Imagine that you are a castaway on a dead planet. You only have provisions for a few days and you are absolutely alone. How would you survive? Andy Weir turned this question into his best-selling novel, The Martian. It is a tale of man versus Mars.
Can GM make electric cars the right way?
Electric car fortunes have had their ups and downs; especially following the collapse of the Better Place electric car network that left hundreds of EV car purchasers with the possibility of being stranded without power over in ISrael. Although some electric car models like Nissan’s Leaf and Tesla sport EVs have made modest inroads, over all, electric cars have yet to capture a sizable share of the world car market.
America’s largest car maker,General Motors, introduced its Chevrolet Volt plug in hybrid model in 2010. GM now hopes to change the way people think about driving electric cars when it markets its new Bolt all electric car sometime in 2017.
In contrast to GM’s Chevy Volt, which has a hybrid engine (both an electric and gasoline engine) the Bolt is a total electric car that will have a driving range of “roughly” 200 miles (322 km). Resembling Chevy’s gasoline driven Sonic hatchback model in appearance and size, the 5 seater Bolt will cost around $30,000. This is after a $7,500 US government tax credit incentive to American EV car purchasers is applied. This will make it more affordable than other similar sized electric models.
A Bolt prototype model made a recent appearance at the popular Detroit Auto Show earlier this year. There, the Bolt appeared to be a better value than other featured EV cars, including Tesla’s new Model 3 and BMW’s i3. Without the government offered tax credit, the Bolt will cost around $38,000; still lower in price than other comparable models. GM does have a lower priced EV car on the market, the smaller Chevy Spark EV car that’s only available in two US states: California and Oregon.
Whether GM’s new EV models reach markets in the Middle East is still anybody’s guess. Israel’s EV car experience, where aging Better Place marketed Renault Fluence EVs are still seen on the roads, has shown that electric cars are not yet being accepted by the general public. The lower price of oil, makes gasoline and diesel cars more desirable, is also a factor, despite warnings by environmentalists linking fossil fuels to climate change and global warming.
For all EV models, including the new Chevy Bolt, the main issue will still be what fuels the power plants that supply electricity for electric cars.
Perhaps solar and other alternative energy’s time has come after all.
Read more on electric cars:
“Driverless” Tesla electric will test run on Israel’s Better Place grid
Happy 2013! A good year for electric cars
Middle East will remain “Leaf” – less as Nissan puts electric car efforts elsewhere
Photo of Chevrolet Bolt EV Car – autoblog/GM :
UBER Middle East delivers puppies on-demand in the most adorable fundraiser!
It’s raining cats and dogs in Amman, Jordan now, closing roads (flooded underpasses), some schools, and many offices. It’s the usual drill for a city ill-equipped for atypical weather. Now online transportation giant Uber is helping to “rain down more dogs” for a limited time today in what could be the world’s most adorable fundraiser.
Crazy heat dome will mean no one can live in Arab Gulf by 2100
Just when we got excited about Dubai’s solar trees, seems like innovations like this will not be enough to save the Middle East. In 85 years the region will not be fit for human habitation.
Extreme Middle East weather patterns as a result of global warming and climate change have become commonplace for some time in many parts of the Middle East. These weather patterns have already wreaked havoc on fragile Arab Gulf natural ecosystems due to extensive human commercial and private real estate development.
Very high summer temperatures have always been a problem for human habitation in Gulf locations like Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, and Dubai, with summer temperatures often surpassing 45 degrees Celsius, combined with high amounts of humidity.
This intense combination of heat and humidity is now resulting in a phenomenon known as heat domes with some of the highest summer temperatures ever endured by mankind in locations like Baghdad, Iraq and Saudi Arabia.
These heat domes, which caused heat indexes last summer to go up to over 80 degrees Celsius (178 degrees Fahrenheit) in Saudi Arabia may result in many parts of the Arab Gulf becoming uninhabitable by humans by the year 2100.
According to CNN the deadly combination of heat and humidity, known by scientists as the “wet bulb temperature effect” becomes deadly when the human body can no longer cool itself by sweating. The wet bulb temperature effect takes place when prolonged summer heat of 31 to 35 degrees Celsius is combined with high rates of humidity.
This is caused by hot drier desert air meeting up with heavy, humid air along coastal areas. Drier areas experiencing much higher temperatures, like Kuwait City for example, would actually be more survivable due to the body still being able to sweat; which is a natural form of ventilation in humans.
