Engineering & Technology

No specific weather event can ever be squarely attributed to climate change but Hurricane Sandy does fit a pattern. It's exceptional in terms of its financial cost but it may be less so in the future. The cost of Sandy is yet to be counted but early estimates put it at around $60bn, so you can place it at number two on our graph below. Whatever the final cost, most of the climatechange models now ... View full abstract»

A shortAge of skilled and experienced engineers in sub saharan Africa (ssA) is preventing the region from achieving a range of development goals, from providing basic sanitation to reducing rural poverty, says a report published by the royal Academy of engineering. View full abstract»

With so much attention on the on-off marriage between BAE and EADs - a would-be contender for the merger of the century - another significant union was somewhat overshadowed: the proposed takeover of British defence group Chemring by Us private equity giant Carlyle. As it turned out, both deals fell apart. But the fallout for jilted Chemring looks like being far greater than for any of the other r... View full abstract»

On 29 October, Hurricane Sandy unleashed colossal devastation on the USA's east coast. Amidst the destruction there were mass power outages, which at their height affected more than eight million users and lingered on for several weeks, hampering relief efforts. View full abstract»

American researchers have tested an experimental device that can use energy from a beating heart to produce electricity, raising hopes for future battery-free cardiac pacemakers that would last indefinitely, saving heart patients from repeat surgery to replace their implants when the batteries are spent. View full abstract»

If you asked those directly involved or interested in managing the risk of workplace injury and ill health to list the reforms to our health and safety law system currently in progress, it is likely few would be able to provide more than a partial answer. That applies equally to me. View full abstract»

Speaking as a palaeoclimatologist, reconstructing past climates, one of the key lines of evidence for human impact on climate change is that over the past few millennia we have never seen such a rate or magnitude of warming that we see now. past climate tells us about trends and variations prior to human impact and when analysing these we never see a trajectory in temperature increases as we are s... View full abstract»

When the climate-change furore began around 1988, I was alarmed and took a stance against it, earning the title 'denier'. Now, 24 years later, everything I advocated then has been proven to be true. The damage done to the image of science, engineering and technology in terms of warping the minds of future generations of engineers and scientists, politicians and the general public will take years t... View full abstract»

The intergovernmental panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will release its latest climate change findings, 'The Fifth Assessment Report', midway through 2013. It will come as no surprise if its conclusions are more portentous than the previous report over five years ago. View full abstract»

October 2012 marked the 25th anniversary of the hurricane that ripped through southern England. Surely there is no more poignant reminder of the importance of accurate weather forecasting than the destruction left behind. View full abstract»

The UK, like the rest of the world, has experienced heavy flooding over the past decade, which has affected thousands of people and caused millions of pounds worth of damage. Although it is impossible to say this increased flooding is a direct result of climate change, some computer predictions say that we can expect to see further extreme weather events in the future. View full abstract»

With energy prices continuing to rise, mounting ethical concerns about over-consumption and its associated environmental impact, and the looming shadow of climate change growing ever larger and darker, the appeal of 'off-grid' living is growing exponentially. According to a study carried out by the Office of Fair trading last year, an estimated 3.6 million homes in the UK are already operating ind... View full abstract»

The golden toad (bufo periglenes), was a small, shiny creature that lived in high-altitude cloud-covered tropical forests above the city of Monteverde in Costa Rica. Today it has the dubious title of being the first species believed to have been made extinct by current climate change. A lone male was found in 1989, and despite extensive searches, not one of the toads has since been tracked down. View full abstract»

The key to London's climate-change adaptation lies in its defences against increases in flooding and temperature, which will affect all industries from finance to logistics. London has become an 'urban heat island'; it suffers from greater absorption of heat into building fabrics, which results in an intensified rise in temperature due to all the buildings, tarmac roads and people. New and existin... View full abstract»

When it comes to illustrating the effects of climate change on the planet it's hard to beat the famous photograph of an exhausted polar bear desperately clutching on to a rapidly melting block of ice. This image has been adopted as a symbol of climate change and has, in some ways, made the polar bear the poster child of the environmental movement. View full abstract»

The prospect of soaring food prices and global warming has brought food security and climate-change concerns to the top of the international agenda. Agriculture now faces the double challenge of dealing with the impact of climate change at the same time as increasing production to meet the food demands of a global population projected to reach 9.1 billion by 2050. View full abstract»

The challenge facing the world's population between now and 2030 is both stark and transparent: supply eight billion people with water from an absolutely finite supply. Compounding an already difficult scenario is the fact that less than 1 per cent of the world's total supply of water is fresh and drinkable; it is also being managed badly, with a growing proportion wasted through despoiling and po... View full abstract»

The John, the khazi, the dunny, the can, the bog, the loo; whatever your preferred name for it, the humble toilet is so thoroughly integrated into life in the developed world it barely merits a second thought. When out shopping, in a restaurant or even camping, those looking to spend a penny are rarely more than a short walk away from a clean, sanitary, private place in which to answer the call of... View full abstract»