Tunisia pushes green energy, cuts solar panel prices

The government is working to spread the use of solar power, which can enable consumers to save up to 70% on their hot water bills.

By Jamel Arfaoui for Magharebia in Tunis – 09/02/10

The Tunisian government has slashed the prices of solar panels in a bid to cut dependence on imported power and lower ordinary people's household expenses.

In addition to providing a sizable 30% discount on solar panels, which cost between 1,350 and 1,850 dinars, the Tunisian Electricity and Gas Company is working with banks to provide customers with an affordable five-year installment plan for such purchases.

The deals are part of a general energy plan, revised by Parliament in February 2009, which includes 40 projects in the period 2010-2016 to bring more solar energy to homes and cut carbon emissions by 1.5 million tonnes per year. Solar energy is the power source of choice for just 1% of Tunisians, according to the Transatlantic21 Association, which monitors the global use of clean energy.

Economist Jannet Ben Abdellah told Magharebia that solar energy "enables the consumer to save up to 70% of hot water consumption costs".

Despite such incentives, ordinary Tunisians' reaction to the government measures has been mixed. According to engineer Assil Shihabi, the demand for solar panels will depend largely on geography.

"People in urban areas have started to demand [solar] services", she told Magharebia. "But ... in remote areas, especially in southern Tunisia, which is rich in solar energy and where temperature is higher than 40 degrees Celsius, people still don't know much about solar heaters".

Tunis homeowner Hamida Laouati is among those who have decided not to take advantage of the government measures. "Winter in Tunisia is short," she said, and solar power will "only provide hot water".

"However, if one day they manage to use [solar power] in lighting, I'll be the first one to participate without any hesitation," she concluded.

Other Tunisians have been happy to give solar power a try. Faicel Ben Zina has been using it for a year, and supports the government's project.

"I will have a refund of the costs I paid [for the panels and installation] in 10 years' time," he told Magharebia. "After that, I'll consume [electricity] for free."

Electricity costs are a concern for plugged-in Tunisia, which was ranked first in Powering Africa Foundation's annual ranking of electricity-dependent nations. According to the foundation, 99% of Tunisians have access to electricity.

Green Party chief Mongi Khamassi said this latest push for solar technology underlines Tunisia's commitment to environmental goals.

"Tunisia ... has high capabilities to develop the use of solar energy to produce electricity", he said in a statement to Magharebia on February 4th, observing that Tunisian soil receives the equivalent of 2,000 watts of sun rays per hour per day.

Solar energy "seems to be promising", Khamassi said. "Especially since many researchers have found solutions to the problem of storing huge quantities of renewable energies".

Tunisia is not alone in the Maghreb in terms of its solar ambitions. Morocco recently rolled out plans to spread the use of the greener, more renewable energy source. The kingdom's $9 billion solar project targets creating capacity of 2,000 MW by 2020 and reducing reliance on imports of electricity, oil and gas.

Source: Magharebia.com
Link: http://www.magharebia.com/cocoon/awi/xhtml1/en_GB/features/awi/features/2010/02/09/feature-02.

Damascus hosts Armenian delegation

DAMASCUS, Syria, Feb. 9 (UPI) -- Damascus welcomed a delegation from Armenia on Tuesday to discuss strengthening bilateral relations and regional issues.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem welcomed Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Arman Kirakosyan to Damascus to take part in bilateral discussions on regional affairs.

Kirakosyan said high-level exchanges between the two countries gave new quality to their level of friendship, the Public Radio of Armenia reports.

Damascus hopes to strengthen its regional position in the community. Washington dispatched top diplomats to Damascus last year in the hopes of reaching a variety of agreements with Syrian officials on issues ranging from Lebanon to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Armenia, for its part, is wrestling with its own regional complications over Nagorno-Karabakh.

War broke out between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh in the early 1990s, and the regional fallout from that row remains tense despite a 1994 cease-fire.

The Minsk group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, led by France, Russia and the United States, is leading peace negotiations aimed at settling the conflict of the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Source: United Press International (UPI).
Link: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2010/02/09/Damascus-hosts-Armenian-delegation/UPI-30671265738888/.

Armenia, Syria to develop bilateral relations

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Tuesday, February 9 Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem met with Armenian delegation led by RA Deputy Foreign Minister Arman Kirakosyan.
The meeting centered around development of bilateral relations in political, economic, scientific and cultural spheres.

Arman Kirakosyan emphasized the importance of Armenia-Syria collaboration, especially noting opening of Armenian consulate in Deir ez-Zor.

On the same day, representatives of Armenian and Syrian Foreign Ministries started the next round of political consultations, RA Foreign Ministry press service reported.

Source: PanARMENIAN.net
Link: http://www.panarmenian.net/news/eng/?nid=42703.

Macedonia hopes to complete EU accession talks within five years

Prague - Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski said Tuesday that he would like his country to start and complete accession talks with the European Union within five years. Macedonia has been a candidate for EU entry since 2005, but the Balkan country's accession to the 27-member bloc has been blocked by a long-standing dispute with Greece over its name.

Greece, a home to a historical region also named Macedonia, wants the former Yugoslav republic to change its name prior to joining the EU.

