Gas | gethardcashhijack.com

swim in a sea of information

Topless protesters detained at Davos forum (AP)

DAVOS, Switzerland ? Three topless Ukrainian protesters were detained Saturday while trying to break into an invitation-only gathering of international CEOs and political leaders to call attention to the needs of the world’s poor. After a complicated journey to reach the heavily guarded Swiss resort town of Davos, the women arrived at the entrance to the congress center where the World Economic Forum takes place every year. With temperatures around freezing in the snow-filled town, they took off their tops and climbed a fence before being detained. “Crisis! Made in Davos,” read one message painted across a protester’s torso, while others held banners that said “Poor, because of you” and “Gangsters party in Davos.” Davos police spokesman Thomas Hobi said the three women were taken to the police station and their papers were checked. They were told that they weren’t allowed to demonstrate, and will be released later, he said. The activists are from the group Femen, which has become popular in Ukraine for staging small, half-naked protests to highlight a range of issues including oppression of political opposition. They have also conducted protests in some other countries. “We came here to Switzerland to Davos to explain position of all poor people of the world, to explain that we are poor because of these rich people who now sit in the building,” said protester Inna Schewcenko. Protesters from the Occupy movement that started with protests against practices on Wall Street held a separate demonstration in Davos on Saturday. A small….

Provide Yourself By Having An Early Childhood … – Family Pursuits

Provide Yourself By Having An Early Childhood Education Degree With an degree in early childhood education, almost any self-respecting person will be able to earn a reasonable living. It doesn?t take much time for you to acquire a diploma especially at this point in our technology-savvy world in which courses can be provided over the internet. Online tutorials or perhaps webinars for all those seeking this degree or wants to be a child development associate are usually available with flexible schedules depending on the University or college along with your particular schedule. Together with excellent organization, you can even engage in two separate diplomas that are correlated. As an example, an early childhood education degree put together with a child?s psychology degree. Along with two degrees in this emerging market, you will be certainly within the cutting edge and can get hired sooner than you can say hire. Almost all educational institutions and also schools have revised their programs and education policies to fit with the current world-wide situation. Nobody likes to end up being left out thus a space have been made within today?s world looking for quality educators rather than the clich? professors that has been around well before. Almost everything comes right down to level of quality within today?s world and teaching is actually not put aside. All the policies put in place necessitate educators of young children to have a diploma or perhaps if they have a normal education diploma, to complete additional programs that touch….

Liberia to vote on constitutional referendum (AP)

MONROVIA, Liberia ? Poll workers and United Nations peacekeepers fanned out across Liberia on Monday ahead of a constitutional referendum that is being boycotted by the country’s leading opposition party. The referendum scheduled for Tuesday is being seen as a test of Liberia’s democracy as the country prepares to hold its second, postwar election this fall. President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who has become a symbol of good governance abroad, is facing stiff competition in this country of 3.5 million devastated by war. Sirleaf has been heading a “Vote Yes to All Propositions” campaign for the four-item ballot. The top opposition party is calling on supporters to boycott the referendum because they say the proposed constitutional changes favor the ruling party and will make it easier for Sirleaf to be re-elected later this year. “We are not joining those who want to slaughter the constitution for selfish reasons,” Acarous Moses Gray, the secretary-general of the opposition Congress for Democratic Change party, told The Associated Press by telephone on Monday. Election Commission Chairman James Fromoyan called the boycott “unfortunate” but said he doubts it will be fully enforced. 1.7 million registered voters are eligible to vote. The secretary-general of the governing party, Wilmot Page, called the boycott “an infringement on the rights of those who want to exercise their franchise.” One of the amendments questioned by the opposition would lower the percentage of votes a candidate needs to win a legislative or municipal election. Currently a candidate needs to get an absolute….

Health Tip: Manage Pain During Childbirth (HealthDay)

(HealthDay News) — Pain is a virtual certainty during childbirth, but there are ways to ease the discomfort without medication. The womenshealth.gov website mentions these no-medication possibilities: Practicing relaxation and breathing techniques. Relaxing in a warm shower or bath, or getting a gentle massage. Receiving hot and cold therapy, including placing a cool washcloth on the forehead or a heating pad on the lower back. Seeking the care and support of a doula, nurse or loved one. Trying various positions to get more comfortable, from crouching to walking. Listening to soothing music. Using a labor ball. Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/meds/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20120128/hl_hsn/healthtipmanagepainduringchildbirth dave chappelle jehovah witness search engine sons of anarchy season 4 australia back street boys georgia

Southern Baptist leaders OK ‘Great Commission’ (AP)

