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Solar panels aren't new. The technology has been around for quite a long time. As all of us are well aware, burning fossil fuels to produce energy isn't doing the natural world much good and increasingly brings us into contact with politically unstable states. And so now could be the moment to perform your bit for your country and fit solar panels to generate electricity!
An electric solar panel uses photovoltaic or PV cells to turn the Sun's energy into electricity. The electricity can then run our lights and devices. A PV panel is constructed from crystalline silicon. Photons from the sun strike the silicon and electricity is generated using the photovoltaic effect.
I can really only think of 2 reasons for installing electric solar panels. This first one is economic and the other one is environmental. Some people install them for environmental reasons. But unless you're Prince Charles or James Lovelock, the majority of us will require a sound economic reason to trigger us in making the investment. Eventually, you may find that having solar panels fitted into your home might well increase it's value. The very next owners will certainly be saving money on their electricity bills.
So, we come to some of the benefits you may enjoy if you decide to put in and use electric solar panels. You can lower your electric bills by around 40% even in the UK.
Solar energy is environmentally friendly. It does not discharge any pollutants including carbon dioxide. Sleep better at night, smug in the warm glow that the contribution to the planet has afforded you. Theoretically, you can actually make some money from your panels by selling excess electricity back to the grid. The power companies are legally obliged to purchase this electricity at an inflated rate. Usually around 18p per KW. You are able to store extra energy in batteries and use them during rainy days or when needed.
Solar panels, correctly installed, will last for over 30 years. Of course, you can find a few things to consider. The solar panels are relatively heavy. You will want to make sure that your roof is robust enough to carry their weight. It is best to consult a construction specialist for proper structural assessment of your roof. You will want to ensure that you have a clear line of sight to the sun. i.e. no buildings, trees, or any structure will block the sunlight going to the panels. This is to capture the highest possible amount of sunlight to generate more electricity. Visit your local planning authority to check if you need permission to install electric solar panels.
The price of putting in an electric solar system differs and depends largely on their size. A typical 2.2 KW solar panel system is priced at about £12,000. The cost of electric solar panel systems per KW range from £4,000 to £8,000. The costs per KW will decrease as the system size increases. Generally speaking, you should see a return on your investment in around 10 years. So, maybe now it's the right time to think about installing some electric solar panels.
Solar panels aren't new. The technology has been around for quite a long time. As all of us are well aware, burning fossil fuels to produce energy isn't doing the natural world mu...
When someone uses your name or personal information, such as your credit card number, driver's license number, Social Security number, telephone number, or other account numbers, without your permission, you become a victim of identity theft.
Thieves steal your personal information and use it to open credit accounts, bank accounts, telephone service accounts, and make major purchases in your name. These criminals use your sensitive information to take over existing accounts, or open new accounts. Their criminal activities can result in damage to your credit rating and denials to credit and job offers.
Protecting Your Identity
While there are no guarantees that your identity will never be stolen or compromised, there are several steps you can take to minimize the risks.
Here are a few of them:
- Before you discard your personal information that you no longer need, such as credit card receipts, billing statements, and pre-approved credit card offers, shred them using, at best, a diagonal-cut shredder.
- Create unique passwords and personal identification numbers (PINS) and avoid using easily available information such as mother's maiden name, date of birth, or last four digits of your Social Security number.
- Do not give your Social Security number to people or companies that you do not know.
- Guard your mail from theft. Promptly remove your incoming mail from your mailbox and place outgoing mail in locked collection boxes at your local Post Office.
- As an extra measure of security, install a lock on your mailbox, even if mail theft is not an identified problem in your neighborhood.
- Before disclosing personal information, even to people you know where you shop or do business, insist on knowing the reason(s) your personal information is required and how it will be used.
Thieves can do much damage with what they remove from your mailbox.
Criminals are increasingly creative in the methods they use to get their hands or eyes on your personal information, and ultimately, your money. Here are some of the low-tech techniques they employ:
- Dumpster Diving, one of the easiest ways for them to appropriate your personal information.
- Mail Theft from unsecured residential mailboxes. According to statistics, mail theft most often takes place at unprotected and easily accessible mailboxes in public places.
- Shoulder surfing takes place when a thief watches or listens literally over your shoulder as you enter your PIN into an ATM machine. They may even follow you home or your place of work to gather additional information about you.
Data transferred across the Internet can be intercepted during its journey.
