Solar takes to the hills at outdoor retailer show - Portable Phone Battery Charger Manufacturer

Recently I had the opportunity to go to the Outdoor Retailer Summershow in Salt Lake City, Utah, where manufacturers of all thingsoutdoor, from gizmos and gadgets to potentially life-savingdevices, show off their current and future wares. Of the more than1,000 exhibitors, a number were solar manufacturers and wholesalerslooking to meet the needs of outdoor adventurers with portable solar-powered products . I had a chance to talk with a few of the companies to learn moreabout how they anticipate meeting people"s needs with theirproducts. Some of these products are already available now; somewon"t be available until later this year or next. The manufacturers touted all sorts of photovoltaic doodads,including everything from the whimsical PV lightup lawn turtle torollable PV Portable Phone Battery Charger capable of running a laptop.

While some Portable Phone Battery Charger can be directly connected to devices, others includebatteries and inverters allowing for more flexibility and forhelping power devices when there"s no sun. There was even aPV UFO (I didn"t get to take a ride in it though.) One company, PowerFilm, Inc. showed off a variety of its thin-film PV panels , most of which are rollable or foldable and have been used by themilitary. The company also sells its modules to other companieslike Brunton, which rebrands and sells PowerFilm PV devices.

At theshow, I had a chance to pick them up. They"re amazingly lightand feel rugged. Some were covered in flexible plastic, making themrollable, while others were attached to fabric making themfoldable. These are the type of panels that would be ideal to integrate intoa hiker"s backpack, while adding little weight and a lot ofopportunities for keeping your devices going.

PowerFilm VicePresident of Manufacturing Steve Martens told me the company hastalked with many pack manufacturers about incorporating theirmodules into backpacks. A British-based company, Mango International, had a number ofuseful PV products for the outdoors. They were showing off theirpowertraveller line of PV products and power storage devices. Amongthem, the powermonkey-explorer has a ruggedized clam-shell siliconPV panel attached to a dedicated battery backup.

It can be used tocharge devices like iPods, cell phones, and more. The company alsooffers the solargorilla PV, a larger ruggedized clam-shell PVmodule, which can be used to power a laptop. Solarrific, a New York-based company, had a plethora of PV-powereddevices ranging from PV-Portable Phone Battery Charger for batteries (great for keepingyour power hungry camera"s extra batteries charged), cellphones and car battery Portable Phone Battery Charger to the more whimsical, like theaforementioned PV-powered lawn turtle. I talked with Solarrificpresident Grace King, who told me most the company"s productsare produced in China.
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Election polling station 'errors' raise troubling questions - China Outdoor Led Floodlight Bulbs

For Borys Wrzesnewskyj, the 2011 election story is not aboutrobo-calls. The former Liberal MP for Etobicoke Centre suspects hewas robbed, but not by Pierre Poutine and his disposable cellphone. Rather, he thinks he may have been doomed by a lax application ofthe rules governing who may vote and where. Citing 181 dubiousvotes, Wrzesnewskyj is suing for another chance to win the ridinghe lost, by just 26 votes, to Conservative Ted Opitz.

That there were mistakes is not in doubt. But, for ElectionsCanada, "clerical errors" should not mean that voters aredisenfranchised or an election overturned. For the court, thequestion is whether such errors affected the result. To date, the Etobicoke case has revealed a tangled tale of sloppypaperwork, some of which is ascribed to a natural instinct on thepart of Elections Canada officials to facilitate voting, ratherthan to obstruct it with red tape.

