• Mastercard launches global plan to recycle credit cards

    Initially partnering with British lender HSBC in eight branches in Britain, Mastercard said banks across the world, some of which have launched local initiatives, would be able to join the programme and help build economies of scale. "We are inviting all card issuers around the world to partner with us, no matter what region they are in, and offer card recycling to their customers," said Ajay Bhalla, president of cyber and intelligence at Mastercard Inc. Under the plan, Mastercard will provide shredding machines to HSBC, each of which is capable of holding 10,000 cards, equivalent to 50kg (110lb) of plastic. Once full, the shredded material will be transferred to a plastic recycling facility. Financial details about the plan were not disclosed. The pilot project, which will run for an…

  • Covid-19 patients with high air pollution exposure spent longer in hospital

    According to researchers from Hasselt University in Belgium, the effect of pollution on patients’ time in hospital was equivalent to being a decade older. Conversely, the effect of reducing exposure to pollution was 40 to 80 per cent as effective in reducing patients’ time in hospital as some of the best available treatments. In a second study, the researchers used data on all 3.7 million Danish people aged 30 or older to establish the impact of air pollution on Covid-19. They found that long-term exposure to pollution at levels well below current EU limits increased the risk of contracting Covid-19, being hospitalised and dying of the disease. The research team used data on levels of three pollutants – nitrogen dioxide, soot and fine particles (PM2.5) – at the patients’ home addresses…

  • Quarter of UK workforce expected to quit jobs in the next 12 months, research says

    Nearly one in four UK workers (23 per cent) expect to change jobs within the next twelve months - up from 18 per cent in 2022 - according to PwC's 'Workforce Hopes and Fears' survey, indicating that the post-pandemic 'Great Resignation' wave is far from over. The survey of over 53,000 workers across 46 countries, including over 2,000 respondents in the UK, also finds that as economic conditions remain challenging, UK employees are increasingly struggling with the cost of living crisis.   Almost half (47 per cent) of the UK workforce have little to no money left over at the end of the month after expenses, and a further 15 per cent said their household struggles to pay all or some of the bills every month. In comparison, the average of the global workforce who have little to no money left…

  • Insulating British homes would deliver £39bn boost by 2030

    The large-scale drive would also save the NHS £2bn and cut new cases of childhood asthma by 650,000, whilst also creating an economic and social boost for regions with the most inefficient housing, the charity said. It said public and private investment in an “urgent” programme of retrofitting would tackle health inequalities, reduce household energy bills and help the UK reach its net-zero targets. A study by the advisory service found that more than 15 million homes across Great Britain are energy-inefficient. It said 13 million of these could be upgraded to achieve a 'C' Energy Performance Certificate. Its research also suggests that upgrading homes to EPC C level would prevent 570,000 children and adults developing mental health conditions associated with cold homes. This would…

  • Review of ethical culture and practices in UK engineering launched

    The audit was one of the actions proposed in the 2022 report ‘Engineering Ethics: maintaining society’s trust in the engineering profession’, which the Engineering Council and RAEng agreed to take forward with the support of the professional engineering institutions. The independent findings in the ‘Ethics in the Engineering Profession’ audit found that the UK engineering profession has a good foundation of ethical practice, that ethical behaviour compares favourably with the wider workforce, and that engineers and technicians take ethics very seriously. However, there is also variation in the support for ethical practice across the industry that must be addressed in a coordinated fashion. The audit was carried out by GoodCorporation and involved asking more than 2,000 individuals, companies…

  • Hands-on review: Tozo Golden X1 true wireless ‘Hi-Res Audio’ earbuds

    As Tozo Acoustic Lab's first 'high-end' offering, the Golden X1 true wireless earbuds represent an excellent inaugural step down the premium path. Shooting for the 'Wireless Hi-Res Audio' market, Tozo has positioned the Golden X1s as a high-end mobile listening experience. HD audio is a growth area for headphone manufacturers, as consumers demand better-quality sonics for everything from music to film and TV streaming and gaming, be that from in-ear offerings or over-the-ear Hi-Res headphones, such as 1More's Sonoflow . For the Golden X1s, Tozo has taken a hybrid design approach to sound reproduction, featuring its own-design polymer composite 12mm dynamic bass/midrange driver paired with a customised Knowles Electronics-designed balanced armature driver for the high end. This 'dual-speaker…

