• 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…

  • Medical engineers shortlisted for IET’s research prize revealed

    The shortlist for the IET's A.F. Harvey Engineering Research Prize has been revealed. The prize is awarded annually in recognition of an outstanding achievement in engineering research in the fields of medical, microwave and radar or laser/optoelectronic engineering, with the prize fund awarded to support further research led by the recipient. “We’re incredibly proud, through the generous legacy from the late Dr A.F. Harvey, to be able to recognise and support the development of pioneering engineering research and the subsequent impact this has on advancing the world around us," said Sir John O’Reilly, chair of the IET’s Search and Selection Panel for the Prize. "I’d like to congratulate our six finalists for this year.” This year’s theme is medical engineering and technology. The shortlisted…

  • National Grid better prepared for next winter than last, operator says

    According to National Grid Electricity System Operator (ESO), the margin of excess energy on the grid will be better this coming winter than the last one. As well as the new generators that have come online since then, the margins have been increased due to improved data quality, the availability of generation units that were partially or fully unavailable last winter and the return to the capacity market of one of the coal contingency units used last winter, which will now operate in the normal electricity market for this year. The UK has pledged to phase out coal-fired power stations by 2025 , but last winter, three coal plants that are ready for retirement were placed on standby in order to make up for potential energy shortfalls in the wake of high prices. Following a request from…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Book review: ‘The Slow Traveller’ by Jo Tinsley

    Some books are best read slowly – not perused or skipped through – with every page savoured, like a sip of a good vintage wine. In our age of supersonic speeds and unending rush, there is a growing tendency for slowness. You may have heard of the Slow Food movement, founded in 1986 by Carlo Petrini from the Italian town of Bra, home of the world’s only University of Gastronomic Sciences. On BBC Radio 4’s Broadcasting House, you can listen to a weekly slot of the Slow Radio: rhythmic sounds of machinery, birds or animals. And Slow Travel, of course... “The slower you travel – the further you get,” goes an old Russian proverb. In 2013, Dan Kieran, one of my fellow ‘elves’ on the question-setting team for BBC quiz show 'QI', published ‘The Idle Traveller – The Art of Slow Travel’, the first…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Renewables help countries weather economic shocks, study suggests

    Researchers from Trinity College, Dublin, looked for patterns in data from 133 systemic economic crises that affected 98 countries over a 40-year span. Their analysis suggests that countries relying on a broader range of energy sources experience longer recovery times. However, the best predictor of economic recovery was the extent to which a country relied on renewable energy. The researchers said that while their findings came from a widely diverse set of societies and their economies, the extent of reliance on renewable energy consistently accounted for a major proportion of the variability in economic recovery time. They believe the analysis provides strong support for nations to strengthen their focus on the renewable transition. Professor Ian Donohue, lead author of the research…

  • Where should digital engineers focus their generative AI efforts?

    Artificial intelligence (AI) has had a game-changing impact on industries far and wide, but we’re still only scratching the surface of what’s truly possible. Nowhere is that statement more relevant than in the field of digital engineering, where leaders are now facing tough decisions on where to focus their resources to best navigate the evolving AI landscape. Generative AI, natural language processing and tools like ChatGPT have become boardroom buzzwords, but investment in one area might lead to underinvestment in another. At a time when resources are stretched and opportunities are plenty, where should digital engineering companies be focusing their resources? AI is ubiquitous, but by most counts it’s still a nascent technology. We may have reached the point where the automation of processes…

  • Dear Evil Engineer: Could I drain the oceans and provide land for all?

