news20090911lat

[Today's Newspaper] from [Los Angeles Times]

[Nation]
Obama, administration officials pay tribute to 9/11 victims
'Let us renew our resolve against those who perpetrated this barbaric attack,' the president says on the first National Day of Service and Remembrance.
By Mark Silva
September 11, 2009 | 8:10 a.m.

Reporting from Washington - On a rainy morning eight years after airline-hijacking terrorists attacked the World Trade Center towers in New York and struck the Pentagon outside of Washington, President Obama today took part in a somber wreath-laying at the permanent memorial to victims of the attacks at the Pentagon.

And high-ranking members of the Obama administration fanned out across the country to take part in the first official National Day of Service and Remembrance.

"Nearly 3,000 days have passed, almost one for each of those taken from us," Obama said, making this pledge outside the Pentagon: "Let us renew our resolve against those who perpetrated this barbaric attack and who plot against us still. . . . We will do everything in our power to keep our nation safe."

The president and first lady also held a moment of silence on the South Lawn of the White House this morning at the time of the first attack. A bell rang three times and a bugler sounded taps as the couple bowed their heads and placed their hands over their hearts.

"Once more we pause, once more we pray, as a nation and as a people," Obama said later at the Pentagon, remembering the victims of the attacks. "We read their names. We press their photos to our hearts. . . . We recall the beauty and meaning of their lives."

The president also saluted the members of the military still at war today in conflicts that ensued after the 9/11 attacks.

"We pay tribute to the service of a new generation, young Americans raised in a time of peace and plenty, who saw their nation in a time of need and chose to serve," Obama said, with a few preacher's words for the assembly: "Scripture teaches us a hard truth: The mountains may fall and the Earth may give way, the flesh and the heart may fail, but after all our suffering God and grace will restore you and make you firm, solid and steadfast."

Today, the president maintained, the nation should observe "not the human capacity for evil, but the human capacity for good. . . . On this first National Day of Service of Remembrance, we can summon once again that ordinary goodness of America,

"On a day when others sought to sap our confidence, let us renew our common purpose," Obama said. "United not only in our grief, but in our resolve to stand for one another, to stand up for the country we all love." He called a commitment to the nation's core causes "the strongest rebuke to those who attacked us."

Eight years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, the U.S. still is at war -- engaged in escalating combat on foreign soil against "the people who knocked down these buildings."

Those were the bullhorn-broadcast words of then- President George W. Bush standing on the rubble of the trade center towers in 2001 and vowing revenge against the attackers.

Today, the architect of the attacks, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, is a prisoner of the United States who has undergone repeated "waterboarding" in the government's pursuit of intelligence about terrorism. The financier and chief of Al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, remains at large. And the U.S. military is deploying increasing forces in Afghanistan in a war launched after the attacks.

Now, it is Obama who holds the bullhorn.

He has committed the U.S. to a stepped-up assault against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan while drawing down troops in Iraq with a goal of removing them by 2011. Obama has pledged to close the military-run prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where Mohammed and other enemy combatants have been held. Obama has banned torture in interrogations, and his Justice Department is investigating the excesses of interrogators whom the Bush Justice Department authorized to employ harsh tactics.

Americans still hand the Republican Party a slight edge over the Democratic Party -- by a ratio of 49% to 42% -- in their view of which party will better protect the U.S. from international terrorism and military threats, according to the findings of a Gallup Poll released today.

Gallup started asking that question in September 2002, when Bush's approval ratings were near 70%. The GOP then held a substantial edge on the security question: 50% to 31%.

The newest findings came from an Aug. 31-to-Sept. 2 survey, which also poses a question that Gallup has been asking Americans since 1951: Which party is better for keeping the country prosperous?

Republicans have not held a significant edge on the prosperity question since September 1994. In November of that year, the GOP won majority control of Congress.

Now, with Democrats in control of the White House and Congress, the party holds a 50%-to-39% edge over Republicans on the prosperity question -- with Obama's own approval ratings hovering at 51% this week, down from his high of 69% after inauguration, in the Gallup Poll's daily tracking.

Obama, who is asking Congress to authorize the biggest overhaul of American healthcare since Medicare was created in the 1960s, will sit today for an interview with CBS News' "60 Minutes," which will air Sunday night. On Monday, he plans a major speech about the nation's financial crisis, one year after the government undertook the biggest intervention in the nation's financial markets since the Great Depression.

On Thursday night, the president sent to Congress an official notification of the continuation of the national emergency that was declared after the attacks in 2001. Federal law requires termination of a national emergency before the anniversary of its declaration, unless it is continued. Obama has posted in the Federal Register a declaration that the emergency declared after the attacks , will remain in effect for another year.

"The terrorist threat that led to the declaration on September 14, 2001, of a national emergency continues," the president's letter to Congress states. "For this reason, I have determined that it is necessary to continue in effect after September 14, 2009, the national emergency with respect to the terrorist threat."

Today also has become a National Day of Service and Remembrance, under the Serve America Act that the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy sponsored and Obama signed in April. The act also is named for Kennedy.

And many high-ranking members of the Obama administration have signed up today for community service.

Vice President Joe Biden and wife, Jill, traveled to New York to attend the city's Sept. 11 commemoration at Zuccotti Park. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was serving as the keynote speaker at the first 9/11 National Day of Service and Remembrance at the Beacon Theatre in New York.

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan and U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk are painting houses and visiting with residents of the Supportive Housing Apartments for the Formerly Homeless in New York.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack is preparing meals for homeless shelters, soup kitchens and feeding programs with participants of DC Central Kitchen's culinary job-training program in Washington.

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis is touring a U.S. Vets shelter and serving food to homeless veterans in Las Vegas.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is assisting in a mass vaccination for prevention of swine flu at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria, Va.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Pennsylvania Gov. Edward G. Rendell are taking part in an event with the Get Help Now and Wills for Heroes program in Pittsburgh.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan is helping City Year AmeriCorps members beautify an elementary school in Washington.

news20090911nyt

[Today's Newspaper] from [The New York Times]

[U.S. > Politics]
Obama Speaks at 9/11 Commemoration
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
Published: September 11, 2009

WASHINGTON — On a gray rainy day in the nation’s capital — so unlike the bright sunny morning eight years ago when terrorists slammed planes into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon — President Obama called upon Americans to “renew our common purpose” with a day of service and remembrance of the Sept. 11 attacks.

“Through their own lives and through you, the loved ones they left behind, the men and women who lost their lives eight years ago today leave a legacy that still shines brightly in the darkness and that calls on all of us to be strong and firm and united,” Mr. Obama said during a memorial service at the Pentagon. “That is our calling today and in all the Septembers still to come.”

Mr. Obama and his wife Michelle began the day of commemoration on the White House South Lawn, where they and some 200 members of the White House staff observed a moment of silence at 8:46 a.m., the moment the first plane struck the north tower of the World Trade Center.

It had been raining heavily here, but stopped moments before the Obamas emerged. A bell rang three times and they bowed their heads. They placed their hands over their hearts while a bugler played taps.

The president took a deep breath before he and Mrs. Obama turned silently and walked back into the White House. The staff, including Rahm Emanuel, the chief of staff, and David Axelrod, the senior adviser, stood silently by for a few moments more.