More moderate climate areas of the Middle East, including Lebanon, Israel, Egypt and Jordan, also experienced summer heat domes lasting several days, combined with high humidity and dust.
This forced most people to stay indoors, running energy consuming air conditioning systems that are now an everyday necessity during the summer. Massive air conditioning systems have long been the norm in Gulf locations like Abu Dhabi and Dubai, where conspicuous consumption by wealthy fossil fuel enriched inhabitants has resulted in such wasteful projects as indoor snow ski centers, high high rise commercial and residential complexes and artificial islands.
All of these projects are built by large numbers of imported guest workers who endure extremely crowded and unpleasant living conditions; often without air conditioning.
While the super rich in Bahrain, Dubai and Abu Dhabi can insulate themselves from wet bulb temperature effects in their glass enclosed bubbles, while doing conspicuous shopping abroad, those serving them cannot for the most part. This factor in itself may result in a massive decline in human habitation in the Arab Gulf, long before the projected date of 2100.
Dig deeper into human caused climate change effects in the Middle East:
When will the Middle East wake up to green roofs?
Climate change “worst” is yet to come, UN report warns today
Climate Change contributing to Mali-Algeria conflict
Photo of Heat Dome Thermometer AFP/Daily Telegraph
Suntan around these badass solar palm trees in… Dubai!
Following Israel’s smart solar trees, the Dubai Municipality is rolling out a series of “community tech hubs” based on 3D printed palm trees that collect solar power. The stations are also where users can recharge their phones, tablets and laptops, enjoy free WiFi, and check in on local weather and news.
The Smart Palm initiative aligns with a UAE Cabinet decision to make 2015 the “Year of Innovation” and with Dubai’s overarching ambition to become the regional leader in digital Smart City technologies.
The oil-rich state has resources to make innovation reality, but why aren’t simpler versions of this basic tech going up as standard civic amenities everywhere?
These six-meter-tall solar-powered towers shaped like palm trees are the latest city-sponsored convenience for tourists and beachgoers. Dubai Municipality installed the first Smart Palm at Zabeel Park in April. The second, which added a feature to give weather updates, sprouted in May at Jumeirah Beach near the Burj Al Arab Hotel. The Dubai World Trade Center received the third unit in June, and a fourth goes up this month at an as-yet unspecified location.
Viktor Nelepa, founder of D Idea Media, the company that designs and builds the structures, told Khaleej Times, “The fourth unit will be another milestone as it will be a unique structure created using 3D printing technology and it will be the biggest such outdoor structure [in the world].”
The newest Palm is made of fiber-reinforced plastic (FRP) instead of steel, making it lighter and more durable than earlier prototypes. It has added ultraviolet and humidity protection to reduce maintenance. All Smart Palms run on its own mono crystal solar panels, which provide up to 21 per cent efficiency and generate enough power for daytime functionality and nighttime lighting. The city plans to add them to all public beaches in Al Mamzar, Jumeirah and Umm Suqeim.
Nelepa said that in the first four months of operation the Smart Palms generated a total of 2.5 MW of green electricity. More than 2,100 devices were charged and – on the silly side – about 2,000 selfies were taken using cameras attached to the towers. The project grew from collaboration between Dubai Municipality, Smart Palm creators D Idea Media, du, Sun Tab Solar Energy and Promo Tech Gulf Industry.
Alya Harmoudi, Director, Environment Department, Dubai Municipality, said each unit can support 50 simultaneous over a radius of 53 meters. She added that the stations can display updates on beach events and serve as a public announcement system. They also show beach rules, guidelines, tips, and sea conditions.
The project took just ten months from conception to delivering the finished product.
Smart Palm is designed in part to serve as functional public art that complements Dubai’s iconic architecture and scenic beaches. As such, it would be a positive addition to all Middle East airports and touristic sites, a necessary replacement for the ubiquitous telephone booths of the past.
If the makers would strip it down to its utilitarian components, production costs would reduce, enabling purchase by (or for) urban communities where people lack reliable internet connectivity or experience intermittent power.
Imagine modified Palms installed in refugee camps. That would be very smart. And for refugee design ideas see this – 10 refugee shelters we hate to love.
