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fatehbaz · 11 months

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[N]ear the Küçükçekmece lake near the Western peripheries of İstanbul. [...] We are waiting to cross a ditch that has been dug [...] [through] an agricultural field that belongs to the İstanbul University over which Kanal İstanbul is planned to pass. Ayşe [...] is crossing back from the field with two plastic bags full of wild mustard she and her friends have collected. The ditch serves both as an obstacle and a reminder of the ever-looming construction efforts. [...] She asks, “Are you taking these people out for a stroll?” (Sen bunları mı dolandırıyorsun), a well-crafted double entendre. “Dolandırmak” literally means to take someone on a stroll, but could also be used to indicate deceit, to “take someone for a ride” the way tour guides, or taxi drivers sometimes do to unsuspecting foreigners. When I laugh and explain that I’m a student she points to a field. “There,” she offers, “this is where the Kanal will pass” (“Buradan Kanal geçecek”).

Kanal İstanbul is a mega dredging project and an accompanying urban transformation plan that promises to open a new waterway between the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea. As such, it combines the spectacle of a megaproject with the more practical effects of shifting the city’s peripheries. The dredging of such a waterway will prove disastrous for the unique ecology of the Sea of Marmara [...] [and] forests, wallows, and lakes located across the Northwest of İstanbul. This area will be subsumed not only by the Kanal but also the accompanying expansion of the city Westwards with new logistics ports, waterfront housing, roads, and bridges.

Ayşe’s comment “this is where the Kanal will pass” is on the one hand a stock response one might hear from the residents of İstanbul’s Western peripheries. The project was originally launched into public consciousness as a speculative election promise in 2013 and recently became a more concrete plan. Either way, it has long haunted this geography, with the path that the Kanal would take remaining a mystery until 2018. It became the source of intense speculation, rumors and several defrauding schemes. [...] And now that the bridges, roads, water, and electricity infrastructure to sustain such a project are being built, there is some chance the project might come to fruition [...].

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But this stock response “this is where the Kanal will pass” (“buradan Kanal İstanbul geçecek) also echoes another familiar phrase in Turkish “this is where a road will pass” (“buradan yol geçecek”). The phrase hints at both the promise and the perils of infrastructural development in Turkey (Kostem forthcoming).

Begüm Adalet points out in her book Hotels and Highways (2018), how theories of modernization were actively tested in Turkey through the construction of material infrastructure like highways in the 1950s and 1960s by a team of experts and engineers from the United States and Turkey. Yet this particular locution captures a more diffuse and affective valence to the ideology of modernization and the way it intersects with mega construction projects and the promise of economic growth.

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Its declarative mode “where a road will pass” ties in macro phenomena such as economic growth and modernization with the promise of personal advancement and financial security or fear of violence and repression. [...] Yet such phrases also present a broader communicative logic that subtends infrastructural development especially in such peripheral spaces that exist on the edges of the city. This communicative logic carries a promissory element that is both familiar and as Appel, Anand and Gupta note, multivalent (2018, 7), at times communicating a threat, at times promising development, at other times offering economic advancement, often shifting between the three and for different subjects.

Yet this communicative structure also resembles a rumor, since the declaration that “a road will pass” or “the Kanal will pass” does not have a subject. Instead, it is often accompanied with the indefinite “so they say” (“yol geçecek diyorlar” or “yol geçecekmiş”). Indeed, this is how I instinctively responded to Ayşe “is that what they say?” (“öyle mi diyorlar?” ). More than a simple locution this communicative logic is reflected in how the state carries out infrastructure development, which takes place under conditions of great secrecy, especially in such peripheral spaces. What is prohibited and allowed, who owns which land, where a construction project might pass, how long it will take is often obscured, true enough for any construction project but doubly so on the peripheries of İstanbul, an area that has witnessed multiple generations of migration and extraction. [...]

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In her work, on İstanbul’s more urbanized Tarlabaşı district, [...] Alize Arıcan argues (2022) that rumors act as a kind of autonomous and collective archive for the racialized communities of this neighborhood, a site of history-making. Addressing the obvious criticisms of Kanal İstanbul that the project was being launched for the sole purpose of creating waterfront property and hence extracting rent, the Turkish Minister of Transportation Adil Karaismailoğlu recently insisted “Kanal İstanbul is a technical issue, we are talking of a world vision here. This is not a matter of political rumors”.

And yet rumors seem to constitute the field of struggle over which financialized infrastructural development takes place both in İstanbul’s and especially also in its peripheries. [...] Turkey moves ahead with a contested election shortly after a devastating earthquake that has once again brought attention to the destructive character of a society organized around the imperatives of construction, economic growth and capitalist expansion, all underwritten by state violence. [...] In this environment, what would it mean for rumors to be an archive of political memory, knowledge-making and even resistance for an autonomous social opposition?

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Text by: Burç Köstem. ‘”A Road Will Pass”: the Communicative Logic of Infrastructure in the Peripheries.’ Heliotrope, Environmental Media Lab at the University of Calgary. 19 April 2023. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

#abolition #ecology #imperial #colonial

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mysteriouslover1516 · 1 year

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Lost without You (Part 1)

The young hacker had managed to evade his pursuers once more, escaping the mine unnoticed and mostly unharmed except for the smoke in his lungs. Apparently there was an exit that not even the FBI had known of, allowing him to escape undetected and swiftly. Fleeing on foot past the outskirts of Duskwood, he was able to slow his pace, being careful to avoid any busy and populated roads. After finding refuge in another city and booking a hotel room under a secret identity, he was then able to focus on setting up his computer. It had been over five days since the incident at the mine, meaning the news of the explosion was everywhere.

Four days ago Alan Bloomgate, chief police of Duskwood, recovered the missing Hannah Donfort from the Grimstone Mine. Although malnourished, weak, and frightened; the young woman was in overall better condition than expected. She showed no signs of injuries beside slight cuts on her body, and chafing on her wrists and ankles from rope. Before anyone could reenter the mine and look for the perpetrator or the missing person of Richy Rogers, the Grimstone exploded. Officers have confirmed that it was clearly an inside job, the person behind everything had set fire to the mine in order to hide the evidence and avoid capture by the police.

Hannah Donfort was brought to the Duskwood hospital and checked over for any more injuries, luckily there were none major. Her family and friends are overjoyed by her safe return; however, the same can not be said for the Rogers family. Police are still searching the burnt remains for any evidence or trace of the young mechanic, another victim of the cruel actions of a maniac. The identity of the perpetrator has not yet been confirmed, officers are still looking for the body or possible bodies in the mine.

Jake bit his lip as he read the article, it was all lining up just as he had suspected. Michael was undoubtedly the one who had started the fire, opting to commit suicide instead of being imprisoned for Hannah’s kidnapping and Amy’s murder. His electric blue eyes then caught the headline of another column, immediately clicking onto the website.

Hannah Donfort has just confessed to being involved in a mysterious and tragic incident that took place nearly ten years ago, the cause of Jennifer Hanson’s death.

In 2013 a young woman by the name of Jennifer Hanson went missing. She was last seen at the Bar Aurora, where her father Michael Hanson was the current owner of. Michael made a statement saying she had left the Aurora for her father’s house, but she had never made it there. The case was thought to be foul play, until a few weeks later her body was found buried deep in the Duskwood forest, the onslaught of rain had washed away the dirt surrounding the grave. The autopsy produced evidence that Jennifer’s death wasn’t necessarily murder, but instead she had been hit by a car. Slivers of paint from an AMC Gremlin were found on her, leading the police to the owner of the matching car: Ted Madruga. Madruga was arrested and imprisoned despite his claims that he was not involved in her death. For ten years he has lived behind bars and been accused of Jennifer’s hit and run, until now.