Speaking to reporters during his two-day Prague visit, Gruevski said that he would like his country to begin and end the EU accession talks during the incoming European Commission's five-year term.

He also indirectly called on Greece to try to solve the problem.

The Czech Republic, which became a member of the EU in 2004, has strongly backed EU and NATO aspirations by Balkan countries such as Macedonia.

Former Czech minister for European affairs, Stefan Fuele, is set to hold the enlargement portfolio in the new European Commission, the bloc's executive arm.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/308360,macedonia-hopes-to-complete-eu-accession-talks-within-five-years.html.

Google takes on Facebook and Twitter with new Gmail Buzz

San Francisco - Google on Tuesday launched a set of social networking tools for Gmail users, hoping to coax them to share photos, links and status updates without the need to visit sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Called Google Buzz, the new features were rolled out to a small number of Gmail account holders Tuesday and to the majority of users within the week.

It allows users to share photos, videos, web links, conversations with "friends" - defined as pre-existing Gmail contacts. Google said it may open Buzz up to outside users in the future.

The shared information goes into a special Buzz section of Gmail and also appears on Google's profile pages.

Google also launched special mobile phone apps for Buzz for Apple's iPhone and for smartphones powered by its own Android operating system.

Analysts said the move by Google was designed primarily to head off Facebook's advantage in the huge amounts of user data that it has amassed and which is highly attractive to advertisers.

Gmail has 167 million users, compared to Facebook's 400 million members.

"Our belief is that organizing the social information on the web - finding relevance in the noise - has become a large-scale challenge, one that Google's experience in organizing information can help solve," said Buzz project manager Todd Jackson.

"There's always been a big social network underlying Gmail. Buzz brings this network to the surface by automatically setting you up to follow the people you email and chat with the most."

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/308377,google-takes-on-facebook-and-twitter-with-new-gmail-buzz.html.

Massive solar storms subject of new NASA launch - Summary

Washington - NASA planned to launch a solar probe on Wednesday to help unlock more secrets about the sun, whose massive storms affect Earth's weather and can pose danger to Earth dwellers. The Solar Dynamic Observatory (SDO) is the "crown jewel" of a fleet of NASA satellites planned to collect more details about what's going on underneath and above the surface of the sun, said Michael Luther, a NASA official who is overseeing the program, in a webcast briefing.

Under the Living With a Star program, scientists said they hope to better predict the sun's periodic release of billions of tons of matter that can endanger human life and health, corrode oil pipelines, disrupt communications and cause power surges.

After an earlier launch was delayed due to bad weather, a NASA meteorologist said high winds could also threaten Wednesday's launch.

From Earth's orbit, the SDO will collect data over five years and download 1.5 terabytes every day - the equivalent of 500,000 songs onto an iPod, said Elizabeth Citrin, project manager.

A special receiving center on Earth will manage the data. For iPhone owners, there will be a special app to see the current-time behavior of the sun as interpreted from the data flow.

"This is way cool," said Madhulika Guhathakurta, lead program scientist for Living With a Star, holding up an iPhone.

While various elements of the sun have been studied over the years, the SDO will be the first to present a "comprehensive view" of all the elements, she said.

The solar probe will collect 60 images a minute with 10 times the resolution of high-definition television, 24 hours a day, measuring the sun's extreme ultraviolet light and mapping its plasma flows and magnetic fields.

"This is the whole picture," Guhathakurta said. It will show "what happens on the sun and what happens to us here."

Dean Pesnell, another project scientist, said the project is vital to figuring out how to predict solar disruptions.

"Our sun affects our lives as we depend more and more on technology," he said. "Every time we look at the magnetic field of the sun, it's different."

The scientists noted the Halloween solar disruptions of 2003, which knocked out GPS systems across the US. In that case, the sun's magnetic field stretched and snapped back like a rubber band, sending billions of tons of gas and particles at 8 kilometers an hour earthwards.

In 1989, a similar storm shut down Quebec's power grid.

"The sun's magnetic fields are the equivalent of tectonic plates on Earth," said Alan Title, another astronomer on the project. When they shift, they are "capable of releasing massive amounts of energy."

Under the normal 11-year cycle of solar disruptions, also known as sunspots, the SDO's mission will coincide with the next storms in 2013 or 2014.

At times in history, however, the sun has skipped its sunspot cycle, scientists say. During one such period, called the Maunder Minimum, from 1645 to 1715, observers also recorded winters that were unusually and bitterly cold. But the link between the sun's dormancy and the so-called "little ice age" has never been proven.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/308379,massive-solar-storms-subject-of-new-nasa-launch--summary.html.

Clinton to visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar

Washington - US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will travel to Saudi Arabia and Qatar later his month and speak at a US-Islam forum, the State Department said Tuesday. Clinton will meet with Qatari officials on February 14 before her address at the US-Islamic World Forum, an event designed to improve Washington's relations with the Muslim world.

Clinton then heads to Saudi Arabia on February 15 for a two-day visit that includes a meeting with King Abdullah.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/308380,clinton-to-visit-saudi-arabia-qatar.html.