Sci/tech tidbits in and around New Hampshire
Like all engineers, beavers sometimes cause trouble
Beavers are awesome engineers, as everybody knows. Sometimes that's great. Sometimes it's not. The Monitor has a story about a long-running right in the town of Bow over a beaver dam and how it is shaping New Hampshire law - you can read it here. House Bill 1530 would...
“A.I. Trivia Time, A Classroom Game Students Will Truly Enjoy!”
Day of A.I., the MIT-backed project to educate teachers and students about the technologies misleadingly known as artificial intelligence, has a new classroom game called A.I. Trivia Time. From their press release: Think of AI Trivia Time as a brain break with a...
Home insurance is the canary in the coalmine for economic effect of climate change
You don’t have to convince Tom Morgan that sea-level rise is a real thing, not after he oversaw the sale of the family home. Two months after he lost his mother in November, 2023, Morgan was at her house when what he descibed as “the worst flood I’ve ever seen in...
NH patents through Jan. 11
Links to each patent can be found here, using the patent number or inventor’s name. By Targeted News Service WASHINGTON – The following federal patents were assigned in New Hampshire in the week through Jan. 11. Photosensor Having Range Parallax Compensation ALLEGRO...
A bill for the electricity-geekiest among you
There's a bill before the New Hampshire legislature "requiring utilities and electric grid operators to assess and report the vulnerability of high-voltage transformers to geomagnetic and electromagnetic disturbances, and to recommend mitigation measures to protect...
Maine might join the ‘balcony solar’ push
Maine is thinking about joining the "balcony solar" bandwagon, as are New Hampshire and Vermont. Hooray! Story from Maine Morning Star is here. That is an online publication, part of States Newsroom, which supports New Hampshire Bulletin and VTDigger among others.
Electric sea-skimming airplane might join the Coast Guard fleet
The Boston Globe has a story about a Rhode Island startup developing an electric plane that would skim low over the ocean, taking advantage of the lift provided by air trapped between it and the water, allowing more speed with less propulsion. Such sea-skimming isn't...
The ice runway is almost open!
There's a good chance that the state's most unusual piece of transportation infrastructure will be in operation this month, luring pilots from hundreds of miles away who want to say they've landed on an ice runway. It will also lure at least one fan from Concord....
Tired: Golf. Wired: 30 MW solar farm.
A solar developer has paid nearly $25 million to buy a public golf course that spans Bellingham and Franklin in Massachusetts, with a plan to close the course and install a 30-megawatt solar array. Full story is here.
Long-term forecasts of electricity need are getting very hard to do
Energy Central reports on ISO-New England's request to change the way it predicts what capacity will be needed in the future: "The grid operator asked FERC to approve prompt auctions starting in 2028, effectively admitting that the volatility of AI data centers and EV...
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