Former Liberal MP Borys Wrzesnewskyj was defeated by ConservativeTed Optiz by 26 votes in Etobicoke Centre. He has gone to court inan attempt to overturn the result. (CBC) But, still: a whole range of problems has turned up which seem topush the boundaries of what's normal. Did some voters vote twice? It seems possible. Did some vote in thewrong riding? Again, it's possible. Led High Bay Lamps

Were there some who do live inthe riding but voted in the wrong polling station? That's possible,too. Did they also vote in the right one? Not impossible. And what about voters whose proof of eligibility can't be found? Ifthey forgot to bring their ID, did someone else vouch for them and, if so, who? Where are the records? If there are no records,how do we know that nobody vouched for more than one person which they're not allowed to do? And, even if they just vouchedonce, how do we know they're eligible? To date, nobody's proved or even alleged anything butinnocent mistakes. But, at some point, Wrzesnewskyj believes,mistakes may be too numerous for the election to be credible. China Outdoor Led Floodlight Bulbs

AndPart 20 of the Canada Elections Act allows challenges in cases of"irregularities, fraud, corrupt or illegal practices that affectedthe results." "This isn't a Liberal or a Conservative issue. This is an issuethat touches everyone," argued Wrzesnewskyj's lawyer, Gavin Tighe."If people have no confidence in the process, it's pretty doubtfulthey re going to participate." David Di Paolo, a lawyer for the chief electoral officer, MarcMayrand, responded that "administrative and clerical errors inelections will be common and, indeed, inevitable and it isessential that only those consequential to the result be used tooverturn an election." Are 'special ballots' really special? Then there's the thorny subject of "special ballots." Such ballotsare available to people who can't get to the polls, either onelection day or at the advance polls. They can apply for one ifthey prove they're on the voters' list or, if they're not on thelist, they can prove they're eligible. In each case, they have tofill out a form correctly. Led Tunnel Light Manufacturer

But what if they don't and get to vote anyway? In the nearby riding of Eglinton Lawrence, these issues contributeto a continuing unease about the 2011 election. This time, theLiberal who lost, Joe Volpe, has not taken the case to court andit wasn't really close, in any case. Conservative Joe Oliver wonhandily, by more than 4,000 votes. Even so, Eglinton Lawrence presents its own set of questions.

At least 2,700 applications by unregistered voters to get on thevoters list were approved by an elections official inEglinton-Lawrence in the last election. Many failed to provide theaddress information Elections Canada requires. (CBC) For one thing, Eglinton Lawrence was plagued with bogus phonecalls. During the campaign, the Volpe team complained to ElectionsCanada about repeated calls, purporting to be from the Liberals,pestering Jewish voters on the Sabbath.

This, Volpe said at thetime, was "a classic vote suppression technique," designed toantagonise Liberal supporters. Elections Canada responded that ithad no jurisdiction to investigate where there was no evidence of"false pretence." The Liberals insist there was. In addition, on election day, Elections Canada workers reporteddozens of complaints from voters who had been told, wrongly, thattheir polling place had been changed. That sounds very much likethe "misdirection" calls that were reported from all over thecountry targeting voters who had revealed they did not plan tovote Conservative. After the election, though, the question of special ballots took ona life of its own in Eglinton Lawrence.

It emerged that anunusually high number of special ballots as many as 2,700 hadbeen applied for and granted. That could reflect a strongget-out-the-vote effort by all parties in a heated contest butthe effort by supporters of Joe Oliver stood out. 'Harper stands for us' In particular, the Liberals point to an "open letter to thecommunity" by a Jewish group called "Gesher," meaning bridge. Theletter urged readers to vote for Oliver and to make sure theirfamilies and friends did the same. "Harper stands for us, we must stand for him," the flyer says."Every vote counts." The Gesher letter notes that many families would be visiting forPassover at the time of the election and adds, "Canadian citizenswho live in other countries can vote in this election.

Pleaseensure that family members visiting for Yom Tov (Passover) go tovote." The flyer was correct up to a point: non-resident citizens can voteif they have been away from Canada for less than five years andintend to return. And many residents, too, could vote by specialballot if they planned to be away when the voting began. In the end, many hundreds of Jewish voters and hundreds ofothers did obtain special ballots in Eglinton Lawrence. We don'tknow how they voted. But we do know that the paperwork was notexactly meticulous.

CBC News has examined more than a thousand of the forms filled into register and to obtain special ballots in Eglinton Lawrenceduring the 2011 election. Of those, only a few seem to be filledout completely and correctly, according to the rules laid out byElections Canada in its "Special Ballot Coordinator's Manual." These specify, for example that a residential address, not merely amailing address, is essential. The application form must be "fullyand accurately completed," the manual says, and ID must be checkedin every case. Even so, hundreds of the special ballot forms are incomplete. Someshow no residential address, or no address at all.