    Dear Evil Engineer, I am director of a global management consulting firm. I recently secured a contract to compile a report on leveraging emerging technologies to settle territorial disputes (‘Breaking New Ground: Territorial Dispute Resolution in the Digital Age’). I admit ending territorial disputes is not strictly aligned with our brand values, but it was too lucrative an opportunity to turn down. Anyway, I brought together my band of bright graduates – none of whom have any experience in the sector, but all of whom really know how to use a fish knife – for some out-of-the-box thinking on the problem. One consultant suggested generating and allocating virtual, non-fungible territory in the metaverse to compensate for real-world territorial concessions. This was unfortunately shot down…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Teardown: Fairphone Fairbuds XL

    Dutch consumer electronics manufacturer Fairphone has been a pioneer in developing sustainable and easily repairable products, most notably smartphones. It celebrated its 10th anniversary at the beginning of the year and its latest offering are the Fairbuds XL over-the-ear headphones. Released for pre-order in mid-May, the units push the envelope for modular design as other more established brands also seek to offer their takes on the concept. The Fairbuds XL cost £219 excluding shipping (currently available to the UK and EU). The company recommends that consumers buy a 1.2m USB C-to-USB C cable for wired listening at £39.15 (though much cheaper alternatives are available). A port converter for a traditional 3.5mm headphone socket is also on offer for £11.95. What most catches the attention…

  • Offshore wind sector calls for ‘dramatic surge’ of skilled workers

    According to the Offshore Wind Industry Council (OWIC), over 100,000 people will be needed by 2030 to maintain and run offshore wind infrastructure as installations ramp up. The report said the industry will need to be able to attract and retain an average of 10,000 people per year. The UK’s existing offshore wind workforce has increased to over 32,000 – up 4 per cent compared to the end of 2021. This includes over 17,000 direct jobs and nearly 15,000 indirect jobs. In the short-to-medium term, a rapid growth in jobs is needed as several offshore wind farms progress to the construction phase - 88,509 jobs are forecast to be required by 2026, the report said. The government has set the industry a target of reaching 50GW of capacity by 2030, including 5GW of floating wind – up from 13.66GW…

  • Spain tops list of EU countries for number of GDPR fines issued

    The study, published by Proxyrack, looked at all the fines issued under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) since the laws were first established in the European Union in 2018. Based on this data, it has revealed the countries issuing the most GDPR fines; the countries handing out the largest average fines; the company’s that have been hit with the heaviest fines to date, and the most common types of GDPR breaches. In the past four years, EU governments have handed out fines totaling over £2.5bn, with the largest-ever individual fine being the one imposed by Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) on Meta last May regarding the way the company transferred data between country borders. The fine was £1.04bn. Countries that have issued the most GDPR fines…

  • Simon Johnson on ‘Power and Progress’ and ‘the thousand-year backstory for ChatGPT’

    While it’s tempting to think that leading economists, senior academics and best-selling authors are not prone to sweeping elevator pitches, Simon Johnson – who is all three – is keen to describe his latest book as “the thousand-year backstory for ChatGPT”. Johnson is one half of the authorship duo (his co-author is the equally well-credentialled Daron Acemoglu) that has just delivered ‘Power and Progress’. He says that the “slightly longer” version of the one-line summary relates to how forms of automation and machines that have been with us for more than a thousand years have been used “to replace labour and make humans essentially more productive”. The subtitle of ‘Power and Progress’ reveals how Johnson and Acemoglu’s analysis of automation has historically brought with it a “struggle…

  • Vodafone/Three merger proposal sparks national security concerns

    Vodafone will own the majority of the business with 51 per cent, while CK Hutchison will own 49 per cent. The firms first announced they were in talks last October, but the finalised merger agreement will now trigger a lengthy review process by UK regulatory boards. In 2021, the Competition and Markets Authority approved the proposed merger between Virgin Media and O2. But a previous attempt by Three to buy O2 in 2016 was blocked by the European Commission over concerns that it would reduce competition for UK consumers. The new deal will help the two firms compete with others in the sector to continue the rollout of their 5G network, which will be able to reach 99 per cent of the population once the deal is confirmed. Aiming to complete the deal by 2024, Margherita Della Valle, chief…

  • Shell abandons target to cut oil production while raising shareholder dividends