Hannah Donfort remembers the incident perfectly as one that will never leave her mind. It is forever embedded in her brain, one that will haunt her the rest of her life. She claims it was an accident, afterall she had been only 14 when it had occurred. She also has named Amy Bell Lewis, now deceased, and Richy Rogers, currently missing and assumed to be dead, as being involved in the incident. According to Hannah, Amy had lost an important necklace during the carriage tour around the Grimstone Waterfall and had asked Hannah to go back and help find it. Since both girls were underage and couldn’t legally drive, they had asked Richy to drive them back to the mine. Hannah states that Richy had been drinking and refused, but after the girls’ incessant begging, he gave them the keys to an old AMC Gremlin. The same AMC Gremlin that Ted Madruga was the current owner of, he had apparently left his vehicle at Roger’s Garage in order to have the car scrapped. The file had been lost, which is why there was no proof that the vehicle had ever been on the shop’s property, leading to Madruga’s arrest. Hannah says she had been driving around the Rogers’ lot for about a year, so she didn’t think anything could go wrong, after all they would be driving on a mostly deserted highway.

Hannah claims that after the accident, she and Amy had returned back to Richy’s house, where the three of them then drove back to the site and buried the body. She was able to lead the officers to the exact spot where Jennifer’s body had been found ten years ago, and her description and obvious remorse and guilt left no doubt in the officers’ minds that she was indeed telling the truth. She is currently being held on trial for her involvement in the death of Jennifer Hanson, the charges will more than likely be lessened due to her confession. Ted Madruga has rejoined society after ten years of unjust and wrongful imprisonment. This is a tragic day for the community of Duskwood, old memories resurfacing as the village’s dark side has once more regained the spotlight.

Jake sighed as he read the article, he knew Hannah had done the right thing, but still he prayed that her sentencing wouldn’t be so bad. He hoped that since she had been a minor when the incident occurred and because of her confession, she’d get off with just a few years of jail time. He had known about Hannah and Amy’s involvement in Jennifer’s death since gaining access to the chat between the two girls; however, the news about Richy was quite unexpected. All this time Richy had held the answers, meaning they might have been able to trace the leads back to Michael Hanson much sooner. No, that was the wrong mindset. Richy was still missing, more than likely deceased, he was still in the mine when the fire broke out. He couldn’t be angry at the mechanic, not now, there had to have been a reason Richy had kept it secret, as did Hannah and Amy. God, this secret had killed Amy and ultimately Richy too, Hannah had barely escaped the hands of a maniac. The thought made his adrenaline skyrocket, fingers running through his black, wavy hair. His eyes landed on a public record that had aired just 48hrs ago, clicking on his mouse as the newspaper clipping flooded his screen.

A new statement has been released concerning the case of Hannah Donfort’s kidnapping, Amy Bell Lewis’ death, and the fire in the mine. Jessica Hawkins, a resident of Duskwood since moving here when she was six, and MC, the mysterious source that led Alan to the Grimstone Mine, have given the police crucial information that connects all three cases. Two recorded video calls have finally disclosed the identity of the kidnapper as Richy Rogers. The link to these two videos can be found here.

Jake watched quietly as he viewed both videos, one of his worst fears coming true. He felt the betrayal, he felt the anger, the pain, but he also felt the sorrow. It wasn’t that he was grieving for himself, but for the others. He couldn’t imagine the pain that the group was experiencing, especially Hannah, Jessy, and MC. Richy was their friend, how could he do this to them? How could he make the last few weeks a living nightmare for Hannah? How could he attack Jessy? How could he allow MC and the others to believe he was dead? How could he strike fear into the group by trying to attack the cabin in the woods? How could he ask MC to come to the Grimstone Mine? The devil had been right before their very eyes, and they had failed to see it. Jake’s breath stuck in his throat as he clicked on the latest article, emotions battling within him as he read the words.

The officers have given up on finding the burnt remains of Richy Rogers, however it is undeniably known that he is dead. The tragedy from ten years ago has finally been solved, but another one has just begun. So many questions arise, so much betrayal and sorrow weighing on the shoulders of the Duskwood community. There are no answers, no explanations for this, some might say this is what the mechanic’s actions warranted him. In just a matter of weeks the people of Duskwood have lost two of their members, Amy Bell Lewis and Richy Rogers. The town offers condolences to the friends and families of the deceased, and desperately hopes for a brighter horizon in the near future.

Hey lovelies! Thank you all for your kind words and support! Please leave reviews and comments in the box below, I love to hear from all of you. I will try to get part two and three out in the next couple of days. ;) Love you all.

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argyrocratie · 2 years

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“On a technological as well as a policy level, the instruments for reducing global warming are a part of the problem, rather than the solution. Because emissions reductions are designed to enable the continuous economic growth on which capitalism is predicated, “going green” means, more than anything else, a shift from fossil fuel energy to renewable energy on a massive, industrialized scale. But renewable energies on an industrial scale are also extremely destructive.

Hydroelectric power is currently the foremost renewable energy source. Hydroelectric dams are extremely destructive to build. They require a huge amount of concrete, production of which is one of the main greenhouse gas emitters, they cause the loss of huge amounts of forest and farmland, they kill off riverine species such as salmon, they disrupt natural flooding cycles necessary to many ecosystems, and their reservoirs emit large quantities of methane.

Photovoltaic cells capturing solar energy—solar panels—frequently use toxic heavy metals such as cadmium, gallium, and lead in their construction. On a localized scale, houses in most climates could be heated, cooled, and provided with warm water through efficient design capturing solar energy. And if people were willing (and able) to alter their daily habits and limit their electricity usage, photovoltaics free of heavy metals could play a role in this. Many of the problems arise when we take the current energy economy and assume we can keep on operating in the same way, but with different inputs. To meet current energy usage, huge swathes of land would need to be appropriated, denuded, and fenced off for solar farms. And since photovoltaics are only productive during sunlight hours, we would have to construct an enormous infrastructure for energy storage and global high-voltage direct current power lines, meaning more toxic mining, more land grabbing, more energy expenditures, and more cancer and other illnesses. Solar panels also present a waste problem, as the typical panel only lasts 25 years. At current growth rates, by 2050 we could have 78 million metric tons of junk panels, and there is currently no good way to recycle them at an industrial scale.25 Andrea Brock and other researchers argue that, far from a “paradigmatic break,” solar energy “is merely the latest iteration of an industrial growth model” characterized by “undemocratic and unsustainable industrial processes, the concentration of corporate power and profits, and externalized waste and pollution.”26

Geothermal energy, aside from having a low efficiency, requires extensive drilling that can contaminate groundwater. The technology uses pentane, a highly toxic, flammable liquid. Geothermal plants release small amounts of methane and the toxic gas hydrogen sulfide, which causes acid rain. In accidents, geothermal plants can release large amounts, such as occurred at a single Hawai’i geothermal plant during a drilling blowout in 1991, in 2013 after an equipment malfunction, and later in 2018 when the plant was damaged by a volcanic eruption.27

Nuclear power is not a renewable energy, given that it expends its fuel source, uranium, though there is a huge lobby seeking to promote it. Countries began adopting nuclear energy in the first place not for its energy benefits, but because it advanced their nuclear weapons programs. Nuclear plants come with a constant risk of meltdown, releasing large amounts of deadly radiation into the atmosphere and potentially making the territory uninhabitable for millennia. In the West, pop cultural representations of the Chernobyl meltdown ascribe the disaster to Soviet incompetence, but meltdowns and near meltdowns at Fukushima, Japan, Three Mile Island, United States, and Loir-et-Cher, France, shine a light on Cold War propaganda and show that no regime is immune to disaster.

In fact, over one hundred nuclear accidents have occurred since 1952, the largest share of them in the US. But the daily, effective operation of a nuclear power plant may be even worse than a meltdown. In 2011, 75 percent of US nuclear power sites were found to be leaking radioactive tritium.28 Depleted plutonium rods have a half-life of 24,000 years, which, for reference, is far longer than agriculture or wheels have existed, more than 40 times longer than the longest lasting state survived, and roughly 500 to 1000 times longer than your typical nuclear storage site goes without experiencing a major leak. Nuclear proponents argue that the rods constitute a small volume of toxic material compared to mine tailing from coal production, for example. They tend to leave out the millions of tons of radioactive uranium mine tailings (11 million tons from a single site in Utah) and the 1.2 million metric tons of depleted uranium produced by uranium enrichment.29 This radioactive byproduct has a half-life of 4,400 million years (or, roughly the current age of the Earth). Inexcusably, those who developed nuclear technology invented no way to safely store all that waste for the amount of time it will pose a lethal danger to all life, and no such storage technology is even on the horizon. Many nuclear waste storage facilities have been found to leak radioactive compounds into the environment.“

- Peter Gelderloos, “ The Solutions are Already Here”

#peter gelderloos #climate change #nuclear energy

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harocat · 5 months

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For WIP Wednesday I wanted to babble some on how I imagine all the realms in the Love Between Fairy and Devil minibang (@lbfad-minibang) fic I'm working on. Btw posting for that starts on DECEMBER 8TH AHHHHH. For the three realms of the far future, I have a few inspirations. Lots of text under the read more lol.