Many also saythe voter is not on the voters list. In at least 150 cases, thereis no residential address on forms which also fail to show whetherthe voters are on the list or say they're not. Others give nodate of birth which is not optional, under the rules or givean address which turns out to be problematic. One gives the addressof a UPS store on Eglinton Avenue.

Nobody lives there. In a couple of cases, there is no address of any kind mailing,residential or previous. On each of those, the applicant also saysthey're not on the voters list. But all of them were approved, asshown by the "signature of authorized officer" on the bottom line.

What to make of these? Basically, we just have to hope that theballot officer checked every voter's ID and didn't bother aboutwhether the form was properly completed. Perhaps there was aline-up and the officer wanted to move things along. But how didthey check the ID to see if it matched an address which ... was notprovided? What's clear is that Elections Canada staff were definitely notobstructing the vote with red tape.

How can Elections Canada investigate if nobody hands over theevidence? None of this proves that the Liberals were robbed, either inEglinton Lawrence or Etobicoke Centre. Even if they were, theproblem is bureaucratic sloppiness, not chicanery by their rivals.However, not surprisingly, Elections Canada officials seem muchkeener to investigate issues like robocalls where no-one'sblaming Elections Canada than their own mistakes. Appearing before a parliamentary committee, Chief Electoral OfficerMarc Mayrand, objected to "sweeping and vague allegations ofirregularities being made public many months after the election andnot supported by specific facts." Mayrand added that, "In some cases, the complaints are made to themedia without any information being forwarded to Elections Canada.Such allegations cannot be verified." He was referring in part, hesaid, to the case of Eglinton Lawrence, noting that "no specificactionable information has been provided to us, making any kind ofreview challenging, to say the least." What is striking about these comments is that, in truth, gettingthe evidence was not challenging at all. That's because the specialballot forms were all provided to Elections Canada, by its ownofficials, immediately after the election.

The same is true inevery riding. By definition, all those forms belong to ElectionsCanada, and have been in its possession ever since. Equally striking is that, in the next breath, Mayrand testifiedthat he had, in fact, reviewed the very forms which, supposedly,had not been provided by the irresponsible authors of theunverifiable allegations. "To be diligent," he went on, "we examined all 1,275 of theseforms, and, with the exception of three voters who were listed at acommercial address, could not find any evidence of irregularitiesas claimed." Presumably, this means that missing addresses or dates of birth, onapplications by people who say they are not on the voters list,don't qualify as "irregularities." In which case, errors are notonly "common" and "inevitable," but uncounted.

Of course, Mayrand also noted that the robocall scandal is far moreserious. "Outrageous," he called it and who could argue? Bycomparison, even hundreds of incomplete special ballot forms don'tstack up. Then again, they do stack up a little too high for comfort. In acountry where you don't even have to prove citizenship to be handeda ballot, it couldn't hurt to make sure that voters at leastprovide an address.

2 u.s. citizens, 2 ethnicities, 2 accounts of jail treatment - China Glass Baby Feeding Bottles

Jovana Renteria and Jessica Davenport are both Americans born inthe United States. But Renteria is Hispanic and Davenport is not. The two womenbelieve that explains why Renteria's identity and citizenship werescrutinized more closely than Davenport's following their arrestsApril 25 on suspicion of blocking Central Avenue during a protestof Arizona's controversial immigration law, Senate Bill 1070. SB 1070 protest in Phoenix The circumstances of their arrests were identical.

Both decidedbeforehand to get arrested in an act of civil disobedience. Bothwere sitting on the pavement and refused to move when ordered bythe police. And both intentionally carried no form ofidentification. Yet their accounts of the 18 hours they spent in custody beforebeing released the next day suggest Phoenix police officers andImmigration and Customs Enforcement officers took extra steps toverify Renteria's identity and citizenship, but were quick toaccept that Davenport, an Arizona State University student withfair skin and blond hair, was an American.