[unable to retrieve full-text content] AP – Leaders of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination have endorsed an optional alternative name for the Southern Baptist Convention: Great Commission Baptists. Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/religion/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120221/ap_on_re/us_rel_southern_baptists_name bbc radio 1 annette funicello family bipolar disorder smallville season 10 kotaku tom welling

use for a quick convenience
app army budget Business car chancellor angela merkel child content debt Estate film Fitness gas german chancellor angela merkel Gingrich google government green bay packers Home INSURANCE iPhone life Marketing michele bachmann new england patriots newt gingrich OOC opposition percent phone president Press providence journal Reuters Search Senate Shopping site Source source feed State Stories Talk time Year

Russian rig sinks, more than 50 feared dead

MOSCOW?? A drilling rig with 67 crew on board capsized and sank off Russia’s far eastern island of Sakhalin on Sunday while being towed through a storm, leaving more than 50 dead or missing in the icy Sea of Okhotsk.

Only on msnbc.com
1. Who’s in charge? Mixed signals from Egypt’s rulers
2. Death penalty dying out
3. Romney snags key newspaper endorsement in Iowa
4. iPhone case gift guide, from wonderful to weird
5. Rumors swirl over Gobi Desert’s mysterious patterns
6. Bachmann in Iowa: ‘I don’t hate Muslims’
7. Mobile chapels to soothe truckers’ souls

Emergency officials said the crew of an icebreaker and tugboat rescued 14 workers alive from the jack-up rig, the ‘Kolskaya’, which was operated by a Russian offshore exploration firm. They recovered four bodies from the water.

Four of the survivors, suffering from hypothermia, were airlifted by helicopter to land and taken to hospital after the disaster struck at 12:45 p.m. (0145 GMT).

The rest of the crew were missing, 200 km (125 miles) off the coast of remote Sakhalin island. The water temperature was one degree Celsius (33.8 Fahrenheit), giving survivors around 30 minutes before death from freezing, according to maritime and rescue websites.

“The Kolskaya keeled to its side … and sank within 20 minutes. The depth of the water at the site is 1,042 metres (0.65 miles),” Russia’s federal water transport agency said in a statement on its website.

Several rescue crafts and helicopters had been sent to the site to scour the waters for survivors from the rig owned by Arktikmorneftegazrazvedka (AMNGR), a unit of state-owned Zarubezhneft.

“There is no ecological danger. The vessel was carrying the minimum amount of fuel as it was being tugged by two craft,” said a spokesman for AMNGR.

But the incident will deal a blow to efforts by Russia, the world’s largest energy producer, to step up offshore oil and gas exploration to stave off a long-term decline in onshore production.

The jack-up rig, which has three support legs that can be extended to the ocean floor while its hull floats on the surface, was heading from Kamchatka to Sakhalin when it overturned in stormy winter conditions with a swell of up to 6 metres (19.7 feet).

“(President) Dmitry Medvedev has ordered all necessary assistance be provided to the victims of the drilling platform accident and has ordered a probe into the circumstances of the loss of the platform,” the Kremlin said. The Emergencies Ministry said it would work through Sunday night.

“The violation of safety rules during the towing of the drilling rig, as well as towing without consideration of the weather conditions … are believed to be the cause of the (disaster),” investigators said in a statement on their website.

The ‘Neftegaz-55′ tugboat, also owned by AMNGR, had been towing the Kolskaya and took part in the search effort, but pulled out after suffering hull damage from the high waves.

The tug, carrying most of the crew rescued from the rig, was taking on water and trying to limp to port. An icebreaker, the ‘Magadan’, was still at the scene.

The rig, built in Finland in 1985, had been doing work on a minor gas production project in the Sea of Okhotsk for a unit of state-controlled gas export monopoly Gazprom, the company said.

Russia’s prize offshore gas and oil fields lie to the northeast of Sakhalin. Two major offshore projects are already producing oil and gas off the island – Sakhalin-1, operated by Exxonmobil and Sakhalin-2, in which Gazprom has a controlling stake.

The disaster is unlikely to seriously affect oil or gas production. AMNGR said the vessel was no longer under contract when it sank.

Operating conditions in the region, explored by Soviet geologists in the 1960s and 1970s, are among the harshest for Russian energy companies.

Winter often lasts 220-240 days in the waters off Sakhalin, where the main companies operating are ExxonMobil, Gazprom, and Royal Dutch Shell. They produce oil and gas, sometimes in icebound conditions, for export largely to Asian markets.

Sakhalin-2, in which Shell and Mitsui also have stakes, produces 10 million tons per year of liquefied natural gas at Russia’s only LNG plant in the port of Prigorodnoye for export to Asia, much of it to Japan.

Each tanker of crude oil produced by at the 160,000 barrels-per-day Sakhalin-1 project, operated by ExxonMobil, is escorted by two icebreakers when ice thickness reaches 60 cm (2 feet).

