• New EU rules could stop the export of plastic waste to poorer countries

    The body, which is responsible for enforcing EU laws, said the new rules are designed to promote the circular economy and tackle the export of illegal waste. Under the proposals, waste exports to non-OECD countries will be restricted and only allowed if third countries are willing to receive certain wastes and are able to manage them sustainably. Waste shipments to OECD countries will also be monitored and can be suspended if they generate serious environmental problems in the country of destination. Under the proposal, all EU companies that export waste outside the EU should ensure that the facilities receiving their waste are subject to an independent audit showing that they manage this waste in an environmentally sound manner. In January 2018, China, which was formerly responsible…

  • Career ‘deflection’ sees UK engineering firms struggling to hold onto talent

    The report, entitled ' Career Deflection: Exploring Diversity, Progression and Retention in Engineering ', was commissioned by world-renowned design, engineering and project management consultancy Atkins. It looks at how the impact of barriers to progress within a career in engineering are being distorted under an applied load over time. The report also suggests that engineering is falling behind other professions in terms of offering progressive opportunities for all people. Atkins is calling for greater industry action to stem the brain drain and ensure talent remains within the industry. Highlighting the impact of ‘career deflection’ on the earning potential and progress of women, ethnic minorities and disabled employees within engineering occupations and the wider engineering sector…

  • Trillions of microplastic particles could be entering the atmosphere, study finds

    Oceans, lakes and rivers often contain a large number of microplastic particles on their surface and impacting raindrops cause many droplets with an almost equally high concentration of microplastics to be thrown up into the air. When they evaporate in the air, the particles enter the atmosphere. Researchers from the University of Bayreuth have investigated the phenomenon and found that when a raindrop hits a water surface, droplets from a small ring-shaped area around the impact site are thrown into the air. They originate from a depth of a few millimetres below the water surface. The microplastic particles contained in the droplets have almost the same concentration as that in this narrow layer of water. The trajectories and flight duration of the particles showed that water from raindrops…

  • Tech giants urged to protect youngsters or face criminal action

    Nadine Dorries told social media firms to act now before the Online Safety Bill appears before MPs early in 2022. Her remarks came after Labour’s Richard Burgon highlighted the case of Joe Nihill, a 23-year-old former Army cadet from Whinmoor, Leeds, who “took his own life after accessing so-called suicide forums”. Burgon, the Leeds East MP, praised Nihill’s family for running an “inspirational campaign” to ensure others do not experience similar tragedy, adding a “firm message” needs to be sent to the tech giants that “they will now have to take action to remove these suicide forums which prey on vulnerable people”. Dorries replied in the Commons: “Those online platforms, those online giants, they have the ability right now today to remove those harmful algorithms that do direct children…

  • View from India: Smog disrupts Delhi-NCR

    A thick layer of smog has enveloped the city, worsening the air quality. As per media reports, the levels of particulate matter PM2.5 – tiny enough to clog lungs – in Delhi are far higher than the World Health Organization's safety guidelines. The System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research has indicated that the Air Quality Index of Delhi continues to remain in the 'severe' category. The Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai has announced that government officials can work from home until 21 November. To think of it, Delhi has two large-scale outdoor smog towers to induct air and purify it. The air-purification system can help to an extent but doesn’t seem to mitigate the pollution levels. A ground-up concerted effort is required to address rising pollution levels like dust…

  • Holographic camera sees through people and around corners with high precision

    Called synthetic wavelength holography, the new method works by indirectly scattering coherent light onto hidden objects, which then scatters again and travels back to a camera. From there, an algorithm reconstructs the scattered light signal to reveal the hidden objects. Due to its high temporal resolution, the method also has potential to image fast-moving objects, such as the beating heart through the chest or speeding cars around a street corner. The relatively new research field of imaging objects behind occlusions or scattering media is called non-line-of-sight imaging. Compared to related imaging technologies, the Northwestern method can rapidly capture full-field images of large areas with submillimetre precision. With this level of resolution, the computational camera could potentially…