Phoenix police and ICE officials say ethnicity plays no role in theway prisoners are booked or screened at the jail. The disparate treatment described by the two women, however,highlights one of the main legal arguments of opponents of SB 1070:that the law violates the Constitution by leading -- without anyother influencing factors -- to heightened scrutiny of Latinos,including those who are U.S. citizens and legal immigrants, bypolice officers trying to identify people in the country illegally. It also provides a possible glimpse at what could happen on alarger scale should the U.S. Supreme Court uphold all or parts ofthe law when it rules in late June. Perfume Packaging Box

"This seems to me to be the logical consequence of SB 1070, whichpretty clearly was aimed at the unauthorized immigration populationfrom a particular country," said Gabriel "Jack" Chin, a Universityof California-Davis School of Law professor who studied SB 1070while teaching at the University of Arizona. "SB 1070 was in somefundamental way about Mexican immigration and so it's certainly notsurprising that law-enforcement agencies responsible for enforcingSB 1070 would focus on the population it was meant to deal with." Renteria, 32, is a community activist for Puente, a Phoenix-basedgroup that advocates for immigrants. She was born in Phoenix and identifies herself as third-generationChicana. Her great-grandparents came from Mexico and Spain. China Glass Baby Feeding Bottles

At thePhoenix Police Department's central-booking facility, she said shegave officers her name and date of birth, as requested. But sinceshe wasn't carrying any identification, officers took her into aroom and electronically scanned her thumbprints before placing herin a cell while they apparently tried to verify her identity. At one point, Renteria said, she heard the officers say herthumbprints had come up "negative" and they were going to book herunder the name "Jane Doe." "They wanted to book me under Jane Doe when I actually gave them my(first) name, my last name and my birth date," Renteria said. Renteria said she thought that it was odd that she did not show upin the system because she used to work in the pharmaceuticalindustry and had provided her fingerprints in the past for abackground check. After being fingerprinted again, Renteria said, she waited morethan two hours in the cell until she was finally transferred to theFourth Avenue Jail in downtown Phoenix. China Foldable Water Bottle

Police handed her an arrest report showing her name, date of birthand her charges. At the Fourth Avenue Jail, Renteria said, federalImmigration and Customs Enforcement officers asked her where shewas born along with the first three numbers of her Social Securitynumber. Renteria said she refused to answer out of protest. "I believed they should not be in the county jail, anyways, so Irefused to give that information," Renteria said. Besides, she said, she had shown them the arrest record with hername and Social Security number.

Meanwhile, Davenport was also being processed by police. LikeRenteria, the 20-year-old, who was born in Mesa and is mostly ofIrish and English descent, was not carrying ID when she wasarrested. But her booking went more smoothly. She said Phoenix police didn't scan her thumbprints and neverplaced her in a cell.

She said Phoenix police simply verified heridentity by radioing for her driver's license number after sheprovided her name, date of birth and other personal information asrequested. At the Fourth Avenue Jail, Davenport said she was prepared to tellICE officers she was born in Mesa after hearing them ask some ofthe Hispanic protesters where they were born. But she said the ICEofficers never asked her that question. "They were calling us up one by one, and they asked me for my nameand the last four digits of my Social, and I was never asked whatcity I was born in," Davenport said. Standard police protocol Officer James Holmes, a spokesman for the Phoenix PoliceDepartment, said officers follow a standard protocol when bookingsuspects who have been arrested.

They do not discriminate orprofile based on race or ethnicity, he said. He said that during booking, suspects are asked where they wereborn. If they answer somewhere outside the U.S., they are asked ifthey are a U.S. citizen. "We ask that of everybody.

It doesn't matter if you are Hispanic,Black, White," Holmes said. "It doesn't make any difference. It's astandard question that's on our booking form." Holmes said police conduct thumbprint screenings when suspectsarrive without identification and police can't verify theiridentity. The prints are run through a nationwide database system. "The thumbprint goes through the fingerprint database to see if wehave ever had any contact with you or whether you have ever beenimprinted before," he said.

