The presidents of Iran and Venezuela launched construction of a joint petrochemical plant on Monday, strengthening an “axis of unity” between two oil-rich nations staunchly opposed to the United States.

Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who both often rail against Washington, also signed a series of other deals to expand economic cooperation, ranging from setting up a dairy factory in Venezuela to forming an oil company.

“The two countries will united defeat the imperialism of North America,” a beaming Chavez told a news conference during an official visit to the Islamic Republic, which the United States has labeled part of an “axis of evil”.

“When I come to Iran Washington gets upset,” he said.

The two presidents—whose countries are members of the OPEC oil producing cartel—earlier attended the ceremony to start building a methanol facility with an annual capacity of …

Beim weltweiten Live-Earth-Konzert am 7. Juli 2007 will Hamburg für den Klimaschutz werben und sich Seite an Seite mit Metropolen wie London, Tokio und Sydney präsentieren. Doch erst die Hälfte der Tickets sind verkauft. Hamburg Tourismus verschenkt Karten im Aktions-Paket. http://www.welt.de/hamburg/article991718/Gedaempftes_Klima_fuer_Live-Earth-Konzert.html

Kompliziert, unermüdlich, tief im Atlantik: Bringt der Klimawandel Europas Wärmepumpe ins Stottern? Statt Messung oder Modell haben deutsche Forscher ein Orakel berühmter Kollegen bemüht. Dabei kam vor allem heraus, dass sie den Nordatlantikstrom bis heute nicht so recht verstehen.

Drohende Weltuntergänge finden leicht ihren Weg in die Medien, so auch am vergangenen Wochenende. Diesmal von Potsdam aus. “Golfstrom droht spätestens 2100 zu versiegen”, berichtete die “Netzeitung” am späten Freitagnachmittag. “Forscher fürchten Ende des Golfstroms”, schrieb “Bild” einen Tag später. “Atlantische Strömung könnte bis zum Jahr 2100 abreißen”, meldete schließlich am heutigen Montag die Tageszeitung “Die Welt”.

Der Nordatlantikstrom befördert als nimmermüdes Fließband die Wärme des Golfstroms an die Gestade Europas und bestimmt außerdem maßgeblich die Niederschlagsverteilung auf unserem Teil des Globus. Als anfällig für den Klimawandel gilt dieser Kreislauf nicht erst seit dem Katastrophenfilm “The Day after Tomorrow” - in dem der Strom abrupt zum Stillstand …

Porsche To Go All Green

Car Magazine in the UK has claimed in an exclusive story that Porsche’s next Cayenne and Panamera vehicles will get petrol-electric hybrid engines, as the firm strives to reduce CO2 emissions.

The sports car maker has gone on the attack, with tough new European Union guidelines on carbon emissions looming. The ECC has already announced it would like the average new car’s emissions to total 130g/km of CO2 by 2012, and is now haggling with the industry about implementing the target. The move will apply in Australia.

In an extraordinary outburst, Porsche board member Michael Macht hit out at small car makers for failing to make big steps to cut carbon. ‘The contribution made by European small car manufacturers in reducing CO2 since 2002 has been truly disappointing. They have reduced CO2 emissions in their segment by just two …

By the way, has it occured to you that the foiled terrorist attacks could have been a Buddhist plot? Because that is a real possibility, according to the Muslim Council of Britain.

“Let’s avoid presumptions,” said Daud Abdullah, deputy secretary general of the MCB, when asked if Islamists were behind the car bombs in London and Scotland. “It can be the work of Muslims, Christians, Jews or Buddhists.”

Indeed. Or perhaps Quakers.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/ukcorrespondents/holysmoke/july07/pointingfinger.htm

Last month, 600 people turned out for a Yeshiva University fund-raiser at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. The museum, which stands as a monument to science, houses one of the world’s most extensive collections of dinosaur fossils. The dinner itself was held in the dramatic Milstein Hall of Ocean Life, which features a massive blue whale that hangs suspended in midair; intricate dioramas modeled on the flora and fauna of the planet’s oceans line the walls. Everything about the affair suggested that Yeshiva, the intellectual epicenter of Modern Orthodox Jewish life in America, is very much at ease in the world of secular science.

This impression is confirmed by Carl Feit, who is an ordained rabbi and Talmudic scholar as well as chairman of the science division at Yeshiva College. Prof. Feit says that in nearly a quarter-century of teaching introductory biology, he has …

Seit einigen Jahren beschwören deutsche und internationale Untergangspropheten die Gefahr einer Mini-Eiszeit, die Europa als Folge der globalen Erwärmung schon bald bevorstehen soll. Im Dezember 2005 veröffentlichte das Wissenschaftsmagazin Nature sogar einen Artikel englischer Klimaforscher, die behaupteten, der Zustrom warmer Golfstrommassen nach Europa habe sich seit 1950 um nahezu 30% verringert. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/11/1130_051130_ice_age.html

Die sensationalle Meldung schlug ein wie eine Bombe. Sie führte zudem zu einer Kontroverse zwischen dem verantwortlichen Chefredakteur von Nature und dem von mir herausgegeben Wissenschaftsnetzwerk CCNet.
http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/CCNet-02-12-05.htm

Im November vergangenen Jahres wurde schließlich offenbar, daß die von Nature publizierten Daten und Behauptungen fehlerhaft waren:

FEARS that a shutdown of ocean currents is about to plunge Europe into a mini ice age receded last week. New measurements have failed to show clear evidence that the current is weakening, and models of the North Atlantic show that a shutdown would not …

Amid growing angst about climate change and terrorism, backyard pre-fabricated “panic rooms” are all the rage in Germany this summer. The shelters can withstand attacks, as well as the increasingly violent weather.

Call it a storm or fall-out shelter, or just an old-fashioned German air-raid bunker. But the government-approved Gartenschutzraum or backyard shelter is just the thing for suburbanites who are tired of Japanese fishponds and garden gnomes. http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2648556,00.html