EU schoolkids build food waste charter includes doggy bags and free food
The European Charter against food waste was just presented at Milan Expo 2015, two weeks before the end of the six-month-long world’s fair which was focused on feeding the world.
Drafted by over 40 schools across seven European countries, and with advice from 50 municipal governments, it outlines concrete actions for cutting food waste from homes, supermarkets and restaurants. While Middle Eastern nations were not signatories, the guidance is applicable most everywhere.
Among the 80 suggestions to limit waste and promote sustainability are mandatory “doggy bags” at restaurants and public canteens and the use of glass water bottles, instead of plastic. Other recommendations include allowing supermarkets to redistribute food that is nearing expiration and turning schools into community food distribution centers.
The project is raising awareness to chronic food waste said Rita Biconne, the project manager of Felcos Umbria, one of the plan’s promoters.
Belgium, Cyprus, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom all participated, but the project also strives to impact in developing countries by encouraging local authorities in Europe to sponsor joint initiatives to improve food security around the world.
An estimated third of all food produced worldwide for human consumption is lost or wasted – about 1.3 billion tons a year, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, with developed nations responsible for most of that figure. Rich countries waste nearly as much food (222 million tonnes) as the entire net food production of sub-Saharan Africa (230 million tonnes).
The impact of food waste goes beyond finances. Environmentally, food waste equates to wasted chemical fertilizers, pesticides and transport fuels. It depletes critical resources such as land, water, and human capital. Then consider that rotting food creates methane, a greenhouse gases that is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide. (In the USA, organic waste is the second highest component of landfills, which are the largest source of methane emissions.)
The Universal Exposition in Milan opened on May 1 with the theme of “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life”. Fifteen Middle East nations are among the 170 country and corporate participants who are exploring food safety and security, innovation in the food supply chain, and technologies to advance agriculture and biodiversity.
Green Prophet will report on how each nation is tackling world hunger, food waste, and agriculture in the face of climate change.
Image of rotten tomato by Joe Buglewicz/Fast Company Design
– See more at: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.greenprophet.com/2015/10/newly-released-eu-charter-takes-aim-at-global-food-waste/#sthash.dcqhkxQ4.dpuf
Lend your nationality and swap passports to those in need
Dutch Design Week 2015 is a misnomer, the event actually runs over nine days across 100 locations displaying the experiments and ideas of 2400 designers, including works by students from the Design Academy Eindhoven. Participating designers often focus on environmental problems, but this year many tackled humanitarian problems such as the flow of refugees from the Middle East. As example, Eindhoven graduate Stefania Vulpi created a conceptual online system that allows a network of people to temporarily share nationalities.
Vulpi designed a website called Universal Unconditional that offers a hypothetical platform to allow people to swap citizenship. “It’s a crazy idea, but it’s also crazy wonderful to think about it,” Vulpi told Dezeen, “Of course I couldn’t make it real, but I wanted to see how it could work.” Her design stemmed from her own frustration over the ongoing stream of refugees coming to Europe from the Middle East.
The website seeks to connect global participants willing to give up their national identities for a limited time to other people in need. Users could also ask to borrow specific citizen rights to healthcare, asylum, or employment, depending on their needs.
Vulpi designed a suite of documents to go with the site, including official stationery and a passport that would clearly identify the holder as a member of the UNUN Embassy, with their lending and borrowing status noted.
“I think design has two ways of influencing or helping, and one is very practical – creating systems that can help or facilitate integration,” Vulpi said, “The other side is to create scenarios, question the rules, and question the system…shine a light on it.”
Vulpi’s design is provocative fantasy, but the practical aspects of her scheme are clear to anyone who has lived in a zip code populated by multinationals. I’ve witnessed the consequences of “wrong nationality” in business settings, where inability to get timely visas caused cancellations of conferences, training events, and trade shows. I’ve seen it affectrecreation, when couples or families with different nationalities fail to get visa approvals before their pre-paid flights leave. It prevents kids from competing in international school tournaments because they hold a passport with restrictive travel rights.
I can imagine the pandemonium swirling around embassies and airports if catastrophic weather events make large populations homeless, or disrupt power and water supplies – forcing immediate evacuation beyond national borders. And I haven’t even mentioned the millions fleeing war zones.
Her website site also offers services for people in need, bringing together professional citizens that can volunteer legal aid, translation or medical help. This is a feature that has is being adopted by many NGOs including the United Nations High Commission for Refugees and International Rescue Committee which are adding platforms to their own sites to encourage personal involvement in their missions.
