Soap made from captured CO2

Darcy Hitchcock

Hotels use a lot of hot water, typically heated by gas. A device from a Canadian company can capture the carbon dioxide and turn it into a useful product, potash, that can be used to make soap or other products. The device also captures waste heat which can then preheat water or warm rooms.

Inside a Radisson hotel, hidden in a mechanical room, a black box roughly the size of two refrigerators is connected to the hot water heaters (which a hotel uses a lot). But they’re not to make the water hotter. The system helps capture CO2 whenever guests take a shower. The technology, from the Canadian company Clean02, reduces emissions from buildings by converting the CO2 from water heaters or furnaces into an ingredient that can be used to make soap or shampoo.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90770632/this-big-black-box-turns-the-co2-emissions-a-your-hot-shower-into-soap

Flue gas enters the chamber and reacts with potassium hydroxide. Every few weeks…

View original post 74 more words

Xmas Pear Pupus

snapshotsincursive

What’s Cooking in Gail’s Kitchen? Enjoyable Eats: Xmas Pear Pupus! A popular Polynesian appetizer, served hot or cold, comes from the Hawaiian word “pūpū”. It can be anything from a buffet table of skewered meat, tempura veggies, raw fish, and other finger foods to simple cold trays of tropical fruits, deviled eggs, edamame, and smoked salmon. Remember to make everything bite-size when planning an informal gathering. Because pear trees live such a long time, their fruit is very symbolic during the holiday season. The pear often represents immortality, wisdom, and health; a treat fit for royalty. By creating a pear pupu platter, you’re giving your guests a gift of intangibles they may treasure for years to come. Get the conversation started. Serve freshly sliced ripe pears and cinnamon dusted pear chips with a wheel of warm Brie. How festive!

XMAS PEAR PUPUS

Ingredients:

2 pears, thinly sliced for baking

1…

View original post 121 more words

Humour In The Snippets!

Filosofa's Word

Sometimes snarky snippets can be humorous, too.


A bit of a disappointment, I guess

A man named Shahram Poursafi started planning to murder former national security advisor John Bolton in October in likely retaliation for his involvement in a drone strike that killed Qassem Soleimani.  Poursafi, a member of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, attempted to pay people in D.C. or Maryland up to $300,000 to carry out the murder, but was thus far unsuccessful and the FBI is currently attempting to locate him.

John Bolton was interviewed by Wolf Blitzer on CNN’s “Situation Room” on Wednesday.  Blitzer asked …

“The suspect put a $300,000 price tag on your head.  What goes through your mind, ambassador, hearing the details of this plot, as explained today in great detail by the U.S. Justice Department?”

I don’t know what sort of response I might have expected, but it wasn’t this one …

View original post 302 more words

Will the Smallpox Vaccine Protect Against Monkeypox? – News @ Northeastern (Me: Short answer… no.)

“The question for folks who have been vaccinated prior to 1972 is are those vaccines still effective against monkeypox?” Maniar asks.

“Immunity wanes over time,” he says. “There are definitely folks getting monkeypox who are in their 50s and were vaccinated against smallpox” as children.

While a study showed the smallpox vaccine is 85% effective against monkeypox, previous research shows that the full protection it offers against smallpox only lasts for 3-5 years, says Brandon Dionne, associate clinical professor in Northeastern University’s College of Pharmacy.

Source: Will the Smallpox Vaccine Protect Against Monkeypox? – News @ Northeastern

CDC streamlines COVID-19 guidance to help the public better protect themselves and understand their risk | CDC Online Newsroom | CDC (Me: Read the whole guidance document – don’t just cherry pick…)