- Phishing and Pharming: While phishing is a scam in which consumers are tricked into entering their personal information via a bogus email and website form, pharming occurs where hackers steal personal information from numerous people simultaneously through something known as "domain spoofing". They take over a DNS server and redirect user information to a new website that they use to gather, collect, "pharm" illegal information.
- Skimming: Thieves quickly and temporarily steal a credit card and run it through a skimmer, a credit card reader that has been reprogrammed to steal information off the card.
Make education about the scams, schemes, and frauds criminals use to steal your identity your priority in view of the rising occurrence of this multi-million-dollar-problem. With education comes prevention. Here are some prevention tips to help reduce the risks:
- Safeguard your personal information. Never take simple things for granted.
- Carry with you only the information you need. Always keep your personal information and documents in a safe and secured place of your choosing.
- Order and review a copy of your credit report at least once a year.
- Shred documents containing your sensitive information before discarding them.
Known as The Master Blog Builder, Etienne A. Gibbs, MSW, helps small business owners and non-profit organizations improve their customer relationship marketing. Often he comes across cases that are red flags calling identity thieves to come in. Hence, he started the "Protecting Your Identity" blog. Contact him at www.MasterBlogBuilder.com for more information.
Examples of major technological advancement within the realm of private enterprise are numerous. Most major technological advancements within society have occurred outside the purview of government intervention. Governments were intended to govern the people. The governments role is to preserve the environment of freedom and democracy so that intellectual curiosity can flourish within this environment. The governments role is also to provide funding, and should not be in the nuts and bolts operation of putting man into space. The ingenuity of man within the realm of private enterprise has resulted in most of the technological advancements we enjoy today.
The cosmos will be explored by man operating from the base of private enterprise and the technology needed to explore the cosmos will be developed within that enterprise. Why is this so. NASA is an agency driven by fear of tragedy. More mishaps will decrease the probability of sufficient government funding. This cycle of fear, mishaps, and the hope for continual funding is one that seems to have no end. But mishaps are part of the business of putting explorers into space. What can better withstand the expected mishaps. A government agency or private enterprise. If a private enterprise fails, it's competitor can step in to fill the gap and the engine of private enterprise can continue to push man into space. NASA is not a private enterprise competing within the world market place.
NASA is not what it used to be during the Apollo days. Given it's current mind set and culture, it will be difficult within this framework to send man out into the cosmos as true explorers. They have given the nuts and bolts of putting man into space to private contractors. But these NASA contractors have the same NASA mind set because they are under the dominion of NASA. There is a fear of mishaps within contractors without true competition within the market place. NASA awards contracts to the lowest bidder. Does the lowest bidder provide the highest level of safety. Once a company is awarded a contract, they remain a NASA contractor for many years and simply become an extension of NASA. Therefore NASA becomes a autocratic agency with it's arms extending outward to many companies. NASA's manned space flight program can do no more then low earth orbit. Year after year of low earth orbit does not excite the American people. Astronauts today are no longer household names. An American president here and there will give a speech saying we are going to Mars. Even President Bush's January 14, 2004 speech seems to have already been forgotten by the American public.
When we went to the moon this was the start of an exploration. A goal was set on May 25, 1961 by President John F. Kennedy, during a speech before a Joint Session of Congress, to reach the moon before the end of the decade. NASA kicked into high gear and achieved one of the greatest accomplishments in the history of mankind. We took the first step into space and then just stopped. Since then all of the manned space missions have never gone beyond low earth orbit, and the American public becomes bored easily. To gain the American interest and support of the Apollo days, we must send true explorers out into space. NASA wants to take such small, time consuming incremental steps that by the time comes when the really exciting work begins, the American support and interest may be eroded to the point where NASA may no longer have the financial means by which to accomplish such an endeavor. Hence, the need for private enterprise to accomplish such an endeavor. If we are going to go into the cosmos, then lets do it and stop the futile activity.
A private enterprise is not a bureaucracy. If safety issues arise from qualified personnel within a bureaucracy, these issues may not resonate to the proper people within the organization. A case in point, the knowledge of a strong potential for a O-ring failure at low temperatures between the segments for the solid rocket boosters of the space shuttle, existed within the bureaucracy of NASA before the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion. More specifically, this critical information in terms of probability of O-ring compromise was expressed by engineers at Morton Thiokol, the contractor for the development and production of the solid rocket boosters. This information never percolated upward from Morton Thiokol to the proper people within the NASA organization.