See this project displayed at the Design Academy Eindhoven graduate exhibition as part of Dutch Design Week 2015, which runs through 25 October
Curious about how your own passport stacks up? Check out these stats from Passport Index:
American and British passports are the jackpot of all travel documents, allowing visa-free entrance to 147 countries (out of a global country count of 196 nations – notional as there is debate as to whether statehood is officially recognized for all). Compare that to the limited travel for Iraqi nationals (38 visa-free travel destinations), Yemeni (41), Lebanese (44), Syrian (48) and Jordanian (49). People in Arab Gulf states fare better; Saudi and Bahraini (61), Qatari (66) and United Arab Emirati (104). (Did you know the UAE issues passports to its prize falcons?)
The worst passport privileges append to the Palestinian Territories (28), and the best in the region attach to Israel (127).
Images from Stefania Vulpi/Dezeen
Israeli Humus Bar promotes peace, one falafel at a time
The rise of violence between Palestinians and Israelis has escalated this month straining a region where wider conflict is causing the largest human migration in history, and raising fears of a third intifada. But headlines don’t ever tell a complete story. Check out how a tiny cafe is working to promote reconciliation by rewarding tables of mixed ethnicity diner with deeply discounted Middle Eastern meals.
Your sunscreen is killing baby coral reefs
We’ve read reports that sunscreen can cause cancer (and that sunscreen doesn’t really work to prevent skin cancer), but yet – doctors say you need sunscreen in the sun.
While the daily use of sunscreen with an SPF of 15 or higher is widely acknowledged as essential to skin cancer prevention, it is hurting the sea. The clincher is that you don’t need to swim for it to be damaging because it’s damaging the reefs through coastal sewage systems and runoff.
New research published in Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology finds that a common chemical in sunscreen lotions and other cosmetic products poses an existential threat — even in miniscule concentrations — to the planet’s corals and coral reefs.
“The chemical, oxybenzone (benzophenone-3), is found in more than 3,500 sunscreen products worldwide. It pollutes coral reefs via swimmers who wear sunscreen or wastewater discharges from municipal sewage outfalls and coastal septic systems,” said Omri Bronstein from Tel Aviv University, one of the principal researchers.
The study was conducted by a team of marine scientists from Tel Aviv including the eminent Prof. Yossi Loya, from the Department of Zoology and the US National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration.
Gets deadlier at the beach
A person spending the day at the beach might use between two to four ounces of sunblock if reapplied every two hours after swimming, towelling off, or sweating a significant amount. Multiply this by the number of swimmers in the water, and a serious risk to the environment emerges, the study authors report.
“Oxybenzone pollution predominantly occurs in swimming areas, but it also occurs on reefs 5 to 20 miles from the coastline as a result of submarine freshwater seeps that can be contaminated with sewage,” said Dr. Bronstein, who conducted exposure experiments on coral embryos at the Inter University Institute in Eilat together with Dr. Craig Downs of the Heretics Environmental Laboratories.
“The chemical is highly toxic to juvenile corals. We found four major forms of toxicity associated with exposure of baby corals to this chemical.”
Forms of toxicity include coral bleaching, a phenomenon associated with high sea-surface temperature events like El Niño — and with global mass mortalities of coral reefs. The researchers found oxybenzone made the corals more susceptible to this bleaching at lower temperatures, rendering them less resilient to climate change.
They also found that oxybenzone damaged the DNA of the corals, neutering their ability to reproduce and setting off a widespread decline in coral populations.
The study also pointed to oxybenzone as an “endocrine disruptor,” causing young coral to encase itself in its own skeleton, causing death. Lastly, the researchers saw evidence of gross deformities caused by oxybenzone — such as coral mouths that expand to five times their healthy, normal size.
It only takes one application
“We found the lowest concentration to see a toxicity effect was 62 parts per trillion — equivalent to a drop of water in six and a half Olympic-sized swimming pools,” said Dr. Bronstein.
The researchers found concentrations of oxybenzone in the US Virgin Islands to be 23 times higher than the minimum considered toxic to corals.