Then the rain resumed.

Mr. Obama then traveled across the Potomac River to speak briefly at the Pentagon, where American Airlines Flight 77, hijacked by five terrorists after taking off from Dulles International Airport bound for Los Angeles, crashed at 9:37 a.m.

An outdoor memorial now marks the spot with 184 benches, each representing one victim of the attack — 59 on the plane, and 125 on the ground. Mr. Obama placed a wreath there, after addressing an audience that included Defense Secretary Robert Gates, military officials and family members of the victims.

“Mindful that the work of protecting America is never finished, we will do everything in our power to keep America safe,” Mr. Obama said.

Mr. Obama is observing his first Sept. 11 as president — eight years ago he was still a state senator in Illinois — and is hoping to use the anniversary and the ones that follow to encourage a spirit of volunteerism. At noon in Washington, there is to be a service at the National Cathedral, and a number of organizations are bringing together students and others for a day of volunteer service, in answer to Mr. Obama’s call.

“On a day when others sought to sap our confidence, let us renew our common purpose, let us remember how we came together as one nation, as one people, as Americans united,” Mr. Obama said. “Such sense of purpose need not be a fleeting moment.”

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[Today's Newspaper] fom [The Washington Post]

[Nation]
White House Marks Sept. 11 Anniversary
By Debbi Wilgoren and Neely Tucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 11, 2009; 11:56 AM

President Obama marked the eighth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks Friday with a national call to public service, a wreath-laying and a solemn moment of silence.

In the first commemoration of the terror strike since he took office, the president, accompanied by first lady Michelle Obama, gathered with about 200 White House staffers on the South Lawn at 8:46 a.m. , precisely eight years after the first of two hijacked jetliners struck the World Trade Center. A bell rang three times, then they bowed their heads, placing hands over hearts as a bugler played taps.

On a cold and rainy morning that stood in stark contrast to the bright sunshine on the day of the attacks, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano issued a statement recalling "a day of sorrow and tragedy, but also a day of heroism and unity."

"Threats to the United States and our allies abroad are persistent and evolving," Napolitano said, adding, "Together, we must build a culture of resiliency and guard against complacency, so we are better prepared for terrorist attacks or disasters of any kind."

The Obamas laid a wreath in Arlington later in the morning, at the year-old memorial to those who died when a third hijacked jet was flown into the Pentagon. Thousands were expected Friday at ceremonies at the crash site of the fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, in Shanksville, Pa.

In New York, at a plaza adjacent to Ground Zero in New York City, families gathered under a cold and steady rain while the names of the Trade Center victims were read, a ceremony that has become a near sacred annual ritual. There were pauses for moments of silence at the minutes the jetliners crashed into the towers.

Vice President Biden ascended the podium in time for a moment of silence at 9:03 a.m., when the second tower was hit, then read a selection by the poet Mary Oliver.

"Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine," he read, the words echoing over a vastly quiet sea of onlookers huddled under umbrellas. "Meanwhile, the world goes on . . ."

The final moment of silence was at 10:29 a.m., when the second World Trade Center tower collapsed.

Former President George W. Bush, whose tour of the collapsed towers provided an indelible moment in the days after the attacks, had no public appearances planned Friday. A spokesman said he would be working in his office during the morning. In a brief statement, he said he and his wife, Laura, were thinking of the victims and their families.

The Obamas are also planning to join in a community service event in the Washington area in the afternoon. No details of that activity have been released yet by the White House, but it is part of a national push to commemorate the attacks through good works. Obama this year designated Sept. 11 a "national day of service" and encouraged communities across America to take part.

At the beginning of the memorial service at the trade center site, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg recalled the spirit of volunteerism that swept the country after the 2001 attacks, and echoed Obama's call for people to serve again as a way to honor the victims.

"From this day forward we will safeguard the memories of those who died by rekindling the spirit of service," Bloomberg said. "Eight years ago, countless people played a part in history by doing something to help another person. . . . Each act was a link in a continuous chain that stopped us from falling into cynicism and despair."

In downtown Washington, U. S. Attorney General Eric Holder and other officials laid a wreath at the National Law Enforcement Memorial near the U.S District courthouse for those who died in the line of duty on September 11.

Holder and Craig W. Floyd, chairman of the memorial, read the names of the 72 officers who died that day. "It was the deadliest day in law enforcement history," Floyd said.

Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the attacks; 184 of them died at the Pentagon. The hijackers of the fourth plane were attacked by some of the passengers as they flew the aircraft across Pennsylvania. That jet crashed in an empty field, killing everyone on board.

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[News] from [guardian.co.uk]

[Environment > Wave, tidal and hydropower]
Marine energy companies to get funding boost from Carbon Trust
Tidal and wave power developers encouraged to thrive as Britain aims to become centre of marine energy industry
Alok Jha, Green technology correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Friday 11 September 2009 00.05 BST Article history

Two of the UK's leading marine energy companies will receive a boost today from the Carbon Trust, with grants of £400,000 to help scale up their technologies and bring them closer to commercial reality.

Marine Current Turbines (MCT), developer of the SeaGen tidal power device, and Pelamis Wave Power, which makes a wave-energy converter that looks like a giant snake, will share the money to design and build more efficient ways to install their machines. Installation can account for up to half the cost of a project and the Carbon Trust says will delay more widespread use of the marine technology unless costs are brought down.

Wave and tides could provide a fifth of the UK's electricity needs, according to the Carbon Trust. It found that the UK was home to around a quarter of the world's emerging wave technologies and that Britain should be the "natural owner" of the global wave power market with the possibility of an industry worth £2bn a year by 2050 and up to 16,000 direct jobs. The government has also recognised wave and tidal as a promising area - in the recent white paper on energy, ministers allocated around £60m for the development of the sector.

"We're beginning to recognise [marine] as an important sector," said Stephen Wyatt of the Carbon Trust. "You need an energy mix in the UK for renewables and wave and tidal energies will play an important role in that. Both in terms of de-carbonising the grid but also the economic opportunities it represents. If we create a buoyant wave and tidal business in the UK, that's also an export opportunity for us."

Pelamis has designed a 180 metre-long "snake" that rides waves to generate electricity. Each device has the potential to make 750KW of electricity and the first commercial installation of four devices was made off the coast of Portugal last year. Its £250,000 grant from the Carbon Trust will be used to tackle the problem of manoeuvring the machines into position, several miles off the coast. Specifically Pelamis will invest in a remotely operated vehicle, so that the boat carrying the devices out to sea can be smaller. The company hopes the new technology will make the projects quicker, cheaper and safer and thereby reduce the overall cost of the resulting electricity.

"This project will allow more machines to be installed more often and more cheaply as we will not be as reliant on good weather conditions and specialist boats for the operation," said Beth Dickens of Pelamis Wave Power.

MCT will spend its £150,000 on an experiment to test out a remotely operated underwater drilling platform which could install foundation piles into the sea bed. That means the main turbine can be installed later as a single unit and will also require fewer and less expensive support vessels. The SeaGen devices have already been in operation at Strangford Lough and, if the remote drilling technology works, it will be used at the next MCT project, a 10MW tidal farm planned for early next deade near Anglesey and which would use seven SeaGens, in partnership with RWE npower renewables.