I've mentioned Mad Max for Cangyan Sea, but I do want to be clear that Cangyan Sea is not a post-apocalyptic setting. They have grown and adapted into a desert culture over time. Though they aren't as populous as they once were, they're not in danger nor are they struggling for resources. There is water and food readily available, and they do trade with Shuiyuntian and Haishi City.

There is a lot of vehicle use, mostly adapted from what's found in the mortal realm. However, vehicles are powered by cultivation as opposed to fuel.

Clothing is layers, not much skin showing, as is consistent with desert cultures, but combined with some of the signatures we know of in Moon Tribe culture.

For Shuiyuntian, I decided to lean into the fact that it seems to be, despite the forest we do see, mostly surrounded by and above water. Thus, they are a water based culture now. My inspiration for them was the 2013 anime, Suisei no Gargantia. In this story, in the far future the Earth has become a water planet, and cities are made up of giant floating barges. These massive barges contain whole cities, with their own economies, agriculture, currency, etc. They do have some land to utilize (unlike Gargantia), but it is limited.

Much like Cangyan Sea, the aesthetic is a bit more rustic, but neither kingdom is in dire straits.

The climate is warm and subtropical, so clothing tends to be thin and breathable without many layers. Sandals, shorter sleeves, etc. Again, combined with some of the signature aesthetics we know exist in fairy culture.

In both cases the lush, elaborate lifestyles you may have seen in the past aren't really a thing any longer, but in general, the populations are healthy.

Items are used longer, clothes get more worn before being replaced, and in general, there isn't as much extravagance.

Cultivation does many of the same things electricity does in the mortal realm (light, fuel, etc.)

The modern mortal realm matches up to our own as as far as technology and equivalent time period goes. The main difference is that I wanted to imagine a China that had been free of the impact of imperialism. It just felt kind of fucked up to have this fantasy version of China, but still have it go through all the same nonsense our own world has gone through.

There is some western influence in architecture, clothes, and technology, but what is there is due to legitimate cultural exchange over time. Architecture is a mix of traditional builds, sometimes using more modern materials like glass and steel, and styles that originated outside the country. Clothes are all over the place. The train platform that's one of the first places they end up at is described as featuring people in 'Lucheng garments that look somewhat familiar', people in t-shirts and pants/jackets and slacks/etc., and people in a mishmash (XLH ends up in what is essentially a hanfu top and a pair of capris).

Because this is a fanfic, and they don't spend THAT much time in the mortal realm anyway, I won't be delving much into how this affected politics, law, and social norms, but you are free to imagine the differences.

(A thing to note is that unlike modern China, men have hair lengths of all types, from long like DFQC's own to cropped short, and it's considered normal.)

There is NO cultivation. Humans lost the ability to cultivate around the same time DFQC and XLH were sealed away forever ago. Magic and immortals exist only in folktales.

The one place that remains essentially the same is Xilan. There is limited use of it by both Shuiyuntian and Cangyan Sea, but old tradition and legend dictates that it mostly be left alone.

Haishi City has become a go between for the two kingdoms (which it sort of already is in canon). As a city that falls between what has become a large sea and an expansive desert, it is foggy and warm. There's little to say about the ecosystem outside the weather, as it's pretty much buildings top to bottom with little to no 'natural' spaces. I imagine it being super populated and set up on 'levels' like the city of Chongqing. I'm not sure if we'll ever make it there in the fic, but that's how it exists in my mind.

#love between fairy and devil #wip wednesday #lbfad minibang #writing

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hiromisuzukimicrojournal · 1 year

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Stolen Kisses & other poems

✽

Stolen Kisses

On the pavement covered with powder snow, A vision of the creek rises to the surface.

Meanwhile, In the forest, Where the trees collected subsoil water, A small pond will probably dry up.

Chasing the mirage from the Musashino Plateau, My thoughts turn to the water sleeping beneath Tokyo.

The narrow alleyway turns into a stream, Leading to the town where you must be living.

A black cat speaks to me showing her pink tongue From the shadow of a potted plant.

Meow!

...

Lemon Tree

Under the wobbly Rainbow Bridge, Danced Java with the Mars Girls Band.

Kissing by the pond, Dreamt of Yggdrasil.

We can no longer eat that lemon.

...

Crow in Black

A rainy garbage collection day.

You can spin your words without money. Crow in black mutters in my ear.

I know, I know. I know that he secretly hides a wire hanger, dumplings picked up from the rubbish bin in Shinjuku, and his precious black quill pen pulled out of his back, behind the transformer on a telegraph pole.

Crow shakes his beak clumsily and pokes the electricity cables with the tip of his pen, then the ink becomes the black raindrops and spreads our stories onto the pavement.

✽

images: hiromi suzuki

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Note: Stolen Kisses & other poems are parts of the first poetry collection Ms. cried – 77 poems by hiromi suzuki (kisaragi publishing, 2013 ISBN978-4-901850-42-1). The poem written in Japanese have been translated by hiromi suzuki, 2023.

✽ ✽ ✽

Stolen Kisses & other poems / Hiromi Suzuki

published in RIC Journal (March 20, 2023)

…

via RIC Journal

#hiromi suzuki #poetry #poem #prose poetry #prose #old postcards #vintage postcards #ephemera #Ms. cried #poetry magazine #poetry journal #literary journal #RIC Journal

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mythingchild · 12 days

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Strategies for mitigating fruit crops to climate change

Mitigation strategies are considered to be human interventions aimed at reducing effect or impact of human activities on the climate system . The mitigation tools are more often used in fruits and vegetables as climate-related problems are multiplying, while adaptation strategies could be considered for longer-term stress management. He predominates includes strategies that reduce the sources or emissions of GHGs and, therefore improve GHG sinks. 'Climate change mitigation" mainly includes steps to reduce emissions or improve the GHG sinks that are responsible for climate change with the help of conscious practices, which can eradicate or permanently reduce long-term climate risks and dangers change the lives of humans.

Thus, mitigation includes the process in which the GHG emissions are reduced or sequestered. The improved agronomic practices for a better efficiency of the use of nutrients, efficiency of the use of water, GHG reduction and ecological fight against diseases and pests strategies are also part of mitigation. Application of the correct amount fertilizer, the use of more biological control measures, an extension of water-saving technology such as drip irrigation or sparkling irrigation, water-fertilizer coupling effect technologies could be useful to decrease GHG emissions. Several mechanical, as well as chemical forces have has been designed to minimize CO2, CH4 and N2O emissions.

Planting trees and improving agroforestry for a high CO2 demand is one of the efforts that will reduce the effects of GHGs. A research by Forster et al. (2021) calculated the potential mitigation of GHGs in the United Kingdom by the national strategy for planting 30,000 ha year-1 from 2020 to 2050 using a dynamic life cycle analysis and recorded that the commercial forest could mitigate 1.64 Pg of CO2 equivalent by 2120.