“Current concentrations of oxybenzone in these coral reef areas pose a significant ecological threat,” said Dr. Bronstein. “Although the use of sunscreen is recognized as important for protection from the harmful effects of sunlight, there are alternatives — including other chemical sunscreens, as well as wearing sun clothing on the beach and in the water.”
Here – we show you how to make your own non-toxic sunscreen from tea
Natural tea and beeswax sunscreen recipe
The researchers hope their study will draw awareness of the dangers posed by sunscreen to the marine environment and promote the alternative: use of sun-protective swimwear.
Cosmic rays reveal the secrets of Egypt’s pyramids!
Some of the mysteries surrounding Egypt’s great pyramids will be explored using space-age technology according to a statement released by the country’s Minister of Antiquities. The “Scan Pyramids” project will use cosmic rays to solve the enigma of the ancient pyramids at Dahshur and Giza, aiming to provide better understanding of their architecture and interior design.
London calling: Gulf elite caught in conspicuous consumption
Critically acclaimed Scottish photographer Dougie Wallace has stepped on some well-heeled toes with his latest documentary project where he turns his lens to the rising economic power of the “one per cent”. His current exhibition, entitled Harrodsburg, captures the ultra-affluent visitors that inhabit – albeit only seasonally – the super-rich residential and retail district of London’s Knightsbridge and Chelsea. Most of his subjects hail from the Gulf states of the Middle East, and gauging from their reaction – they are not quite ready for their close-up.
Syria’s seedbank seeds sent for safety to Morocco
Whenever I read the news about Syria’s refugee and environmental crisis I wonder how Syria’s dictator Bashar Al-Assad’s wife Asma al-Assad, once so vocal about the natural environment (even biking to the West Bank in the past), can let her husband keep this madness up.
A little sanity in the craziness that is and has been Syria:
Precious seeds that had originally been sent by the International Centre for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) for safeguarding in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the Arctic Circle were safely delivered to Morocco and Lebanon today.
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The seeds originally stored at ICARDA’s genebank in Aleppo, Syria, had become increasingly difficult to access.
While the seed cold store is still operational in Syria, the seed retrieval from Svalbard (above) was initiated by ICARDA in partnership with Crop Trust to continue with the service of distributing seeds to users around the world – a vital aspect of ICARDA’s genebank function and role in world food security.
ICARDA routinely distributes around 25,000 samples every year to partners and outside agricultural organizations.
These seeds could hold the key to developing new crop varieties crucial to meeting world food demands with climate change.
RELATED: Syria’s seeds are in Norway
The seeds in ICARDA’s care are a globally important collection with 65 percent as unique landraces and wild relatives of cereals, legumes and forages. These ancient varieties have developed naturally robust genes from thousands of years of survival, adaptation and evolution – a valuable resource for building climate resilience in crops.
The shipment, landing in Rabat and Beirut this week, contained a total of 128 boxes with roughly 38,000 seed samples of forages such as faba beans, lathyrus, wild relatives of cereals and pulses, and cultivated wheat, barley, lentil and chickpea.
With Svalbard mission successfully completed, each sample will be planted and grown at ICARDA’s facilities to multiply seeds and replenish its active seed stock for distribution and also to return a portion back to the Seed Vault for safekeeping.
The Martian stars the Wadi Rum Desert and every Sci-Fi book we love
Ridley Scott’s, The Martian is based on Andy Weir’s best-selling novel. It was filmed in Jordan’s beautiful Wadi-Rum desert.
Hollywood loves adventure stories, especially tales of humans struggling to survive in the wilderness. The Martian has 
something in common with The Life of Pi, 127 Hours, Castaway, Into the Wild and All is Lost.
But a much more direct comparison can be made to two much older films, Apollo 13 (1995) and Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964.)
Matt Damon plays botanist, terraformer and extreme survivalist Mark Watney in The Martian, a film directed by Ridley Scott and based on the best-selling novel by Andy Weir.
When Drew Goddard wrote the screenplay for The Martian, he wisely chose to use the novel’s first-person journal format. This gives the reader a glimpse inside Mark Watney’s head, something we would miss if the film had used the third person point of view as in All is Lost. This also works well for the YouTube generation, already familiar with the wide-angle views of video blogging and what appears to be an authentic-looking GoPro camera strapped to Mark’s spacesuit.
Even with this adaptation, we know much less about the character’s backstory than we did in the novel. Matt Damon’s expressions and colorful language fill in some of the gaps.