State-controlled Rosneft this year reached a major deal with Exxon to explore for oil and gas in the Kara Sea, to the north of the Russian mainland, a largely unexplored region estimated to hold over 100 billion barrels of oil.

A combination of poor infrastructure and chronic corner-cutting has dealt the country its share of sea disasters, notably the 2000 sinking of the nuclear submarine Kursk in the Barents Sea in August 2000, killing all 118 aboard and prompting criticism of the sluggish response.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45714698/ns/world_news-europe/

grape seed extract kate spade ireland dead island washington nationals rachel maddow nba mock draft

Written on December 20th, 2011 , savor Tags: gas, gobi desert, sakhalin island

Why the World May Be Running Out of Clean Water (Time.com)

Earlier this month, officials in the South Pacific island nation of Tuvalu had to confront a pretty dire problem: they were running out of water. Due to a severe and lasting drought, water reserves in this country of 11,000 people had dwindled to just a few days’ worth. Climate change plays a role here: as sea levels rose, Tuvalu’s groundwater became increasingly saline and undrinkable, leaving the island dependent on rainwater. But now a La Ni?a?influenced drought has severely curtailed rainfall, leaving Tuvalu dry as a bone. “This situation is bad,” Pusinelli Laafai, Tuvalu’s permanent secretary of home affairs, told the Associated Press earlier this month. “It’s really bad.”

So far Tuvalu has been bailed out by its neighbors Australia and New Zealand, which have donated rehydration packets and desalination equipment. But the archipelago’s water woes are just beginning ? and it’s far from the only part of the world facing a big dry. Other island nations like the Maldives and Kiribati will see their groundwater spoil as sea levels rise. Texas, along with much of the American Southwest, is in the grip of a truly record-breaking drought ? even after days of storms in the past month, Houston’s total 2011 rainfall is still short of its yearly average by a whopping 2 ft., or 60 cm. Australia has experienced severely dry weather for so long, it’s not even clear whether the country is in a state of drought, or more worryingly, a new and permanent dry climate that could forever alter life Down Under. “Climate-change impacts on water resources continue to appear in the form of growing influence on the severity and intensity of extreme events,” says Peter Gleick, one of the foremost water experts in the U.S. and head of the Pacific Institute, an NGO based in Oakland, Calif., that focuses on global water issues. “Australia’s recent extraordinary extreme drought should be an eye-opener for the rest of us.” (See photos of the world’s water crisis.)

Volume 7 of the Pacific Institute’s regular report on global water usage, The World’s Water, comes out today, just in time to address the squeeze of droughts, the increasingly apparent impact of climate change and the threats facing our relatively scarce supplies of freshwater. The sweeping report is a reminder that clean water is vital to life ? as Gleick points out, more than 2 million people die each year from preventable water-related diseases ? and that on the whole, we’re not doing a very good job of husbanding that resource. There’s even a risk here that parts of the U.S., especially the arid West, may have passed “peak water” ? the point at which it becomes essentially impossible to increase supply.

Potential water shortages are one more reason to try to reduce carbon emissions and blunt the worst impacts of climate change ? a warmer world is likely to further dry out already arid regions, even as extreme rainfall intensifies in already wet areas. But however severe the effects of climate change become, we’re going to need to use water much more efficiently than we do now: the world’s population is expected to pass the 7 billion mark by the end of this month, and more people will need more water. “New thinking about solutions and sustainable water planning and management, better data, case studies and efforts to raise awareness, are all needed,” Gleick writes in The World’s Water.(Read about radioactive water in Japan.)

Smarter water policy might mean rethinking other fields of resource use. Take, for example, natural gas drilling. Hydraulic fracturing has vastly increased American supplies of natural gas, which is good for gas companies and, because natural gas generally has a greener footprint, potentially good for the environment as well. But fracking requires a significant amount of water ? up to 5 million gal. (19 million L) per well. That might not be a major problem in a relatively wet state like Pennsylvania, but in bone-dry states like Texas, water-intensive fracking has sparked a backlash. There’s also the uncertain risk of water contamination from fracking and drilling, and the problem of water waste. “The rapid expansion of the use of hydraulic fracturing to increase natural gas production has serious potential consequences for local water resources,” says Gleick. It’s important that “more effort be put into both understanding the real risks and protecting water resources before pushing for accelerated programs of natural gas production.”

What we need most of all is a rethink of how we deal with water and a recognition of just how valuable it is ? especially in a warming world. That means focusing on modulating demand as much as increasing supply. Through most of the 20th century, governments dealt with water problems through massive construction projects designed to expand and regulate supply ? think the Hoover Dam near Las Vegas or the Three Gorges Dam in China.

