energy

2008 Russian financial crisis

2008-09-28T07:50:14-06:00

The 2008 Russian financial crisis is an ongoing crisis on Russian markets, as nervousness over the global banking crisis has been compounded by political fears after the war with Georgia, as well as renewed concern about state intervention in corporations of strategic interests. Russia's economy is also heavily dependent on energy prices, especially oil which has lost more than a third of its value since its record peak of USD 147 on July 11, 2008.

Russia is a major exporter of commodities such as oil and metals, its equity market has been hit hard by the decline in the price of many commodities. In addition, investors have pulled billions of dollars out of Russia on concerns over escalating geopolitical tensions with the West following the military conflict between Georgia and Russia, as well as concerns about state interference in the economy. Those concerns were underscored in July by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's criticism of steel company Mechel which wiped out billions of dollars of its market capitalization. By September 2008, the RTS stock index plunged almost 54%, making it one of the worst performing markets in the world. Compounding the volatile situation in Russia's financial system has been also involvement in the US subprime mortgage crisis with the Russian Central Bank owning US$100 Billion of mortgage-backed securities in the two American mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that were taken over by the US government that most likely will have to be written off

Swedish Foreign minister Carl Bildt said on September 17 that the current Russian financial crisis is "obviously more worrying" than the ongoing subprime mortgage crisis in view of the political development in Russia.

References

"Oil prices slip to 90 dollars", AFP (2008-09-16).
"OIL PRICES BELOW 100 USD, GAS PRICE STILL THE SAME", www.worldbulletin.net, Turkey (2008-09-10).
Financial turmoil accelerates in Russia, MarketWatch, September 17, 2008.
Delasantellis, Julian (2008-09-09). "Paulson placates China, Russia - for now", Asia Times Online.
Kramer, Andrew E (July 26, 2008). "Putin’s Criticism Puts a $6 Billion Hole in a Company", The New York Times.
Stewart, Catrina (July 28, 2008). "Putin blasts steel firm Mechel for tax evasion", BusinessWeek.
Lesova, Polya (July 28, 2008). "Fresh criticism by Putin sends Mechel shares tumbling again", MarketWatch.
Russian stocks suspended in worst plunge since 1998, Reuters, September 16, 2008.
Russian markets suspended again after shares plummet, The Times, September 17, 2008.
Russian Exchanges Halt Trading for Second Day; VTB Declines, Bloomberg, September 17, 2008.
Russian Exchanges Halt Trading for Second Day; VTB Declines, Bloomberg, September 17, 2008.
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(Swedish) Carl Bildt bloggar om krisen, Dagens industri, September 17, 2008.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Video: Russia's financial crisis, Sept 17 08

Particle accelerators and the Large Hadron Collider

2008-09-09T16:54:46-06:00

Current complex

CERN operates a network of six accelerators and a decelerator. Each machine in the chain increases the energy of particle beams before delivering them to experiments or to the next more powerful accelerator. Currently active machines are:

Two linear accelerators generate low energy particles for injection into the Proton Synchrotron. The 50 MeV Linac2 is for protons, and the 4.2 MeV/u Linac3 is for heavy ions.
The Proton Synchrotron Booster increases the energy of particles generated by the proton linear accelerator before they are transferred to the other accelerators.
The Low Energy Ion Ring (LEIR) accelerates the ions from the ion linear accelerator, before transferring them to the Proton Synchrotron (PS). This accelerator was commissioned in 2005, after having been reconfigured from the previous Low Energy Anti-proton Ring (LEAR).
The 28 GeV Proton Synchrotron (PS), built in 1959 and still operating as a feeder to the more powerful SPS.
The Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS), a circular accelerator with a diameter of 2 kilometres built in a tunnel, which started operation in 1976. It was designed to deliver an energy of 300 GeV and was gradually upgraded to 450 GeV. As well as having its own beamlines for fixed-target experiments, it has been operated as a proton-antiproton collider, and for accelerating high energy electrons and positrons which were injected into the Large Electron-Positron Collider (LEP). From 2008 onwards, it will inject protons and heavy ions into the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
The On-Line Isotope Mass Separator (ISOLDE), which is used to study unstable nuclei. Particles are initially accelerated in the PS Booster before entering ISOLDE. It was first commissioned in 1967 and was rebuilt with major upgrades in 1974 and 1992.
The Antiproton Decelerator (AD), which reduces the velocity of antiprotons to about 10% the speed of light for research into antimatter.

The Large Hadron Collider

Most of the activities at CERN are currently directed towards building a new collider, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and the experiments for it. The LHC represents a large-scale, worldwide scientific cooperation project.

The LHC tunnel is located 100 metres underground, in the region between the Geneva airport and the nearby Jura mountains. It uses the 27 km circumference circular tunnel previously occupied by LEP which was closed down in November 2000. CERN's existing PS/SPS accelerator complexes will be used to pre-accelerate protons which will then be injected into the LHC.

Six experiments (CMS, ATLAS, LHCb, TOTEM, LHC-forward and ALICE) are currently being built, and will be running on the collider; each of them will study particle collisions under a different point of view, and with different technologies. Construction for these experiments required an extraordinary engineering effort. Just as an example, to lower the pieces for the CMS experiment into the underground cavern which will host it, a special crane will have to be rented from Belgium, which will be able to lift the almost 2000 tons for each piece. The first of the approximately 5,000 magnets necessary for construction was lowered down a special shaft at 13:00 GMT on 7 March 2005.

This accelerator will generate vast quantities of computer data, which CERN will stream to laboratories around the world for distributed processing (making use of a specialised GRID infrastructure, the LHC Computing Grid). In April 2005, a trial successfully streamed 600 MB per second to seven different sites across the world. If all the data generated by the LHC is to be analysed, then scientists must achieve 1,800 MB per second before 2008.