Robinson Crusoe on Mars also uses this first-person narrative technique when Commander Kit Draper finds himself alone on Mars. He begins to record his experiences into an authentic-looking early 1960s tape recorder. Something about the film’s creepy etherphone music, the fire-colored sky and the sound of the clanging in the Martian wind gives this movie an atmosphere of loneliness beyond what we see in The Martian.
Kit explains, “All right, here’s another note for you boys in Survival…for you geniuses in Human Factors. A guy can lick the problems of heat, water, shelter, food. I know. I’ve done it. And here’s the hairiest problem of all – isolation, being alone. Boy, here’s where he’ll crack. Here’s where he’ll go under. I know, I know. I had great training, including two months in the isolation chamber. But when I was in that chamber, I knew I was coming out. I knew I’d be with people again. But up here on Mars…”
Is it OK for kids?
Except for an opening scene involving adult behavior at a party, Ron Howard’s Apollo 13 is good fun for kids of almost any age. There were no presidential visits to strip clubs that made The Right Stuff the wrong stuff for less LB-jaded eyes. The Martian also aims at a younger and broader audience than has been usual in recent years. Anyone sensitive to seeing people hurt, should probably go out for popcorn about ten minutes into the movie. But there is nothing that you wouldn’t see in an average TV medical show.
The movie withheld some of the book’s salty dialog. “Like”, “Dude” and “F***” may make up a growing proportion of the YouTube generation’s vocabulary, but their overuse can be distracting or offensive to some people. Jane Hawking was distracted by the profanity in The Theory of Everything even though their own children admitted to adding swear words to Stephen Hawking’s voice synthesizer. This movie could have easily aimed for a profitable 18+ rating, but that would have prevented it from inspiring a younger generation.
Is it as good as the book?
Matt Damon does a good job of translating some of the novels jokes and curses into something we can watch on the screen. He tones down the character’s abrasiveness enough to make him believable as a crew member on a long voyage. The movie does miss some of the novel’s humor and scientific detail, especially regarding biology, energy flow and maintaining a terraformed environment.
But it is fun and it adds some beautifully interesting visuals. It is amazing to see the color and landscape of Mars especially when we have photographic evidence that Mars actually does look like that. The movement of shadow and light in the scenes depicting the centrifugal artificial gravity of the Hermes ion drive spacecraft is a beautiful detail until someone starts trying to calculate if the spin rate and position of the sun are correct. The way weightlessness and artificial gravity are portrayed along with the physics of tethered bodies in microgravity is realistic enough to make us wonder whether this was filmed aboard the ISS or inside a CGI computer. The Martian was filmed in 3D but this wasn’t overused. In fact it was barely noticeable except for a few scenes inside the spacecraft.
Robinson Crusoe on Mars was filmed in technicolor at a time when electromechanical rocket fuel gauges, zippo lighter flames, models, strings and gelatin filters were pushing the bleeding edge of Hollywood special effects. The movie is apologetically campy with a supporting cast that includes monkey named Mona and Colonel Dan McReady, played by Adam West – aka Batman and a man named Friday.
The movie’s poster boldly claims, “This film is scientifically authentic… it is only one step ahead of present reality!” Well– maybe a couple of steps. But given that this was filmed before any probes had photographed Mars, the landscape and the color of the sky was realistic enough, Ignore the orbiting flameballs and flying saucers. Unlike sparkling Ceres and Technicolor Pluto, Mars isn’t so very different from what we imagined more than 50 years ago. Even the production of oxygen and water by heating rocks might be plausible now that we know a little more about the chemistry of Mars.
Is it believable?
As with the book, you’ll find endless online debates over the scientific accuracy of The Martian. The fact that people are complaining about the force of Martian winds and the color of Hydrogen flames gives a clue as to how little suspension of disbelief is required for those of us without PhDs in Astrophysics. Some have noted that it is probably safer to be a castaway on Mars than it is to be exposed to interstellar radiation while on board the spacecraft on its way home.
Apollo 13 was filmed in 1995 when CGI wasn’t nearly good enough to simulate weightlessness. So the more fun/nauseating comet comet option was necessary. The weightlessness was realistic because it was real. Director Ron Howard had the support of NASA engineers and astronauts and history to guide him in making a film about a story that didn’t need any Hollywood embellishment to be compelling. Other than the need to fit this storyinto a 2 hour and 20 minute, there was no reason to change anything and it probably the most accurate fictionalization of Apollo era spacecraft. But when Ron Howard talked to audience members after its first screening, many people told him that it was unrealistic. “There’s no way those guys would have survived.” Indeed, truth is much stranger than fiction.