  • Plastic waste and excess CO2 converted into sustainable fuel

    The researchers have developed a solar-powered reactor that converts captured CO2 and plastic waste into sustainable fuels and other valuable chemical products. In tests, CO2 was converted into syngas, a key building block for sustainable liquid fuels, while plastic bottles were converted into glycolic acid, which is widely used in the cosmetics industry. The team took CO2 from real-world sources – such as industrial exhausts or carbon captured from the air itself – and concentrated it to transform it into sustainable fuel. Although improvements are needed before the technology can be used at an industrial scale, the researchers said the project demonstrates the possibility of producing clean fuels without the need for environmentally destructive oil and gas extraction. “We’re not just…

  • Labour Party pledges to turn UK into a clean energy superpower by 2030

    In a speech given in Scotland today (Monday), the Labour leader set out new targets to reduce the time taken to complete clean power projects from “years to months”, as one aspect of the party's 'Green Prosperity Plan'. The party has also committed to a local power plan which it says will allow households across the UK to receive discounts on their bills if their area signs up to new green initiatives. Sir Keir will set out how a new public body, called Great British Energy (aka GB Energy, an idea previously announced in September 2022), will collaborate with councils, communities and the private sector to bring down energy costs. The power plan would be directly owned by local people, with profits from the energy sold to the grid from local renewable energy schemes being returned to…

  • Scotland best placed to take advantage of UK’s green transition, report finds

    In the document entitled 'The Cluster Effect', the Green Alliance think-tank calls on the UK government to bolster its decarbonisation efforts in the wake of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in the US and the Net Zero Industry Act in the EU. It finds that due to its proximity to offshore wind and carbon capture and storage (CCS) sites in the North Sea, as well as pre-existing strengths in the sector, Scotland is likely to benefit strongly from the transition. East and North East Scotland are best placed to house renewable energy-generation clusters, while the Glasgow city region is well placed for a green services cluster, it said. The report singled out certain facilities as promising templates for future industry expansion, such as the Aberdeen Offshore Wind farm, which received £9.3m…

  • P&O launches double-ended hybrid ferry for Channel Crossing journeys

    P&O Ferries’ newly commissioned Fusion Class vessel ‘P&O Pioneer’ has two bridges so that it does not need to turn around in ports, which saves fuel on every roundtrip. The firm said it forecasts a 40 per cent reduction in carbon emissions on the Dover-Calais route which crosses the English Channel from its first day in service. This makes it the “most sustainable ferry ever” to sail between Britain and the Continent, it added. The Fusion Class vessel, which cost about £111m, is propelled by a combination of fuel and battery power. Reductions in fuel usage and emissions are delivered by the hybrid system by allowing the Pioneer to operate from its energy storage system while manoeuvring or in port, and is designed to have the capacity to become fully carbon-neutral in the future. The…

  • View from India: Cyclone hits, yet those affected already back on their feet

    Economic consequences of the cyclone unfurled. Strong winds and heavy rainfall shook and knocked out a small bridge near the Bhavanipar village of Bhuj. Trains and flights were cancelled. The ravaging cyclonic storm damaged 5,120 electricity poles. Electricity snapped off in 4,600 villages. Yet almost immediately, the power supply has been restored in 3,580 villages. The remaining villages are due to have their power supplies restored by 20 June. Also interesting is that shops and business establishments in Gujarat’s Kutch district have already bounced back to near-normal service, opening their doors as the electricity was restored. Many trees were also uprooted by the cyclone - nearly 600 of them. The resulting road blockages are now being cleared to facilitate movement. The quantum of…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • British manufacturing rebound eases recession fears

    A survey published by Make UK showed that the transport and electronic sectors were doing particularly well, reflecting the continued recovery in the aerospace sector with the increase in passenger miles, together with a spate of large orders for new aircraft over the last year. Air India, for example, announced plans to buy 470 jets from Airbus and Boeing in February amid hot competition from domestic flight provider IndiGo. Airbus makes the wings and fuel systems for its A350 and A320 planes, which were part of the deal, in the UK. MakeUK said it also recorded strong balances for electronics manufacturers as companies invest in digitalisation and extra capacity to counter labour shortages. The investments are now translating into “consistently strong balances” for the South-East where…

