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Elves and Sprites
Upper atmospheric lightning or upper atmospheric discharge are terms sometimes
used by researchers to refer to a family of electrical breakdown phenomena that occur well
above the altitudes of normal lightning. The preferred current usage is transient luminous
events (TLEs) to refer to the various types of electrical discharge phenomena in the upper
atmosphere, because they lack several characteristics of the more familiar lower
atmospheric lightning. TLEs include red sprites, sprite halos, blue jets, gigantic jets,
and elves.
UN scientist: Eat less meat to tackle climate change
Rajendra Pachauri, the chair of the UN-run Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has said that eating less meat is a good way to reduce damage to the climate.
Solar: the sky is the limit
This week’s record-breaking night flight by the Solar Impulse aircraft has been
widely acclaimed, but few of us are ever likely to fly in such a plane.
Solar thermal seeks U.S. breakthrough
Solar thermal power could be close to a breakthrough in the U.S. market, but only if developers can shave costs to beat back competition from photovoltaic solar systems and attract the huge sums needed to finance the renewable energy plants
G8 leaders set new emissions target
he leaders of the Group of Eight (G8) countries are meeting in L'Aquila, Italy, from July 8 to July 11. On Wednesday, the group announced that it had agreed to a cut in carbon emissions.