The world of smart appliances capable of communicating with humans is slowly taking shape, thanks to the increasing popularity and ubiquity of so-called personal assistants. At the International Consumer Electronics Trade Show now being held in Berlin, manufacturers are promoting a new generation of gadgets from smart refrigerators to window cleaning robots. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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From: MeNeedIt

Floodwaters have inundated at least five highly contaminated toxic waste sites near Houston, raising concerns that the pollution there might spread.

The Associated Press visited the sites this past week, some of them still only accessible by boat.

Long a center of the American petrochemical industry, the Houston metro area has more than a dozen such Superfund sites, designated by the Environmental Protection Agency as being among the most intensely contaminated places in the country.

No immediate response

EPA spokeswoman Amy Graham could not immediately provide details on when agency experts would inspect the Houston-area sites. She said Friday that staff had checked on two other Superfund sites in Corpus Christi and found no significant damage.

“We will begin to assess other sites after flood waters recede in those areas,” Graham said.

Near the Highlands Acid Pit, across the swollen San Jacinto River from Houston, Dwight Chandler sipped beer and swept out the thick muck caked inside his devastated home. He worried whether Harvey’s floodwaters had also washed in pollution from the Superfund site just a couple blocks away.

In the 1950s, the pit was filled with toxic sludge and sulfuric acid from oil and gas operations. Though 22,000 cubic yards of hazardous waste and soil were excavated in the 1980s, the site is still considered a potential threat to groundwater, and EPA maintains monitoring wells there.

When he was growing up in Highlands, Chandler, now 62, said he and his friends used to swim in the by-then abandoned pit.

“My daddy talks about having bird dogs down there and to run and the acid would eat the pads off their feet,” he recounted Thursday. “We didn’t know any better.”

Superfund sites a priority

EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has said cleaning up Superfund sites are a priority, even as he has taken steps to roll back or delay rules aimed at preventing air and water pollution. President Donald Trump’s proposed 2018 budget seeks to cut money for the Superfund program by 30 percent, though congressional Republicans are likely to approve less severe reductions.

Like Trump, Pruitt has expressed skepticism about the predictions of climate scientists that warmer air and warmer seas will produce stronger, more drenching storms.

Under the Obama administration, the EPA conducted a nationwide assessment of the increased threat to Superfund sites posed by climate change, including rising sea levels and stronger hurricanes. Of the more than 1,600 sites reviewed as part of the 2012 study, 521 were determined to be in 1-in-100 year and 1-in-500 year flood zones. Nearly 50 sites in coastal areas could also be vulnerable to rising sea levels.

The threats to human health and wildlife posed by rising waters inundating Superfund sites varies widely depending on the specific contaminants and concentrations involved. But the EPA report specifically noted the risk that floodwaters might carry away and spread toxic materials over a wider area.

In Crosby, across the San Jacinto River from Houston, a small working-class neighborhood sits between two Superfund sites, French LTD and the Sikes Disposal Pits. The area was wrecked by Harvey’s floods, with only a single house from among the roughly dozen lining Hickory Lane still standing.

After the flood water receded on Friday, a sinkhole the size of a swimming pool had opened up and swallowed two cars. The acrid smell of creosote filled the air.

At the Brio Refining Inc. in Friendswood, the floodwaters had receded by Saturday. There was a layer of silt on the road leading to the Superfund site. The company operated a chemical reprocessing and refining facility there until the 1980s, leaving behind polluted soil and groundwater.

Completely underwater

The San Jacinto River Waste Pits Superfund site was completely covered by water when an AP reporter saw it Thursday. According to its website, the EPA was set to make a final decision this year about a proposed $97 million cleanup effort to remove toxic waste from a paper mill that operated there in the 1960s.

The flow from the raging river washing over the toxic site was so intense it damaged an adjacent section of the Interstate 10 bridge, which has been closed to traffic due to concerns it might collapse.

There was no way to immediately access how much contaminated soil from the site might have been washed away. According to an EPA survey from last year, soil from the former waste pits contains dioxins and other long-lasting toxins linked to birth defects and cancer.

