Welcome to 2010!

Here are some predictions for 2010 from New Scientist -

  • Final flight of the space shuttle
  • We figure out if we have Neanderthal in us
  • We create life - a Man made DNA is used to jump start and keep alive, a cell
  • Electric dreams - electric cars start arriving
  • Genome sequencing goes mass market - start to look out for errors in the code
  • Exploration of ocean-ridges 6000 meters down. At this depth water doesn't boil until it reaches 500C

 


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Posted On: 1/1/0001
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Copenhagen - does it matter?

With old political systems ill prepared to cooperate in a rapidly changing world, is it possible that new forms of cooperation that bypass political structures will emerge and drive grass roots change in our behaviours toward energy consumption or will rapid advances in the delivery of energy from new sources such as solar mean that our worries about waste and excess will ultimately be meaningless?

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Company: Noble & Associates
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David Deutsch: A new way to explain explanation


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Home Brew - Personalised Electricity from Solar

The following quote from ACS Publications Inorganic Chemisty Journal is telling - The point here is that energy storage needed for solar Personalised Energy (PE) is currently within reach of the chemist with the design of catalysts that effectively promote eq  1 or 2 in the forward (solar storage) and reverse (fuel cell) directions.

Personalized energy (PE) is a transformative idea that provides a new modality for the planet’s energy future. By providing solar energy to the individual, an energy supply becomes secure and available to people of both legacy and nonlegacy worlds and minimally contributes to an increase in the anthropogenic level of carbon dioxide. Because PE will be possible only if solar energy is available 24 h a day, 7 days a week, the key enabler for solar PE is an inexpensive storage mechanism. HY (Y = halide or OH) splitting is a fuel-forming reaction of sufficient energy density for large-scale solar storage. Read the full article


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Categories: Energy
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Australian Shaman - An aboriginal art exhibition sponsored by futureWA

Can't get to the exhibition? Visit online at www.australianshaman.com.au


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Company: Noble & Associates
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Agriculture - the next big thing for Western Australia

Ok, so agriculture is already a big part of the WA economy but lately it has been seriously overshadowed by the reignited mining boom.

Some drivers for the future of agriculture in this state -

  • Water and land availability around the Ord river
  • Improvements in large scale farming practices
  • New technologies for monitoring the environment
  • New genetically modified strains of crop that are hardier in respect of low water and pest tollerance
  • Rapidly growing human populations

 


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Company: Noble & Associates
Phone: 61894007400
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$40 million venture capital fund for WA

Yuuma, a partnership between the federal government and the  private sector has some funding available for startups. The fund will be funding new ideas in life sciences, biotech and information technologies.

Yuuma is expected to work closely with universities and will have a 10 year lifespan.

Given the recent global financial crisis, funding has been particularly difficult for young high-tech companies in Western Australia to secure.


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Company: Noble & Associates
Phone: 61894007400
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Redundancy - do we have it in Western Australia?

In an increasingly volatile world, we may want to consider our fate under various unpleasant scenarios -

  • Global weather patterns are severely disrupted by a 'tipping point'. Food shortages across the globe drive up prices significantly ....like 500%.
  • Chinese and Indian consumers cannot soak up the demand left by a burnt out, over weight Western baby boomer generation quickly enough. Global productive capacity is significantly excessive. Productive capacity is shut down rapidly, demand for our raw materials subsides significantly and mineral prices slump leading to the inevitable demise of our resource based economy.
  • A global full scale conflict erupts with multiple pressure points including the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Taiwan and the Korea?s. Global sea traffic is severely disrupted & demand for our raw materials slumps.

There are probably many more 'black swans' sitting out on the horizon or in the words of Donald Rumsfeld, 'unknown unknowns'.

Here are a range of redundancy strategies -

  • supporting certain less competitive industries on a small scale so that at least we had the option of rebuilding those industries in the event that we were struck by a 'black swan' event and could not rely on the produce of an external supplier
  • encouraging a range of agricultural product to be grown locally
  • protecting our environment from degradation and ensuring that fish and other natural resources are over harvested
  • developing smart, efficient energy and transport systems
  • educating on the benefit of minimising use of CO2 based resources and H2O resources

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Company: Noble & Associates
Phone: 61894007400
Posted On: 1/1/0001
Contact via email: andrew@nobleaccounting.com.au
Categories: Climate Change | Energy
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WA Nobel prize winner to develop new vaccine

Barry Marshall, WA's own Nobel prize winner is continuing his research work into using bacteria to transmit anti virus's into the body. His current research uses foods such as yoghurt to deliver the anti virus. If trials at Sir Charles Gardiner Hospital succeed, the whole global vaccine industy could be revolutionised allowing for a range of viral illnesses to be treated without the need for injections as a delivery mechanism.

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What happened to our WA hemp industry?


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Company: Noble & Associates
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