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Better Living Through Well Being
Healthy soil is the root source of a livelihood that sustains farmers and communities all around the world. It not only grows the food we eat, it also helps protect natural resources and watersheds, and restores habitats for plants and wildlife. A healthy soil ecosystem plays a vital role in climate change as it regulates soil carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas emissions.
It is important to realize that the soil ecosystem is also a limited resource. Creating new soil takes longer than a human life. It is a natural resource we must work to conserve for future generations. Fortunately, collaborative projects between farmers and agriculturalists to adopt conservation practices are becoming increasingly common across America. These projects, aimed at increasing adoption of soil, nutrient and water conservation practices through on-farm demonstrations, are not without certain challenges in overcoming social and economic barriers. For growers to invest in conservation practices such as reduced tillage, cover crops and smart irrigation practices, they need to clearly understand the cost and the benefits that will impact their profitability. One big challenge is overcoming the initial concern over the cost of adopting conservation practices. For example, adopting smart irrigation practices such as soil moisture sensors and variable-rate irrigation are likely to increase overall yield and profitability across the field. Another example is adding cover crops, which are crops planted to protect and improve soil during the seasons in which cash crops are not actively growing. These have the potential to decrease the need for irrigation through improved water holding capacity. They also provide supplemental nutrients to the cash crops that follow them. Understanding the costs and benefits of conservation practices such as these can help growers make decisions about them. The “Future of Farming Project” at the Auburn University College of Agriculture in Alabama is one such collaborative conservation project. **************************************** Forests now cover 31 percent of our planet’s land surface. In recent years, these natural allies against global warming have also become its victims, due to the intensification of heat waves, droughts and fires, 90 percent of which are man-made. Thanks to new space technologies and the Internet of Things via satellite, there has been a recent paradigm shift in forest fire prevention. Due to cost of fighting forest fires and increasingly scarce water resources on land for putting out fires, early detection is extremely important in fire prevention. Satellites alone can only detect and locate fires if they are large-scale, which is too late for emergency services, the ecosystem or the surrounding population. But with a forest fire detection system that integrates a satellite-based IoT, this time factor is considerably reduced. Satellite operator and global connectivity provider, Kineis, uses it constellation of nanosatellites and Ground Remote Station to locate and connect objects via terminals, wherever they may be on the planet using IoT. As they pass overhead, the satellites collect messages or data from specific devices or sensors and distribute them to the user within twenty minutes. **************************************** Development of the UAE Wind Program marks the debut of large scale, utility wind power on the UAE’s electricity grid, diversifying the country’s energy mix and advancing its energy transition by unlocking the new potential of wind. By working with global technology leaders and turbine manufacturers, the UAE is paving the way for commercialization of further utility scale, low-wind speed projects. **************************************** * More than 70 countries have set a net-zero target in a race toward net zero and the transition to a net-zero world. * World’s largest energy exhibition and conference draws more than 40 ministers and 120 CEOs from across the globe to enable cross-industry alignment on ‘Decarbonizing. Faster. Together.’ * Carbon capture feasibility study is planned for mineral production facilities in the U.S. Midwest. * New solar energy facilities in Tallahassee, Florida will generate enough clean energy to replace fossil fuel-generated energy for up to 1,400 homes. * SeaWorld invests in state-of-the-art system that will generate 16 percent of the park’s electricity while providing shade to 1,200 parking stalls. * Drug-free, non-invasive, over-the-counter pain patches incorporating a neuro-based, haptic vibrotactile trigger technology (VTT), shown to influence various neural networks in the brain related to sleep, stress, mobility and other physiological functions. * World Sight Day casts light on avoidable blindness throughout under-resourced communities worldwide. * Meal delivery services are a key component in helping seniors live healthier, independent live as country’s population ages. ***************************************
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Better Living Through Well Being
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