  • Takeover of Arm by Nvidia to be investigated by competition authority

    Arm is one of the UK’s most successful and influential companies, designing the industry-standard chip architecture found in all categories of computing devices - from supercomputers to microcontrollers - and establishing it as the world leader in processors for mobile devices. The Cambridge-based firm was bought by Japan's SoftBank in 2016 for $32bn, but which is now in the process of selling it to graphics card makers Nvidia for $40bn. The latest deal has proved controversial, with Arm co-founder Hermann Hauser describing it as a “disaster” and lamenting the fact that it was one of the few European technology firms with global relevance that is now being sold to the US. Digital secretary Nadine Dorries has written to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), instructing them to carry…

  • Schools and industries close as Indian capital smothered by smog

    The measures come as India’s top court is deliberating whether New Delhi should go into a lockdown as a blanket of thick, grey smog continued to surround the city, particularly in the mornings. The panel issued the guidelines on Tuesday night in an attempt to stem the pollution and to show residents that the government was taking action to control an environmental crisis that has been plaguing the capital for years. Besides the closure of schools, the Commission for Air Quality Management ordered a stop to construction activities until 21 November and banned trucks carrying non-essential goods. The panel also directed the states to “encourage” work from home for half of the employees in all private offices. Despite some improvement in New Delhi air over the past two days, readings of…

  • Cyber attacks surged in 2021 with vaccine supply chain targeted

    The agency, which is a part of GCHQ, released its annual report showing that it dealt with an unprecedented 777 incidents over the last 12 months – up from 723 the previous year – with around 20 per cent of organisations supported linked to the health sector and vaccines. The health sector and in particular the vaccine rollout was a major focus for the NCSC, as it was forced to tackle threats levied against the NHS, healthcare, and vaccine supplier IT systems from malicious domains billions of times. Over the past 12 months, the NCSC also responded to a rise in ransomware attacks . A range of services have been provided to businesses over the past year to help protect them from ransomware including the Early Warning Service alerting organisations to emerging threats and cyber-security advice…

  • ‘Dog n bone’ device lets anxious pets video call their owners

    The system, dubbed DogPhone, works when a pet picks up and shakes a ball fitted with an accelerometer. When the accelerometer senses movement, it prompts a video call on a screen connected to the device. Believed to be the first of its kind, the invention is the brainchild of the University of Glasgow lecturer Dr Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas, her 10-year-old labrador, Zack, and colleagues from Aalto University in Finland. The team behind the pet-friendly invention said the DogPhone could help address the separation anxiety of pets who have grown used to having people at home during the coronavirus pandemic. Hirskyj-Douglas explained: “There are hundreds of internet-connected ‘smart toys’ on the market that dog owners can buy for their pets. But the vast majority of them are built with the needs…

  • Pollutant emissions in seaports likely to have spiked during pandemic

    The findings serve as a stark contrast against findings from the Nasa Earth Observatory that showed that the freeze in industrial processes and human activity arising from the pandemic resulted in lower air pollution. In Singapore, researchers from Nanyang Technological University (NTU) found emissions were modelled to have more than doubled (123 per cent), during the pandemic period, while they increased twofold in Los Angeles (100 per cent), almost two-thirds (65 per cent) in Long Beach, California, and over a quarter (27 per cent) in Hamburg, Germany. “Our study presents a review of the ship emission outlook amid the pandemic uncertainty,” said Professor Law Wing Keung from NTU’s School of Civil and Environmental Engineering. “Lockdown measures and other Covid-19 restrictions on human…

  • TikTok enhances safety policies around young people and online challenges

    Research conducted by the popular social media video app looked at how young people engaged with online challenges and hoaxes, including disturbing and harmful ones which attempt to coax viewers into self-harm or suicide. TikTok said it will now start removing “alarmist warnings” about potentially harmful online challenges and hoaxes because its research found these warnings can exacerbate the problem by treating the hoax as real. The study of 10,000 teenagers, parents and teachers from around the world – including the UK – found that while only 0.3 per cent of young people said they had participated in an online challenge they would categorise as very dangerous, nearly half of those asked said they wanted more information and help on how to better understand risk. It comes as social…