Kara Cook-Schultz, who studies Superfund sites for the advocacy group TexPIRG, said environmentalists have warned for years about the potential for flooding to inundate Texas Superfund sites, particularly the San Jacinto Waste Pits.

“If floodwaters have spread the chemicals in the waste pits, then dangerous chemicals like dioxin could be spread around the wider Houston area,” Cook-Schultz said. “Superfund sites are known to be the most dangerous places in the country, and they should have been properly protected against flooding.”
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From: MeNeedIt

Sah Phon can live with some grief from his ancestral spirits.

The elderly villager abandoned them in Cambodia’s Stung Treng province in favor of a relocation package after learning his homeland would be swallowed by an enormous dam. But he’s confident they will forgive him.

“If we do something wrong, we pray in accordance with our traditions; for example [sacrificing] pigs and chickens for praying. And we pray so that we can be recovered,” he reasons.

Once a fisherman from Sre Kor village near the confluence of the Sre Pok and Se San rivers, Phon has watched as fish stocks have dwindled over the past few years.

Some blame the dam construction, others destructive techniques such as electro-fishing but all agree the population of fish is rapidly shrinking.

Relocation offer

So with his village set to be flooded and his primary source of income dead, Phon took a relocation offer early. He says he was the first.

The swift decision paid off. Phon struck out in a relocation lottery with a house right next to the entrance road of Kbal Romeas Thmey (New Kbal Romeas).

He built up a business selling household wares in the prime location and says he’s doing fine.

“It’s different because it has a highway — an ASEAN highway,” he boasted as his grandson hooks bait to a line — practicing the skills of his grandfather’s dying profession. “Before I could not transport any goods. Now I can. The truck can get into our home to transport goods. Whatever I need, they can reach my home.”

Phon has been lucky, but there are only so many general stores one village can support and not many others are as enthusiastic about relocation.

That includes his brother, Sah Voeurn, who like thousands of ethnic minority villagers facing eviction, is pained by the prospect of abandoning a fundamentally different way of life.

“I really don’t want to live there. The situation is difficult, there’s not enough water. It’s mountain land and it’s rocky and sandy and very difficult to do agriculture,” he said.

Behind the rows of shiny blue new roofs at the relocation villages each family has a small plot of land. On the surface, the village looks quite nice.

Inadequate compensation

Away from the prying eyes of company representatives and local officials monitoring the area, many quietly complain that opportunities to generate income are scarce, the soil is poor and personal movements are heavily restricted.

Voeurn feels so strongly against relocation that he has traveled the long journey from Sre Kor to Kbal Romeas to join a community protest — a trip made harder by multiple police checkpoints attempting to restrict access to the area.

“The government is building the dam to get more income for the government, not for the villagers,” he said on the eve on a pig sacrifice with 50 Bunong families that are holding out and trying to stop the dam

The 400-megawatt Lower Se San II, which is Cambodia’s largest dam so far with a flood plain of 335 square kilometers, hasn’t just stirred controversy because of the roughly 4,000 families it will forcibly displace.

It has far wider implications for fish stocks, conservationists argue.

More than 9 percent of the fisheries for the entire Mekong river would be lost because of the Lower Se San II, according to a report in the Proceedings of the U.S. National Academy of Science.

Even an environmental impact assessment commissioned by the dam’s developers and approved by the Cambodian government in 2010 found the impacts on fish would be severe, as it would block migratory species.

The Ministry of Mines and Energy did not respond to multiple request to comment on the impact of the project.

With Cambodian’s energy demands predicted by some estimates to triple between 2012 and 2020 and supply already heavily reliant on imports, the government argues the more than $800-million project will supply much needed power to five provinces.

Debates rage about how this benefit stacks up economically against the loss of fish and impacts on water flow and quality.

What none of the arguments over figures can appreciate though is the value of a fundamentally different way of life, or whether affected villagers will attain a better standard of life by being dragged into the formal economy rather than living effectively off grid.

