Morecambe Eden Project Gains Chancellor’s Backing
The title of this post is the same as that of this article in the Westmoreland Gazette.
This is the first paragraph.
Plans for an Eden Project in Morecambe have received official backing from the Chancellor today as he pledged £100,000 in today’s budget to support the development of the proposals being led by Eden Project International.
This is surely good news for the project.
My Preparations For Brexit
My Dalstonian grandmother was caught out by WW1, so she had a hundredweight each of jam and sugar in her cellar for WW2.
I shall be storing my money in Zopa, as it should ride out any storms, as it has done in the past.
How Many Believe The Saudis About The Death Of Jamal Khashoggi?
I certainly don’t!
But Donald Trump does!
But then Trummkopf likes dictators like Putin and Fatty The Third!
HyperSolar Granted Critical Patent for Producing Low Cost Renewable Hydrogen
The title of this post is the same as that as this article on Global News Wire.
It looks to me that a company call HyperSolar is working on producing hydrogen direct from solar power from any water source.
This is technology to watch. Pending full development, you can always watch this video on the HyperSolar web site.
Is This The Most Important Door In My Life?
In some ways this is the most important door in my life.
It used to lead through into the superb banking hall of Lloyds Bank.
In the early 1970s, I was doing some programming for the bank as a consultant to a company called Time Sharing Ltd.
The purpose of the software was to take the banks costs and expenses and calculate how much each of the various actions cost the Bank, by branch,area and region.
I was working for one of the Managers; Mike Spicer, who worked under the Chief Management Accountant; C. R. C. Wesson, who I later knew as Bob.
I’d never met Bob and as Mike was away, Bob phoned me up one morning and asked me to run the software, as they’d just uploaded a new batch of data.
I duly did this from home, and checked that it had run successfully after cycling to Time Sharing at Great Portland Street. They then asked, if I could take the results to the Bank on my way home to the Barbican.
I was worried that I was not dressed for visiting the Head Office of one of the UK’s big banks. I was painting our flat and wearing a pair of ice blue jeans and a short-sleeved shirt. . Luckily, I had a carrier on my bike, for the couple of inches of fan-folded green-striped print-out.
I had been told to ring the bell by the side of the door in the photograph and despite the banking hall being closed, I would be let in.
I arrived safely about six and rang the bell.
Perhaps a minute or two later, the ornate and extremely heavy door slid aside and a footman appeared, immaculately dressed in the Lloyds uniform of green tail-coat and top hat. He said. “You must be Mr. Miller!”
When I affirmed, he ushered me through and I offered him the printout. He then said, that Mr. Wesson would like to see me. I protested about my clothes, but he firmly showed me to the lift and pressed the appropriate floor. He added that Mr. Wesson would meet me at the lift.
It was the start of a very firm friendship.
Together we developed the software and produced loads of copious tables and graphs.
I learned a tremendous amount from dealing with the only innovative accountant I have ever met.
A lot of his philosophy found its way into Artemis.
One thing he told is that bankers when given a table of figures, always add them up to make sure there are no mistakes.
So I developed a technique in the Lloyds Bank software, where if money was allocated between various rows in a table, the total was always correct. If you round each row, this isn’t always the case.
I used this technique in the aggregation of resources and costs in Artemis.
Sadly, Bob died of I think cancer, a few years later!
I owe him a great debt!
A Fast Food Restaurant With Gluten-Free Beer In An Iconic Location
Leadenhall Market is one of the City of London’s iconic locations.
Leon have an outlet and I was surprised to find that it sells Estrella Damm Daura, a very reasonable Spanish gluten-free beer.
I’ll experiment one day, to see how a beer goes with Lean’s excellent gluten-free chicken nuggets.
The restoration of the market was done in 1990 by students, as I posted in No Budget; Employ Students.
I actually walked through at eleven o’clock on a Sunday morning, and it was good to see the City more open at that time.
In a couple of years, the City will become one of the must-see places to go in London and the best time will be the weekend.
Will Brexit Result In A Secure Irish Border?