In private enterprise, which is non-bureaucratic by nature, a relatively small group of people are working toward a common goal. In this situation, safety issues which arise will be known by all members of the organization. Safety issues will not get lost in a bureaucracy. NASA depends on it's contractors to deliver a high level of safety. A private enterprise depends on itself to provide a high level of safety. The structure of a private enterprise is more suited to the endeavor of sending out explorers into space. The government should award grants to the most promising companies with the understanding that the sending out of explorers into space does indeed benefit mankind.
Americans are at their best when they compete. Competition is an integral component of American society. What was the driving force that put us on the moon. It was the competition with the Russians. At the present moment in time, this type of competition does not exist. Although, it appears as if China may be a future competitor. Americans need to compete to accomplish something. It is competition which drives the advancement of technology. Why not let companies compete for government funding and let the research and development occur within these companies, and most importantly let them compete. These companies can have the same characteristics of any company that wants to produce a viable product. They will not be under contract from NASA and will operate as a separate private enterprise entity. A company can make money from space tourism and the same company can be involved in sending explorers out into space. Government grants can be awarded based on how strong the potential exists for space exploration. A company can be involved in space tourism, exploration, or can provide a research and development platform. This is the future of man's endeavor into space.
Man will be exploring the cosmos with private enterprise being the driving engine. If one enterprise fails, one of the competing enterprises will win out. Sure there will be some disasters and risks will be taken because that is the nature of the business. But when unfortunate disasters or mishaps do occur, the private enterprise engine will not grind to a complete halt. Burt Rutan and his Scaled Composites team have taken the first steps toward this archetypical dream of exploring the cosmos, and they did it with a fraction of the budget that NASA uses and with a team of 130 or so people to boot. They won the Ansari X-Prize by sending a man into space and returning him safely to earth and then they repeated this within two weeks. An absolutely unbelievable accomplishment given the facilities and resources which were available to them. This could only occur within a society where freedom and democracy are regarded as a right to all individuals. The United States is such a society.
Burt Rutan has said that he has never worked a day in his life. He only plays. His passion for his work is what produces results. Burt Rutan and his team represent the core of what makes the United States the greatest country in the world. May be terrorist can get it through their thick heads that freedom does work. Most importantly, Scaled Composites has shown the world what private enterprise can accomplish. Even if Scaled Composite's endeavors never go beyond earth orbit, they have taken the first step within the proper mind set and culture, and this is what will put man into the cosmos. This mind set and culture of pure unadulterated intellectual curiosity is what really will put man into the cosmos. Not NASA's mind set of fear.
NASA has played it's important role by lighting the torch in sending man to the moon. We are now at a point in the history of mankind where that torch should be passed to private enterprise. The developer of the Ansari X-Prize I'm sure shares my thoughts. God has placed the planets and all the stars within the universe there for a reason. It is God's intention for us to move outward into the final frontier. We do this to fulfill the natural curiosity that God has given to us and in the process we better the lot of mankind. Lets go...
Thomas Sullivan, the author of this article is an IT Consultant/Search Engine Optimizer, Pilot, and Space Enthusiast. He manages the website Pilot Portal USA - Pilot Weather Briefing, Flight Schools USA, Aviation Directory. Send questions or comments to Thomas Sullivan. His email address can be found on his website.
In 1960, a quadruple murder occurred in a small rural Kansas town. The murder of the well-liked Clutter family devastated the tiny community of Holcomb, Kansas. But it was not until a curious pair of eyes spied the crime report in the New York Times that the case gained nationwide notoriety. Outgoing novelist and playwright Truman Capote spent six years of his life exhaustively researching this then-obscure case and turning it into a novel called In Cold Blood. With the help of his dear friend Harper Lee, he explored even the most minute details of a gruesome four-victim homicide in the sleepy town. Capote arrived in the town early enough that he was able to record the chronicle of the events - the investigation, arrests, and subsequent trial - while they occurred in real life.
The crime itself was a robbery gone terribly awry. Two ex-convicts, Dick Hickock and Perry Smith traveled several hundred miles to the house of the Clutter family because Hickock's prison cellmate had implied the family was extremely wealthy. In actuality, the agriculturally based family was not poor but did not have a safe full of cash as the cellmate had claimed. Panicking, empty-handed, and afraid of being arrested for attempted robbery, Hickock and Smith tied up the family of four and shot them to death at point-blank range. They escaped to Mexico but ultimately were apprehended, tried, and convicted. Capote read a small blurb about the crime in a side column of the New York Times and was immediately taken with it.