“The native people have a way of life opposite to mainstream people, native people consider nature as friend and don’t have a passion to own,” says Loek Sreyneang, a project officer at Cambodia Indigenous Youth Association.

The scores of families holding out want an audience with the government, but that has not been forthcoming.

So instead they have taken their case to the provincial court, arguing the development amounts to a systematic attack on indigenous people and thus a crime against humanity under Cambodian law.

That desperate final act will almost certainly have no impact and in weeks their houses will be underwater.

“I can feel their misery to leave from home, a fatherland which they have lived in for ages,” Loek Sreyneang lamented.
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From: MeNeedIt

Floodwaters are beginning to recede around Houston, and although Hurricane Harvey has dissipated, the health problems have not. In fact, some are just beginning. 

Aerial views of Houston Friday showed that just about everything is under water. It’s what’s in and under that water that has public health workers concerned. More people could die after Harvey’s long gone than during the worst of the storm. Health officials are telling people to stay out of the water if possible, although it’s too late for many.

Downed power lines electrocuted at least two volunteer rescuers when their boat hit the power lines they couldn’t see. And a young man, Andrew Pasek, died after he stepped into electrified water in his family’s yard. Pasek and a friend went back to the family home to search for his sister’s cat. Jodelle Pasek, his mother, said her son’s last words were, “I’m dying,” as he warned the friend not to follow him.

WATCH: As Texas Flooding Recedes, Health Hazards Likely to Emerge

Tens of thousands of residents of Houston, the fourth most populous city in the U.S., fled their homes as the water continued to rise, many at a moment’s notice. Virginia Rogers Grasso, an elderly woman who was taken to the city’s convention center, which is now being used as a shelter, said she didn’t want to leave her home, but authorities told her it was mandatory and that her house “is fixing to be flooded.”

Medicines left behind

People with diabetes didn’t have time to collect lifesaving medications like insulin. Others left without blood pressure or cholesterol controlling drugs. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, local hospitals and pharmacies are helping out. Doctors have volunteered to help with routine medical care. 

Dr. Mehdi Ravazi, a cardiologist at Texas Heart Institute, told VOA that he went to the convention center to provide basic medical care. Ravazi said he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary at the shelter.

Beyond flooding

But, with lots of water and daytime temperatures in the 30s (90s Fahrenheit), Dr. Samuel Dorevitch says Houston is a perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes and bacteria. Dorevitch is an epidemiologist at the University of Illinois in Chicago who specializes in waterborne illnesses.

“The public health concerns following Hurricane Harvey go way beyond the immediate flooding and rainwater,” Dorevitch said. “The concerns extend to mosquitoes and the diseases they carry when standing water is available, especially in containers.”

Dorevitch also said people exposed to floodwater can develop multidrug-resistant staph infections. Photos and video of Texans in the flood zone show hundreds of people walking in water. Any cut could lead to a serious infection. And then there’s E.coli, bacteria that can also be deadly and is very likely in the floodwater.

“If wastewater treatment facilities are overwhelmed, there’s potential for sewage to get into the water,” Dorevitch said. “And then there’s the drinking water that comes out of the tap, which is threatened, as well, by flooding that’s limiting the activity at one of Houston’s drinking water treatment plants right now.”

The Environmental Protection Agency issued a statement saying it will test floodwater samples as well as drinking water and wastewater facilities. The agency is warning people not to drink or bathe with well water, which is commonly used in Texas. Even in homes, water that has flooded storage areas for pesticide or other products containing hazardous chemicals is not safe to walk in. The CDC is advising people who waded through floodwaters to get tetanus shots because the water can contain glass and sharp objects.

Mental health concerns

As the water recedes, mold and respiratory problems caused by mold can increase. Mold can grow in water-soaked walls, insulation, furniture and carpeting, even in ceilings where roofs leaked or were damaged during the storm.

The CDC said its Emergency Operations Center is now activated to bring together CDC staff to respond to public health needs and to send resources and personnel if requested. It has set up medical stations in Louisiana and in Texas. Those in Texas are now operational.