They found that the growth rate of forests was the most important in determining cumulative mitigation, whether or not the trees were harvested by 2120. Minimize the burden on oil and coal, fossils fuel sources are used by different methods of extracting biofuels Jatropha and Pongamia species and their use. The use of biofuels-low-carbon fuels, i.e. natural gas, CNG, cow dung

gas-will improve the efficiency of electricity generation and transmission and distribution worldwide. Numerous architectural manipulations have been employed by developing greenery above the buildings through the lawns and similar constructions. The reduction of CO2 and CH4 emissions has been taken into consideration throughout the agricultural process. So, there is a need to quantify the GHG emissions of all agronomic improvements practices before cataloging or labeling a technology as "green" or "low-carbon" technology. In the processing technology, the production of biogas is extremely useful because it reuses or recycles various agricultural waste and can be used with possible renewable energies, such as hydropower and wind energy. The biogas produced can also be used in transport activities or storage facilities, thereby reducing dependence on fossil fuels and reduce CO2 emissions into the environment.

Intercropping in orchards or the introduction of green manure crops or cover crops in orchards facilitate the function of carbon sinks in different fruits crops and their associated vegetation in ecosystems. So, carbon sequestration is encouraged by mechanical, chemical, biological and pedogenic manipulations. This process of carbon accumulation is called carbon reservoirs or carbon sinks. Fruit trees are also an essential element part of the sustainable solutions for climate change mitigation. In 2012, it has been reported that perennial crops can sequester about 320 to 1,100 kg of soil carbon per hectare compared to 0-450 kg of carbon per year crops and are therefore more likely to provide better yields than annual at higher temperatures (Glover et al., 2007; Sthapité and Scherr, 2013).

Horticultural crops are perennial, such as plantations, fruit trees and tree spices which are potential candidates for carbon sequestration.

Although currently most of them do not fall under the carbon trade, there are many possibilities for these tree species to be used in carbon sequestration and climate regulation system. Similar studies conducted on coconut plantations have suggested that the annual sequestration of carbon in the coconut above the terrestrial biomass varies between 15 and 35 Mg of CO2 ha-1 year-1 depending on cultivar, agro-climatic zone, soil type and management (Kumar, 2013).

Cocoa-coconut intercropping is also a good system for carbon sequestration with the potential to sequester 5-7 Mg of CO2 ha-1 year-1 (Kumar, 2009; Balasimha and Kumar, 2010). It encourages reproduction for a high and wide range stress-resistant varieties thanks to conventional breeding techniques and biotechnology. Such improved cultivars are highly recommended or incorporated with a protected horticultural production for a better and safer economic returns.

Mitigation strategies also include policies and institutions capacity required to mitigate the adversities of climate change .

The adaptation policy proposal consists of more activities, that is research focused on plant breeding, photosynthetic capacity, biological nitrogen fixation rate, stress resistance level, protected horticulture precision crops and horticulture to increase the adaptability of crops to climate change. Development of climate monitoring, forecasting and monitoring the pre-alert capacity in all provinces will contribute to the adaptability to climate change. Therefore, improving public awareness of the climate problems of change and the need to improve adaptation and mitigation it is highly recommended. As a result, there is a critical need for a decision support system (SSD) to facilitate better management of agriculture at the farm level and for sustainable and climate-resilient crops production. A farmer must answer several questions related to the crop production and marketing before deciding on the most suitable technology to the state of the farm. Crop models are of immense use in the climate change perspective as well as from the point of view of crop management.

The developed crop models must also be calibrated and validated for the purpose of the study before conducting a large-scale analysis. Connect the GIS and remote sensing data models also offer enormous possibilities for regional estimates of GHG emissions and to significantly reduce the loss of yield. The main areas of application of crop simulation the models include crop management, agroecological zoning, estimation potential production, performance gap analysis and selection development strategies. Strategic and anticipatory decision-making in the system as well helps to find areas of cultivation potential for land use planning and high technology horticulture. Crop insurance and horticultural advice based on weather conditions are also depends on the crop simulation models. Crop modeling is considered a important tool in the research and development of perennial planting cultures because it takes a long time to conduct research experiments.

Similar to any other approach, simulation modeling also has limitations and the uncertainties associated with it.

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umbreonlatias · 3 months

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(Mobile user almost exclusively!)

Hi there!

Mun's name is Catherine.

Mun is Cis, She/Her.

Mun is an adult, mun is EST-but usually a nightowl.

Mun can dissapear for long periods of time, then do a bunch of stuff at once.

It's part of her ADHD! 😅

This is a sort of Pokéblog so Lola, my Umbreon/Latias OC can talk to others!

PFP is from @/holydramon and @/scrub-slots.

Used to use a free base from Paddedveepaws on Deviantart- still use it for Youtube, but I prefer Roseate's art for Lola! 😁

Header image is from Super Pokémon Mystery Dungeon- Xerneas's Tree of Life.

There's a backstory from Facebook years in the making, but other than that, no story to be heard from here!

Not here to make content, and mun will come on every once in a great while, but others can talk to Lola and co if they wish!

Or she hyperfocusses and keeps checking for new stuff.

I created Lola in 2013 for Facebook after seeing Facebook pages, and RP profiles.

Wanting to try it, I created a few pages/RP profiles.

They're still up, but I don't do anything with them either! 😅

(Facebook kept taking the RP proflies down, so I abandoned them...)

After looking at Pokéblogs, mostly of the ask variety, and of the comic/text based blogs, I wanted to try a hand at one.

Finally got the courage to make one in the beginning of 2024!

I dunno exactly what I'm doing, but I wanna try it out, at least a bare bones kinda thing

I have four other blogs

@coatlscoatlseverywhere - Main blog, asks will come from here. Flight Rising centered

@clanofmikiwing - Flight Rising ask blog

@catofaces- Secondary blog for everything not Flight Rising

@spiritexplosion - Hisuian Typhlosion Ask blog like this one

More info about me is scattered between blogs, mostly the 1st and the 3rd.

Linktr.ee

Rules Refs Family lore (text)

Lore under cut

Lola is the same age as mun- 28 currently!

March 22 is her birthday- same as mun!

Same orientation as well- Ace, Bi or Lesbian

-She's afraid of the dark- even being part dark type, go figure!

-She doesn't like loud noises, especially sudden ones

-She's wary of those of the Electric type/those that have Electric moves, and will scamper off if not involved

-She's afraid of spider mons, and is not a big fan of snake mons- though the Snivy line's cool!

-She's got shiny Latias wings, and can fly, but chooses to hover close to the ground because of fear of heights

No one knows where the Latias DNA came from, as neither of her parents possess such DNA, maybe Arceus did something to her Eevee egg?

Or kidnapped by Team Flare/Rocket, they did something, and then either returned her, or she escaped- maybe hence all the fears???

-Her and her family live in a BIG tree, deep in the forest near Geosenge town in the Kalos region.- Think Xerneas's tree- hence the header image being the SPMD Tree of life.

-There was a hotel on Facebook, and portals to other worlds even deeper in, dunno if keeping it here.

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sparkboyproductions · 4 months

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SparkBoy: Facts & Backstory.

SparkBoy (real name as Dominic Woodhouse) is the main protagonist in the Team Honour Universe He is the founder as well as leader of the superhero team, also given the nickname "king of all heroes" as he has the courage to lead others to battle the forces of evil and fight for justice and world peace.

SparkBoy has a sweet and gentle personality, often gets excited over things that takes his interest such as Formula One, space rocket launches and animals (he loves them). But sometimes, although he's always brave as a superhero, SparkBoy"s negative emotions often gets in the way. He gets nervous at some occasions but really he gets angry, mad or upset when villains do very extreme ways, or call him names that really gets him go berserk. SparkBoy is a Roman Catholic, and still takes words from the bible, hoping he dosen't do anything that's against God and will try his best not let the Devil himself or the seven deadly sins take control of him or his powers. He is viewed to be a great leader to many superheroes, as he not only comes up with plans in battling the supervillains, but make sure his team (his friends) stay together and be not be left behind.

Powers:

The ability to control electricity.

Super speed. As fast as five cheetahs or three race cars put together.

Super amazing strength.

Teleportation.

Lasers out of hands.

Invisibility.

Create force fields.

Can create auras to fly and breathe oxygen when in space or in water.

Weaknesses:

Radiation exposure about up 600%, causing sparks to disintegrate.

Caught in contact with electric machinery such as substations and pylons

Stab wounds in abdomen and back.

Overcharged power being contacted to his body.

Likes:

Cultures of the world.

History of countries and people.

Going into space.