The Martian faces the opposite problem. Many people left this movie assuming that it was non-fiction. That’s right, they believed that we already had a large ion-drive spaceship like Hermes and habitats on Mars. This film strays furthest from reality in its portrayal of our culture and politics. Humans first set foot on another world with Apollo 11. Only eight months later when Apollo 13 launched, the mission wasn’t even broadcast on the America’s TV networks until things started to go wrong. How will we maintain our cultural attention span when a single Mars mission could take as long as the entire Apollo space program?
NASA’s current budget is anemic, less than 1/50th the amount spent on the first bank bailout, less than what will be spent on mudslinging in America’s 2016 election campaign. The movie imagines a 1960s NASA transposed into the near future with no sign of the private space companies such as Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Hopefully we won’t have to repeat the failures portrayed in the movie in order to convince ourselves that global cooperation will be necessary to make this happen. Hopefully someone will be inspired by watching this movie. Maybe it will be you.
Photos are from the movie posters of Apollo 13, Robinson Crusoe on Mars and The Martian.
Israelis design 3D-printed home for NASA village on Mars!
Israeli design team Tridom won honorable mention in NASA’s 3D Printed Habitat Challenge for their ‘Bubble Base’ building, a prototype for future human habitation on Mars. The design competition invited solutions to the “need for safe, secure and sustainable housing on earth and beyond.” This goes beyond Hollywood set design for The Martian (shown above) or Interstellar. It’s also grounded in rapidly emerging technologies, with immediate application.
Eat New York City farm feast from city-grown fish and veggies
It’s the middle of NYC AgTech Week. It’s a time where futurists growing hyperlocal food and technologies
in New York City open their labs for urban food week. Tonight there will be a fish taco dinner prepared with fish raised on a roof in the city; the rest of the food was grown in urban farms in locations throughout the Big Apple. Dining starts tonight at Farm on Kent, pictured above, in Brooklyn if any Green Prophet’s are in the city.
A host of tours from 12 noon to 4 tomorrow Friday will show of off the city’s coolest urban farming technologies and I’ll be there giving a demo on how my hydroponics technology flux works.
Leading a global trend to grow hyper-local food close to home, New York entrepreneurs have innovated their food well beyond tomorrow using bold applications from the world of high-tech.
Tonight Manhattan Agriculture chefs will do the chopping and cooking and at the event meet 21 of New York’s leading urban agtech companies planting roots for a vision that New York will produce up to 40% of its food locally.
Sample pesticide-free food or see how food is grown on “water” or hydroponically –– one of the most sustainable ways to grow fresh, tasty food in cities.
The event is hosted by the New York City Agriculture Collective (www.farming.nyc), of which flux is founding member.
Henry Gordon-Smith, from Blue Planet Consulting, one of the city’s leading consultants on urban farm projects using technologies like hydroponics says: “I am getting calls on a daily basis from Real Estate developers wanting to know how they can make use of rooftops to grow both food and a new source of income.
“On the flipside I am seeing nothing short of a revolution driven by young entrepreneurs across the globe. Farming in the city has become the next big career: Post-degree, college students from various disciplines are asking me how they can switch careers and they are moving to NYC to make it happen. They want to quit everything and start growing food in their cities. This week will give answers to everyone who is curious about the industry,” he says.
The crunchiest carrots, the coolest connected cucumbers
And just like each New York neighborhood has its own flavor, the same is true for urban farms in the city. Urban farming can mean growing fish for families on a roof in Brooklyn, using hydroponic greenhouses in the Bronx to grow greens in the winter, or using connected sensors and software to optimize yield in the smallest of space –– even if you live in a small rental in Soho.
It’s no surprise that when a movement to “grow local” sweeps across the nation that New York City picks it up and takes a firm stance and a bold leaf, ahem, lead in urban farming.
Meet the breadth of New York City’s agriculture leaders in industry and products for the connected garden at New York’s first AgTech Week where investors will connect to educators, backyard farmers, large-scale commercial growers, community activists, and city officials.
The full program is found here. Or email [email protected] for more.