Holmes could not explain why Davenport's thumbprints were notscanned since she was not carrying an ID. "They should have," he said. But he said in cases where police are able to verify a suspect'sidentity by looking up their driver's license number, "then thereis no need" to conduct a thumbprint check. He said any differences in the way the protesters were treateddepended on their individual circumstances and the answers theygave, not their ethnicity.

"They were treated according to their arrests," Holmes said. "Itall depends on the circumstances of their arrest, the informationthey provided and their identification." He could not explain why Renteria was held for several hours inpolice custody, but he said verifying a prisoner's identitysometimes takes time. Amber Cargile, a spokeswoman for Immigration and CustomsEnforcement, would not agree to an interview. She issued a written statement that said all suspects booked intothe jail are screened by ICE officers regardless of their race,ethnicity or language as part of the federal Criminal AlienProgram, which is designed to identify and deport immigrants whopose a public threat.

"The questions posed during the screening may include where theindividual was born and their country of citizenship," thestatement said. ICE officers at the jail question suspects to determine theircitizenship and whether they should be held for possibleimmigration enforcement later, she said. She said the protesters arrested during the April 25 demonstrationwere screened by ICE officers, who determined they were U.S.citizens, she said. Protesters' experiences vary Renteria and Davenport were part of a group of six protesters whomade plans to be arrested the same day the Supreme Court heardarguments in a federal lawsuit against Senate Bill 1070, most ofwhich has been put on hold by two lower courts. Renteria was among four Hispanics arrested.

The others also are allU.S. citizens born in this country: Sandra Castro Solis, 24, ofPhoenix; Danielle Nieto, 31, of Tempe; and Tony Verdugo, 22, ofTempe. Verdugo, an ASU student who carried his U.S. passport, wasthe only one of the four with identification.

According to their accounts, some of the other Hispanics arrestedalso experienced increased scrutiny by police and Immigration andCustoms Enforcement officers, though to a lesser extent thanRenteria. All of the Hispanics said they had their thumbprints scanned sothat police could verify their identity, including Verdugo, eventhough he was carrying his passport. Davenport was one of two non-Hispanics protesters arrested. Theother was Amy McMullen, 52, of Gold Canyon. McMullen had herArizona driver's license on her when she was arrested.

Davenport and McMullen described other instances where policeappeared to give them more favorable treatment than the Hispanicmembers of the group. After they were arrested and placed in a van, they said policeofficers repeatedly addressed Davenport and McMullen first beforetalking to the others. Facing misdemeanor counts On Thursday, the six protesters had their first hearing in PhoenixMunicipal Court. They were among hundreds who marched through downtown beforeunfurling a large anti-SB 1070 banner in the middle of CentralAvenue and blocking Phoenix's largest thoroughfare for half an hourduring rush hour in front of a Homeland Security Building thathouses ICE's immigration detention center. The six protesters were charged with misdemeanor counts ofdisorderly conduct-fighting and blocking a public street.

The caseshave been continued to June 13. Prosecutors are offering to drop the more severe disorderly-conductcharge if the protesters plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge ofobstructing a public street and agree to a sentence of 12 monthsprobation and 1 day in jail, which they have already served.

For medication disposal, new advice is trash beats take-back - Vertical Pressure Leaf Filters

Returning extra medicine to the pharmacy for disposal might not beworth the extra time, money or greenhouse gas emissions, accordingto a University of Michigan study that is the first to look at thenet effects of so-called take-back programs. The new evidence suggests that discarding unused drugs in the trashis a better option to limit the risk of poisoning and at the sametime curb pollution of both water and air. To arrive at this conclusion, the researchers compared the totalemissions created by take-back, trash and toilet disposal methods.This included emissions of pharmaceutical active ingredients aswell as releases of other water and air pollutants. "National policy seems to be changing to support take-backprograms, and we don't know if that's justified," said Sherri Cook,a doctoral student in the U-M Department of Civil and EnvironmentalEngineering.

Cook is first author of a paper on the findingspublished in Environmental Science & Technology. U.S. households accumulate an estimated 200 million pounds ofunused pharmaceuticals every year, the researchers say. In mostcases today, the FDA recommends throwing them away, but only if youdon't have access to a take-back program. Cities, states and evensome stores have initiated them.