And finally, Dorevitch says, mental health is also a concern. It can be overlooked in the haste to get Houston and other cities running again, but the tragedy of losing everything and those who lost family members or friends can suffer lasting trauma. Much of the video coming from Texas shows people, young and old, weeping for the homes, family photos and the former lives they have lost.
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From: MeNeedIt

The digital arms race between the United States and Russia appears to be accelerating, fueled in part by new comments by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Putin, speaking to a group of Russian students Friday, called artificial intelligence “not only Russia’s future” but “the future of the whole of mankind.”

“The one who becomes the leader in this sphere will be the ruler of the world,” he said. “There are colossal opportunities and threats that are difficult to predict now.”

Digital domain

Top U.S. intelligence officials have been warning of a “perpetual contest” between the United States and Russia, with much of it playing out in the digital domain.

The Defense Intelligence Agency in particular has sought to maximize its ability to make use of artificial intelligence, or AI, reaching out to private industry and academia to help maintain the U.S. advantage.

Russia and China are seen as key competitors in the digital space and have been working on how to apply technologies, such as artificial intelligence and quantum computing, to their war-fighting doctrines.

“They’ve got their heads wrapped around the idea that 21st century warfare is as much cognitive as it is kinetic,” outgoing DIA Director Lt.  Gen. Vincent Stewart told a small group of reporters from VOA and other organizations last month.

Top officials, both in government and in the private sector, have long been willing to discuss the impact of artificial intelligence and other technological advances.

But some analysts see Putin’s willingness to address the issue publicly as telling.

“[It’s] rare that you have a head of state discussing these issues,” said Frank Cilluffo, director of the Center for Cyber and Homeland Security at George Washington University. “He is sending a message.”

And Cilluffo hopes the U.S. is paying attention.

“A big space race is on, and it’s a race we can’t afford to lose,” he said.

US maintains advantage

Many experts say the U.S. still maintains an advantage over Russia in artificial intelligence and quantum computing. Still, as Russia, China and other countries seek additional breakthroughs in how to apply such technology, the stakes are high.

“It completely changes the game of warfare,” said David Kennedy, who served with the U.S. National Security Agency and with the Marine Corps’ electronic warfare unit.

“It’s no longer going to be about who has the most bombs or who has the better bombs,” he said. “It’s going to be who can apply these principles to respond faster to fight a war and win a war.”

And Kennedy, now chief executive officer at TrustedSec, an information technology security consulting firm, sees Russia gaining.

“They explore all options, and they have a substantial budget for it,” he said, noting that Moscow may have an advantage in how to apply the technology since it is willing to sidestep privacy and ethical concerns that the U.S. and even China have tried to address.

China, too, is making significant gains. But unlike Russia, China has focused more on quantum computing, launching a quantum satellite into space last year.

Quantum computing uses a quirk of physics that allows subatomic particles to simultaneously exist in two different states. As a result, a computer is then able to skip through much of the elaborate mathematical computations necessary to solve complex problems.

It is seen as a potentially game-changing tool for intelligence agencies, enabling them to hack encrypted messages from their adversaries while their own communications would be “hackproof,” if the technology can be perfected.

“The Chinese have one of the most powerful quantum encryption capabilities in the world,” DIA’s Stewart cautioned last month. “Whoever wins this space wins the game.”
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From: MeNeedIt

When U.S. astronaut Peggy Whitson returns to Earth on Saturday from the International Space Station, she will have spent more time in space than any other American.

Whitson will have logged 665 days in space over three separate missions, the equivalent of about one year and 10 months outside the Earth’s atmosphere.

The world record belongs to Russian Astronaut Gennady Padalka, who spent 879 days in space.

Whitson is scheduled to return to Earth Saturday night in Kazakhstan in a Russian Soyuz capsule. She will then travel to Germany before heading home to Houston, which is still crippled from Hurricane Harvey.

Whitson said in an email to the Associated Press that her home was not damaged in the storm. However, she said the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston was temporarily closed except for essential personnel, such as those staffing Mission Control for the space station mission.