I have been to Ireland many times and also have had several good friends from Southern Ireland.
One tale I heard was from a respectable farmer, was about how during the Second World War he helped his father smuggle food into the North. As he said, “We couldn’t let fellow Irishmen starve!”
It is tales like this, that have always made me believe that Ireland may not politically be one country, but economically and personally, it is a closer relationship.
I also remember tales from a couple of decades ago, where because of different prices across the border, people would shop or trade, where there was a financial advantage.
I’ve actually never driven across the Irish border, as I’ve only been to both countries in the same trip once and I crossed the border by train.
But as with the borders between Wales and England or Scotland and England, I suspect only the locals know on which side they are standing.
One of the main reasons many voted for Brexit was to keep out immigrants.
What is to stop would-be immigrants to the UK, after Brexit going to Ireland and then being smuggled across the porous border, just as food was in the Second World War?
Surely, the only way to stop the smuggling of immigrants is a secure border!
Crossrail-Spoil Wetland Provides Haven For Wildlife
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
This is the first two paragraphs.
A £70m project to create a wetland twice the size of the City of London is nearly finished with wildlife thriving in new lagoons, marsh and fields.
New wetland on Wallasea Island, off the Essex coast, was created from tunnel spoil from London’s Crossrail project.
Wallasea Island shows that large construction projects don’t have to be all about steel and concrete.
Brush Traction Signs Contract With Skeleton Technologies For Modules For Class 769 Trains
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on Rail Advent.
This is the first two paragraphs
Skeleton Technologies has announced that they have signed a contract with Brush Traction to supply SkelStart Engine Start Modules for all Porterbrook Bi Mode Class 769 trains.
The high-power density, safe and tiny size of the 24V SkelStart module were decided over other solutions during the feasibility stage to start the Auxiliary Power Supply (APS) units. Simply put, there was not enough room available for another solution.
The article then gives a few brief details on the SkelStart
Who are Skeleton Technologies?
They have a web site at www.skeletontech.com and there is a brief description on the home page.
Under a title of.
Powering Energy Savings With Ultracapacitors
There is this description.
Skeleton Technologies’ patented curved graphene is changing the world of energy storage.
Our superior technology enables us to deliver ground-breaking energy storage solutions with market leading power and energy density. Our products are used across industries from automotive to aerospace and everything in between.
Curved graphene? I know about graphene, but I’d never heard of it being curved.
There is a Press Release on the Skeleton Technologies web site, which is entitled Skeleton Technologies Signs Contract with Brush Traction to Supply Ultracapacitors for All BMU Class 769 Prime Movers.
This gives a lot more details, including this brief description of size and weight.
The 24V SkelStart has the size of a regular car battery and with its 8kg weight, it solved the space restriction we had.
It looks to be a very simple application of a capacitor with the ability to hold a lot of charge.
One of their products is called a SkelMod 170V 53F Ultracapacitor Module.
The datasheet gives these details.
- Voltage – 170 Volts
- Capacitance – 53 Farads
- Maximum Stored Energy – 0.2127 kWh
- Weight – 77 Kg.
That is a lot of energy for a capacitor.
A 50 kWh capacitor suitable for a bus or train, with this energy density would weigh eighteen tonnes, so it’s a bit impractical for this type of application at present.
But who knows what will be possible in the near future?
Skeleton Technologies would already appear to have pushed capacitor design a long way.
Skeleton Technologies Are An Estonian Company
This surprised me at first! But why not?
An Aside
Somewhere in my past about the 1960s, I remember an electronic news item, where someone like AERE Harwell, had built a one Farad capacitor, that was house-sized. Noe we get 53 Farad in a suitcase.
Conclusion
I think we’ll eventually see supercapacitors big enough to replace lithium-ion batteries in a lot of applications.
The View From The Schilthorn
These pictures were taken from the viewing platform by the side of the Piz Gloria restaurant on the Schilthorn.
It was certainly worth going up to the top of the Schilthorn.
The Anonymous Widower 