Search Results for: Research

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE WIDESPREAD use of decentralised stand-alone fuel cell power and heat generating units could halve carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel electricity production, claims research from the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) and the Fuel Cell Europe group.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has announced its first Euro 166 million tranche of funding for food and food safety projects, via the EU’s Sixth Framework Programme on research. While not releasing individual budgets for successful projects, it highlighted funding a “key network of excellence” on prion diseases, including BSE.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
NOBODY likes nuclear waste but nobody has yet thought up a universally-acceptable way of disposing of it. This is as true in Europe as anywhere else. It may be fair to say, however, that some European countries have gone further than the rest of the world in drawing conclusions about the future of nuclear energy as a result of the problems caused by radioactive waste.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union has struck a research cooperation deal with the United States over the development of hydrogen fuel cells. Both sides have agreed to pool efforts, including staging demonstrations of fuel cell vehicles and fuelling networks, writing codes and standards for the technology and assessing the economics of exploiting rare earth materials to build special high-temperature cells.…

BY PHILIP FINE

THE ALREADY-SOARING premiums for insurance policies compensating US workers who have suffered on-the-job injuries will continue to rise, according to a research institute that looks into the challenges facing the sector. Richard Victor, Executive Director of the Workers (note to ed: no apostrophe) Compensation Research Institute says the biggest driver to the current high premiums has been the rise in medical costs and he does not see those going down.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THREE European Union research projects on combating the spread of anti-biotic residues in the environment have reported their findings. The studies ERAVMIS, REMPHARMAWATER and POSEIDON have recommended that sunlight and ozone treatment are applied to drinking water and waste water streams, to prevent anti-biotic residues – such as from human waste – entering rivers and groundwater.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
WATER utilities need to guard against the leaching of marine pollution through porous aquifers into freshwater groundwater sources, a European Union funded research project has warned. The Euro 2.4 million SALTRANS study has dismissed earlier assumptions that toxic organic pollutants are not sufficiently soluble to flow into groundwater reserves.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has been authorised to negotiate a cooperation agreement with China on developing peaceful uses of nuclear energy. With the decision following Beijing’s move to become involved in the international fusion energy project ITER, one of the areas of joint-effort between the European Union (EU) and China will be “controlled thermonuclear fusion.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
TECHNOLOGY is being developed by a European Commission funded research project to allow curators to effectively monitor environmental pollution that can damage ancient treasures in museums and galleries. The MIMIC (microclimate indoor monitoring in cultural heritage preservation) project has adapted airborne particle detectors called dosimeters to assess the effects of combinations of pollutants, densities at which they could cause damage and microclimatic anomalies.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
NEW alternative methods of drug testing that are supposed to save up to 200,000 rabbits a year have been unveiled by the European Commission. The six tests detect potential fever-causing agents (pyrogens) in drugs, by using human blood cells instead of rabbits; they have been developed by a EU-supported research team, involving national control laboratories, test developers, and pharmaceutical companies.…