Both companies have had their problems in the past year: the first wave farm using Pelamis, off the coast of Portugal, fell victim to the global economic downturn after the collapse of its majority owner, Australian-based infrastructure giant Babcock & Brown. And MCT's project in Strangford Lough suffered technical problems with snapped blades during the test phase. Despite this, the Carbon Trust considers the two devices "front runners" in the marine energy area.

Carbon Trust director of innovations, Mark Williamson, said cutting the price of wave and tidal technology was critical. "Our analysis shows that the UK is already leading the world in wave energy. If we can bring down the costs of deploying this technology, we will be able to generate marine energy on a scale that will help meet our 2020 renewable target and deliver significant economic value as well."


[Environment > Birdwatching]
Rare Fiji petrel photographed for first time
Researchers lured the critically endangered bird, which had never been positively identified at sea, by throwing frozen fish into waters 25 miles south of Fiji's Gau island
Associated Press
guardian.co.uk, Friday 11 September 2009 12.46 BST Article

A group of researchers in Fiji has captured for the first time images of the endangered and elusive Fiji petrel.

Scientists photographed the chocolate-coloured sea bird soaring above the ocean about 25 miles south of Fiji's remote island of Gau in May, according to the UK conservation group BirdLife International. The researchers' findings were described in a paper published in this week's Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club.

"Finding this bird and capturing such images was a fantastic and exhilarating experience," the paper's lead author, Hadoram Shirihai, said in a statement.

The bird is listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, which compiles the world's red list of endangered species.

The first Fiji petrel specimen was collected in 1855 on Gau, and a second not until 1984. Since then, there have been a handful of reports of birds crashing into houses on Gau, but no one had ever positively identified one at sea, the researchers said.

The finding is significant because there is so little information about the bird, said Nicholas Carlile, sea bird project officer with the New South Wales state Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water in Australia.

Carlile has studied the Fiji petrel for years and began to hunt for the animal's breeding ground in 2003. Despite all his research, even he has never seen one of the elusive birds.

"There has been no positive sighting of the Fiji petrel at sea – it's very rare," Carlile said. "So it was absolutely fantastic to see those images."

The researchers threw blocks of frozen fish pieces mixed with dense fish oil into the water, creating a smelly slick that attracted the birds. The scientists spotted up to eight petrels over their 11-day expedition.

Expedition member Dick Watling of the conservation group NatureFiji-MareqetiViti said more surveys to locate the birds' breeding area are planned for next year.

"Once we know the location, we can assess what needs to be done to turn around the fortunes of this species," he said.

news20090911gdn2

[News] from [guardian.co.uk]

[Environment > Wind power]
Wind power 'could cut China's emissions by 30%'
China's energy needs are expected to double by 2030, but a study in the journal Science says the country could produce 30% less CO2 if it uses wind power to meet them
Associated Press
guardian.co.uk, Friday 11 September 2009 12.14 BST Article history

China could cut its CO2 emissions by 30% in the next two decades if it uses wind power to meet its growing energy demands, a US study said today.

It is estimated China will need to increase its capacity by 800 gigawatts by 2030 to meet demand – roughly double its current capacity.

The study, in the journal Science, proposed a way for wind power to make up most of that increase and, if it did, said China's emissions of carbon dioxide could be 30% lower.

Using meteorological data to assess the potential for wind power in China – the world's largest emitter of carbon dioxide – the researchers also say wind could theoretically supply all of the country's energy, though it only laid out the figures for meeting half its needs.

"The world is struggling with the question of how do you make the switch from carbon-rich fuels to something carbon-free," lead author Michael McElroy, a professor of environmental studies at Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, said. "The real question for the globe is: what alternatives does China have?"

Coal currently supplies 80% of China's electricity, and hundreds of coal-fired power plants are built every year to keep pace with demand, but Beijing is also investing heavily in renewable energy.

It plans to build seven large wind-power bases over the next decade, and already ranks fourth in the world in terms of installed capacity, at 12.2 gigawatts – about equal to the energy produced by two dozen average-sized coal-fired plants.

It trails only the US, Germany and Spain in installed capacity, but not all of those turbines are hooked up to the electricity grid. In fact, just 0.4% of China's electricity is supplied by wind – or around 3 gigawatts.

Justin Wu, a wind analyst at New Energy Finance, a London-based industry-research firm, said the gap between installed capacity and wind-generated power is more than just a footnote. Connecting the wind farms to national electric grids is very difficult and expensive, he said, because the on-and-off blowing stresses the grids. He said the study does not take into account that in order to overcome this difficulty, power grids would need costly upgrades.

"It's not possible to have 100% of a country's energy demand coming from wind using current technologies, because it requires quite a bit of advancement in smart grid technology to accommodate the unstable effect of wind," he said. "Without real advancements in grid technology or power storage, you will not be able to do that."

The innovation is only likely to be undertaken by power companies if they're offered big incentives to offset the costs – incentives that are so far lacking.

Still, analysts note that China has shown a commitment to renewable energy and may be able to overcome the problems; it is now the fastest-growing market for such energy. The US-based First Solar Inc said this week it had received initial approval from China to build what may become the largest solar field in the world, in Inner Mongolia.

The researchers behind the Science study proposed that the country could produce 640 gigawatts from wind farms, assuming they ran at 30% average capacity – a measure of how much output can reasonably be expected from a wind turbine. Average capacity takes into account that wind is fickle, and calculates more or less how much of the time you can expect a turbine to be working at full capacity.

Thirty percent is at the high end of estimates for most wind projects. In China, most tend to average about 23-24% capacity. At current prices, the study said the plan would require an investment of about $900bn (£539bn).

"The present analysis suggests that wind resources in China could accommodate this target. This will require, however, a commitment by the Chinese government to an aggressive low-carbon energy future," said the study, which was carried out with Tsinghua University in Beijing and supported with a grant by the US's National Science Foundation.

While the study also put forth the notion that wind could eventually meet all of China's needs, Julian L Wong, an analyst at the Washington-based thinktank Center for American Progress, cautioned against relying too heavily on it, saying wind is not a substitute for sources like coal, natural gas or nuclear power.

A shortage of wind could be devastating for industry, Wong said. While electricity from wind can be stored when too much is produced and used when winds die down, he said it is unrealistic to expect storage technology would have advanced enough in the coming decades to allow China to be entirely powered by wind.

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[Environment] from [scientificamerican.com]

[News > Energy > Alternative Technology]
September 10, 2009
The Answer to China's Future Energy Demands May Be Blowing in the Wind
Wind power is growing by leaps and bounds in China and might one day supply a significant portion of the country's electricity needs--but not until it surmounts a host of challenges
By Sarah Wang

After just four years of rapid development, China has the world's fourth largest wind power capacity: more than 12 gigawatts. However, the power of the breeze has become available so fast that the nation is struggling to make use of it.

For instance, the Jiuquan wind power base in Gansu Province—better known as "Three Gorges on Land"—is expected to supply 10 gigawatts of electricity when it reaches peak capacity in 2020. The wind farm, under construction in the Gansu Corridor—a narrow natural passage cutting through the Gobi Desert, Qilian Mountains and the Alashan Plateau—is just one of seven such giant complexes approved by the Chinese government.