As of August 2008 the majority of the LHC ring is now cooled to the 1.9 K (−271.25 °C) operating temperature. The initial particle beams are due for injection in August 2008, the first attempt to circulate a beam through the entire LHC is scheduled for September 10, 2008, and the first high-energy collisions are planned to take place after the LHC is officially unveiled, on October 21, 2008.

Decommissioned accelerators

The original linear accelerator (Linac1).
The 600 MeV Synchro-Cyclotron (SC) which started operation in 1957 and was shut down in 1991.
The Intersecting Storage Rings (ISR), an early collider built from 1966 to 1971 and operated until 1984.
The Large Electron-Positron Collider (LEP), which operated from 1989 to 2000 and was the largest machine of its kind, housed in a 27 km-long circular tunnel which now houses the Large Hadron Collider.
The Low Energy Antiproton Ring (LEAR), commissioned in 1982, which assembled the first pieces of true antimatter, in 1995, consisting of nine atoms of antihydrogen. It was closed in 1996, and superseded by the Antiproton Decelerator.

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Map of the Caucasus region (1994)

2008-08-14T08:19:14-06:00

Detailed map of the Caucasus region (1994), including locations of economically important energy and mineral resources: South Ossetia has reserves of lead and zinc, Abkhazia has coal, and Georgia has oil, gold, copper, manganese, and coal.

Energy and water in Drobeta Turnu Severin

2008-08-14T07:43:14-06:00

The Hydroelectric Power System of the Iron Gates (SHNPF)

The local officials bestowed particular attention to the lighting of the town by introducing street lamp lighting in 1850 and later, the electricity produced by the power plant located in the public gardens (1907).

Today, the kilowatts are pumped by the power giant from Gura-Vaii. Built as a result of the cooperation between Romania and neighboring Yugoslavia, it has an installed capacity of 2,050 Mw, half of which belongs to the Romanian party.

The Turbine Hall at the Iron Gates

In order to permit an unhampered shipping traffic on the Danube, a sluice was built on either of its banks. They are both provided with upstream and downstream outposts as well as with equipments which are able to ensure lock chamber filling and evacuation operations.

The power plant is also provided with a control tower which helps to regulate and guide sluice traffic.

The sluice lock chamber sizes are in accordance with the recommendations of the Danube Committee for the Lower Danube sector. The Iron Gates I system for navigation and energy production (S.H.E.N.) is the third in Europe, following the hydropower stations on the Volga river.

The Electrical Company Headquarters (ENEL)

A particular problem the municipality had to solve was that of the town power supply. At the very beginning this was ensured by means of casks with water coming from the town fountains and later, from a well that was located in the Radu-Negru square and which was wind powered.

The "RADU NEGRU" Hall

It was only in 1910 that the water plant and the Water Tower started to be erected, the water source being the Danube itself.

The Water Tower

Two of the public-buildings which are emblematic for the town, the Water Tower and the Hall were erected between 1910-1913 and 1904-1906, respectively. The building project of the former belonged to the engineer Elie Radu, while the architecture plants for the latter were drawn up by C.I. Gabrielescu.

Rock flowers

2008-07-30T01:11:09-06:00

In geology, rock is a naturally occurring aggregate of minerals and/or mineraloids. The Earth's lithosphere is made of rock. In general rocks are of three types, namely, igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic. Petrology is the scientific study of rocks.

Iron oxides and carbonates play a large part in many sedimentary rocks and are especially important as coloring agents. The red sands and limestones, for example, which are so abundant, contain small amounts of iron(III) oxide (hematite), which in a finely divided state gives a red hue to all rocks in which it is present. Limonite and goethite, on the other hand, makes rocks yellow or brown; manganese oxides, asphalt and other carbonaceous substances are the cause of the black color of many sediments. Bluish tints result sometimes from the presence of phosphates or of fluorite; while green is most frequently seen in rocks which contain glauconite or chlorite.

If the quartz from natural crystalline stone (such as quartz, beryl, calcite, obsidian, or amethyst), it may display the natural colouring and structure of the mineral from which it was fashioned. Some authors advise students to place a sigil, seal, or talsimanic emblem beneath a clear sphere, but most do not. Most authors suggest that the work of crystal gazing should be undertaken in a dimly-lit and quiet room, so as to foster visions and more easily allow the onset of a trance state.

Film made by Dan Alexoae

The color of the quartz

2008-07-26T15:31:40-06:00

The crystal-gazer's trance can be induced with any shiny object, including a crystaline gem stone. The size of quarty preferred varies greatly among those who practice crystallomancy. Some gazers use a few inches diameter quarty that is held in the hand; others prefer a larger quarty mounted on a stand -- although most authors agree that the expense of a very large quatz is not always justified by added efficacy. The stereotypical image of a gypsy woman wearing a headscarf and telling fortunes for her clients by means of a very large crystal ball is widely depicted in the media and can be found in hundreds of popular books, advertising pages, and films of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, and the pervasiveness of this image may have led to the increased use of fairly large crystal balls by those who can afford them.

Film made by Dan Alexoae

Quartz crystals - Crystal gazing

2008-07-24T12:57:49-06:00

Crystal gazing may be used by practitioners -- sometimes called "readers" or "seers" -- for a variety of purposes, including to predict distant or future events, to give character analyses, for fortune telling, or to help a client make choices about current situations and problems.

Film made by Dan Alexoae

Crystals (2)

2008-07-21T10:16:06-06:00

More at http://www.sfetcu.com

Because crystal gazing has been developed by people of various cultures through a long period of time, the term crystal gazing denotes several different forms of a variety of objects, and there are several schools of thought as to the sources of the visions seen in the crystal gazing trance. (Wikipedia)

Film made by Dan Alexoae