Exploring

Teaching people do good things.

Fighting crime.

Bring world peace.

Protect mother nature.

Help fellow autistic people.

His fellow super-friends

Special holidays, for example: Christmas.

Heavy Metal and Hard Rock Music.

Movies.

Dislikes:

Racism.

Wars

Religious extremism.

Plants and animals going extinct.

The League of Sin.

Losing his family and friends.

Cancer and other diseases.

People not listening.

The Deadly Sins: Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy & Pride.

Backstory:

Born in London to a British-Polish family, Dom spent most of his life a peaceful area in Norfolk. He has Asperger's syndrome, a type of autism. His condition may had made suffer multiple difficulties in the past but now he has the ability however to control his condition while he does his best to think positive in life.

It was sorta a mystery of how he got his electric-like superpowers, because all though Dom's childhood and adolescence, he suffered a ruptured ear that often gets infected, but after a successful surgery, he discovered his powers at age 17. During his spare time from studying at West Suffolk College, Dom goes into a nearby forest to practice his powers, including causing some mischief on people who got him mad such as woodsman putting up a fence he disliked. Somehow, without anyone noticing Dom was met by secret agents who run a secret organisation (not run by the government) who are willing to search and recruit beings with superpowers to solve crimes that need to be prevented and prevent wars from happening (not too easy to stop). There, they tested Dom's powers, giving him the name 'SparkBoy' and his Spark-suit, making him a full superhero, when ready.

In 2013, that was the year SparkBoy came to the eyes of the world. After the Boston Marathon Bombing shook the world, Dom (who turned 18) felt he had enough of all these crimes and terrorist attacks, and someone has to to stop all the wrongs of the world. He fought and beaten multiple criminals, earning a mixture of support and dislike from people all over the world. His crime-fighting skills inspired other superheroes to come together and fight crime all together as Team Honour.

#teamhonour #superhero #sparkboy #backstory #autism #aspergers #peace

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jcmarchi · 5 months

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AI meets climate: MIT Energy and Climate Hack 2023

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/ai-meets-climate-mit-energy-and-climate-hack-2023/

AI meets climate: MIT Energy and Climate Hack 2023

The MIT Energy and Climate Hack brought together participants from myriad fields and disciplines to develop rapid, innovative solutions to one of the most complex challenges facing society today: the global energy and climate crisis. Hundreds of students from MIT and colleges across the globe convened on MIT’s campus and virtually for this year’s event, which was held Nov. 10-12.

Established in 2013, the MIT Energy and Climate Hack has been the launchpad for innovative and sustainable solutions for a decade; an annual reminder that exciting new ideas are always just around the corner.

According to Claire Lorenzo, an MIT student organizer and communications director for this year’s Energy and Climate Hack, “There were a lot of people from a lot of places who showed up; both virtually and in person. It was encouraging to see how driven everyone was. How passionate they were about finding great solutions. You could see these ideas starting to form immediately.”

On the first day, representatives from companies across numerous industries presented participants with their most pressing energy and climate-related challenges. Once the gathering broke into teams, participants had two days to “hack the challenge” they were assigned and present their solution to company representatives, fellow hackers, and judges.

The focus areas at this year’s event were energy markets, transportation, and farms and forests. Participating corporate sponsors included Google, Crusoe, Ironwood, Foothill Ventures, Koidra, Mitra Chem, Avangrid, Schneider Electric, First Solar, and Climate Ledger.

This year’s event also marked the first time that artificial intelligence emerged as a viable tool for developing creative climate solutions. Lorenzo observed, “I’m studying computer science, so exploring how AI could be harnessed to have a positive impact on the climate was particularly exciting for me. It can be applicable to virtually any domain. Like transportation, [with emissions] for example. In agriculture, too.”

Energy and Climate Hack organizers identified the implementation of four core AI applications for special consideration: the acceleration of discovery (shortening the development process while simultaneously producing less waste), optimizing real-world solutions (utilizing automation to increase efficiency), prediction (using AI to improve prediction algorithms), and processing unstructured data (using AI to analyze and scale large amounts of data efficiently).

“If there was a shared sentiment among the participants, it would probably be the idea that there isn’t a singular solution to climate change,” says Lorenzo, “and that requires cooperation from various industries, leveraging knowledge and experience from numerous fields, to make a lasting impact.”

After the initial round of presentations concluded, one team from each challenge advanced from the preliminary presentation judging session to the final presentation round, where they pitched their solutions to a crowded room of attendees. Once the semi-finalists had pitched their solutions, the judges deliberated over the entries and selected team Fenergy, which worked in the energy markets sector, as the winners. The team, consisting of Alessandro Fumi, Amal Nammouchi, Amaury De Bock, Cyrine Chaabani, and Robbie Lee V, said, “Our solution, Unbiased Cathode, enables researchers to assess the supply chain implications of battery materials before development begins, hence reducing the lab-to-production timeline.”

“They created a LLM [large language model]-powered tool that allows innovative new battery technologies to be iterated and developed much more efficiently,” Lorenzo added.

When asked what she will remember most about her first experience at the MIT Energy and Climate Hack, Lorenzo replied, “Having hope for the future. Hope from seeing the passion that so many people have to find a solution. Hope from seeing all of these individuals come so far to tackle this challenge and make a difference. If we continue to develop and implement solutions like these on a global level, I am hopeful.”

Students interested in learning more about the MIT Energy and Climate Hackathon, or participating in next year’s Hack, can find more information on the event website.

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wildflower-cake · 9 months

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Short stories

Here's a collection of some short stories that I had posted on my dreamwidth but as I'm here now, it seems better just to move everything. There's a little bit of everything so I'm sure you'll find something you'll like!

Running

Originally published August 17, 2013

My parents tell me that I’ve been running ever since I was born. Not running from anyone or anything – just running for the sake of it. I went straight from crawling to toddling around on my little legs as fast as they could carry me, and never ever stopped.

But every so often, even I needed to stop to catch my breath. Today was one of those times.

This house in the forested mountains was the closest thing we had to a base. A home. We always came here when we needed a break, help, or even just company. They were loving, fearless, open and generous, and I couldn’t do without them. Their home was a sanctuary of love and nature, and electricity for our laptops.

I sat cross-legged on the mattress in the back of the van, feeling the sun’s rays warming me through the open windows. It was rare that I was alone these days, so I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and just listened. The morning birds were awake and starting their daily routine of endless calls, extraordinary in their diversity. I could hear a gentle breeze flowing through the thick bushland, rustling the leaves ever so gently. There were distant sounds of cars and activity in the house in the valley below. I could hear water quietly gurgling away in the fountain in the front garden. These quiet moments were all I needed to recharge. I was ready to run again.

I opened my eyes. Frankie was sitting next to me on the mattress, his deep green eyes regarding me with slightly blank affection. I smiled.

‘What’s up, Frankie? Did you sleep well?’

He said nothing, as per usual. Instead he blinked at me and curled up beside me. I gave the black fuzz on his head a little scratch. He made a peep of contentment and settled in.

I returned to the task at hand. I grabbed my flat brush and stirred the brightly coloured goo in the bowl, careful not to stick my face too close to it. I took the brush and started painting it on my head, working from my part down, staring into the mirror, intent on my task. Distantly, I could hear a voice calling my name. Haley. Haley Dee.

I looked up in the mirror to see Thom striding towards me with a cup in his hands.

‘Blue again?’

‘Why not?’ Blue had always been my favourite colour. It made me feel happy, calm, and alive. It kept my feet on the ground and my head in the clouds.

Thom put the cup down on the little shelf next to the mirror. It was tea. Hot and sweet.

The smell of the dye was pretty noticeable. Thom wrinkled his nose and looked down at Frankie.

‘How can you stand it, bud?’

Frankie didn’t stir. He usually didn’t until someone mentioned food.

I took a sip of my tea and instantly felt human again. I sat in the van and stretched my neck and fingers. My fingers were starting to itch. I was already feeling it. Thom watched me through the mirror.

‘Are you ready to go?’

I smiled. 'Yes.’