  • AI project aims to reduce harm among pregnant black women

    Experts from Loughborough University will work with the Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB) to identify patterns in more than 600 of its recent investigations into adverse outcomes during pregnancy and birth. HSIB, an independent patient safety body, has conducted more than 2,000 maternity investigations since April 2018, with around 10 per cent concerning black, Asian and ethnic minority families. These examined cases such as the death of the mother during pregnancy or childbirth, miscarriages, stillbirths and neonatal deaths. Black mothers are four times more likely to die from pregnancy complications than white women, according to a report published by MBRRACE-UK earlier this month. It found that pregnancy is safe, with 8.8 women per 100,000 between 2017-2019 dying either…

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    E+T Magazine

  • After All: A Scottish tour triggers memories of an enclosed childhood

    For someone like me, who has spent most of his peripatetic life away from the country of his birth, there exist two distinct types of nostalgia: positive and negative. The former is a bitter-sweet longing for the happy moments of your past; the latter a somewhat darker attraction to (or even a near-obsession with) an environment similar to the one you grew up in – no matter how restrictive, or even sinister, it could have been. My undying interest in enclosed spaces goes back to my childhood. I spent the first three years of my life in a so-called ‘closed town’ near Moscow, to which my parents, newly married graduates of Kharkiv University (Mum a chemical engineer, Dad a nuclear physicist), were dispatched to work at a top secret Soviet government facility, developing nuclear and hydrogen…

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    E+T Magazine

  • Government urged to plug STEM skills gap at earliest school age

    In an open letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the influential group has appealed to the government to work together with educators and industry to develop practical support for teachers of young children and to embed engineering in their existing STEM learning. The letter - signed by Major Tim Peake, Carol Vorderman MBE, will.i.am, and industry representatives from Rolls Royce, Vodafone and the MOD, amongst others - calls on the government to join the campaign and contribute to securing the UK's future as a nation of innovators, whose skills will become increasingly important in the coming decades to help tackle the global challenges posed by the ambition to reach net zero and meeting the pledges made at COP26. In June this year, the IET's own report - ‘Addressing the STEM skills shortage…

  • Scientists confirm CO2 cold traps on the Moon that could help extend lunar missions

    The discovery could influence future lunar missions and could impact the feasibility of a sustained robot or human presence on the Moon. In the permanently shadowed regions at the poles of the Moon, temperatures dip below those in the coldest areas of Pluto, allowing for carbon dioxide cold traps. In these cold traps, carbon dioxide molecules could freeze and remain in solid form even during peak temperatures in the lunar summer. As well as fuelling longer longer lunar stays, the carbon dioxide and other potential volatile organics could also help scientists better understand the origin of water and other elements on the Moon. Although cold traps have been predicted by planetary scientists for years, this new study is the first to firmly establish and map the presence of carbon dioxide…

  • ‘E-nose’ and drone solution helps sniff out bad odours from wastewater

    Coupled with a drone, the lightweight e-nose can measure the concentration of different smells, predict odour intensity and produce a real-time odour map of the plant for management. Conventionally, a wastewater plant’s odour is measured by dynamic olfactometry, where a human panel whiffs and analyses bags of air collected from the plant. Although the method has been considered the gold standard, the process is costly, slow and infrequent, which doesn’t allow operators to quickly respond to problems or pinpoint the root of the stench. “I live two kilometres away from a wastewater treatment plant and from time to time you can’t even open the window because the smell is horrendous,” said senior author Santiago Marco of the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia. “We shouldn’t underestimate…

  • MPs react in anger to possible scrapping of HS2 Leeds route

    Yesterday, the BBC claimed that the Transport Department is planning to announce a new rail plan on Thursday that will involve £96bn in funding for routes in the North and Midlands. But this will involve scrapping the original plans for an eastern branch of HS2 that would include Leeds. Instead, two shorter high-speed routes created in part by upgrading existing lines will be developed. HS2 trains will still ultimately travel to Leeds, but on the older lines at reduced speeds. Shadow transport secretary Jim McMahon said ministers were attempting to “quietly back out” of infrastructure schemes that they had “committed to dozens of times”. Naz Shah, Labour MP for Bradford West, said: “This is Boris pulling the whole damn rug from under our feet and ripping up the floor behind him.” The…