But the era of those big projects may be ending, largely because we’ve begun to recognize the environmental problems that come with major dams, including the loss of aquatic wildlife and the displacement of local populations. Last month Burma’s military government ? not ordinarily responsive to public opinion ? canceled a planned $3.6 billion Chinese-backed hydroelectric dam that would have displaced thousands of villagers. Just as we’ve recognized that energy efficiency is often the fastest and cheapest way to address carbon emissions, there’s much that can be done to curb water waste. We need to “adopt 21st century strategies of new forms of sustainable water supply, rethink water demand and efficiency of use, and [embrace] smart use of pricing and economics,” says Gleick. The alternative could mean ending up like poor Tuvalu ? high and dry.

Read about how people in Tucson, Ariz., are saving water.

See photos of the politics of water in Central Asia.

View this article on Time.com

ANALYSIS

Cuadrilla Resources believes there are huge reserves of natural gas in layers of shale under Lancashire.

That is based on the testing it has already done, but an important part of its exploration work was put on hold when it had to suspend hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

Even though today’s report says it is highly probable that fracking did trigger two earth tremors earlier this year, the company believes it can resume that process safely- with some modifications to the way it works.

Some environmental groups opposed to shale gas are calling for a moratorium on fracking. It’s not just the process itself that they’re concerned about. They say large-scale gas extraction will lead to more reliance on fossil fuels rather than alternative energy sources.

The industry argues that there is big potential for a new home-grown energy source that could reduce gas prices and also provide new jobs.

A study by The British Geological Survey placed the epicentre for each quake about 500m away from the Preese Hall-1 well, at Weeton, near Blackpool.

The Geo-mechanical Study Of Bowland Shale Seismicity report, carried out by independent experts, said the combination of geological factors that caused the quakes was rare, and would be unlikely to occur together again at future well sites.

It said: “If these factors were to combine again in the future local geology limits seismic events to around magnitude 3 on the Richter scale as a worst-case scenario.”

However, it said that “even the maximum seismic event is not expected to present a risk”.

Mark Miller, chief executive officer of Cuadrilla Resources, said: “We unequivocally accept the findings of the independent report and we are pleased that there is no threat to people or property in the local area from our operations.

“We are ready to put in place the early detection system that has been proposed in the report so that we can provide additional confidence and security to the local community.

“Cuadrilla is working with the local and national authorities to implement the report’s recommendations so we may resume our operations.”

A spokesman for Frack Off said: “This report does not inspire confidence, they should have done their research before drilling began.”

He added: “Can we believe anything else the industry says when it talks about the safety of fracking?”

Protesters have called for an end to fracking. There have been concerns that potentially carcinogenic chemicals could escape during the process and find their way into drinking water sources.

‘Hopelessly naive’

“The contamination of irrigation water means that everyone’s food supplies could potentially be affected,” the Frack Off spokesman added.

Friends of the Earth’s senior climate campaigner Tony Bosworth said: “This report shows fracking for shale gas caused earth tremors in Lancashire – experience in the US shows it could also pollute air and water supplies.

“Extracting shale gas would suck vital funding away from clean and safe energy alternatives that could create thousands more UK jobs.

“An early seismic detection system won’t be enough to make local people feel safe – there should be no more fracking in Britain until the health and environmental impacts are fully understood.”

Doug Parr, chief scientist at Greenpeace, added: “Anyone who believes shale gas is the solution to our energy needs is being hopelessly naive.

“There are significant unknowns about the local and global impacts of fracking, illustrated by the conclusion by seismologists that recent fracking in the North West was responsible for a minor earthquake.”

He said fracking was a “distraction from the real challenges” and that “real energy solutions” would be found in using renewable sources.

Nick Molho, head of energy policy at World Wildlife Fund UK, reiterated a call for a moratorium on fracking in the UK.

“These findings are worrying, and are likely to add to the very real concerns that people have about fracking and shale gas,” he said.

The industry denies that shale gas is unsafe and a government committee has recommended that fracking should be allowed to go ahead.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) said: “The implications of this report will be reviewed very carefully – in consultation with the British Geological Survey, independent experts, and the other key regulators, HSE and the Environment Agency – before any decision on the resumption of these hydraulic fracture operations is made.”

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/uk-england-lancashire-15550458

cornel west marzieh vafamehr marzieh vafamehr lady liberty lady liberty the rum diary addams family

Written on November 5th, 2011 , savor Tags: earth tremors, earthquake prevention, gas

gethardcashhijack.com is proudly powered by WordPress and the Theme Adventure by Eric Schwarz
Entries (RSS) and Comments (RSS).

swim in a sea of information

use for a quick convenience

ANALYSIS