In conjunction with other wind farms in China, Jiuquan might be able to meet the country's entire electricity demand by 2030, according to a September 11 study in Science. In fact, a $900-billion network of wind power plants built over the next 20 years and covering 500,000 square kilometers could provide nearly 25 petawatt-hours of electricity, seven times greater than the nation's current consumption, the researchers estimate.

China seems determined to arrive at that future, installing 6.25 gigawatts of turbines in 2008 alone and aiming for 100 gigawatts by 2020. "The wind has just taken off here," says Li Junfeng, deputy director of the Energy Research Institute under the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the government ministry charged with economic development. But "new wind projects only accounted for 7 percent of the entire new power-producing capacity added in China last year, compared to 42 percent in the U.S. and 43 percent in Europe." And wind power currently accounts for just 0.4 percent of China's generating capacity as a whole.

The larger, looming challenges currently facing China's wind farms include serious problems in connecting grids with larger networks, low-quality turbines, and wind farms that have been poorly sited. And another consequence of all these factors is that the current boom has yet to bring a profit to many wind farms.

Profit problems
Chinese wind power generation capacity, it is estimated, could reach 20 gigawatts by the end of 2009, according to the Chinese Wind Energy Association (CWEA), up from 12.15 gigawatts at the end of 2008. By comparison, globally, there were 120.6 gigawatts of operating wind power capacity at the end of 2008; Europe accounted for 66 gigawatts and the U.S. accounted for 25 gigawatts of the total, according to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) in Brussels.

Chinese wind farms, however, "in general have difficulties in operation or even lose money," according to a government State Electricity Regulatory Commission report, which came out in July. For starters, so far, there is less wind power actually being generated than previously estimated by CWEA. The report notes that China's wind power generation capacity in 2008 should actually have been calculated as 8.94 instead of 12.15 gigawatts because some turbines were installed but not used, thanks to government mandates that set as a target the quantity of turbines rather than the amount of electricity they can generate.

In any case, China's wind farms currently struggle to connect with grids, creating power delivery problems. For instance, many of the farms are located in less developed northern and western provinces, such as Gansu, where patchy grids cannot manage the fluctuations in electricity production inherent in wind power.

Also, the power produced would have to be transmitted thousands of miles to high-energy demand areas on the densely populated coast in order to make a profit, a feat that is impossible today because of the lack of long-distance transmission technology or the funding to install it. One solution would be international assistance. "The U.S. also has to transmit wind power over long distances. The two countries can have technological cooperation," says engineer He Dexin, president of CWEA, who has been promoting wind energy since 1980.

The U.S. has infrastructure issues, too, such as aging and regionally constrained electrical grids, and Europe sometimes sees delays in connecting turbines to its grid. But getting intermittent wind turbines to work properly with the existing grid is "indeed a problem in China, much more so than in Europe and the U.S.," says Angelika Pullen, GWEC's communications director.

In the longer run, grid reconciliation is "not a real obstacle," NDRC's Li says. Half of China's grids were built in the past four years (70 percent in this century). They can be upgraded with better technologies. "We will improve our grids and build new ones to catch up with the wind power boom. We can work it out," he says.

Turbine troubles
One advantage in China—the cost of producing a turbine there is 70 percent of the international cost, Li says. China-made wind power devices accounted for 75 percent of the technology installed at Chinese wind farms in 2008, up from 57 percent in 2007, according to CWEA, thanks in part to central and local government mandates that require an ever-growing percentage of equipment at a wind farm in China be made domestically. For example, the NDRC stipulates in a 2005 regulation that wind farms cannot be built when the percentage is lower than 70.

But the quality of homegrown wind turbines is a serious problem. Many of the roughly 70 turbine manufacturing companies in China were set up in just the past four years. "Turbine producers need to test-use their products, especially their first ones, but some give no time to the step," He says. Some turbines cannot be used when they are installed, and some develop broken blades or cracked axes just a few weeks after they begin to operate.

And some wind farms have been built where there is not enough wind to ensure consistent generation of power, He adds. "The wind power sector is growing too fast. It needs to be stable for a period so that there can be a sustainable development in the long term," he says.

Despite these issues, government continues to chase the wind, setting the price for renewable power as high as 0.61 yuan per kilowatt-hour in July, about 10 percent higher than current prices for electricity from such installations. Wind farms also sell carbon credits at between 6 and 12 U.S. cents per kilowatt-hour. "They are major players in China's carbon trading," Li says.

And the links between alternative energy, economic development and climate change pertain no less in China than elsewhere in the world. Harvesting wind power may be key to reining in China's emissions of greenhouse gases. "Our study shows that it is financially feasible to have wind as an important alternative to coal as a source of energy for electricity generation in China," says Wang Yuxuan, associate professor of environmental science and engineering at Tsinghua University in Beijing, who co-authored the September 11 Science paper. "It is possible for China to use wind power on a large scale and to eliminate much, if not all of the CO2 expected to be emitted by the power sector over the foreseeable future."

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[SN Today] from [ScienceNews]

[SN Today]
Swine flu vaccination should target children first
With influenza season looming, an analysis models the H1N1 virus’s potential spread and various programs to contain it
By Rachel Ehrenberg
Web edition : Thursday, September 10th, 2009

If the H1N1 flu outbreak doesn’t peak until midwinter, it could be curtailed with a staggered vaccination program that begins with children and ultimately targets 70 percent of the population, researchers report online September 10 in Science.

From mid-April to August 30, a total of 9,079 hospitalizations and 593 deaths associated with the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus have been reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. Experts aren’t sure when seasonal flu activity will peak this year, but cases of H1N1 influenza have flared in the weeks since school began. For example, in a briefing on September 8, Anne Schuchat, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, reported that about 25,000 children were dismissed from schools on September 4 because of the flu.

A new analysis by infectious disease specialists and biostatisticians models the potential spread of the flu and then looks at the effectiveness of various proposed vaccination programs.

“We had no idea how vaccinating would work in the teeth of the epidemic,” says study coauthor Ira Longini, a biostatistician at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Institute at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington School of Public Health in Seattle.

About 30 to 40 percent of transmission will occur in households and about 20 percent in schools, the researchers estimate. Using numbers from an outbreak at a private New York City school this spring, the model suggests that a typical school-age child will infect an average of 2.4 other kids at his or her school. The team also found that the flu will probably spread through September and peak in mid- to late-October.

Current estimates suggest that between 45 million and 52 million doses of vaccine will be ready by mid-October, with another 195 million by the end of the year. Longini and his colleagues find that because children will experience the highest infection rates they should receive vaccines first. Vaccinating other at-risk groups, such as health care workers and those with compromised immune systems, is also important. Given the pattern of spread among connected people, the researchers suggest that vaccinating 70 percent of the U.S. population will contain the virus.

“At first we were happily surprised,” that vaccinating children first could effectively curtail the flu’s spread, Longini says. But in order for this plan to work, the vaccine would have to arrive earlier than expected and the spread would have to hit its high point later than expected. “The more likely scenario this year is that it could be peaking when the vaccine arrives,” he says.

