Friday, 30 January 2009
Kakarigeiko
Tonight's training Andrea senpai had us focus on how to practice kakarigeiko (かかり稽古）, which translates into something like 'continous hitting'. This practice has many benefits as it quickens your reflexes and ultimately helps you strike a target immediately as it opens, automatically without thinking.
It's one of those exercises where you dread it the second before the first strike, but once you're in the action it's quite an exhilarating feeling of release and freedom. I've never been too good at it myself but today I think I've made a breakthrough.
I've always strived to be faster (with good form) but today I realised that a mindful kakarigeiko is superior to one that is fast but ignorant. Though the hits may be continuous and at a thousand miles an hour, there is always a 'split' second where you can anticipate, adjust distance and think about which strike to use. By mindfully applying that 'split' second, your strikes become more meaningful, and communication between the kendoka is created. This is where good players develop their timing.
But yah, I still want to be as fast as these guys here!
It's one of those exercises where you dread it the second before the first strike, but once you're in the action it's quite an exhilarating feeling of release and freedom. I've never been too good at it myself but today I think I've made a breakthrough.
I've always strived to be faster (with good form) but today I realised that a mindful kakarigeiko is superior to one that is fast but ignorant. Though the hits may be continuous and at a thousand miles an hour, there is always a 'split' second where you can anticipate, adjust distance and think about which strike to use. By mindfully applying that 'split' second, your strikes become more meaningful, and communication between the kendoka is created. This is where good players develop their timing.
But yah, I still want to be as fast as these guys here!
Thursday, 29 January 2009
Windy day
Quite a packed day, but nothing overly exciting.
Probably the highlight was a visiting talk by the Vice President Jakob Larsen of Vestas, the world's leader and largest manufactuer of wind turbines for wind power electricity generation. It's interesting the way Scandanavians operate, compared to Brits. Serious, staid, zero humour, ruthless efficiency. I imagined myself making a big mistake to have Jakob bashing me over my head shouting "jaaaaaaaa". Maybe that's going too far.
But it's amazing the record so far for Vestas. There turning over some 4 billion EUROs a year, have installed 35000 wind turbines worldwide currently with sales of 4000 megawatts (4 gigawatts) in 2007. They've increased the efficiency of their wind turbines 100 times in 15 years and are aiming to install HALF of what they've installed in their entire history every year for the next 10 years. This amibitious target is being brought about by EU's target of 20% renewables by 2020, strong potential in China and the positive signals of the Obama regime.
He pitched it so well that I even thought of buying some Vestas shares. Indeed, if the politicans follow up with their rhetoric and a global deal at Copenhagen is agreed, Vestas will be one of the biggest winners.
There are some difficult challenges that remain though, with the intermittency of the wind the major drawback. Firstly technologies will need to be developed to store electricity that is generated for times when the wind is not blowing. Secondly, an integrated grid infrastructure is needed to support and complement wind with other electricity generators. The example Jakob gave was that in Denmark, approximately 23% of electricity generation is from wind. However when wind speeds pick up, other power plants are shut and Denmark can be 100% wind. Any surplus can also be sold to Norway or Sweden through integrated grids. When wind speeds are low, Denmark purchases surplus hydro generated electricity from Norway. Such an arrangement sounds so logical and more importantly works.
The positive outlook for Vestas may be the reason why they've sent a delagation to the sombre World Economic Forum, where Russia and China are blaming and bashing the US for global economic woes. It's pretty scary when the IMF projects that globally 55 million jobs will be lost....am I gonna be one of them? But maybe there will be light at the end of the tunnel for cleantech, it seems.
Well I certaintly hope so.
Probably the highlight was a visiting talk by the Vice President Jakob Larsen of Vestas, the world's leader and largest manufactuer of wind turbines for wind power electricity generation. It's interesting the way Scandanavians operate, compared to Brits. Serious, staid, zero humour, ruthless efficiency. I imagined myself making a big mistake to have Jakob bashing me over my head shouting "jaaaaaaaa". Maybe that's going too far.
But it's amazing the record so far for Vestas. There turning over some 4 billion EUROs a year, have installed 35000 wind turbines worldwide currently with sales of 4000 megawatts (4 gigawatts) in 2007. They've increased the efficiency of their wind turbines 100 times in 15 years and are aiming to install HALF of what they've installed in their entire history every year for the next 10 years. This amibitious target is being brought about by EU's target of 20% renewables by 2020, strong potential in China and the positive signals of the Obama regime.