From collection sites, thereturned drugs are transferred to another facility where they'reincinerated as hazardous waste. Health officials caution that unused pills should be out of thehouse as soon as possible to prevent poisoning and drug abuse byother family members. But that need must be balanced with pollutioncontrol, both for human health and environmental reasons. Flushingunused pills down the toilet is no longer advised, as the activeingredients in drugs have been found in drinking water and aquaticenvironments. Candle Filter Purification

The new study found: If half of people threw away unused medications and half took themback to the drug store, the amount of active pharmaceuticalingredients in the environment would be reduced by 93 percentcompared with today. If everyone trashed their extra drugs, those amounts would bereduced by 88 percent. That 5 percent improvement in pharmaceutical emission reduction dueto take-back programs would come at a significant cost, possiblymore than a billion dollars annually, along with a 300 percentincrease in other emissions such as greenhouse gases andsmog-forming substances. "Nobody has ever added up all the emissions associated withdisposing of medication," said Steve Skerlos, a professor in thedepartments of Mechanical Engineering and Civil and EnvironmentalEngineering and a co-author of the study. Vertical Pressure Leaf Filters

"When you look at theavailable evidence to support take-back, it just doesn't add up." The researchers focused on a 50 percent take-back compliance ratebased on actual practice in Sweden, which has had a nationaltake-back program for 40 years. The compliance rate there is just43 percent. Drugs that aren't returned tend to stay in the medicinecabinet, defeating the goal of getting unused medications out ofthe home quickly, the researchers say. The U-M researchers considered a wide range of factors, includinghow often people would return medication, how far they live fromtake-back sites, how rainfall might affect landfill leachateleaking into groundwater, and what percentage of residents could beexpected to comply. Horizontal Pressure Leaf Filter

The results surprised the team. "We didn't expect that landfilling would be the best option,because when you incinerate something, it's gone, and when it's ina landfill, it can remain for some time," said Nancy Love, aprofessor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineeringand a co-author of the study. "However, once we considered all theenvironmental emissions for the three options, the results madesense." The researchers encourage policymakers to focus on getting morepeople to get rid of medicines by trash, rather than take-back. "Trashing unused medications reduces the consumer's inconveniencerelative to take-back, and if there is a clear message perhaps wecould increase the percentage of people putting them in the trash,"Cook said. Currently, about 60 percent of people already use trash disposal,while 40 percent of people still flush unused medication down thetoilet.

When discarding pills in the trash, the FDA recommends mixing themwith an unpalatable substance such as coffee grounds in a plasticbag. This helps to deter would-be abusers from picking them out ofthe garbage. Additional References Citations.

Foster the people gibson amphitheatre - Stage Led Screens - Led Traffic Signals

This past weekend, LA natives-turned-superstars Foster The People played two sold-out shows in LA, much to the delight of the over12,000 devout fans who showed up to support their hometown heroes.Since releasing their 2011 debut album, Torches , the indie rock trio has risen to international fame with theiruniversally appealing, atmospheric, synth-heavy pop, and theybrought every impressive element of an arena-sized show to theGibson this weekend, showing SoCal fans that no matter how bigFoster the People may get, they'll always put on one heck ofa homecoming show. Opting to have opening acts as uniquely entertaining as them,Foster The People was joined by comedic magician opener Justin Willman followed by New Zealand artist Kimbra , who broke into the American market with her guest vocals onGotye's "Somebody that I Used To Know." Thepetite powerhouse came onstage in a tie-dyed poncho and performed athirty-minute set of tracks off her debut album, Vows . As she sang "Open Up Your Heart," she emotionallyreached out as if grabbing the sky-high notes. She also performedan impressive cover of Nina Simone's "Plain GoldRing" before launching into her own inventive track"Love Is A Two Way Street." The animated artist blewthe roof off the amphitheater with "Settle Down,"belting scales so high she reminded me of soulful English singerJessie J. Keep an eye on this girl