Swedish truck manufacturer Scania announced this week the start of a year long search across 28 countries to find the best truck driver in the world. According to initial estimates, some 45,000 truckers and not only will enter the competition, now in its seventh year.

"The driver is the single most important factor for economy, environment and safety. Skilled and committed drivers will deliver energy efficient transport, reduce emissions and contribute towards safer roads, Leif Ostling,… (read more)

The Porsche Panamera is better than a Mercedes S-Class and Bentley Continental, and is just like driving the sedan version of the Porsche 911 Turbo, according to Fifth Gear. I must say, this Panamera Turbo is very sexy in white and being a girl myself, I’m quite jealous that Vicky gets to take a spin. The handling is lovely, the speed and power impressive for a car of this size and weight, and overall, it’s far more exciting than you’d expect from any other luxury sedan. “Sexy”, “super-racy” and “super-quick” and at 500 hp, you’d believe all of that, too. If I was very very rich, with a couple of kids, I think I would just about purchase this…

Genii Capital, one of the bidders involved in the Saab case, confirmed on Wednesday that it has submitted an improved bid for GM’s Swedish unit Saab, emphasizing that it has what it needs – financially speaking – to take control of the company.

Although General Motors has already started closing Saab – and even hired a firm to handle the process – Lars Carlstrom, the one who represents Genii Capital and Bernie Ecclestone during the talks, said he’s very optimistic that GM could give a respon… (read more)

The two Dakar Rally contenders will have to work hard until the very last stage of this year’s event if they want to clinch the overall win in the South American race. Following the results in yesterday’s stage from Santiago to San Juan – won by X-Raid BMW driver Guerlain Chicherit – Qatari Nasser Al-Attiyah closed in on overall leader and VW teammate Carlos Sainz by more than 5 and a half minutes.

Chicherit recorded his very first stage win of the rally in 2009, crossing the finish line ahea… (read more)

The aim of this event is to provide a forum for industry and academia to interact and explore potential business opportunities, and to learn about the latest innovations within hydrogen technologies including hydrogen generation, materials science for storage and building future low carbon infrastructures.

More information here

By Andrew Jacobs, Reporter, New York Times

Google’s (GOOG) declaration that it would stop cooperating with Chinese Internet censorship and consider shutting down its operations in China ricocheted around the world on Wednesday. But in China itself, the news was heavily censored.

Some big Chinese news portals initially carried a short dispatch on Google’s announcement, but that account soon tumbled from the headlines, and later reports omitted Google’s references to “free speech” and “surveillance.”

The only government response came later in the day from Xinhua, the official news agency, which ran a brief item quoting an anonymous official who was “seeking more information on Google’s statement that it could quit China.”

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By Jeff Nolan, Blogger, Venture Chronicles

Larry wrote this today and I think it pretty much sums up the situation for Google (GOOG) in China.

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By Evgeny Morozov, Fellow at the Open Society Institute in New York

Unlike many other honorable members of the technology blogosphere, I am not too excited about Google’s (GOOG) ultimatum to the Chinese government (if you have been living in a cave or are not on Twitter: Google wants to either stop censoring search results on Google.cn or shut down their Chinese shop altogether).

Of course, all companies make mistakes, and Google’s executives may have discovered that they blundered when they decided to offer a censored version of Google.cn. I grant them the right to to fix the situation.

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By James Fallows, National Correspondent, The Atlantic

I have not yet been able to reach my friends in China to discuss this story, and for now I am judging the Google (GOOG) response strictly by what the company has posted on its “Official Blog,” here, and my observations from dealing with Google-China officials while overseas. Therefore this will epitomize the Web-age reaction to a breaking news story, in that it will be a first imperfect assessment, subject to revision as new facts come in. With that caveat, here is what I think as I hear this news:

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By Rebecca Mackinnon, Contributor, Opinion Asia, The Wall Street Journal

One night in the mid-1990s when I was working as a journalist in Beijing, I went out to dinner with some Chinese friends. I had just finished reading a book called “The File” by the British historian Timothy Garton Ash. It’s about what happened in East Berlin after the Berlin Wall came down and everybody could see the files the Stasi had been keeping all those years.

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Mozilla Labs has announced the availability of the release candidate version of the Weave Sync bookmark and preferences sync add-on. Mozilla Weave Sync 1.0 RC2 comes with some updated features, but mostly rounds out the edges on the existing one and speeds things up a little. The final build should be coming soon, the dev team says, likely in time … (read more)

This year’s New York International Auto Show (NYIAS) due to be held in April will premiere the first-ever iPhone application for an auto show. When it launches, the free app will also allow Blackberry Storm and Motorola Android users access to the same content as the one available on the Auto Show’s mobile website.

"The New York Auto Show app is designed to provide a visually-driven experience for consumers before they visit the Show, during their visit, and even after the Show," sa… (read more)

We have seen augmented before realty but only here and there – well Hallmark is looking to take this new technology to the mainstream with the introduction of Webcam Greetings. These new cards not only feature the same lovey dovey messages but now you can also open up a whole new interactive world when you go to the Hallmark website. Just follow the directions in your card by placing the Webcam Greetings in front of a webcam and watch the card come to life. Its a great way for people to get interested in sending greeting cards again and takes Hallmark to a whole new technological level. Check out the demo here.