Walking

Originally published July 29, 2013

I started walking away from the city. Walking, walking, walking. I never stopped, never looked back. I couldn’t stop.

All I had were the clothes on my back and my boyfriend’s shoes. Mine were bloodstained and ripped. They squelched. His were five sizes bigger than mine, but they were all I had left. Of him. Of me.

The blisters were terrible, but at least they reminded me that I could still feel. That I survived. Still alive, whatever that came to mean.

I kept walking. It was all I could do. I walked the flesh off my bones and the skin off my feet. I walked until my nose bled and the shoes became rags. I walked to eat. I walked to drink. I walked to forget.

I was going anywhere. Going nowhere. No past, no future, no present. Just me and the silence.

I still walked. Someone had to.

ZombieCon

Originally published July 1, 2012

Three figures circled the teenage girl, slowly closing in around her. They were shabby and dishevelled, clothing ripped and torn, shuffling, their feet scraping along the concrete ground. Their faces were twisted into horrible expressions, their hands reaching for the girl. Their faces and clothes were covered in dried, old blood. Some appeared to have eyes missing, and some had skin missing or just hanging off.

The girl was frozen. She had nowhere to run, no way to move. She couldn’t fight back, dressed only in a short skirt, thin midriff shirt and high heels. She just watched and waited for the inevitable. Their fingers grasped her flesh. They all leaned in, aiming for her neck and mouths, softly moaning, their mouths opening, ready to sink their teeth in-

CLICK! FLASH!

The figures instantly stopped and fell away. They smiled. The girl’s boyfriend checked the photo on his camera.

‘Great! Thanks guys!’

‘No problem, dude,’ one of the zombies replied.

The girl and her boyfriend disappeared into the crowd, his cape trailing behind them. It was SuperCon time again.

SuperCon was the highlight of the year for many people – a two day convention where fans of many things came together, dressed up, bought merchandise, and met their heroes. Wandering around the 10,000-strong crowd on day one were zombies, cartoon characters, caped superheroes, and robots, as well as people plying their wares – merchandisers, comic artists, authors and special celebrity guests. The day was packed with activities including costume contests, panels, signings, and performances. The exhibition centre was packed and buzzing with excitement.

Crowds waited in line to get their books signed by favourite authors, or handed over money to have pictures taken with their favourite stars. Crowds surged from place to place listening to seminars or watching competitions. Overworked volunteers and administrators in bright uniforms zoomed between the aisles, herding fans into orderly queues or getting coffee for a guest. The Artist Alleys teemed with traders and buyers, flipping through books and listening to increasingly desperate sales pitches.

Volunteer medics and ambulance staff also zipped through the crowds. It was hardly unusual – people wearing hot full-body costumes not drinking enough water, or a sexy comic book girl falling off her heels.

The caped superhero and his sexy cheerleader girlfriend spotted a lone zombie, in a quiet dark corner, almost hidden from view. He loved zombie movies and there were people around with such good makeup. The three zombies they took the photos with before were pretty good, layering blood and latex, taking care to make the skin colour to their applications. Some people had faces that looked like they slapped melted wax on, but the effort was still appreciated. It was a tough thing to do – faces sore and sticky by the end of it. The couple were determined to get photos with every zombie they came across, provided they finished in time for the cosplay competition, of course.

They approached the lone zombie. He was just standing there, facing the wall, seemingly in thought, contemplating quietly. The caped hero approached him.

‘Hey, do you mind if we get a picture?’

The zombie slowly turned around. In addition to his clothes being artfully ripped and bloody, his skin was an unearthly shade of purplish grey, mottled around his neck, where a wound gaped open. Underneath was a mass of tendons and veins, drained and bloodless. His eyes were red and splotchy, as if haemorrhaged. His mouth and tongue lolled open as he very slowly staggered towards the girl. Amazing accuracy, the hero thought. He even smelled authentic. But, it was a very hot day and he must be boiling under the latex.

The hero readied his camera.

‘Ready? One, two, three… BRAINS!’

‘Brains!’ the cheerleader called brightly. The zombie didn’t say brains, nor did he react to the camera flash. He just continued on his course, gripping onto the girl with his cold hands, his mouth zeroing in on her pale, delicate neck, unwavering…

‘Hey, let-’

The girl let out a harsh squeak, her face contorted with pain and fear. Blood poured from a small wound in her neck. She dropped to the floor. The zombie followed her. The hero pushed him away, blindly punching him in the face. He staggered and fell, and then started crawling towards the girl, who was lying in an increasing puddle of blood, twitching. The area suddenly flooded with hired security men and police, easily a dozen of them, all chattering away on radios, headsets and phones. The hero was confused by the babel as one security officer directed him out of the way. Paramedics swooped in and took the girl away. The hero tried to go after her.

‘No, son,’ the security man said. ‘You need to stay here. There’s nothing you can do for her.’

‘What? But I have…’

‘Stay here,’ the man said forcefully. ‘Don’t make me restrain you.’

‘What? I haven’t done anythin-’

‘Be quiet.’

One police officer stomped past him, his words discernible as he passed.

‘We have a level five biohazard situation…’

The hero didn’t even attempt to ask for an explanation. He could see the security officer fingering the Taser in his holster. He looked around. A wall of police and security prevented him from seeing the rest of the convention. The zombie was gone, presumably taken through an open emergency exit. One of the paramedics marched up to him.

‘Did he touch you?’

‘What?’

‘Did he TOUCH you?’ she snapped.

‘I- I don’t know.’

She then jammed the needle she held in her hand into his left arm. He was too shocked to even speak.

‘Just in case. Go to the emergency room if you have any symptoms.’

Then, just as quickly as she came, she left.

His head spun, his arm smarting from the force of the syringe. He had no idea what was going on. The zombie was gone, as was the girl. There was no trace of blood. Cleaners had already taken care of it. He obviously wasn’t allowed to ask any questions.

A police officer approached him.

‘Name and address.’

He gave it automatically. The officer wrote it down and put his notebook back in his pocket.

‘We will contact you in the next few days. Say nothing about what happened here. We will deal with the girl’s family. Clear?’

‘Yes,’ he mumbled.

The officer looked around. ‘We’re done here,’ he declared. The police and security disbanded, and melted back into the crowd. The superhero stood in the corner, all alone. No one was even looking in his direction. No one noticed. No one saw anything. He too then merged with the crowd, and said nothing.

Remains

Originally published April 24, 2012

I no longer recognise the city where I was born.

It’s been three years since it all started. They asked me to come across the ocean, back to that place, where I was both given life and my name.

It stood eternally, proud and unapologetic, for thousands upon thousands of years. It saw wave upon wave of invaders and defenders, many changes of name, language and people. Many grand buildings, and not so grand ones, pierced the skyline, hugging the river that was its vena cava. We used to admire the old architecture, laughed at the modern ones, shaking our heads at the misguided ingenuity of man. The river now lay stagnant, almost filled in, desperately pinched. It was full of the remains of those buildings, as well as many of the millions of the inhabitants, bones lurking under the muddy surface.

I would have given anything to see the modern buildings again. Anything recognisable. The city beside the river lay degraded and twisted, ruined. It had been only a few years since my last visit but the world was so changed by the event and its aftermath that I may as well have been away for an aeon. Its trees were completely grey and brown, trunks hanging down into the river or across roads and dirt.

I don’t know how, but I survived. I was one of the strong ones. I could still walk unaided and had all body parts present and accounted for. That’s why they asked me to come, to help the few who were still alive. The contamination was still present but at acceptable levels, apparently. I’m not entirely sure about this, but it’s hard to tell when you don’t even have sufficient power to run an x-ray machine. If you could find one that still worked.

The deformed metal skeletons of structures loomed over my head. I could still see the shattered glass panels that were hanging precariously in place, the charred interiors, stonework crumbling and ripped away. Bricks and boulders and steel beams were still strewn across the street in the less-used areas, starting to accumulate moss in the damp. Thankfully most of the bodies had been removed from the main city but I’m sure, in a city that size with millions of people, there are still thousands out there, locked up and unburied. The underground had been sealed off since it all began, and no one dared venture down into the endless, fetid tunnels. So many people had sealed themselves away down there, like they had done before, but there was no more safety there than above ground. It was everywhere and there was no escape. No one knows for sure but from my own experience, I would say that the percentage of deaths from suicide in the immediate aftermath would be around 30-35%. God knows I thought about it myself, but it wouldn’t have been fair to all the people I watched die.

