Recycling 101

More and more places are accepting all sorts of items for recycling these days, but how do you know what to recycle and where to take it. Most local authorities have guidelines to help you and most will have a website detailing what is accepted and what isn't.

Here in Yale College in the LRCs at Grove Park and Bersham Road you can recycle paper, batteries, plastic, CDs, and DVDs. You can easily locate these by the specially marked containers.

The website RecycleNow! lets you enter your postcode and it will show you what recycling centres or other options are available to you.

Freecycle lets you post items you don't want and links you up with people who do want your items. A recycling swap shop.

Food waste is another big area for improvement and we are all being encouraged to compost organic material. A great site for composting tips and more is WigglyWigglers.

Owls replace pesticides in Israel

Owls and kestrels are being employed as agricultural pest controllers in the Middle East.
Many farmers are installing nest boxes to encourage the birds, which hunt the crop-damaging rodents.
In Israel, where there is a drive to reduce the use of toxic chemical pesticides, this has been turned into a government-funded national programme.
Scientists and conservation charities from Jordan and Palestine have joined the scheme. To read this story in full visit http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8004426.stm

New Sea Creature to Harness the Power of the Seas

A new wave energy device known as "Anaconda" is the latest idea to harness the power of the seas.
Its inventors claim the key to its success lies in its simplicity: Anaconda is little more than a length of rubber tubing filled with water.
Waves in the water create bulges along the tubing that travel along its length gathering energy.
At the end of the tube, the surge of energy drives a turbine and generates electricity.
The device is being developed by Checkmate Seaenergy Ltd, which has been testing a small-scale 8m-long prototype in a wave tank in Gosport, Hampshire, owned by the science and technology company Qinetiq.
Paul Auston, chairman of Checkmate, says the tests have proved the concept works.
The company is now looking to raise £7m from investors to build a larger version to test at sea.
"We've seen excellent results in scale-model testing, and now we are gearing up to attract the necessary investment to develop Anaconda and begin producing the first full-sized units for ocean testing within the next three years," he told BBC News.
"The UK is known for its engineering excellence and politicians from all parties have been keen to challenge companies to come up with renewable energy projects that can be sold around the world.
"With Anaconda, we have an invention that changes conventional thinking and it can help to meet government targets for cutting CO2 by providing renewable wave energy from our coastal waters.
"It will also help cement the UK's world-leading position in this technology."
For the full story visit BBC Environment. or The Guardian Enviroment.