He pitched it so well that I even thought of buying some Vestas shares. Indeed, if the politicans follow up with their rhetoric and a global deal at Copenhagen is agreed, Vestas will be one of the biggest winners.
There are some difficult challenges that remain though, with the intermittency of the wind the major drawback. Firstly technologies will need to be developed to store electricity that is generated for times when the wind is not blowing. Secondly, an integrated grid infrastructure is needed to support and complement wind with other electricity generators. The example Jakob gave was that in Denmark, approximately 23% of electricity generation is from wind. However when wind speeds pick up, other power plants are shut and Denmark can be 100% wind. Any surplus can also be sold to Norway or Sweden through integrated grids. When wind speeds are low, Denmark purchases surplus hydro generated electricity from Norway. Such an arrangement sounds so logical and more importantly works.
The positive outlook for Vestas may be the reason why they've sent a delagation to the sombre World Economic Forum, where Russia and China are blaming and bashing the US for global economic woes. It's pretty scary when the IMF projects that globally 55 million jobs will be lost....am I gonna be one of them? But maybe there will be light at the end of the tunnel for cleantech, it seems.
Well I certaintly hope so.
Wednesday, 28 January 2009
The end of beef
Since I became passionate about climate change issues, which admittedly is still recent (from March, 2008), I've decreased my beef consumption to almost nothing. Ocassionally I have a hamburger at a pub or a steak but there's usually no meat in the house and when there is it's chicken. It helps when you live with 3 vegetarians.
I avoid beef because of the high global warming effect of producing beef (cows belch methane which is 25 times more lethal than CO2), the inhumane industrialisation and mechanization of cow slaughter through feedlots, and the chemical "enhancements" of beef into toy food with strange properties such as lasting forever and "nutritional" benefits.
However, after reading this article from Scientific America, I'm debating whether to quit beef. Forever. Turns out that the global warming effect of beef consumption is much scarier than I thought. For example, the carbon equivalent emissions of a beef hamburger patty is equivalent to driving a car for 10 miles. Also, in order to produce a kilo of beef, you basically need 10 kilos of crop which can be used to feed much more hungry people for longer time. Raising cows also require more land which contributes greatly to deforestation in developing countries, where meat demand is increasing the fastest. When forests are cut, the CO2 that trees lock up in the ground are released causing more global warming.
Why don't I just quit beef then? Well, as in everything in life there is always another side.
First of all there is locally produced and distributed, humanely treated, organic, grass fed beef at small quantities that are not mass produced, and sold at premium prices (well depicted in Omnivore's dilemma by Michael Pollan). At geogrpahic areas where forests can not be planted I can't see why it shouldn't exist. Secondly there are cultures where the preparation of a particular beef dish is a real art and part of their identity as people, and I respect that.
I guess my conclusion is that unless I face a situation with the above conditions, I quit beef. Forever.
I avoid beef because of the high global warming effect of producing beef (cows belch methane which is 25 times more lethal than CO2), the inhumane industrialisation and mechanization of cow slaughter through feedlots, and the chemical "enhancements" of beef into toy food with strange properties such as lasting forever and "nutritional" benefits.
However, after reading this article from Scientific America, I'm debating whether to quit beef. Forever. Turns out that the global warming effect of beef consumption is much scarier than I thought. For example, the carbon equivalent emissions of a beef hamburger patty is equivalent to driving a car for 10 miles. Also, in order to produce a kilo of beef, you basically need 10 kilos of crop which can be used to feed much more hungry people for longer time. Raising cows also require more land which contributes greatly to deforestation in developing countries, where meat demand is increasing the fastest. When forests are cut, the CO2 that trees lock up in the ground are released causing more global warming.
Why don't I just quit beef then? Well, as in everything in life there is always another side.
First of all there is locally produced and distributed, humanely treated, organic, grass fed beef at small quantities that are not mass produced, and sold at premium prices (well depicted in Omnivore's dilemma by Michael Pollan). At geogrpahic areas where forests can not be planted I can't see why it shouldn't exist. Secondly there are cultures where the preparation of a particular beef dish is a real art and part of their identity as people, and I respect that.
I guess my conclusion is that unless I face a situation with the above conditions, I quit beef. Forever.
McKinsey is back....version 2
No classes today, hence woke up at 9am and really lazing around...