Native app multitouch, you say? It’s a dream that most US Android users have failed to experience, but Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha has let loose some promising words. In an interview with Laptop, he asserted that the company will be more proactive in getting the two-finger (or more) shuffle into its Google devices — more specifically he said, “I think you will see us deliver multitouch in the majority of our devices going forward. There’s a complex set of factors, not all of them technical.” That last bit’s pretty ominous, but nothing we haven’t surmised before, and frankly, it all sounds a lot better than “we’ll consider it.” Also discussed in the interview is the inevitability of tablet experimentation, and the (un)likelihood of a Motoblur phone landing in Google’s online store. “I think clearly the bias is towards Google Experience devices.” Perhaps, but we’ll be interested to see what HTC has to say about that.

Multitouch coming to ‘majority’ of future Motorola devices, says CEO originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 Jan 2010 02:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Although one would believe that such a model would be more appropriate to be unveiled during an aftermarket show, Honda will present the Insight Sports Modulo Concept at the Tokyo Auto Salon. Just as its name suggests, the concept is based on the Insight but, thanks to the customizations brought by Honda Access Corporation – Honda’s very own manufacturer of aftermarket parts and accessories – the car comes with a new face and interior.

Unfortunately, only a few details are available at this p… (read more)

Although back in November, when the Camaro Synergy was unveiled at SEMA, some questions about it turning production version still existed, those questions have been answered yesterday by Chevrolet when it announced pricing and availability for the green Camaro.

Although it will be produced in limited numbers, the Camaro Synergy is coming this February and will retail for $26,790. The car is based on the Camaro 1LT and features a 3.6l direct injection V6 engine, developing 304 horsepower and … (read more)

Slappa recently unveiled a new line of ladies laptop bags. From that collection we received a review sample of the sleek and sexy Loren bag. The bag’s Designer style, normally found in handbags, merges shape fully with business practicality. Nothing about the appearance of this bag says it is for laptops. It simply says minimalist elegance. It is the anti-type to the blaring pink women’s laptop bags we often spot on the market today. This is a bag that could seamlessly transfer from boardroom to boardwalk.

We say minimalist because there aren’t a lot of frills on this bag. The outside has two pockets, one on each side. One of them a zippered pocket, the other a slide in pocket. Inside there is a large padded plush lining laptop pocket. Opposite of that are a few little pockets for holding various small items. The largest would hold an iPhone and it’s charger. Mostly I found myself just dumping stuff in the vast void space between. There is lots of room there and it is amazing how much i could fit. I actually lost my camera for two days in it.

 

The custom finished faux leather is really quite impressive right down to the feel of it. The bag has an overall sturdiness to it that makes one feel safe to carry a laptop in it. Keeping in mind that this is a faux finish and not real leather, it takes a careful eye not to scratch it and ruin the illusion. The metal pieces are 5 micron plating so that they will not tarnish. Inside is a floral non obtrusive print that is muted.

The Loren comes with two shoulder straps and one attachable cross shoulder strap. I found the two shoulder straps perfectly sufficient though. It sits nicely on the shoulder and the two straps help to spread some of the weight more evenly and prevent your shoulder from dislocating on heavy bag days. It should be noted that this is a big bag. It is larger then my torso. Being made to fit a 15.4″ laptop it is definitely quite a presence to carry. When I have to carry such a large ever present bag, i don’t want to try to balance a purse awkwardly with it as well. It just doesn’t feel right. So i went about combining my purse with my new laptop bag and found that it just wasn’t meant to be. Not enough pockets! It just all ended up in a sad little mosh pit of purse items in the middle, which then resulted in a flustered me, elbow deep into the bag fishing for various items throughout the day vaguely starting to feel like a soccer mom looking for a band aid.

We also received the Slappa white diamond pillow netbook sleeve. The pearly white exterior is a raised soft material and the inside is a quilted silky  material. So it really is like a pillow for your netbook. There is a rear pocket for the cords and a sturdy zipper to hold the computer in snugly. It would fit nicely in the larger Loren bag.

Conclusion:

Overall, the Loren has great appeal as a laptop bag. The size is roomy as can be. Your laptop is definitely protected well. The style is unique and classy. Coming in at $79.99 on Slappa’s site it is a little on the pricey end, but this is a good example of getting value for what you pay for.

The good: Excellent exterior. Well padded interior for laptop. Plenty of space inside. Comfortable shoulder straps. Fashion is easily transferable to many different occasions.

The bad: More purse-like pockets would be helpful. Faux finish is easy to scratch.

Researchers at the University of Nevada, Reno are developing a solar technique that will take care of the ecosystems of terminus lakes around the world. This new solar distillation system will help in removing the salinity of the lake water. This will be possible with the help of a specialized low-cost solar pond and […]
Posted in: Future Energy, Inventions, Solar Power

Cap and Trade is an attractive idea that looks like it might work until one gets into the details.  It certainly was my first choice as a putative solution.  It is just not that simple.

The major problem is that the energy industry does not operate a level playing field when it comes to properly monetizing its costs to society.  If this were changed, the problems would likely begin to go away.

A huge part of the cost of coal based power has been the impact of the stack gas on adjacent communities.  Cleaning them up is possible and costly.  It is far cheaper to politically engineer you way around the problem than to actually fix it.

That is why Chinese cities presently suffer from debilitating air and it derivative health costs.

Far better than cap and trade would be a treaty that progressively begins to charge back those costs to those that fail to remedy the situation.  An outright ban is impractical but leveling the playing field over twenty years allows the better solutions to be quickly implemented.

Severin Borenstein on Cap and Trade

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/severin-borenstein-on-cap-and-trade