“Any trepidations I might have about returning in the aftermath of a hurricane are entirely eclipsed by the all those folks keeping our mission going,” she said.

Whitson, a biochemist, began her third and latest mission on the International Space Station last November. During the mission, she performed a spacewalk and also become the first woman to command the space station twice.

She and the other crew members aboard the International Space Station also pursued hundreds of experiments in biology, biotechnology, physical science and Earth science.

At 57, Whitson is the oldest woman to have been in space.

The astronaut has said she is unsure whether this most recent space mission will be her last.

NASA had scheduled a news conference earlier this week with Whitson, to be filmed from the space station, but said it had to be rescheduled after she returns because of the impact of Hurricane Harvey in Houston.
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From: MeNeedIt

Comedian Shelley Berman, who won gold records and appeared on top television shows in the 1950s and 1960s delivering wry monologues about the annoyances of everyday life, has died. He was 92.

Berman died Friday at his home in Bell Canyon, California, from complications from Alzheimer’s disease, according to spokesman Glenn Schwartz.

Berman was a pioneer of a new brand of comedy that could evoke laughter from such matters as air travel discomforts and small children who answer the telephone. He helped pave the way for Bob Newhart, Woody Allen, Jerry Seinfeld and other standup comedians who fashioned their routines around the follies and frustrations of modern living.

Tributes came in Friday from Steve Martin, who tweeted that Berman “changed modern standup,” and Richard Lewis, who said there was “no better wordsmith.”

Late in his career, he played Nat David, father of Larry David, on HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” With dialogue improvised by its cast, the comedy series gave Berman the opportunity to return to his improv roots and introduced him to a new generation of TV viewers.

“I’m not a standup comedian,” Berman often insisted. “I work on a stool.”

Comedy was not a childhood ambition for him. He trained as an actor, with the Goodman School of Drama in his native Chicago and with the prestigious actress-teacher Uta Hagen in New York.

“I had dreams of being an actor,” he said in a 1960 interview. “For 10 years I tried, picking up small jobs in summer stock and TV. I had a hard time of it.”

Nightclub routine

As a last resort, he put together a 20-minute routine and auditioned at the Chicago nightclub Mister Kelly’s. He was given a job, and then he had to scramble to write more material for a half-hour show.

“I was always one of those life-of-the-party boys,” he admitted, “though I never stooped to wearing women’s hats or lampshades. I was always making people laugh, in school and later in life.”

Berman’s success in Chicago led to a booking in Las Vegas. He bombed. The gamblers didn’t laugh, nor did they talk. Accustomed to slam-bang comics out of vaudeville and burlesque, they listened in amazement to the guy sitting on a stool and using big words with a routine that often consisted of one side of a make-believe phone call.

He continued on the saloon circuit, honing his craft and deciding on which direction to go. He didn’t fit any category. He wasn’t a joke teller nor a “sick” comedian. He figured he was a “humanist humorist.”

Berman made the first of many appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1959. That year he issued his first album, Inside Shelley Berman. It won a gold record and received the first-ever Grammy Award for the spoken word. Two more albums achieved gold status.

Along with his busy schedule in nightclubs and auditoriums, he fulfilled his first ambition to be an actor. He appeared in a Broadway play, The Boys Against the Girls, in 1959 and a musical, A Family Affair, in 1962. His film debut came in 1964 with the adaptation of Gore Vidal’s hit political stage drama, The Best Man, starring Henry Fonda and Cliff Robertson.

“Not only an accomplished comedian, actor and author, Shelley was among the new breed of comedians who made a significant impact through recordings,” The Recording Academy said in a statement. “Shelley will be deeply missed, but the influence he exerted on our creative community will remain forever.”

Berman’s comedy career stalled in 1963. He was performing his act before an audience for a documentary-style NBC show, Comedian Backstage, when a telephone ringing interrupted him; it was the second night it happened. He stormed backstage and ranted at everyone in sight. His outburst, edited to make him appear temperamental, was included in the telecast.