I stepped off the small boat at the makeshift jetty. I looked around, desperately trying to get my bearings. All the bridges, so many bridges across the river, lay in pieces. Some had been patched with wood and stone, but very crudely. Roadways, wires and pavements lay jutting up from the river in sharp chunks, the rain having washed off the blood and ooze. At least it still rained here, although you could only be exposed safely for five minutes, and that was a guess at best. The sky hung low and heavy, but hopefully it would stay dry. The air was so thick still, and it was a little hard to breathe.

The ground was cracked and crumbled. I carefully stepped around the piles of asphalt and dirt. I heard a voice say, ‘Be careful of the sinkholes.’

So it was true. We’d heard at home about massive sinkholes appearing in the city, the extensive underground structures succumbing and collapsing from the stress of the disaster and lack of maintenance. But it was hard to verify what was going on in other countries. Communications were patchy and infrequent, mostly word of mouth and rumour. This is what it must have been like before the invention of the telegraph. Even if we had the power, even if the magnetics had been unaffected, the satellites were still falling out of the sky, massive holes punched in them by the infinite debris in orbit, which in turn created even more debris. There was a rumour that the International Space Station was knocked out a couple of months ago and landed in the Kalahari Desert. The Internet and even phones were for now a thing of the past. We didn’t even have the capacity to find the oceanic co-axial cables, let alone restore the connection. Basic messages were carried by those strong enough to travel but that happened sporadically – fuel was precious, travel was rare and messages could take months to get between bases.

We all walked slowly and deliberately. Apparently new sinkholes were appearing every day, and there were a couple close to where we landed. We walked uphill from the river, and the pale moonlight grey stone of the buildings, charred and patchy in parts, seemed very familiar. There was a frontage in mosaic that was largely intact, and I saw a name I recognised. It was an old train station. The red, black and white signage of the streets confirmed my suspicions. Only then it hit me. I remember being 21 years old, lining up outside one of the beautiful and grand consular buildings in the area because I needed to vote in my country’s elections, on my own for the first time and feeling content. Even after all I’d seen, I couldn’t help a tear coming to my eye.

I looked around. The church in the middle of the road that I remembered partially remained, its columns stripped for rebuilding purposes. The fittings for the phone boxes were sticking up from the ground, wires splayed everywhere like dropped spaghetti. My guide walked further up the block, looked around the corner, and beckoned me to him.

‘Slowly.’

There was an acrid smell in the air, faint but discernible. This must be a sinkhole.

I crept slowly towards the corner. I could see the pale earth around the remains of the road. I caught sight of the hole, and had to step back as I experienced a dizziness I’ve never felt before.

My guide sat me down a couple of feet away, but I felt compelled to crawl closer to look again. I couldn’t stop staring.

The sinkhole was about 50 metres across, at a conservative estimate. The drop was sharp and sheer, the pale dense earth covering the rock strata. Rubble was piled at the bottom, and there were various broken pipes and cables hanging loosely, swaying slightly in the breeze.

I couldn’t stop looking at the tunnels. Two underground train tunnels were exposed, the jagged concrete split open. Straight underneath me dangled twisted, rusty rails. On the other side a train carriage hung precariously from the tunnel, the livery peeling and faded from the elements and the remaining carriages barely visible behind. I’m not sure if it was my imagination or not, but I thought I could see skeletons still trapped inside. I stared for what felt like an eternity. My guide gently placed a hand on my shoulder.

All I could think of to say was, ‘Will it fall?’

‘Eventually. The coupling can’t last forever.’

He helped me to my feet, even though I couldn’t take my eyes away from the train.

‘Do you see them?’

He sighed. His face looked grim. ‘All the time.’ He wrapped his hand around my shoulder and steered me away, past the sinkhole.

‘Come on, Doctor,’ he said. ‘The morgue awaits.’

Typetrigger: Radio

Originally published August 22, 2011

‘Radio… live transmission…’

We got up. We moved. We moved in and around the music and each other. Tapped out bass lines, waved to drums, nodded to guitars.

We breathed and mouthed and sang and screamed, changing our voices.

We didn’t even know we were in the room. We didn’t feel the presence of the other people in the room. We closed our eyes and let the flashing lights wash over our lids. There was no carpet under our feet, only air. We could have been anywhere. We were everywhere.

‘Dance, dance, dance, dance, dance to the radio…’

We weren’t thinking about the words now, they automatically spilled out of our mouths like an overflowing cup of tea. Our bodies moved, anticipating the beats we knew were to come. The air hung heavily with memories, some not as old as others. We primed our lungs, throats and hearts, ready for the big scream…

‘AND WE CAN DANCE!’

Memories of screaming those words stumbling down a wet, leaf-strewn street in a neighbourhood much cooler than we were, trying not to slip on the slick, star shaped detritus. We were flushed, so happy, full of exhilaration and excitement inspired by a documentary. Trying not to girlishly scream at one of the idols in action during the film. Foggy spectacles from the cold wet and the lingering warmth of the pizza place…

We were still in the room, bathed in light and flashes of glow. Still moving, still dancing…

‘Dance, dance, dance, dance, dance to the radio…’

Typetrigger: Bear With Me

Originally published July 12, 2011

I went for a walk in the woods, and there was a bear with me.

I’m not sure how old he was, but he wasn’t a cub, or an adult. I asked him where his mama was, but he didn’t reply. He never said a word over the whole weekend.

I’m not sure how I ended up out here, with this bear. I just started walking. I think I might have been asleep. I woke up in a forest glade, face buried in the bear’s soft brown fur. Just like Snow White.

He was good at keeping me warm. And he would offer me fish, which was kind, but I’m a vegan. I had some apples and gluten-free sandwiches in my satchel, which was almost empty. I had a bottle of iced tea, my sandwiches and a notebook. No phone, no cameras, no wallet.

The sun was streaming through the firs as we padded along in comfortable silence. It was freeing, not needing to speak. The bear was patient as I stopped to sketch or jot down a paragraph or two.

I think I was out there for a weekend. Three days maybe. Not really sure, they blurred somewhat. On the last night, as I bunked down in his fur, he licked my face. As first I was momentarily afraid, but in my heart I knew he would never hurt me. This was, I discovered later, his way of saying goodbye.

I woke up in my city again the next morning, near my house. I turned to see a soft brown flash disappear behind garbage bins. I searched my satchel and the notebook was gone. I’m not entirely sure if I dreamed this or not.

But one day I want to walk again in the woods, a bear with me.

#stories #short stories #horror #gore #post-apocalyptic #whimsical #fantasy #typetrigger #writing prompts #music #original writing #writers on tumblr #zombies

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xtruss · 1 year

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Analysis: Will Brazil Destroy the Amazon to Save the Climate? Brazil’s Mineral Wealth Could Power the Energy Transition, But Mining is a Very Dirty Business.

— April 22, 2023 | Foreign Policy

An aerial view shows a mining site in Para state, Brazil, on Aug. 6, 2013. Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP Via Getty Images

Whether it was gold, diamonds, or iron, the history of Brazil has been shaped for centuries by the hunt for minerals. Colonial fortune hunters and their legions of pick-and-pan-wielding slaves dredged up 800 to 850 tons of gold in the 18th century alone, filling the coffers of the Portuguese crown. In the early 1800s, gold financed the war chest of the Brazilian independence movement.

The search for minerals expanded in the 20th century, turning Brazil into a mining colossus. The country still draws waves of “adventurers, madmen, and starvelings,” as French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss called prospectors. Many scour the Amazon for paydirt, so much the worse for the world’s largest rainforest and the Indigenous communities that depend on it for survival.

