KLM To Use Recycled Frying Oil To Fuel Flights
KLM airlines are going green, well, at least for some flights. BBC reports:
The Dutch airline KLM says it plans to use recycled cooking oil on 200 flights between Paris and Amsterdam.
The fuel, biokerosene, is derived from used frying oil, which has to be tested to meet the same technical specifications as traditional kerosene.
Airlines are under EU pressure to cut their carbon emissions by 3% by 2012.
KLM’s interest in biofuels dates back to 2009, when it ran a test flight carrying 40 people, including the then Dutch economics affairs minister.
The 90-minute flight was majority powered by traditional aviation fuel, with just one of the its four engines powered 50% by biofuel.
Future flights will use half traditional kerosene and half biofuel.
[Continues at BBC News]
China Leads The World In Clean Energy
Photo: Richard Chambers (CC)
One of the most polluted countries has become number one in clean energy. The US ranks number three. The Guardian reports:
China has overtaken the US for the first time in a league table of investments in low-carbon energy among the G-20, according to a new report by not for profit group the Pew Charitable Trusts published this week.
The report found that despite an overall 6.6 per cent global decline in clean energy investments last year, China invested almost twice as much as the United States in clean energy during 2009.
But the US still leads in energy capacity. It’s interesting for the UK too:
• third in overall clean energy investments
• fourth in five-year clean energy investment growth rate
• fifth in the percentage of total power it receives from clean energy sources ahead of France, China and the US
Canada’s Goldstream River Turned Fluorescent Green
Via Utica Daily News:
The river, which runs through the city of Langford, British Columbia, turned a fluorescent green on Dec. 30, when a passer-by captured stunning video of the verdant waterway.
At first it wasn’t clear what caused the river — and the water in a nearby fountain — to change color. But investigators now believe that the green hue was caused by the addition of fluorescein, a synthetic organic compound that is often used as a dye, or a “fluorescent tracer,” in the testing of water systems.
[Continues at Utica Daily News]