It appears that due to the financial crisis, companies under the EU ETS will have surplus EUAs of up to EURO1 billion to sell in the market, due to decreased production and demand. Selling of these EUAs in the market is likely to lead to windfall profits as they were allocated EUA permits for free. The situation is shown in this Forbes report. The effect of this sell-off is that carbon prices have plummeted, most recently to EURO11 for an EUA.
There are some points worthy of note in this issue:
1) The surplus and sell-off does not hurt the cap and the environmental integrity of the scheme. The cap is still being met regardless because less fossil fuels are being burnt. In terms of the environment and the atmosphere, it doesn't care how it's done.
2) But windfall profits do bring into question the ambitiousness of the cap.
3) the windfall profits would not be there if the permits were auctioned instead of given away for free by government.
4) Even though there are suplus EUAs, they are being bought. Because EUAs can be banked into the third phased whether they are needed for compliance or not, the price will unlikely drop to zero like the first phase. Companies will likely buy "bargain" EUAs in anticipation that EUAs will be scarce in the third phase, thus pushing prices back up.
5) Some industrials whose existence may be threatened before compliance date 2012 may sell all the EUAs they have, even those they need to comply, especially if they will shutdown by 2012.
On another matter, McKinsey's long awaited and "infamous" cost abatement curve version 2 is here.
Personally I'm not a fan of this curve as it's overused by proponents of cleantech and dare I say academics without seriously thinking through all the intangibles such as incentives, inconvenience of installing new technology and equipment, political lobbying etc. It oversimplies the myriad of factors that need to be considered when talking about switching.
But I'll have a read of it and make some comments later ; p.
It appears that due to the financial crisis, companies under the EU ETS will have surplus EUAs of up to EURO1 billion to sell in the market, due to decreased production and demand. Selling of these EUAs in the market is likely to lead to windfall profits as they were allocated EUA permits for free. The situation is shown in this Forbes report. The effect of this sell-off is that carbon prices have plummeted, most recently to EURO11 for an EUA.
There are some points worthy of note in this issue:
1) The surplus and sell-off does not hurt the cap and the environmental integrity of the scheme. The cap is still being met regardless because less fossil fuels are being burnt. In terms of the environment and the atmosphere, it doesn't care how it's done.
2) But windfall profits do bring into question the ambitiousness of the cap.
3) the windfall profits would not be there if the permits were auctioned instead of given away for free by government.
4) Even though there are suplus EUAs, they are being bought. Because EUAs can be banked into the third phased whether they are needed for compliance or not, the price will unlikely drop to zero like the first phase. Companies will likely buy "bargain" EUAs in anticipation that EUAs will be scarce in the third phase, thus pushing prices back up.
5) Some industrials whose existence may be threatened before compliance date 2012 may sell all the EUAs they have, even those they need to comply, especially if they will shutdown by 2012.
On another matter, McKinsey's long awaited and "infamous" cost abatement curve version 2 is here.
Personally I'm not a fan of this curve as it's overused by proponents of cleantech and dare I say academics without seriously thinking through all the intangibles such as incentives, inconvenience of installing new technology and equipment, political lobbying etc. It oversimplies the myriad of factors that need to be considered when talking about switching.
But I'll have a read of it and make some comments later ; p.
Chinese New Year Part III
Part III of Chinese New Year celebrations took place at Wien's uni lodging. Wow food wise it was by far the best potluck I've been to since coming to Edinburgh...Le's stir fry lettuce was unbelievable, I also liked the jellyfish and even just the plain rice! Been eating half a year of pan boiled or microwaved rice and today's steamed rice from a proper rice cooker was simply heaven.
Spoke to Wien's flatmate Rieko today in proper Japanese. Haven't practised for such a long time but came out better today...language is such a confidence thing. Today I felt more confident, and spoke and listened much much better!
I contributed by making Taiwanese fried chicken, which has become somewhat of a specialty now since I got those "secret" spices from cousin Josie. Unfortunately, I stuffed up again the first couple of pieces because the oil was too hot!! But later with Manish's help I could finally work out how to test for the right oil temperature. Simply sprinkle some batter or egg yoke into the oil and if it sizzles and doesn't fall to the bottom, it's hot enough. If it sizzles too quickly and get burnt it's obviously too hot. So logical isn't it!!!!!
Also, though putting in the oven takes away some of the oil, the crispiness of the fried chicken is lost so it's still better to serve straight after deep frying.
All that about fried chicken...
Tuesday, 27 January 2009
Air Algae!
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