Israel's water shortages

In today's world, it seems like oil is the most important natural resource we have, yet people have forgotten that our source of life is water!. Water levels around the world are running low and people should become aware of this and take action for preservation!. This short clip shows Israels water shortage crisis and how it has now begun to create man made pools to store water for the near future.

Thesis proposal 1

Title:
Promotion of waste vegetable oil as alternate fuel for large diesel fueled vehicles.

Introduction:
Daily thousands of trucks, busses and delivery vans travel the roads of our city and province, this making the transportation industry responsible for a fair amount of the carbon dioxide emissions affecting us today. Status Canada shows that the transportation industry has grown dramatically since 2004, growing at a range of 5 % per year. The increase in the transportation industry also brings an increase in oil demand at times where the world has passed its peak oil point. Peak oil is the term for reaching the maximum global oil extraction and entering a rate of production decline. With oil supplies falling, humankind most find alternate and effective energy sources if it wants to keep up with demand and its way of living. Our economy relies extremely on oil for its survival; we use oil in everything from tires, plastic covers, and of course the transportation of food and other goods. This makes oil shortages as being catastrophic for our society. Finding more efficient alternate fuel sources can help slow down the demand for oil as well as drift from our need for it. There are plenty of new sources of energy in the works such as solar, wind, tidal and geothermal power, these are extremely environmentally friendly. Though these new energy sources are good for our planet, the only problem that they bring is that they are yet not strong enough to surpass the capabilities of fossil fuels. We are still far for finding a source of energy to replace oil, but some technologies can be used in certain aspects in today’s world that could lead to the decrease on oil demand. Looking at the transportation industry today, local vehicles that do not travel long distances can utilize alternate sources of energy thus reducing emissions and fuel demand. Many of the current buses, trucks and delivery vans run on diesel fuel, this engines posses the capacity to be modified under 3000 dollars in order to run on straight waste vegetable oil. This could is a good source of energy and can be acquired at low or even no price from local restaurants since these places must pay to get rid of this oil. This technology still requires the vehicle to start and turn off on diesel, but it multiplies the mileage per gallon of fuel and also producing lower carbon dioxide emissions.


Abstract:
Limited supplies, production decline and demand on the rise, we must find new sources of energy to counter our dependence on fossil fuels. The transportation industry is responsible for big part of this demand for it requires fuel to run on its daily basis. This project aims to the promotion of waste vegetable oil as an alternative form of fuel for diesel running transportation vehicles in cities and towns, aiming to reduce fuel demand as well as emissions.

Research question/problem:
Having experienced the wonders of waste vegetable oil as fuel (a friend has converted his bus and traveled to British Columbia with it). It was clear that this new source of fuel could be of great help to society for there are thousands of restaurants that need to get rid of their waste vegetable oil on the daily basis. My research question is how to promote the use of WVO as an efficient fuel source and how to properly promote this to an industry that will benefit from it. We are at a time where new sources of energy are crucial to our survival, so the need for an alternative source to an industry that relies on fuels for its operation is very important.


Audience:
The audience for this project would be mostly companies that use diesel fueled vehicles for their business. These companies can see great savings by converting their car fleets to waste vegetable oil; the cost of the conversion will pay itself at the end due to less necessity to purchase diesel fuel. One tank of fuel would last twice to three times longer than before for the diesel fuel is only needed to start and turn off the engine. These companies can be on a minor scale at first such as small delivery trucks, vans, etc.

Realization:
In order to realize this project, a full on research on the extent of use of the waste vegetable oil must be done. This information will come from first hand experience with people that have used the technology in the past. To properly promote the project, a full-scale campaign must be done. Posters, promotional pamphlets, a how to convert your car booklet and an informational website are the deliverables.

Learning outcomes:
The learning outcomes of this project would to increase my knowledge about this and other forms of alternate fuels that are already out there but yet not implemented, also to explore to what extent these sources of energy can be implemented in a small, medium or larger scale. Also my aim is to get on the track of promoting a more sustainable society with the use of resources we already have without the depletion of our planet.






Bibliography:


"Energy Management." Chain Store Age 83.6 (2007): 61. Business Source Complete. EBSCO. Web. 11 Apr. 2010. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=25311396&site=ehost-live

Ito, Robert. "Convert Your Car." Los Angeles Magazine 53.3 (2008): 76. MasterFILE Premier. EBSCO. Web. 11 Apr. 2010
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=31145604&site=ehost-live

“ Vegetable oil fuels”, Government of Alberta, Agriculture and rural development.
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/eng4435

Joshua Tickell ; edited by Kaia Roman , “From the fryer to the fuel tank : the complete guide to using vegetable oil as an alternative fuel”. Greenhaven Press, 2006.