  • ISS astronauts forced to shelter after Russia destroys orbiting satellite

    The satellite was destroyed as part of a Russian test for a space missile. However, the blast created at least 1,500 new pieces of space junk that will take years to leave orbit. Nasa issued an angry response to the test, which endangered the lives of those currently residing on the ISS including two Russian astronauts, Anton Nikolaevich and Petr Valerievich. “Earlier today, due to the debris generated by the destructive Russian Anti-Satellite (ASAT) test, ISS astronauts and cosmonauts undertook emergency procedures for safety,” Nasa administrator Bill Nelson said. “I’m outraged by this irresponsible and destabilising action. With its long and storied history in human spaceflight, it is unthinkable that Russia would endanger not only the American and international partner astronauts on…

  • Heat-seeking technology gives better picture of seal pup numbers

    The Farne Islands, off the Northumberland coast in north-east England, are an important haven for thousands of seabirds and hundreds of adult seals and are looked after by the National Trust. The Atlantic grey seal is one of the rarest seal species, is protected and their numbers are carefully counted on the Farnes every autumn. National Trust rangers have used drones in recent years to do the count on outlying islands, using aerial images which are then analysed later to survey the new population. Now rangers are working with academics, sea mammal specialists and expert fliers to use a drone with two cameras. One films the seals from above in the normal way, while a second uses thermal imaging. This dual approach gives the analysts more accurate results. Drones are increasingly being…

  • Sustainable electrochemical process improves lithium-ion battery recycling

    Worldwide consumption of electronic devices has led to a sharp increase in waste batteries. Spent lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) contain critical elements, such as lithium (5-8 per cent); cobalt (5–20 per cent); nickel (5–10 per cent), and manganese (10–15 per cent). Nickel–metal hydride batteries also possess a high content of nickel (36–42 per cent) and cobalt (3–5 per cent). Future demand for such critical elements, especially cobalt and nickel, has been predicted to exceed identified reserves and there are increasing geographical, environmental and political pressures related to primary mining operations. This means there is urgent pressure to develop sustainable strategies to recover critical elements from the potentially valuable secondary resources. However, it is difficult to separate…

  • View from Brussels: Blessed are the green steelmakers

    COP26 may have fallen short in guaranteeing that the Paris Agreement’s topline goal of limiting global warming to 1.5° Celsius is met, but it did throw up one initiative that could retool how some of our most polluting products are made. The European Union and the United States initially announced that they will suspend the trade disputes over steel and aluminium imposed by Donald Trump during his time in office under the guise of ‘national security’ concerns. In addition to that pause on tariffs and a reactivation of a quota system for EU imports, the two sides are also setting up a global arrangement that will aim to spur the adoption of green technologies and address the issue of production overcapacity. “The global arrangement will add a powerful new tool in our quest for sustainability…

  • Bizarre Tech: ELIRA Apparel, Mella Mushroom Chamber and Knee+

    ELIRA Apparel ‘No need to strip, just UNZIP!!’ You need to check out the campaign on Indiegogo , just so you can witness the hilarious images and videos. Sadly there’s not an artful or subtle way to display the product – the closest they got was a black and white picture of a lovely looking woman squatting near some bushes. So, whether you’re into the outdoors, or have a lame pelvic floor and there are no loos nearby, or you’re on a night out and all the pubs are closed, ELIRA Apparel is the way to go. I am, like many women, annoyed at the ability of men to be able to whap it out wherever and do a cheeky wee, without needing to do anything drastic. Most womenfolk pretty much have to moon the public and squat like a delinquent in the corner, holding their knees so they don’t tip over. …

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • ‘Coal, cars, cash and trees’ tackled at COP26 but summit outcome disappoints many

    UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson described the summit as “truly historic” and “game-changing”, but he acknowledged that some countries had not raised their ambitions high enough. At a Downing Street press conference on Sunday evening, Johnson said that Glasgow had “sounded the death knell for coal power”. He added: “I know it’s tempting to be cynical and to dismiss these types of summits as talking shops. But we came to Cop with a call for real action on coal, cars, cash and trees and real action is exactly what we got.” The first draft of a deal “to accelerate the phasing-out of coal and subsidies for fossil fuels” was later watered down with more focus on scaling up clean energy facilities and only a cursory mention of reducing fossil fuel consumption alongside this. Coal is one of…

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