  • Transforming vibrations into electricity could facilitate self-powered IoT sensors

    The new energy-generating device was made by combining piezoelectric composites with carbon fibre-reinforced polymer (CFRP), a commonly used material that is both light and strong. This composition allows it to transform vibrations from the surrounding environment into electricity. "Everyday items, from fridges to street lamps, are connected to the internet as part of the Internet of Things (IoT), and many of them are equipped with sensors that collect data," said Fumio Narita, co-author of the study and professor at Tohoku University. "But these IoT devices need power to function, which is challenging if they are in remote places or if there are lots of them." In order to leverage the vibrational energy, the team relied on  piezoelectric materials' ability to generate electricity when…

  • The eccentric engineer: The darkest days in Rjukan

    Rjukan, in Telemark, Norway, is a city that owes its existence to an engineer. Sam Eyde completed his engineering degree at Berlin in 1891, and went into business planning new railways first in Germany and then back in his native Norway, building up one of the largest civil engineering companies in Scandinavia. This business took him to the area of Rjukan in 1902. At the time, this wild area in the south of the country was only sparsely inhabited, and where the town would one day spring up was just a deep valley – so deep that for six months of the year sunlight does not even reach the bottom. What Rjukan did have was what Eyde was discovering to be one of Norway’s greatest assets – waterfalls – in particular, the eponymous 100-metre-tall Rjukan waterfall. Eyde realised that the power of…

  • Lost Jerusalem neighbourhood recreated in 3D app

    The Moroccan quarter of Jerusalem's Old City was located at the foot of the Western Wall and now serves as a plaza in front of one of Judaism's most sacred sites. Virtual tourists and residents will soon be able to walk around the streets of the neighbourhood - half a decade after it was destroyed by Israeli authorities - through a 3D version of the city accessible through a mobile app. Founded in 1187 by Saladin during the age of the Crusades, and once a place of settlement for Muslim pilgrims from North Africa, the Mughrabi quarter was demolished after Israeli forces captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War. Mughrabi Quarters destruction plan / Israel State Archives GL - 3847/4 Image credit: Israel State Archives GL - 3847/4 In January 2023, excavations

  • Scientists develop material that could harvest water from desert air

    The rubbery material is made from hydrogel and can swell to absorb water vapour even in desert-like conditions, where there is only 30 per cent relative humidity in the air.  Once absorbed by the gel, the water could be heated, condensed and collected as ultrapure water.  The MIT researchers were able to achieve “record-breaking” vapour absorption by infusing the hydrogel with larger amounts of lithium chloride — a type of salt that is known to be a powerful desiccant. This new material can be developed at speed and scale, and could potentially be used as a source of drinking water in very dry climates. Moreover, the material c ould also be fitted into air conditioning units as an energy-saving, dehumidifying element.  “We’ve been application-agnostic, in the sense that we mostly focus…

  • US Department of Energy funds $135m worth of decarbonisation projects

    The move is part of efforts to shift towards a net-zero emissions economy by 2050, it said. “America’s industrial sector serves as the engine of the US economy, producing many of the products we rely on every day, but also produces a significant amount of the nation’s carbon emissions,” said US energy secretary Jennifer M Granholm. “These projects funded by President Biden’s Investing in American agenda will slash industrial emissions and accelerate next-generation technologies for a clean energy future that’s made in America.” The US industrial sector accounts for one-third of all energy-related domestic greenhouse gas emissions and is among the most difficult to decarbonise. The DOE has funded 40 projects that will be led by 36 different universities, national laboratories and companies…

  • Back Story: Fiona McGarry, ‘Diversity gives rise to better solutions’

    Shini Somara: Is manufacturing in the UK diverse? Fiona McGarry: It’s probably one of the least diverse sectors within engineering. Only 29 per cent of the workforce and only 8 per cent of its apprentices are female. Less than 10 per cent of engineers and technicians come from an ethnic minority background. There’s a lot of work to be done in spite of a lot of work that has already been done over the last 15 years; unfortunately progress is slow. In the last couple of years, I have started to see a shift. Younger people and parents are understanding that it isn’t a dirty, horrible, male-dominated, environment. There are also lots of exciting digital AI prospects and it’s a progressive and supportive environment. The industry is aware of the necessity for diversity, because it enables…