Preliminary results based on three weeks of data from several vaccine trials suggest that one dose of the vaccine elicits a good antibody response in healthy young and middle-aged adults. The findings are “welcome and reassuring,” states an editorial by Kathleen Neuzil in the Sept. 10 New England Journal of Medicine, where the preliminary studies are published. Experts thought two does of the H1N1 vaccine might be necessary, which halves the number of people that can be vaccinated with a fixed amount of vaccine. Because children seem especially susceptible to the pandemic strain of H1N1, and because children generally have an inferior response to vaccines compared to adults, two doses may still be necessary for kids, notes Neuzil, of the allergy and infectious disease division at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle.

If the pandemic flu peaks earlier in October, a vaccination program that targets children would need to be launched as soon as possible, the new analysis in Science concludes.

The new work is well done and highlights the importance of vaccinating children, says Jan Medlock, a mathematical biologist at Clemson University in South Carolina. Close quarters with multiple peers and more liberal personal hygiene policies make kids more likely to carry germs. Vaccinating kids protects them and reduces disease transmission, protecting others, he says.

Compared with most influenza viruses, the H1N1 pandemic flu has also caused more disease in people under age 25 than in older people, perhaps because older people have some preexisting immunity to this strain. That offers another reason to focus initial vaccine efforts on younger people.

While prevalent — by mid-July, 99 percent of all tested flu in the United States was pandemic H1N1, according to the CDC — the virus appears not to have changed much since the spring. This offers hope, researchers say, that vaccines based on spring strains will be effective against what is brewing now.

A model simulates how the 2009 H1N1 virus may spread in the United States if there is no vaccination intervention (top) vs a vaccination effort that covers 70 percent of the population, with no particular age or risk group targeted (bottom).

Launching an aggressive vaccination program that targets children and begins before the H1N1 outbreak peaks could contain the spread of the virus.

news20090911sn2

[SN Today] from [ScienceNews]

[SN Today]
Stone Age twining unraveled
New finds suggest that people used plant fibers for sewing and other purposes in western Asia by 32,000 years ago
By Bruce Bower
Web edition : Thursday, September 10th, 2009

{Strung out
An excavation in western Asia has yielded wild flax fibers, such as this twisted specimen, suggesting that people made twine for sewing clothes and other purposes around 32,000 years ago.
Science/AAAS}

In the Stone Age, advances in fiber technology globalized people not communication. As early as 32,000 years ago, hunter-gatherers figured out how to transform wild flax fibers into cords suitable for sewing clothes, weaving baskets and attaching stone tools to handles, researchers report in the Sept. 11 Science.

Their excavations at a western Asian cave have yielded the oldest known fragments of twine.

Following the ancient invention of cord-making techniques, human groups were able to create warm, durable clothes and other gear needed for trekking into Siberia and across a now-submerged land bridge to North America, proposes Harvard University archaeologist Ofer Bar-Yosef, a coauthor of the new study.

“The invention of cordage was an extremely important technological event,” Bar-Yosef says.

In 2007 and 2008, a team including Bar-Yosef and led by paleobotanist Eliso Kvavadze of the Georgian National Museum in Tbilisi collected soil samples from Georgia’s Dzudzuana Cave containing more than 1,000 wild flax fibers. Radiocarbon measurements of animal bones and charred wood in the cave’s sediment pointed to periods of human activity from 32,000 to 26,000 years ago, 23,000 to 19,000 years ago and 13,000 to 11,000 years ago. These periods fell within a Stone Age phase called the Upper Paleolithic, during which cave painting and other cultural activities flourished.

{Twine site
Scientists unearthed twisted and knotted flax fibers suggestive of Stone Age twine at Dzudzuana Cave in Georgia.
Science/AAAS}

Flax fibers display a signature microscopic shape and structure, the researchers say. Some of the new finds included pairs of flax fibers that had been twisted together, suggesting intentional modification of the fibers. One such find contained numerous knots. Other ancient fibers had been dyed different colors including black, gray, turquoise and, in one case, pink.

Natural pigments available near the Georgian cave, including roots and other plant parts, could have provided dye ingredients, Kvavadze and his colleagues suggest.

Prehistoric cave residents probably used fiber cords in activities that involved fur, skin and cloth, such as garment making, the scientists say. Fiber-containing soil samples also yielded remains of hair from an extinct wild ox, skin beetles, moths and a fungus known to destroy clothes and other textiles.

Upper Paleolithic cord remnants are “extraordinarily rare,” remarks archaeologist Olga Soffer of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Researchers have found 15,000- to 17,000-year-old rope fragments in France’s Lascaux cave and 19,000-year-old fragments of fibrous twine at Israel’s Ohalo II site.

The types of plant fibers used at Lascaux and Ohalo II remain unknown.

It’s not surprising that Upper Paleolithic people used wild flax fibers to make string, rope, nets and cloth, comments archaeologist James Adovasio of Mercyhurst College in Erie, Pa. By around 5,000 years ago, cultivated flax fueled a revolution in textile production in the Middle East and western Asia.

Other signs of Upper Paleolithic textiles come not from actual fibers but from impressions of cords, baskets, nets and various fabrics on prehistoric pottery. Soffer and Adovasio previously identified such evidence at a 26,000-year-old site in the Czech Republic. Representations of woven material also appear on female figurines from around that time.

Harvard archaeologist Irene Good agrees that people made textiles out of plant fibers around 30,000 years ago but takes a cautious view of the new fragmentary finds. It’s possible individual flax fibers blew into the ancient cave, got buried and then became twisted during microscopic analyses, Good says.

Some fibers might have absorbed mineral colors from the soil rather than from intentional dyeing, in her view. “If this is evidence for dyeing fibers, then it is by far the earliest,” Good notes. Dyeing of wool began roughly 4,000 years ago.


[SN Today]
Metamaterials mock the heavens
Physicists could study black holes and chaotic planetary orbits in the laboratory, a team proposes
By Laura Sanders
Web edition : Thursday, September 10th, 2009

Tabletop black holesMathematical models predict that a new class of metamaterials could concentrate and trap light waves (high density waves are shown in yellow), similar to what happens in a black hole. X. Zhang Laboratory/UC BerkeleyTiny special materials may mimic astronomical events, including the trapping of light in black holes and the disruption of planetary orbits, a new report in the September Nature Physics proposes. The shape and design of such materials may allow scientists to do previously impossible experiments by replicating aspects of the heavens at the laboratory bench.

“Astrophysicists build a telescope and watch the sky, and if they’re lucky, in their lives, they’ll see one or two events,” says study coauthor Xiang Zhang, of the University of California, Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. “Now you don’t have to wait 100 years to observe interesting phenomena. Now we can study it in a tabletop experiment.”

Zhang and his colleagues propose to mimic the cosmos using a breed of man-made materials that twist and contort light and other electromagnetic waves in unusual ways. These materials, known as metamaterials, guide light in directions that normal materials can’t.

The new study “may give new inspiration to particle physicists and astrophysicists,” comments Ulf Leonhardt of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. “If you begin to do experiments in the laboratory, it creates surprises and new perspectives.”

Zhang’s team proposes a new class of metamaterials—called continuous-index photon traps—that can direct light in a way that traps it inside. Through a series of calculations, the researchers conclude that mixtures of copper and air, or mixtures of the alloy gallium indium arsenide phosphide and air, would create such a material.

“Light traveling through a metamaterial is very similar to light traveling through the universe,” Zhang says. Though the material is not the same as space, and the trapping region is not exactly like a black hole, Zhang says that under certain conditions, “the physics works exactly the same, so you can use one to study the other.”

