Newcastle wind turbine project shelved - FT.com

A project to build the world’s largest wind turbine blade in Newcastle has been shelved.

Clipper Windpower, a Californian company, was to have developed and built the blade for the Crown Estate’s Britannia Project, a 10-megawatt offshore turbine prototype.

The plant, which had been expected to ultimately employ 500 people, was hailed at the groundbreaking in February 2010 by Gordon Brown, then prime minister, as a sign of UK aspiration to become a world leader in offshore wind.

BBC News - Cloud simulator tests climate models

According to Professor Lockwood, it is very unlikely that variations in cosmic rays have played a significant role in recent warming.

"The result that will get climate change sceptics excited is that they have found that through the influence of sulphuric acid, ionisation can enhance the rate of water droplet growth. Does this mean that cosmic rays can produce cloud? No," he told BBC News.

Study links El Nino climate to civil wars, unrest - Forbes.com

WASHINGTON -- Scientists have found another thing to blame on the climate demon El Nino: civil strife in poor tropical countries.

A new study released Wednesday finds a significant increase in unrest during the years of an El Nino, which is a regular climatic event that tends to warm up and dry out tropical regions.

"When people get warm and uncomfortable, they get irritable, they are more prone to fight," said Mark Cane, a professor of Earth and climate sciences at Columbia University and co-author of the study.

"People do like to fight and El Nino conditions help."

Flashback: Baltimore Crime Beat: DC: Summer homicides down 44 percent

searing heat may drive people indoors, and even dull the ardor to keep cycles of revenge killings going