Dutch Brewery Burns Iron as a Clean, Recyclable Fuel

Many industries use heat-intensive processes that generally require the burning of fossil fuels, but a surprising green fuel alternative is emerging in the form of metal powders. Ground very fine, cheap iron powder burns readily at high temperatures, releasing energy as it oxidizes in a process that emits no carbon and produces easily collectable rust, or iron oxide, as its only…

Massive Criminal Trial Begins For ‘Cyberbunker’ Dark Web Server

The Times of London reports:
A gang of cyberexperts turned a former German military bunker into one of Europe’s biggest hubs for the “dark web” and a superhighway for at least a quarter of a million offences, including drug trafficking and the falsification of identity papers, a court has been told. Four people from the Netherlands, three Germans and a Bulgarian are…

Improved model shows gamma rays and gold at merging neutron stars

An international team of astrophysicists under Dutch leadership has demonstrated with an improved model that colliding neutron stars can emit gamma rays. Old models did not predict this and faltered since the merging of two neutron stars in 2017 that released gamma rays. The researchers publish their findings in the The Astrophysical Journal. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-10-gamma-rays-gold-merging-neutron.html…

Exxon’s Plan For Surging Carbon Emissions Revealed In Leaked Documents

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Exxon Mobil has been planning to increase annual carbon-dioxide emissions by as much as the output of the entire nation of Greece, an analysis of internal documents reviewed by Bloomberg shows, setting one of the largest corporate emitters against international efforts to slow the pace of warming. The drive to expand both fossil-fuel…

America’s IRS Wants Cryptocurrency Exchanges Declared on Tax Forms

America’s dreaded tax-collecting agency is sending “a strong warning to millions of crypto holders who aren’t complying with the law that they must file required forms,” reports the Wall Street Journal. The front page of this year’s tax forms — just below “Name” and “Address” — will ask filers to declare whether they’ve received or exchanged any virtual currencies. The Journal…

Shell Reportedly To Slash Oil and Gas Production Costs To Focus More On Renewables

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBC.ca: Royal Dutch Shell is looking to slash up to 40 percent off the cost of producing oil and gas in a major drive to save cash so it can overhaul its business and focus more on renewable energy and power markets, sources told Reuters. Shell’s new cost-cutting review, known internally as Project Reshape…

Wikipedia Edits Have Massive Impact on Tourism, Say Economists

Forget glossy travel brochures and whizzy online sites; one of the most cost-effective ways tourism chiefs can drive business to their towns or cities is by updating their Wikipedia page. From a report: An experiment by economists at the Collegio Carlo Alberto in Turin, Italy, and ZEW in Mannheim, Germany, found that a few simple edits to a Wikipedia page could…