Water in the Desert

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Rio Grande, May 19, 2007

Originally uploaded by heinemanfleck.

I’ve been otherwise occupied over the last week, so I haven’t been paying my usual attention to the river. But when I went out yesterday for a bike ride, it was wonderfully high – 3,700 cubic feet per second through Albuquerque, which I think is the highest it’s been this season. This picture was taken from the old Alameda Bridge, which is a great place to walk out and look at the river. The water’s overtopping the island in the middle of the stream there. Another great view spot right now is the Montano Bridge. On the south side pedestrian walkway, they built little observation decks. The one in the middle looks out on one of the islands where they’ve cut little stream paths for minnow habitat. The water’s high enough to fill them right now with the sort of low flow water the little fishies need.

Montano Bridge Island

A Google Map (or not)

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George and Big Toe

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George and Big Toe

Originally uploaded by heinemanfleck.

Big Toe joined me Thursday morning at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, which has been in Albuquerque all week. He in particular wanted to see George Hotz, who I’d featured in the morning newspaper:

George Hotz’s words exploded, as if there were three sentences in his head for every two that made it out of his mouth.
“I’m sure you’re familiar with polar coordinates. They have a theta, an R and a Z,” he said to the gray-haired man visiting his science fair booth.
The man leaned in and nodded as a smile crept across his face.
“You’re familiar with DLP technology,” Hotz said, holding up a circuit board. The man nodded again, the smile growing, as he responded, “From Texas Instruments?”
Hotz, a 17-year-old wunderkind from Glen Rock, N.J., and Craig Barrett, chairman of the board of Intel— the largest computer chip maker in the world— spoke the same language.

George, I’m happy to say, won one of the fair’s top prizes – a trip to Stockholm to the Nobel ceremonies. I feel personally privileged to have spent the week with George and the rest of these kids, who are so bright, creative, passionate and morally committed to what they do that it gives me hope.

P.S. Chantal did a nice job of capturing my enthusiasm here.

The Innovation Frame

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An example of framing in the statement out today from the national academies of 13 nations:

Major investments and successful technological and institutional innovation will be needed to achieve better energy efficiency, low- or zero-carbon energy sources and carbon-removing schemes. A clear area for increased investment is energy conservation and efficiency. This has immediate and long-term benefits for local and regional health and environment, security of energy services and climate change, while having potential for local economic development and build-up of local technological capabilities.

But How Does It Taste?

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This must seem silly to folks who don’t have access to potable water at all, but those folks probably aren’t reading my blog. Here in the first world, we care about how our water tastes, and the folks in San Diego, California, are trying to figure out how to best market desalinated seawater, so they did a real, peer-reviewed taste test:

Consumers were able to discern between desalinated seawater and imported water, preferring imported water when forced to make a choice. However, the investigators did not believe that the difference in consumer perception was significant enough to warrant special blending facilities to mitigate the relatively minor aesthetic quality differences between imported water supplies and desalinated seawater.

Administrivia

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I’ve upgraded the software running Planet Fleck. I was running a quite old version of Jeff Waugh’s wonderful Planet, and it wasn’t handling some of the feeds very well. That’s why James’ blog, for instance, looked like gibberish, as did the new Nature climate blog. But I wasn’t motivated enough to fix it (I hate upgrading software unless I absolutely have to because of the risk of things going wrong). The last straw was when it stopped displaying my blog. Can’t have that!

To my delight, once I upgraded it I realized I’d missed the pictures from Dave and Cate’s vacation! (It apparently wasn’t properly updating Dave’s blog either.)

Energy Efficiency at the Science Fair

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Stuff I wrote elsewhere – on the zeitgeist of the world’s youth, including biofuels from wasted bananas and coconut sap:

The event offers a peek into the spirit of some of the world’s brightest youths. The young scientists frequently pick topics dear to their hearts and pursue them with a passion. They search for solutions to medical problems that afflict people they love, or tackle environmental problems in their communities.
    This year, creative attacks on the world’s energy problems are everywhere.

Daybook

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  • paper of the day: Mendoza et al. in Climatic Change look at Maya droughts over the last several centuries
  • weather: Hottest day so far this year in Albuquerque at 84F (29C), warm enough for a lovely chat on the back porch at a party last night. Over the last five days, we’ve seen a statistically significant warming trend. (data here)
  • family: Yesterday was moving day. Big Toe helped, having had some experience working as a mover during his student days at the Sorbonne. Apparently the French have a saying: “Soulever avec vos jambes.”