Capote packed his things, picked up Harper Lee, and went down to Kansas. He interviewed nearly all the members of the town - curiously without taking notes, claiming a memory with "99% accuracy." He made the story of the murders into a narrative and it was picked up by a publisher. His book was a roaring success. Newspapers raved about Capote's seamless weaving of factual narrative with engaging prose. This book jump-started the true crime genre, which, prior to In Cold Blood, had not really existed. The wildly popular book was made into an equally successful film. The film was notable for the accuracy with which it portrayed the city in which the murders took place. Director Richard Brooks went so far as to use real jurors from the actual trial to play themselves in the trial scene. Actor Robert Blake who portrayed killer Perry Smith famously went on to kill his own wife in real life, several decades later.
The entire process caused Capote a large amount of grief and anxiety and was hugely emotionally draining for him. He had become very close to one of the murderers, Perry Smith, with whom he believed he had many similarities. Both, for example, had alcoholic mothers. After they had been sentenced to death, Capote kept up an extensive and frequent postal correspondence with both of them. He was wracked with guilt after failing, out of fear and trepidation, to attend their execution. After their deaths, he became a terrible alcoholic, and never fully recovered from the whole experience. Capote became very prestigious in the publishing industry, but the price he paid was his mental health.
Article source:
https://articlebiz.com/article/1051344516-in-cold-blood-the-original-true-crimehttps://articlebiz.com/article/1051344516-in-cold-blood-the-original-true-crime
In 1960, a quadruple murder occurred in a small rural Kansas town. The murder of the well-liked Clutter family devastated the tiny community of Holcomb, Kansas. But it was not until a...
By: Mark Boardman
In April and May of 1997 the Red River, bordering North Dakota and Minnesota flooded across the Red River valley causing $3.5 Billion worth of damage, making it one of the most expensive natural disasters ever.
The winter of 1996-97 was particularly harsh in the area with a succession of winter storms piling up massive amounts of snow over the large floodplain. Two of the worst-hit towns were Fargo and Grand Forks which had a record amount of 117 inches and 98.6 inches of snowfall on the two towns respectively over the winter.
The Red River flows north into Lake Winnipeg and as it flows north the temperatures get colder. This causes a problem with ice jamming, where the river freezes and the waters flowing from further south begin to back up against the ice dam. This is a frequent concern for the local community and in an effort to prevent ice jamming sand was dumped on the icy river to help melt the ice and increase the flow.
Flood warnings were put out for the region as early as February and the National Weather Service (NWS) predicted a 49-foot crest at Grand Forks. This peak prediction was not updated until April 14th which was just 4 days before the start of the flood. There were some complaints that the NWS could have made earlier and better crest predictions, but what isn't in doubt is the efforts the residents of Grand Forks and Fargo made in trying to save their towns.
The community built up dykes with sandbags and clay to a height of 52 feet, which was 3 feet above the NWS prediction. Students were even excused classes to help in the efforts. With the 52 feet barriers to the river in place, the residents thought they would be spared. Alas, the sudden thaw of this brutally harsh winter's snowfall over such a large floodplain was more than the residents could have imagined. In Grand Forks, the waters peeked at 54 feet and completely overwhelmed the town. The flooding began on April 18th and town after town along the Red River became inundated with floodwaters well above previous records.
The topography of the Red River valley is very wide, and very flat, leaving nothing to bar the way of the floodwaters once they had broken through their banks. As a result, the floods reached up to 3 miles inland (imagine being flooded by a river 3 miles away!) The waters in Grand Forks, at 54 feet, were now 26 feet above the usual flood stage. A massive evacuation of the residents (75% of a population of 52,000) had taken place and this was repeated in all the towns affected by the flood. This evacuation helped with the remarkable statistic that not a single death occurred as a result of the flood despite its massive scale. Also, a large fire ignited in Grand Forks engulfing 11 buildings, including 60 apartments.
The floodwaters eventually began to subside on 23rd April but took a long while to completely recede. The cleanup operation was on a massive scale. 20,000 volunteers flew in to help the beleaguered residents who had to throw away virtually all of their possessions. Slowly but surely the area returned to normal but those who lived through it will never forget the spring flood of 1997 and will be hoping the next great flood won't be in their lifetime.
Article Source:
https://articlebiz.com/article/202242-the-flood-of-the-centuryhttps://articlebiz.com/article/202242-the-flood-of-the-century
By: Mark Boardman
In April and May of 1997 the Red River, bordering North Dakota and Minnesota flooded across the Red River valley causing $3.5 Billion worth of damage, making it one of the most expens...