In other calculations, the researchers found that with some basic tweaks in the design, the new class of metamaterials could also model chaotic systems, such as disordered planetary motions, by inducing chaos in electromagnetic waves.

Constructing these metamaterials doesn’t present a major challenge, says Leonhardt. “This is not that far off,” he says. “In the not-too-distant future, we will see these kinds of things.”

In addition to helping researchers study fundamental questions about the universe, these metamaterials may also offer new ways to store energy. Practical applications might include smaller, more powerful antennae and energy trapping devices, Leonhardt says. “Those could be interesting spin-offs.”

In particular, Zhang says, the proposed metamaterials might be the perfect way to concentrate and hold light, creating a highly efficient solar cell. Light trapped and held in place could be collected for energy use. Such a solar cell could be far more efficient than those currently in use, he says.

news20090911nn

[naturenews] from [nature.com]

[naturenews]
Published online 10 September 2009 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2009.899
News
Italian quake analysis rumbles in
Satellite data pinpoints fault at heart of L'Aquila earthquake.
By Katharine Sanderson

{Radar images mark the fault
Richard Walters/GRL}

The earthquake that rocked the ancient city of L'Aquila, Italy, less than six months ago was caused by a fault not thought to be a major seismic hazard.

The Gran Sasso region near L'Aquila is criss-crossed with large, looming faults running through the mountainous terrain that their activity has created. But the first published analyses of the quake, which struck on 6 April and killed 307 people, suggest that the culprit was the Paganica fault, an undistinguished fracture in comparatively flat ground.

"It shows it is dangerous to work on the assumption that the faults associated with the largest topographic features are going to produce the largest events," says Richard Walters, who studies tectonics at the University of Oxford, UK.

Walters and his colleagues analysed radar images from the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite, taken before and after the earthquake. They used differences between the phases of radar waves reaching the Earth's surface in the two sets of data to spot changes in the area's topography.

Plotting interferograms, which show these changes as contours, and comparing them with models based on seismological data for the region, Walters's team saw a 25-centimetre dip on one side of the Paganica fault and a small rise on the other. The work is published in Geophysical Research Letters¹.

The Paganica fault also stood out from Envisat radar data in a separate study by Simone Atzori from the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) in Rome and his colleagues. This first assessment of the earthquake was also published recently in Geophysical Research Letters².

The fault had drawn attention before the earthquake, says Laura Peruzza from the National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics in Sgonico, Italy, who was not involved with the studies. She says that in an analysis she and her colleagues performed in 2006, Paganica appeared as the most dangerous fault in the region, and the L'Aquila region "jumped out of the map"³.

But, she adds, her study's methodology — which took into account the variable timing of recent geological disruptions, as well as their placement — is not accepted by regulatory authorities worldwide. The standard model assumes a constant rate of earthquakes.

Remaining strain

Walters's colleagues had previously pinpointed two particularly stressed regions in Italy, a land which has been stretching because of seismic activity for around three million years. One, he says, was the L'Aquila area, which is still in danger despite the pressure build-up relieved by the magnitude-6.3 April quake: "What has been released [by the L'Aquila earthquake] only makes up around 15% of the energy deficit."

Dramatic events such as large earthquakes are not the only way of releasing pressure, however; landslips or a long-lasting series of tremors called seismic swarms can let it out gently. And Atzori warns against reading too much into Walters's conclusions about the stress remaining in the region. "The calculation is made on the past few decades, but stress accumulates over many centuries," he says. The assessment of how much pressure has been released cannot be used to make predictions about when and where an earthquake might happen, he adds.

Another group, colleagues of Atzori from INGV, spotted a seismic swarm at the end of March this year and placed five extra GPS receptors in the region. These have provided excellent GPS data for the time of the earthquake, which have also been published⁴. "We were from a certain point of view lucky, and from another point of view clever," says Atzori.

That seismic swarm might have been the precursor to the earthquake, so Atzori and colleagues are now closely monitoring another possible seismic swarm close to a nearby reservoir, Lake Campotosto. "We cannot say it will end in an earthquake," he says.

Analyses in the aftermath of the L'Aquila quake are a reminder that attention on the region should remain high, says Peruzza, but cannot be used to predict quakes in future. "It is impossible to predict exactly where the next fault will be active," she says. "The only thing to do is to live in safe buildings. Prediction is not the key to surviving."

References
1. Walters, R. J. et al. Geophys. Res. Lett. 36, L17312 (2009). | Article
2. Atsori, S. et al. Geophys. Res. Lett. 36, L15305 (2009). | Article
3. Pace, B., Peruzza, L., Lavecchia, G. & Boncio, P. Bull. Seismol. Soc. Am. 96, 107–132 (2006). | Article
4. Anzidei, M. et al. Geophys. Res. Lett. 36, L17307 (2009). | Article


[naturenews]
Published online 10 September 2009 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2009.903
News
Physicists propose 'Schrödinger's virus' experiment
Laser technique could put virus in two overlapping quantum states.
By Geoff Brumfiel

{What will happen to Schrödinger's virus in a superposition of two quantum states?
Romero-Isart et al}

Suspending a cat between life and death is one of the best-known thought experiments in quantum mechanics.

Now researchers from Germany and Spain are proposing a real experiment to probe whether a virus can exist in a superposition of two quantum states. Such superpositions are typically the domain of smaller, inanimate objects such as atoms. But the team believes that their technique, using finely tuned lasers, will soon allow for the superposition of something much closer to a living organism. They outline the experiment in a paper posted to the arXiv pre-print server¹.

At its most fundamental level, quantum mechanics says that particles can only exist in discrete states. For example, researchers can measure the direction a particle spins as either 'up' or 'down', but nothing in between. Yet, as long as no one is looking, the particle exists in a combination of both states simultaneously, a strange blend known as a superposition.

In the 1930s, Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger described the now-famous cat experiment, intending it as a caution against applying quantum rules to the real, 'classical' world. He imagined placing a cat inside a box that contains a vial of hydrogen cyanide. A hammer, suspended above the vial, would be set to smash it if triggered by the decay of a tiny chunk of radioactive material.

As long as the box is closed, the radioactive material behaves like a spinning particle because it exists in two states — decayed or not decayed. That means the cat is left in a limbo of being simultaneously dead and not dead. Only when scientists actually measure whether the radioactive substance has decayed will the superposition break down into one or other of the two possibilities.

Oriol Romero-Isart at the Max Plank Institute for Quantum Physics in Garching, Germany, and his colleagues now say they hope to attempt a similar 'Schrödinger's virus' experiment in the lab.

Chilled out virus

The team hope to trap a virus in a vacuum using an electromagnetic field created by a laser. Then, with another laser, the team would slow down the virus's movement until it sits motionless in its lowest possible energy state.

Once the virus is fixed, the team will use a single photon to put the virus into a quantum superposition of two states, where it is either moving or not. Until it is measured, the virus should exist in a superposition of motion and stillness.

The team suggest that tobacco mosaic virus, a rod-shaped plant virus measuring about 50 nanometres wide and almost 1 micrometre long, would be an ideal candidate for the experiment. While there is still debate about whether such viruses can really be classed as alive, the experiment could even be extended to tiny organisms, the scientists say. Microscopic tardigrades, or water-bears, can survive in the vacuum of space for days, and may be suitable for the same sort of Schrödinger treatment.