Joseph Dunlavy, Augustine Akuoko-Asibey,
Robert Masse and Denis Pilon. “An Analysis of the Transportation Industry in 2005”
Status Canada, June 14, 2006.

"Biofuels—The Next Great Source of Energy?." Britannica Book of the Year, 2008. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica, 2009. .

waste vegetable oil as fuel

Here is a short video on how waste vegetable oil from local restaurants can serve as fuel for diesel powered engines. A friend of mine actually did convert his diesel bus to run on vegetable oil and embarked on a cross country trip to British Colombia. So far the bus has ran 3000 kilometers on Waste vegetable oil.

http://videos.howstuffworks.com/science-channel/5061-invention-nation-vegetable-oil-engine-video.htm

ART & COPY

Very interesting documentary about the world of advertising. As graphic designers we also come to take part of this world so this documentary was a good watch. It follows stories of famous advertising legends about advertising, how it came to be and about creativity. The film touches into great topics such as morality when it comes to advertising. It explains how Nike, Budweiser, Apple, and brands as such went from advertising simple products to advertising lifestyles. Although many questions about advertising are raised during the film, that is all it does for not many are actually followed. On the good side it does implies that bad advertising has come to pollute the world.

Design process 2

After doing research on the utility assigned, I was able to become familiar with electricity, its uses and how we interact with it on daily basis (simple things just as just turning on a light, plugging something to the outlet, etc.) and also a graphic information that would allow me to create a graphic language for the utility.

Before developing a graphic language for the identity, first further research was done into the field of electricity providers. The research was made in a form of an identity audit. This process helped in seeing whats been done before, what things to take in account for, what not to do, a sense of colour pallets, etc.




This graphic language knowledge became very helpful in the next step of the project which was to create a logo for the utility.

Design process

So this semester has been long and well not much has been posted on here regarding my actual graphic design process. Thankfully for my graphic design class we have been working the whole semester on researching and developing an identity for an utility company for Toronto. There were four entities which were transportation, electricity, water and parks/recreation. The entity assigned to me was electricity.
The process for the development for this project began with no surprise a research on what the actual thing was and how we come into contact with it on a daily basis.





The second phase begins as a study of mark making of electric objects we interact with, these are things such as plugs, outlets, etc.