    The fossil fuel giant has instead said it will aim to keep the amount of oil the company extracts at today's level until the end of the decade.  The news was announced as part of a strategic shift presented by Shell's new chief executive Wael Sawan in New York, that aims to “simplify” the energy major’s business and increase investor confidence. Since taking the job in January, Sawan has been looking at ways of increasing performance in an attempt to close the valuation gap that separates the company from its US rivals. As part of this effort, Shell said it would reduce capital spending in 2024 and 2025 to $22-$25bn (£17-20bn) a year, down from a planned $23bn-$27bn (£18-21bn) in 2023. To achieve this, the company plans to cut group-wide annual operating costs by $2bn-$3bn (£1.5-£2…

  • Starting anew: the refugee engineers

    Immigration is a highly controversial topic. As we mark World Refugee Day on 20 June, the latest UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) statistics paint a harrowing picture. In the first half of 2022, 103 million people were forcibly displaced globally, a huge leap from the period before (89.3 million), linked to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The figure for the first six months of 2023 is forecast to be higher still, with the UNHCR predicting more than 800,000 people will flee from Sudan alone. But wherever these people end up, all they want is to carry on with their lives, by getting an education, providing for their families and continuing their careers. And, as Mark Davies, head of communications and campaigns at the Refugee Council, highlights: “They show tremendous resilience and determination…

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    E+T Magazine

  • AI brainstorms weather prediction

    For as long as humans have wanted to know what the weather was going to do next, we’ve looked to technology to help us work out which atmospheric dynamics are portents of changing conditions. From the 17th-century invention of the barometer to 21st-century Earth observation satellite radar, forecasting the weather has developed broadly apace with advances in engineering and science. Generations of supercomputers have for decades been crunching through the massive datasets needed to inform weather forecasts, typically using Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models – objective calculations of changes to the mapped weather founded on physics-based mathematical equations. However, even the most advanced petaflop-powered compute platforms have limitations and are not necessarily the best way…

  • How protected is London from flooding?

    “People have this idea about the River Thames, the sheer beauty of it, the sparkling sunshine on the water. But the river can turn nasty,” says Professor Hannah Cloke from the University of Reading. On a freezing January morning 70 years ago, residents of Canvey Island in the Thames Estuary woke to gale-force winds and the terrifying spectacle of water overcoming the sea wall. There had been no warning, it was bitterly cold, the wind howled and the waters rose so quickly that residents who could not escape fast enough, had to cling on to their rooftops. Those that could not hold on slipped into the icy waters and were carried away. The North Sea Flood of 1953 took the lives of 58 people on Canvey Island, while the entire population of the island – about 13,000 – had to be evacuated. In…

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    E+T Magazine

  • Humans can inhale a credit card’s worth of microplastic weekly, study finds

    According to a team comprised of researchers from a variety of universities, humans might inhale about 16.2 bits of microplastic every hour which usually contain toxic pollutants and chemicals. Understanding how they travel in the respiratory system is essential for the prevention and treatment of respiratory diseases, the team said. They developed a computational fluid dynamics model to analyse microplastic transport and deposition in the upper airway. “Millions of tonnes of these microplastic particles have been found in water, air and soil. Global microplastic production is surging, and the density of microplastics in the air is increasing significantly,” said author Mohammad S Islam. “For the first time, in 2022, studies found microplastics deep in human airways, which raises the concern…

  • UKRI pledges £50m for ‘trustworthy’ AI projects

    During this year’s London Tech Week, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) has announced it will provide £50m in funding to develop trustworthy and secure AI tools.  The announcement follows the Prime Minister's keynote speech at the conference, where Rishi Sunak pitched London as a tech hub to industry leaders and stressed his goal of making the UK "the best place in the world for tech AI".  As part of this effort, the UKRI's funding pledge will aim to bring experts across different fields together in order to drive forward AI research in the country.  Over half of the funding – £31m – will go to Responsible AI UK, a consortium led by the University of Southampton that aims to foster the safe and accountable use of AI, UKRI revealed. The consortium's goal is to help people understand what…