Other physicists are sceptical about how much the experiment will show. There's no reason to believe that a virus would behave any differently than a similar-sized inanimate object, says Martin Plenio a physicist at Imperial College in London. "I'm absolutely convinced that a virus would behave exactly the same as an inorganic molecule," he says.

Still, he concedes, testing relatively large objects, whether viruses or molecules, could prove interesting. According to quantum mechanics, it should be possible for macroscopic objects like cars and people to enter superpositions, but that never appears to happen. Studying relatively large objects, says Plenio, may help physicists learn where the quantum world ends and the our macroscopic world begins.

References
1. Romero-Isart, O. et al. preprint at http://arxiv.org/abs/0909.1469 (2009).

news20090911bbc1

[One-Minute World News] from [BBC NEWS]

[Asia-Pacific]
Page last updated at 10:19 GMT, Friday, 11 September 2009 11:19 UK
Taiwan ex-leader jailed for life
Taiwan's former President Chen Shui-bian has been sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of corruption by a court in Taipei.

{Mr Chen chose to stay in detention rather than hear the verdict in person}

Mr Chen was charged with embezzlement, taking bribes and money laundering, involving a total of $15m (£9m) while in office from 2000-2008.

Mr Chen had denied the charges, saying they were politically motivated.

His wife, Wu Shu-chen, already jailed for perjury in the case, was also sentenced to life for corruption.

'Illegal' sentence

Taipei District Court convicted Mr Chen on six charges and Mrs Wu on seven charges. The were also fined $15m.

"Chen Shui-bian and Wu Shu-chen were sentenced to life in prison because Chen has done grave damage to the country and Wu because she was involved in corruption deals as the first lady," said court spokesman Huang Chun-ming.

{CHEN SHUI-BIAN SENTENCES
Life sentence for embezzling $3.15m from a presidential fund
Eight years for money laundering
Lesser sentences for taking $12m in bribes and kickbacks
Differing views on Taiwan trial}

A spokesman for Mr Chen said the sentence was "illegal", pointing to a decision to replace the judges in mid-trial. The former president has said he will appeal.

Mr Chen has previously said the charges were constructed by the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) government in a political vendetta. He has admitted accepting money but said it was campaign contributions.

Several dozen of his supporters were outside the court on Friday as the verdict was given, waving placards declaring his innocence.

Unprecedented trial

Mr Chen and his wife were both sentenced to life for embezzling $3.15m (£1.9m) from a special presidential fund.

They received lesser sentences on the charges related to accepting at least $9m in bribes from a Taiwanese company to help it sell a piece of land to the government and of accepting nearly $3m more in kickbacks for helping a contractor gain a government project.

Mrs Wu had already been sentenced on 2 September to one year in prison for perjury for asking her children to lie in court.

{Mr Chen's supporters say he is being persecuted}

The three-year case also involved close family members of the couple, as well as former aides and government officials.

Their son and daughter-in-law received sentences ranging from 20-30 months for money laundering. Other relatives received suspended sentences. Two former advisors were given sentences of 16 and 20 years in prison.

The case, involving revelations of corruption at the highest levels, has gripped the nation, says the BBC's Cindy Sui in Taipei.

It is unprecedented in Taiwan's short history as a democracy. Direct presidential elections were first held in 1996, after one-party rule ended in the 1980s.

Many expected a guilty verdict but some believed the trial was political revenge on the part of the new ruling party.

Mr Chen and his Democratic Progressive Party favoured Taiwan's independence from the Chinese mainland, angering Beijing as well as the pro-China Kuomintang (KMT) in Taiwan.

Relations between Beijing and Taipei have been improving since the KMT, under President Ma Ying-jeou, took office last year.

Taiwan has been ruled separately from China since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, when the defeated Kuomintang retreated to Taiwan to create a self-governing entity.

But Beijing sees the island as a breakaway province which should be reunified with the mainland, by force if necessary.


[Asia-Pacific]
Page last updated at 03:44 GMT, Friday, 11 September 2009 04:44 UK
Clinton stresses key China goals
China and the US will open a dialogue on counter-terrorism issues this year, the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said.

｛Hilary Clinton said they were 'entering a new era in China US relations'｝

She said the two powers must cooperate closely on a wide range of topics.

The head of China's Congress, Wu Bangguo is visiting Washington, where he has met US President Barack Obama and called for closer economic ties.

Mrs Clinton has previously stressed her desire for close ties and talks with China despite US concerns about rights.

Speaking at a dinner hosted to welcome Mr Wu, Mrs Clinton said that building a strong relationship with China was a central goal of the Obama government.

Trust?

She avoided topics such as US complaints on Chinese trade and human rights practices, focusing instead on the need for better communication and trust.

She said the countries must cooperate on nuclear standoffs with North Korea and Iran, climate change, non-proliferation, pandemic diseases and poverty reduction.

"I am pleased to announce that the United States and China will be conducting joint talks on counterterrorism this fall," she said at a business forum attended by Mr Wu.

｛Chinese and US ships have confronted each other in the South China Sea｝

Reporters quoted regional diplomats saying such talks could be the first institutionalised dialogue with China on counterterrorism.

President Obama's administration held its first revamped Strategic and Economic Dialogue with China in July, focusing on bilateral, regional and global challenges on economic and foreign policy issues, as well as climate change.

Trade

Mr Wu for his part was more focused on trade, saying he wanted to see the removal of what he called trade barriers protecting US industries from foreign competition.

He is the chairman of China's Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, a weak legislature guided by the Chinese Communist Party. He described his US trip as the first by a Congress leader in 20 years.

Stressing that China's growth is linked to that of the world, he warned the US to eschew "excuses to interfere in other countries' internal affairs or contain other countries' development."

"We should remove all forms of trade and investment barriers (and) properly handle economic and trade frictions and disputes between the two sides," Mr Wu said.

He said that China "could not achieve development in isolation from the rest of the world, and world prosperity and stability would not be possible without China."

The US has long held concerns about China's rights record, treatment of minorities, failure to protect intellectual copyright and much more.

It is particularly keen to secure China's assistance in persuading North Korea to return to negotiations over its nuclear programme.

On her first trip as secretary of state to China in February, Mrs Clinton called for a deeper US-China partnership.

Co-operation between the US and China on global issues such as the economy and climate change would take precedence over points of friction between the two governments, such as human rights and Tibet, she said.


[Business]
Page last updated at 06:46 GMT, Friday, 11 September 2009 07:46 UK
China's exports see sharp decline
China's exports continued to decline in August, down 23% from the same month last year.

{China's exports have been falling as world demand has slowed}

Official figures show exports fell to $103.7bn, from $134.9bn in August 2008. Exports of almost all major industrial products saw double-digit drops.

The trade surplus fell 45% from August 2008 to $15.7bn, but was up from July.

Recent signs that recession has ended in some major economies, including China's major trading partner Japan, suggest that exports may pick up again.

But separately, Japan's economy grew 0.6% in the third quarter from the previous three months, less than the 0.9% originally estimated.

This was due to fewer private-sector inventories than previously estimated, Japan's finance ministry said.