  • Continuing to promote the importance of being up to date with vaccination to protect people against serious illness, hospitalization, and death. Protection provided by the current vaccine against symptomatic infection and transmission is less than that against severe disease and diminishes over time, especially against the currently circulating variants. For this reason, it is important to stay up to date, especially as new vaccines become available.
  • Updating its guidance for people who are not up to date on COVID-19 vaccines on what to do if exposed to someone with COVID-19.  This is consistent with the existing guidance for people who are up to date on COVID-19 vaccines.
  • Recommending that instead of quarantining if you were exposed to COVID-19, you wear a high-quality mask for 10 days and get tested on day 5.
  • Reiterating that regardless of vaccination status, you should isolate from others when you have COVID-19.
    • You should also isolate if you are sick and suspect that you have COVID-19 but do not yet have test results.
      • If your results are positive, follow CDC’s full isolation recommendations.
      • If your results are negative, you can end your isolation.
  • Recommending that if you test positive for COVID-19, you stay home for at least 5 days and isolate from others in your home.  You are likely most infectious during these first 5 days. Wear a high-quality mask when you must be around others at home and in public.
    • If after 5 days you are fever-free for 24 hours without the use of medication, and your symptoms are improving, or you never had symptoms, you may end isolation after day 5.
    • Regardless of when you end isolation, avoid being around people who are more likely to get very sick from COVID-19 until at least day 11.
    • You should wear a high-quality mask through day 10.
  • Recommending that if you had moderate illness (if you experienced shortness of breath or had difficulty breathing) or severe illness (you were hospitalized) due to COVID-19 or you have a weakened immune system, you need to isolate through day 10.
  • Recommending that if you had  severe illness or have a weakened immune system, consult your doctor before ending isolation. Ending isolation without a viral test may not be an option for you. If you are unsure if your symptoms are moderate or severe or if you have a weakened immune system, talk to a healthcare provider for further guidance.
  • Clarifying that after you have ended isolation, if your COVID-19 symptoms worsen, restart your isolation at day 0. Talk to a healthcare provider if you have questions about your symptoms or when to end isolation.
  • Recommending screening testing of asymptomatic people without known exposures will no longer be recommended in most community settings.
  • Emphasizing that physical distance is just one component of how to protect yourself and others.  It is important to consider the risk in a particular setting, including local COVID-19 Community Levels and the important role of ventilation, when assessing the need to maintain physical distance.

Source: CDC streamlines COVID-19 guidance to help the public better protect themselves and understand their risk | CDC Online Newsroom | CDC

Evolution and control of the COVID-19 pandemic: A global perspective – ScienceDirect

The empirical results show that among the control measures, School-closures, international-travel restrictions and public-gathering-restriction have the best effect on epidemic control. Compared with any single control measure, interactions between measures had greater explanatory power for the cumulative NCCC, especially for combined measures of Public-gathering-restrictions∩ School-closures, international-travel-restrictions ∩ Workplace-closures and Public-transport-restrictions ∩ International- travel-restrictions. Source: Evolution and control of the COVID-19 pandemic: A global perspective – ScienceDirect

FBI seized ‘top secret’ documents from Trump home

A property receipt unsealed by the court shows FBI agents took 11 sets of classified records from the estate during a search on Monday.

The seized records include some that were marked classified as top secret and also “sensitive compartmented information,” a special category meant to protect the nation’s most important secrets and those that if revealed publicly would harm U.S. interests. The court records did not provide specific details about the documents or what information they might contain.

The warrant details that federal agents were investigating potential violations of three different federal laws, including one that governs gathering, transmitting or losing defense information under the Espionage Act. The other statutes address the concealment, mutilation or removal of records and the destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in federal investigations.

The property receipt also showed federal agents collected other potential presidential records, including the order pardoning Trump ally Roger Stone, a “leatherbound box of documents,” and information about the “President of France.” A binder of photos, a handwritten note, “miscellaneous secret documents” and “miscellaneous confidential documents” were also seized in the search.

Trump’s attorney, Christina Bobb, who was present at Mar-a-Lago when the agents conducted the search, signed both property receipts — one that was two pages long and another that is a single page.

In a statement earlier Friday, Trump claimed that the documents seized by agents were “all declassified,” and argued that he would have turned over the documents to the Justice Department if asked.

While incumbent presidents have the power to declassify information, that authority lapses as soon as they leave office and it was not clear if the documents in question have ever been declassified. Trump also kept possession of the documents despite multiple requests from agencies, including the National Archives, to turn over presidential records in accordance with federal law.

Source: FBI seized ‘top secret’ documents from Trump home