The death of the aral sea

Uzbek Orol a once-large saltwater lake straddling the boundary between Kazakhstan to the north and Uzbekistan to the south. The shallow Aral Sea was formerly the world's fourth largest body of inland water. It nestles in the climatically inhospitable heart of Central Asia, to the east of the Caspian Sea. The Aral Sea is of great interest and increasing concern to scientists because of the remarkable shrinkage of its area and volume that began in the second half of the 20th century. This change is primarily due to the diversion (for purposes of irrigation) of the riverine waters of the Syr Darya and Amu Darya, which discharge into the Aral Sea and are its main sources of inflowing water.
The Aral Sea depression was formed toward the end of the Neogene Period (which lasted from about 23 to 2.6 million years ago). Later the hollow was partially filled with water—some of which came from the Syr Darya. Toward the end of the Pleistocene Epoch (which occurred about 2,600,000 to 11,700 years ago) or in the early Holocene (after about 11,700 years ago), the depression was inundated for the first time by the Amu Darya, which had temporarily changed its course from the Caspian to the Aral Sea, and the rivers' combined flow maintained a high water level.
The Aral Sea area is characterized by a desert-continental climate of wide-ranging air temperatures, cold winters, hot summers, and sparse rainfall. The rate of precipitation—an annual average of 4 inches (100 mm) in all—is only a tiny fraction of the lake's traditional rate of evaporation. The most significant factors affecting the water balance of the Aral Sea are river flow and evaporation, which formerly took out each year about the same amount of water that the rivers brought in. Over the centuries, variations have exceeded 20 feet (6 metres), while annual and seasonal variations of between 10 feet (3 metres) and less than a foot have been recorded. In 1960 the surface of the Aral Sea lay 175 feet (53 metres) above sea level and covered an area of 26,300 square miles (68,000 square km). The Aral Sea's greatest extent from north to south was almost 270 miles (435 km), while that from east to west was just over 180 miles (290 km). Although the average depth was a shallow 53 feet (16 metres) or so, it descended to a maximum of 226 feet (69 metres) off the western shore. The sea's northern shore—high in some places, low in others—was indented by several large bays. The low-lying and irregular eastern shores were interrupted in the north by the huge delta of the Syr Darya and in the south were bordered by a wide tract of shallow water. The equally vast Amu Darya delta lay on the lake's southern shore, and along the lake's western periphery extended the almost unbroken eastern edge of the 820-foot- (250-metre-) high Ustyurt Plateau.
From about 1960 the Aral Sea's water level was systematically and drastically reduced because of the diversion of water from the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers for purposes of agricultural irrigation. As the Soviet government converted large acreages of pastures or untilled lands in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and elsewhere into irrigated farmlands by using the waters of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, the amount of water from these rivers that reached the Aral Sea dropped accordingly. By the 1980s, during the summer months, the two great rivers virtually dried up before they reached the lake. The Aral Sea began to quickly shrink because of the evaporation of its now-unreplenished waters.
By 1989 the Aral Sea had receded to form two separate parts, the “Greater Sea” in the south and the “Lesser Sea” in the north, each of which had a salinity almost triple that of the sea in the 1950s. By 1992 the total area of the two parts of the Aral Sea had been reduced to approximately 13,000 square miles (33,800 square km), and the mean surface level had dropped by about 50 feet (15 metres). The governments of the states surrounding the Aral tried to institute policies to encourage less water-intensive agricultural practices in the regions south and east of the lake, thus freeing more of the waters of the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya to flow into the lake and to stabilize its water level. These policies succeeded in reducing water usage somewhat but not to the level necessary to have a significant impact on the amount of water reaching the Aral Sea. In 1994 these same states—Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan—established a joint committee to coordinate efforts to save the Aral Sea. The difficulty of coordinating any plan between these competing states, however, has hampered progress.
By the end of the century the Aral had receded into three separate lakes: the Greater Sea had divided into a long, narrow western lake and a larger, broader eastern lake, with the remains of the Lesser Sea to the north. The level of the sea had dropped to 125 feet (36 metres) above sea level, and the water volume was reduced by three-fourths of what it had been in 1960. Almost no water from the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya reached the sea. In the early 21st century the eastern portion of the Aral suffered the most drastic and immediate decline—diminishing by some four-fifths between 2006 and 2009. Although the World Bank funded the construction of a dike that was anticipated to preserve the northern portion of the sea, it was expected that the entirety of the remaining southern portion—both eastern and western lobes—would be lost by 2020.
The rapid shrinkage of the Aral Sea led to numerous environmental problems in the region. By the late 1980s the lake had lost more than half the volume of its water. The salt and mineral content of the lake rose drastically because of this, making the water unfit for drinking purposes and killing off the once-abundant supplies of sturgeon, carp, barbel, roach, and other fishes in the lake. The fishing industry along the Aral Sea was thus virtually destroyed. The ports of Aral in the northeast and Muynoq in the south were now many miles from the lake's shore. A partial depopulation of the areas along the lake's former shoreline ensued. The contraction of the Aral Sea also made the local climate noticeably harsher, with more extreme winter and summer temperatures.
In the late 1990s an island in the Aral Sea, Vozrozhdenya, became the centre of environmental concern. The Aral Sea derived its name from the Kyrgyz word Aral-denghiz, “Sea of Islands”—an apt designation, as there were more than 1,000 islands of a size of 2.5 acres (1 hectare) or more strewn across its waters. Many of these islands have joined the mainland with the shrinking size of the sea. By 1999 the sea had receded to a level where only 6 miles (10 km) of water were separating Vozrozhdenya Island from the mainland. The increasing accessibility of the island from the mainland was of special concern because Vozrozhdenya had been a testing ground for Soviet biological weapons during the Cold War. In addition to testing done there on such agents as tularemia and bubonic plague, hundreds of tons of live anthrax bacteria were buried on the island in the 1980s. In 1999 still-living anthrax spores were discovered on the site, and scientists feared that when the island was no longer surrounded by water, land vertebrates could carry anthrax to populated areas.
The health costs to people living in the area had already begun to emerge. Hardest hit were the Karakalpaks, who live in the southern portion of the region. Exposed seabeds led to dust storms that blew across the region, carrying a toxic dust contaminated with salt, fertilizer, and pesticides. As a result, health problems occur at unusually high rates—from throat cancers to anemia and kidney diseases—and infant mortality in the region is among the highest in the world.

THOUGHTS:

This is a clear example how our way of living has impacted the planet at a large scale. Many people believe that global warming is not such a big deal as they picture it to be, but when massive lakes seize to exist we must open our eyes to the reality of things. Its infuriating how many people do not appreciate and acknowledge that the resources we have are only limited, if we keep living the way we live we are in for big trouble! WAKE UP PEOPLE!



MLA style:
"Aral Sea." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica, 2010. Web. 5 Apr. 2010 .