Japan is the world's second-largest economy.

'Not yet steady'

The Chinese export figures were worse than expected by economists.
So far this year, China's total trade with the US fell 16.4% and its trade with Japan fell 22%.

Trade with the European Union dropped nearly 21%, the government said.

"The stabilisation and recovery of the Chinese economy is not yet steady, solid and balanced," Premier Wen Jiabao said on Thursday.

"Some of the stimulus measures will see their effect wane, and it will take time before those long-term policies show effect."

China, which is targeting 8% economic growth this year after 10% annual growth over the past few years, has relied on its $586bn stimulus plan to boost spending this year.

news20090911bbc2

[One-Minute World News] from [BBC NEWS]

[Asia-Pacific]
Page last updated at 04:51 GMT, Friday, 11 September 2009 05:51 UK
Nine held over Xinjiang syringes
Nine suspects have been arrested for the recent syringe attacks in Xinjiang, China's official news agency, Xinhua, and the China Daily have reported.

The attacks have panicked communities already tense due to conflict between the Han and Uighur ethnic communities.

Last week, tens of thousands of people rallied in the Xinjiang capital, Urumqi demanding action to end the attacks.

The Chinese government has been struggling to restore calm to Xinjiang since major riots in July.

The beating of Hong Kong journalists covering recent events in Xinjiang has also sparked conflict with the former British colony, now a special autonomous zone in China.

Officials in Hong Kong have said they cannot do much to protect Hong Kong people in China, but politicians and press freedom watchdogs plan a Sunday march to defend against Chinese state controls.

Mystery

The latest arrests follow reports earlier in the week that the authorities had identified 45 suspects behind the attacks - it is unclear how many of these are actually in detention or face formal charges.

The source and scale of the recent attacks by hypodermic needle also remain unclear - so far none of the reported victims of the attacks have suffered poisoning or other effects.

The syringe attacks have provoked more panic than actual injuries, according to reports from hospitals where people have appeared claiming attacks but carrying no sign of injury.

{Police moved to contain the protesters in Urumqi on Thursday｝

Police are offering a 5,000 yuan ($735) reward for information about the attacks, Hotan police said. The nine suspects were caught in the Hotan, Altay and Kashgar districts.

Of nine reported attacks in Hotan, three were actually pricked, while in Altay, four of five reported attacks were false alarms and in Kashgar, three of five were false alarms, the China Daily said, citing local officials.

The attacks, which have targeted innocent people, are believed to have been orchestrated in a bid to scare residents and create further unrest, said Du Xintao, an official with the regional public security department.

"The attacks are terror attacks," Mr Du said, in remarks quoted by the China Daily.

Ethnic tension

By last Friday, Urumqi health and police authorities had confirmed 531 people had been stabbed by hypodermic syringes in the city, 171 of the victims showed obvious signs of the attacks, the paper said.

The majority of the victims were from the Han ethnic group. Others were from ethnic groups including Uygur, Hui and Kazak.

The tension between Xinjiang's Uighur and Han communities has been simmering for many years, but the ethnic unrest in July was the worst in China for decades.

The violence began on 5 July when an initially peaceful protest by Uighur youths, apparently prompted by an earlier riot in a factory in southern China, spiralled out of control - with shops and vehicles burned and passers-by attacked.

About 80 people have been charged over the violence but no date has been set for their trial.

[Science & Environment]
Page last updated at 17:04 GMT, Thursday, 10 September 2009 18:04 UK
Japan's space freighter in orbit
Japan has successfully launched its new space freighter from the Tanegashima base in the south of the country.
By Jonathan Amos
Science reporter, BBC News

The 16.5-tonne unmanned H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) is on a mission to re-supply the space station.

Its role is vitally important to the station project, which is set to lose the servicing capability of the US shuttle fleet next year.

The freighter left Earth atop an H-IIB rocket at 0201 local time on Friday (1701 GMT, Thursday).

Separation from the rocket's upper-stage was confirmed some 15 minutes later.

The HTV mission is being directed by engineers in Tsukuba, Japan, and at the US space agency's (Nasa) mission control in Houston.

The vehicle must conduct a number of tests of its navigation and rendezvous systems before making a close approach to the International Space Station (ISS).

Docking is not expected to take place until at least day eight of the mission.

The freighter is carrying about 4.5 tonnes of cargo on this maiden flight. It has the capacity to carry six tonnes.

Over the next few years, the HTV, and the other robotic re-supply ships like it, will be central to the operation of a fully crewed, fully functional ISS.

"This HTV-1 vehicle is a demonstration flight to verify its functionality and performance," said Masazumi Miyake, one of the Japanese space agency's (Jaxa) senior officials in the US.

"After completion of this mission we are planning to launch one operational HTV per year on average."

Grab and dock

The flight to orbit marked the first time Jaxa had used the H-IIB rocket, a beefed up version of the existing H-11A launcher.

The rocket incorporates additional solid-fuel boosters and a second main engine on its core stage to achieve significant extra thrust.

Unlike all previous spacecraft to visit the International Space Station (ISS), the HTV will not drive all the way into the orbiting platform.

Instead, the Japanese ship will simply park itself under the bow of the ISS to allow the station's robotic arm to grab it.

The vessel will then be locked into an Earth-facing docking port on the Harmony (Node 2) connecting module.

Safety will be the primary concern for the ISS astronauts. The robotic vessel will be monitored constantly to see that it is behaving as expected.

"[The astronauts] can command the vehicle to abort, to retreat or to hold. They can also command the grapple fixture to separate in case there is a failed capture," said Dana Weigel, a US space agency (Nasa) flight director for the mission.

The HTV will remain attached to the ISS for about six weeks while its supplies are unloaded.

In addition to the cargo (3.6t) carried in its pressurised compartment (accessed from inside the ISS), the ship has important cargo (900kg) mounted on a pallet in an unpressurised compartment.

These exterior supplies include two new Earth-observation experiments for the exposed "terrace" of instruments that sits outside Japan's Kibo science module.

Again, astronauts will use the station arm to remove the pallet before handing it across to the Kibo arm, which will then position the new experiments.

As the freighter's supplies are used up, the ship will be filled with station rubbish. Ultimately, it will undock from the ISS and take itself into a destructive dive through the atmosphere somewhere over the south Pacific.

When the US shuttles retire at the end of next year or the beginning of 2011, the ISS project will become dependent on five robotic freighters for its logistics:

• The Russian Progress and European ATV have already demonstrated their flight capability. Four more ATVs have been booked to fly to the station, one a year starting in 2010.

• After the first HTV mission, Japan plans a further six flights through to 2015.

• Two commercial US suppliers, SpaceX and Orbital Sciences, are in the process of developing their Dragon and Cygnus supply ships. The first of these is scheduled to deliver supplies to the ISS no earlier than the end of 2010.

HTV and Dragon are particularly important because of their ability to deliver larger items in their unpressurised compartments that would not normally fit through the docking port of a pressurised compartment.

{Length: 9.8m; Diameter: 4.4m; Vehicle Mass: 10.5t; Max cargo: 6t
Pressurised cargo: Food, clothing, water, laptops, science equipment, etc
External cargo: Equipment to study Earth's oceans and the atmosphere
First unmanned vehicle to deliver both pressurised and unpressurised cargo}