  • The price of independence

    Few got a ringside seat to the immense financial risks that surround chipmaking from its beginning as good as Arthur Rock’s. Instrumental in obtaining work for the team of engineering managers who “betrayed” transistor pioneer Williams Shockley in the late 1950s, Rock again helped some of them set up Intel a decade later and helped develop what sometimes gets called Moore’s Second Law.   The corollary of the more famous law, Rock observed that the cost of fitting out a semiconductor fab doubles every four years. He identified in the late-1990s that the bill had risen to $12m from just $12,000 in the late 1960s. Today’s, it’s well north of $12bn. Even a single lithographic scanner, used to define circuit images one layer on one wafer every 30 seconds or so, costs in the order of $200m and…

  • Vital element for extraterrestrial life found in Saturn’s moon

    The presence of high concentrations of phosphorus in Enceladus could point towards the moon's potential to harbour life, according to the scientists. The discovery was based on data collected by Nasa's Cassini spacecraft, the first to orbit Saturn, during its 13-year landmark exploration of Saturn and its many moons from 2004 to 2017. The same team that worked on Cassini has previously confirmed that Enceladus' ice grains contain a rich assortment of minerals. However,  phosphorus, the least abundant of six chemical elements considered necessary to all living things (carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen and sulphur) had never been detected on the moon - until now. "It's the first time this essential element has been discovered in an ocean beyond Earth," the study's lead author, Frank Postberg…

  • Aviation sector unconvinced it will meet 2050 decarbonisation target

    Some 325 aviation decision-makers from companies across the world were interviewed for the survey. Just 46 per cent said they believed the industry will meet its net-zero goal by 2050, while 32 per cent said it will not, with 22 per cent unsure. On average, respondents believe the target will be met by 2055 and identify rising costs, budgetary pressure, supply issues and energy resources as the biggest hurdles. Just 29 per cent of respondents said that governments were the external group applying the most pressure to accelerate sustainability efforts, followed by investors at 17 per cent. As may have been expected, 61 per cent of those polled said they had a preference for incentives and policy support over mandates and regulation. Aviation, which accounts for approximately 3 per cent…

  • The measure of: Arosa electric hovercraft

    VonMercier’s Arosa hovercraft is powered by a trio of electric engines with the capacity to glide 15-20cm above the ground, making it possible for the vehicle to move across gravel, grass, snow, sand and water. Its body and hull are moulded from carbon fibre and it has a three-seater open-air cockpit, with an optional teak deck and a ladder for use on water. Besides being easily chargeable via a standard EV charger, its electric powertrain also reduces noise, pollution and maintenance compared to a petrol version – and it is said to be quieter than a vacuum cleaner. Image credit: Arosa electric hovercraft VonMercier will produce only 25 models this year but is aiming to double production in 2024. The Arosa has a $200,000 price tag. Vital statistics: Arosa electric…

  • View from India: Cyclone Biparjoy makes landfall on Indian coast

    It’s a stormy scene out there. The cyclonic storm that formed in the Arabian Sea is now approximately 170km from Jakhau Port in Gujarat and 201km west of Devbhumi Dwarka in Gujarat, at time of writing. The storm is expected to cross the coast as a Very Severe Cyclonic Storm (VSCS), with a maximum sustained wind speed of 125-135kmph, gusting to 150kmph.   The cyclone began in the low pressure area over a week ago before it rapidly grew into an Extremely Severe Cyclonic Storm (ESCS). This storm seems to have been in the sea for a long time compared to many recent storms - probably the longest in the Arabian Sea. That’s how it has gathered abundant energy and moisture, making it extremely fierce and severe. Drones have captured images of dark clouds that have gathered over the Gujarat horizon…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • EU calls for Google break up due to anticompetitive practices

    EU regulators could force Google to sell part of its digital advertising (adtech) business, in order to address the bloc's competition concerns.  The European Comission has published a preliminary conclusion of their investigation into the company's dominance of the adtech sector,  The document stated that the search giant had abused its dominant position in the sector by shutting out competitors since at least 2014. It added that “only the mandatory divestment by Google of part of its services would address its competition concerns”. The preliminary view is a summary of a two-year-long investigation into Google's adtech practices, due to concerns that the company controlled almost all levels of the supply chain for online display advertising. In the report, the Comission stated that…

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