZ/ProBEC showed that the rocket barn reduced fuel consumption by 50% and increased farmer income by approximately USD1300/p.a. This year in Malawi, Hestian Innovation will partner with Alliance One and Limbe Leaf to build approximately 1500 barns in the next 6 months.
Working with BAT and GTZ/EAPUganda, we are also prototyping a new and unique barn for Uganda.
Internship Opportunity! We are interested in placing interns in Malawi to help support the dissemination effort. If you are interested, let us know by clicking here.
Research Opportunity! If you are interested in helping in developing collaborative research projects with universities to study and improve the design of the rocket barn, let us know by clicking here.
Contact us for user guides and step-by-step plans for constructing rocket barns, available on a case-by-case basis.
Ashden Award for rocket stove mass production
Click the image to the left to view a video prepared by the Ashden Foundation about this award.
Buy a factory-made rocket stove
Household rocket stoves designed by Aprovecho Research Center and manufactured in China are now available for sale. Aprovecho has established a subsidiary, StoveTec, to distribute the stoves in the US, and has licensed EcoZoom to distribute them internationally. Peter Scott is working with EcoZoom to provide the stoves to international projects.
For more information, please contact Ben West at EcoZoom .
Rocket mass heaters: super efficient wood stoves you can build
Are you looking for a rocket stove heater you can build and snuggle up to? If you are, the book about how to build one, and the site about the book, can be found at www.rocketstoves.com.
We need your stories!
Do you have a rocket stove project? Please let us know about it so we can tell others about it here!
We need your support!
Rocketstove.org is a collaborative effort of many people who have aninterest in rocket stoves, their construction, their use, and theirbenefit to the planet.
Keeping this site going requires somespecialized skills that we simply have to buy. Editing new submissions,updating the web site, and developing and supporting our design toolsrequire a modest but necessary flow of funds.
If you can contribute to this flow, please do. Rocket stove users all over the world will benefit.
Thanks to the Ashden Trust
Funding for development of the Institutional Stove Design Tool and part of the original funding for this web site were provided by the Ashden Trust.
Another day in court for Dale Farm residents | Dale Farm Solidarity
- Hearing to be continued over the next few days
- Current injunction extended to Tuesday
Today was another intense day in court for Dale Farm residents. Upon entering the courts, one of the residents expressed how stressful the process was- how she could not sleep because of the uncertainty of whether she would have a home to go to at the end of the day.
At the court, the Judge heard evidence about whether the decision to evict Dale Farm was proportional and whether it should go ahead. This argument was based on the fact that the operation will not and cannot be a full-scale site clearance which would result in the site being restored to greenfield. Because Basildon Council botched the eviction notices in their overenthusiasm to chase Travellers out of Basildon, the operation will at most be a partial site clearance where people will be allowed to remain but fences, walls and some caravans will be able to stay. This means that the Court’s decision will essentially decide whether Basildon Council should spend £18 million on “restoring” Dale Farm to its original state- a scrapyard.
Another major focus of the court case was the fact that Basildon Council did not fulfil its responsibility to find suitable alternative sites prior to going ahead with eviction. Despite the Homes and Communities Agency offering free land (who turns free land down?!) to be developed in the Basildon area into a Traveller site, Tony Ball and Basildon Council pulled out of negotiations and decided to pursue eviction.
Today, Labour Leader Ed Miliband came out against the eviction of Dale Farm prior to finding alternative sites. This is a significant improvement over his previous unqualified support for the right of Basildon Council to evict, and although we reckon the eviction is just plain wrong, we’re glad Miliband has at least enough sense to say that alternative sites ought to be found.
Meanwhile, the anxiety felt by families at Dale Farm has been increased by Tony Ball’s refusal to commit to giving adequate advance warning in the case of an eviction. His lawyer said that if the court case had gone in favour of Basildon Council, bulldozers would have gone in right away- possibly even before news about the Court’s decision would have reached residents. Outside the court, Tony Ball refused to answer the question of whether he would give residents any warning before sending bulldozers in.
Arguments will continue in court tomorrow, and a ruling is not expected until Tuesday. The injunction remains in place until Tuesday under its current conditions.