But the coming treasure hunt may trump them all. The 21st century’s prizes are cobalt, lithium, nickel, niobium, and the other critical strategic minerals of which high-tech gadgets and green energy technology are built. To produce an equal amount of power, photovoltaic generation consumes 40 times more copper than fossil fuel combustion and wind power up to 14 times more iron, according to a forthcoming Igarapé Institute report. To meet the burgeoning global demand for green energy technologies—including a massive switch to electric batteries—the World Bank estimates that 3 billion tons of critical strategic minerals will be needed by 2050.

That this scramble for resources is centered on the Amazon lays bare an uncomfortable truth: Climate policy and environmental protection are not the same thing, and as the energy transition gathers pace, that trade-off is becoming increasingly evident. Indonesian rainforests have been cleared for palm oil plantations producing biofuels, and West African forests are felled for wood pellets to heat green homes in Europe. Open-pit mining is one of humanity’s most ruinous industries, razing everything in its path—while toxic runoff, tailings, and waste products can poison rivers and wreak havoc for miles.

How Brazil handles the energy transition’s burgeoning hunger for resources will help determine whether our policies to save the planet will leave us with a planet left to save.

Owing to its vast expanse and favorable geology, Brazil is exceedingly well endowed with highly valuable critical minerals. It sits on 94 percent of the world’s niobium, a bright, white metal crucial to strengthening steel; 22 percent of all graphite; and 16 percent of known reserves of rare-earth metals. The latter comprise 17 scarce elements, many of which are indispensable for clean energy and other technological hardware.

Right now, most of these mineral deposits are still in the ground. Brazil is not yet mining enough of them to even rank among the world’s major producers of strategic minerals or rare earths. That could soon change, driven by rising global demand and Brazil’s centuries-old engineering and geological acumen—after all, it was independence hero and mineralogist José Bonifácio who discovered lithium. Brazil already mines 70 minerals, worth $62 billion in 2021. And whereas Asia’s and Africa’s potential is comparatively well known and researched, much of Brazil’s critical mineral bounty has yet to be mapped.

Critical minerals bring the promise of fabulous wealth but also a bevy of existential challenges. One is the peril of abundance: Like oil does in petrostates, critical minerals could flood the economy with gushers of cash and its corruptive effects. New mines could also deepen Brazil’s dependence on trading raw materials, which already account for some 64 percent of exports. In 2021, only 2 percent of Brazil’s exports were high-tech goods, compared with 12 percent in 2000.

But the most consequential dilemma is how to unearth, refine, and ship these valuable assets without razing forests, eroding biodiversity, and devastating Indigenous and riverine communities. Close to one-third of Brazil’s critical minerals wealth—including one of the world’s largest deposits of rare earths—lies cached beneath the Amazon Basin. The region has scant infrastructure and public institutions to manage conflicts or tensions arising over resource competition. Official data shows that close to 15 percent of known deposits lie in protected conservation areas across Brazil and more than 4 percent within Indigenous lands.

Clearly, no government can forgo a mother lode, especially when the world is scrambling for these resources. Consider that to achieve the climate goals in the 2015 Paris Agreement, the world will need to quadruple—yes, quadruple—mineral production through 2040, according to the International Energy Agency. Surging demand will especially affect Latin America, which has 40 percent of global copper reserves as well as a large share of the world’s cobalt and nickel. Just three countries—Argentina, Bolivia, and Chile—control two-thirds of the global supply of lithium. The pressure to mine rare earths will grow as well, especially as China, the world’s largest producer, moves to restrict exports and as other countries work to lessen their strategic dependence on Beijing.

How Brazil manages a vast expansion of its mining industry and handles the attendant environmental, social, and other negative consequences could therefore shape the rules and red lines of an expanding global mining sector for years to come.

Then-Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro sought to boost the mining sector in 2021 with his landmark Pro-Strategic Minerals Policy. This was a marquee initiative of the country’s public-private investment program, which holds that government entities have a duty to expedite priority investments. It gives the government discretion to waive regulatory restrictions designed to protect the environment and Indigenous communities if the project is deemed to be in the “national interest.” The gates were opened to fast-tracking critical minerals exploration and mining permits.

It was a policy of dig, baby, dig. Environmental preservation was never a priority for Bolsonaro and his backers, who mostly saw the rainforest and its Indigenous inhabitants as speed bumps to progress. Unsurprisingly, the Bolsonaro government greenlit 19 of the 26 critical minerals projects it vetted between 2018 and 2022. Many of these were in the so-called Legal Amazon, a Brazilian region already besieged by deforestation and degradation.

Even before he took office in January 2023, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva vowed to rewrite the script. He pledged to make the Amazon the centerpiece of Brazil’s green reset while also committing to prioritizing the search for vital minerals. Lula talked up mining in recent meetings with both the United States, which wants exclusive access to some of Brazil’s critical minerals, and China, which is hoovering up raw materials from everywhere. Whether Brazil will be able to lock in a good deal without mortgaging the rainforest to global superpowers is another matter. How Lula finesses those competing demands may shape the direction of the global green energy transition.

To be sure, Lula cannot escape the trade-offs that come with wanting to accelerate mining of critical strategic minerals on the one hand and protect the rainforest and its people on the other. At a minimum, his administration will need to uphold its promises to reinstate environmental and Indigenous rights protections dismantled during Bolsonaro’s tenure. This will be challenging, not least since ambitious mining projects could exacerbate simmering tensions. According to the Environmental Justice Atlas, roughly 4.5 percent of reported environmental conflicts worldwide already occur in Brazil.

Moreover, tightening oversight, enforcement, and compliance could also stimulate the illicit minerals market, where organized crime, dark money, and violence already abound. Even more worrisome, extracting and processing critical minerals and rare earths can exact a heavy environmental toll, from releasing carbon dioxide stored in the subsoil to spilling toxic mercury used to amalgamate gold into the rivers and food chain. Limiting these effects will be especially difficult in the vast Brazilian Amazon, an area that has long been troubled by poor governance and outright lawlessness.

More positively, Lula seems intent on reinstating the regulations and consultation processes that his predecessor weakened or scuttled outright. Ratification of the Escazú Agreement, signed by Brazil in 2018, would go a long way to institutionalizing these protections, including safeguarding environmental defenders and Indigenous peoples in the Amazon.

Efforts are also underway to lock in private sector commitments to the terms of a new green deal in Brazil. Some forward-looking investors are already on board: They increasingly recognize that cutting corners to fatten the bottom line is a corporate own-goal, especially in an era when corporations face pressures from activist investors and the public to adhere to environmental, social, and governance standards. What’s more, big-ticket projects that fail to benefit local populations are a common driver of social unrest, with protests halting mining operations or slowing new developments. In fact, one of the chief reasons large mining companies are hesitant to engage in early-stage exploration and extraction in the Amazon is that they want to avoid conflict with local communities.

Nevertheless, holding the country’s mining giants to account is a work in progress. Brazil’s five largest prospectors all produce lucrative critical minerals such as gold, copper, manganese, niobium, and uranium, which guarantee Brazil a reliable trade surplus. Mega-miner Vale last year signed a long-term agreement to supply nickel to Tesla, while Anglo American CEO Duncan Wanblad has called for Brazil to open up its mining sector to meet surging global demand.

Encouragingly, private operators are also increasingly facing growing pressures to do good while doing well. Last December, for example, Canada-based Indigenous groups and supporters launched the Sustainable Critical Minerals Alliance, calling on countries to protect against unsustainable mining in the Amazon by honoring their agreements to safekeep at least 80 percent of the river basin by 2025.

Ultimately, that decision will fall to Brazil. If the country manages to create productive strategies for delivering both wealth and well-being, this land of prospectors has a shot at reinventing the rules for sustainable, socially responsible enterprise and its own history as well.

— Nicholas Pope contributed to this article. He is a postdoctoral research fellow at King’s College, a consultant to the Igarapé Institute, and a co-author of a forthcoming report on critical minerals in Brazil.

— Robert Muggah is a principal at the SecDev Group, a co-founder of the Igarapé Institute, and the author, with Ian Goldin, of Terra Incognita: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years.

— Mac Margolis is a Brazil-based journalist, an advisor at the Igarapé Institute, and the author of The Last New World: The Conquest of the Amazon Frontier.

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