Category: Science & Technology
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Spilt Milk
Just a reminder, sometimes “settled science” isn’t so settled. Headline from today’s Washington Post: “Is Whole Milk Good for Us After All?” — JAB
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When Dynamic Pricing Meets Energy Storage
Other states are targeting energy storage as an industry of the future but Virginia may have the most hospitable climate for it.
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Building the Ed-Tech Research Network
by James A. Bacon K-12 schools and higher ed institutions across the United States are expected to spend a combined $11.3 billion on education technology in 2015. So many new products are flooding the educational marketplace that educators are finding it difficult to make informed decisions about which to use. To address this challenge, the…
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Energy's Innovation Race
Foes of fossil fuels are wondering if natural gas production in the United States is peaking. While some observers depict the supply of natural gas as lasting decades, maybe a hundred years, others see signs that gas wells in the Marcellus shale formation are playing out more rapidly than anticipated. As supply becomes constricted, prices will…
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Energy’s Innovation Race
Foes of fossil fuels are wondering if natural gas production in the United States is peaking. While some observers depict the supply of natural gas as lasting decades, maybe a hundred years, others see signs that gas wells in the Marcellus shale formation are playing out more rapidly than anticipated. As supply becomes constricted, prices will…
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Next Step for Offshore Wind
Earlier this year Dominion Virginia Power received a bid for building two experimental offshore wind turbines that exceeded internal cost projections by more than half, making the proposed project unlikely to win State Corporation Commission approval. In a July stakeholder meeting, DVP executives laid out their analysis of what went wrong. Now stakeholders will convene in…
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Virginia's Spaceport: a Century-Long Commitment
by James A. Bacon The McAuliffe administration has settled a dispute with Orbital Science Corp. over insurance of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at Wallops Island. Orbital, which is in the business of launching payload into orbit, will reimburse the state for one-third of the $15 million in damages incurred by the spaceport when Orbital’s rocket exploded during lift-off…
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Virginia’s Spaceport: a Century-Long Commitment
by James A. Bacon The McAuliffe administration has settled a dispute with Orbital Science Corp. over insurance of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at Wallops Island. Orbital, which is in the business of launching payload into orbit, will reimburse the state for one-third of the $15 million in damages incurred by the spaceport when Orbital’s rocket exploded during lift-off…
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The Democratization of Data
Andrew Mondschein, an assistant professor at the University of Virginia School of Architecture, is studying how the redevelopment of Tysons affects the pedestrian experience. The first step is collecting data. Accordingly, he is dispatching students equipped with sensors, wearable cameras and smartphone apps to monitor temperature, light levels, green cover, noise pollution and carbon monoxide…
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Alpha Natural Resources: Running Wrong
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in Business and Economy, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Energy, Environment, Federal issues, Government Finance, Health Care, Housing, Infrastructure, Insurance, Labor and Workforce, Land use & Development, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Poverty & income gap, Property rights, Public safety & health, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Science & Technology, Social Services and Entitlements, TaxesBy Peter Galuszka Four years ago, coal titan Alpha Natural Resources, one of Virginia’s biggest political donors, was riding high. It was spending $7.1 billion to buy Massey Energy, a renegade coal firm based in Richmond that had compiled an extraordinary record for safety and environmental violations and fines. Its management practices culminated in a…
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Renewable Energy: A Tale of Two Virginias
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By Peter Galuszka Call it a tale of two Virginias – at least when it comes to renewable energy. One is the state’s traditional political and business elite, including Dominion Resources and large manufacturers, the State Corporation Commission and others. They insist that the state must stick with big, base-loaded electricity generating plants like nuclear…
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Big City Advantage in Innovation Not What It Used to Be
by James A. Bacon Maybe the Internet is allowing innovation and creativity to break free from the confines of geography after all. Economists conventionally argue that large metropolitan areas are better incubators of inventions and innovations than smaller cities and rural areas. However, a new study, “Cities and Ideas,” by Mikko Packalen and Jay Bhattacharya, finds that the…
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Is NoVa over the Job Hump?
There has been considerable wailing and gnashing of teeth over the abrupt halt in economic growth in Northern Virginia due to sequestration-mandated cutbacks in defense spending and other federal government programs. My fellow Bacon’s Rebellion bloggers and I have led the wailing chorus. Indeed, Don Rippert engaged in some ferocious teeth gnashing in a post this morning.…
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Dubious Oil Lobby Bankrolls Dubious Poll
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in Business and Economy, Courts and law, Demographics, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Electoral process, Energy, Environment, Federal issues, Government Finance, Infrastructure, Insurance, Labor and Workforce, Land use & Development, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Public safety & health, Science & TechnologyBy Peter Galuszka In a recent post, Bacons Rebellion extolled the findings of Hickman Analytics Inc., a suburban Washington consulting firm hired by the Consumer Energy Alliance, which found that according to a survey of 500 registered voters, the vast majority of Virginians support Dominion’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline. The $5 billion project would take natural…
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What Role for Nuclear Power in Virginia's Energy Future?
by James A. Bacon Virginia can lead a national renaissance in nuclear energy, argue Robert Hartwell and Donald Hoffman in a new white paper published by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. They advance two main arguments: (1) nuclear is an economical source of green energy emitting near-zero levels of carbon dioxide, and (2)…