Mercury: Coming from a Power Plant Not Near You
November 4th, 2007. By Dave Oei. 424 views.
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It’s bad enough that the United States uses coal-burning power plants that, as of 2000, were releasing 50 tons of toxic Mercury into the air yearly. How bad is Mercury? This bad. But at least the EPA has put rules in place to reduce emissions, over a period of…13 years. A step in the right direction? I suppose.
But just when the horizon is starting to look just that much more rosy, new reports suggest that Mercury originating from coal power plants in China are contaminating air, water, and fish in the United States. The effects are quantifiable and significant. What’s worse is there’s no end in sight. Ah, what a morbid way to end a post.
Photo: NationalHistoryMag.com
Source: Yahoo!
If you’re from New Jersey you’ve probably known about this for a while and have long since been able to breathe very longs signs of relief. Otherwise, this is news to you as it was to me. It turns out that the EPA had been doing routine testing of squirrels which lived near a dump to see if they were…er…fit for human consumption. The EPA said no because of elevated levels of lead found in their systems. But today, hurray-hurray, it turns out the EPA made a mistake with their testing and found that these squirrels were fine for eatin’ after all.
Ecologists in Berkeley teamed with researchers from Save the Elephants and discovered that those elephants which herd with dominant matriarchs traveled significantly less for food when resources were scarce. I guess sometimes it is about who you know.
The wonderminds at MIT have created a gel that can change colors quickly based on minute fluctuations in various environmental variables, such as humidity or temperature. The possibilities are seemingly endless, that is, except as a Jello coloring agent.
Now visible to the naked eye, Comet 17P Holmes can be seen by looking in the constellation Perseus. Right now, there’s not much to see, but the view might prove noteworthy with a telescope. 
Sometimes it’s not about building a better mousetrap, but building a device that dispenses beer much faster. These geniuses at 
Geneticists at Stanford have dug their 
How’s this for a