Back to acting

“Once you’re known as being difficult, it becomes too hard to deal with management and even fellow artists,” he remarked in 1986. The bookings fell off, and Berman returned to acting, with little luck. He and his wife, Sarah, were forced to file for bankruptcy, and he began a long struggle to pay off his taxes and creditors.

He found work in television series such as The Twilight Zone, Rawhide and Peter Gunn and occasional movies including Divorce American Style. He became active in regional theater and also worked his old routines before college and lecture audiences.

For more than 20 years he taught comedy at the University of Southern California.

In recent years, he landed guest roles on series including The King of Queens, Boston Legal and CSI: NY, and appeared in the film Meet the Fockers.

He retired from performing in 2014 after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

Sheldon Leonard Berman was born in Chicago and attended public schools. After training as an actor, he joined an improvisational company in Chicago, Compass Players, the beginning of the famed Second City. Watching his fellow performers, Mike Nichols and Elaine May, Berman said in 2000, “I learned more in two weeks than I did in four years at Goodman.”

He married in 1947, and he credited Sarah with helping him to survive through his jobless period while trying to be a comedian, the bankruptcy, the rebuilding of his career and the loss of their son, Joshua. They also had a daughter, Rachel, who, along with his wife, survives him.

Berman said of his marriage: “The love we have and the way it has grown, that’s what I’d like to be remembered for.”
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From: MeNeedIt

Although 75 percent of our planet is covered with water, many countries around the world suffer from a low supply of fresh water. There is plenty of water in the ocean, but removing the salt is very expensive, and only coastal nations with an ample supply of power, such as the Arab Gulf States, can afford to rely on desalination. Now, as sources of fresh water dwindle, emerging new technologies could make the technology much more cost effective. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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From: MeNeedIt

Aid groups have criticized efforts by European leaders to stem the flow of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, arguing Europe’s economy needs more workers. One nongovernmental organization in Italy has been trying to fill the gap by training African migrants to work as beekeepers and then pairing them with local honey producers in need of employees. Ricci Shryock reports for VOA from Alessandria, Italy.
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From: MeNeedIt

Some energy, like solar and wind, is renewable. Other sources of power are recyclable. Faith Lapidus tells us how old tires and congealed fat are generating interest and energy.
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From: MeNeedIt

The French government said on Thursday it would cap unfair dismissal payouts and give companies more flexibility to adapt pay and working hours to market conditions in a labor reform France’s biggest union said was disappointing.

The reform, President Emmanuel Macron’s first major policy step since his election in May, is also the first big test of his plans to reform the euro zone’s second-biggest economy.

For decades governments of the left and right have tried to reform France’s strict labor rules, but have always diluted them in the face of street protests.

The government said in a document presenting the reform that it will make it possible to adapt work time, remuneration and workplace mobility to market conditions based on agreements reached by simplified majority between employers and workers.

Workers compensation for dismissal judged in a labor court to be unfair would be set at three months of wages for two-years in the company with the amount rising progressively depending on how long a worker was with the firm, unions said.

However, normal severance pay would be increased from 20 percent of wages for each year in a company to 25 percent, Liberation reported.

The government consulted with unions for weeks as it drafted the reform, and only the hardline CGT union, the country’s second biggest, said from the start that it would hold a protest, set for Sept. 12.

France’s biggest union, the reformist CFDT, said that it would not call a strike against the reform but described the reform as a missed opportunity to improve labor relations.

“CFDT disappointed,” the union’s leader Laurent Berger told reporters after a meeting with the government, but he added: “Taking to the streets is not the only mode of action for unions.”
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From: MeNeedIt

Mysterious black holes, thought to reside in the center of every galaxy, are difficult to study because even the closest one, in the center of our own Milky Way, is still some 27,000 light years away. But researchers at the University of Nottingham’s Quantum Gravity Laboratory have found that some of the physical phenomena linked to black holes can be studied in an ordinary bathtub. VOA’s George Putic has more.
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From: MeNeedIt