  • Smart meter rollout remains a challenge for government

    According to the latest figures, 57 per cent of all meters in Great Britain are now smart, although around 9 per cent – approximately three million – were not working as intended as of March this year, the NAO said. In February, the government launched a consultation on plans to have smart meters installed in 80 per cent of homes and 73 per cent of small businesses by the end of 2025 to help achieve net-zero targets and save money. The NAO said the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) had made recent progress with the rollout, but faced challenges in meeting its latest targets. The government had worked with industry to develop new smart meter technology that worked in more homes, but there remained a shortage of installation engineers and disagreements with suppliers,…

  • The bigger picture: Multi-decker caravan

    Berlin-based Ulises Design Studio has used AI to re-imagine the classic caravan as a futuristic multi-level living space. Created using AI tool Midjourney, the ‘Kinetic Kingdoms’ vehicles are said to unite nomadic lifestyles with modern amenities “in a charming retro-futuristic style”. Studio founder Ricardo Orts explains: “By embracing a more nomadic lifestyle, we can explore new ways of living that are both exciting and sustainable, all while fostering a sense of community and connection with the world around us.” Image credit: Cover Images

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Handheld device could 3D-print tissues and organs in-situ

    A research team from University of Victoria, Canada, has been able to overcome some of the challenges of bioprinting as a field and developed a device that could be used to 3D-print organs outside of hospitals and research labs.  If successful, the device could pave the way for a wide variety of applications in regenerative medicine, drug development and testing, and custom orthotics and prosthetics. The device allows for the  3D-printing of biocompatible structures and tissues directly within the body. In contrast to previous devices of its type, the new bioprinter has the ability to p rint multiple materials and control the physicochemical properties of printed tissues, which would make it more compatible with the human body. These printed tissues could substantially improve the lives…

  • James May: ‘Our attitude to engineering is a very British disease’

    James May just likes talking about and getting stuck in with vehicles. When he’s not on our small screens presenting (in the past) ‘Top Gear’ or (currently) ‘The Grand Tour’, he’s tinkering about in workshops, creating videos of his adventures in making motorbikes out of Meccano, building model planes that can fly across the Channel, or his attempts to build a ‘Swiss Army Bike’. A man it seems obsessed with the machines that get us from A to B, his current focus has turned away from propelling them by burning fossils or charging batteries, and towards those “marvellous vehicles” that only require the application of human muscle. ‘Marvellous Vehicles’ also happens to be the title of his new kids’ book that’s just about to be published. So what vehicles are marvellous and why? “Human-powered…

  • US sues Microsoft to block takeover of Activision

    The regulator said the deal, which could close within the next few days, could "substantially lessen competition" in the video games industry. Microsoft first announced its  multi-billion deal to buy Activision  in January 2022, which would see the company  acquire hit titles such as Call of Duty and Candy Crush. The deal has been hailed as the   “biggest takeover in tech history”  and is already the largest acquisition in the history of the video game industry, at least in theory at this stage.   The news follows moves from the UK's competition authority, which blocked the sale in April, as it would “alter the future of the fast-growing cloud gaming market”, fearing Microsoft would make the Activision games exclusive to its existing cloud gaming platform, Xbox Game Pass, cutting off distribution…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Electric ridesharing fleets worsened local air quality, study finds

    Uber has announced plans to transition hundreds of thousands of its drivers to electric vehicles by 2025, with 50 per cent of kilometres in EVs in key European cities by then. By 2030 it claims all its vehicles will be zero emissions in the US, Canada and Europe. But a team funded by Carnegie Mellon University has conducted life-cycle comparisons of battery-powered electric vehicle fleets to a gas-powered one, using real-world rideshare data. They found up to a 45 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from full electrification but warned that traffic problems and air pollution could increase. The cars and SUVs used in ridesharing scenarios typically drive more miles each year than a personal vehicle, contributing a higher proportion of greenhouse gases to the environment, the…

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