Dear SciSchmoozers,
A 6.1 earthquake topped off my birthday this month in Oaxaca, Mexico (and abruptly terminated a huge outdoor rock concert). Since the quake was located 108 kilometers below the terrain, there was almost no damage – except to nerves.
The Loma Prieta Earthquake of 1989 was a 6.9 magnitude event. The San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 was a 7.9 magnitude event. Because the magnitude scale is logarithmic, the San Francisco quake was 10 times “bigger” than the Loma Prieta event. In terms of energy, however, the San Francisco quake released over 30 times the energy of the 1989 quake.
¿Is our Bay Area threatened by another 7.9 quake? Well, yes, but not for a while. The geological plates separated by the San Andreas fault have not yet crept far enough past each other for a 7.9 shaker. There’s only a 2% chance of a 7.9 before 2050 on the San Francisco portion of the San Andreas. The Hayward fault is a different story; there’s a 32% chance of a 6.7 or higher temblor on the Hayward fault sometime in the next 13 years.
Thursday is International ShakeOut Day which is intended to prepare us for strong earthquakes.
Here’s a series of brief videos on how to best ride out an earthquake wherever you are. Register to participate in International ShakeOut Day. (I’m registered.)
TECHNOLOGY
The Turlock Irrigation District is covering over 3 kilometers of canals with solar panels. If this pilot project achieves its goals of reducing algae growth, reducing water evaporation, and safely producing energy, it could lead to thousands of kilometers of solar-panel-covered canals in California.
Roughly half of Kenya’s electric power comes from geothermal wells – and the percentage is growing. Furthermore, Kenya is assisting other African countries to install geothermal and lessen their dependence on fossil fuels.
Finland is preparing a storage area 450 meters below ground for used nuclear fuel rods. The United States was preparing a similar but larger repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada but funding was withdrawn 12 years ago due to NIMBY voices.
SPACE
As pristine material from asteroid Bennu is being studied (lots of carbon and water), a mission to asteroid Psyche launched last week. The spacecraft will reach Psyche in 2029.
Eventually, optical telescopes and radio telescopes will be installed on our Moon’s far side. To test radio telescope technology in the harsh lunar environment, a spacecraft is slated to land on the far side of the Moon in 2025. It is the Lunar Surface Electromagnetics Experiment-Night, or LuSEE-Night.
The Kessler Syndrome is a scenario where a high velocity collision between two satellites results in debris that spreads out and collides with other satellites creating yet more debris and eventually it becomes unsafe to launch any new spacecraft whatsoever. Ah, but technology creates safeguards. At present there are about 9,000 operational satellites in orbit and another 40,000 are planned; each has little thrusters controlled from the ground so they can avoid colliding with each other. Sounds good? But what if a coronal mass ejection disables satellites?
PSEUDOSCIENCE
The McGill University Office for Science and Society published a short list of What’s trending in the world of pseudoscience. ¿Is it true that rose essential oil can harmonize the human body’s frequency and can treat underlying medical conditions? The answer is probed in this short video.
If you have a few minutes for a comedic take on conspiracy culture, i recommend watching “Imminent Arrival.”
DEMOGRAPHY
About 20 years ago, the Church of the Latter Day Saints (Mormons) announced that “Large Families No Longer Necessary – Small Families No Longer a Sin.” The State of Utah – with two-thirds of the population identifying as Mormon – now leads the United State in its decline in birth rates; a full 36% decrease from 2007 to 2022. There are now four states with a higher birth rate.
Because of COVID and an overall decrease in birth rate, the U.S. population dropped by 1.4 million from 2009 to 2022 – in spite of documented and undocumented immigration.
ANTHROPOLOGY
Homo sapiens emerged in Africa about 300,000 years ago, so it was surprising that an example of carpentry dates to over 450,000 years ago. Boards were fashioned from logs and then shaped to fit together; possibly to build a shelter. ¿The earliest Airbnb?
NERDY VIDEOS
Cell-Cultivated Meat – The Right Chemistry – Joe Schwarcz – 5 mins
EV battery manufacturing: China vs U.S. – Wall Street Journal – 8 mins
Scotland’s floating wind farm – Equinor – 9 mins
Mathematical prediction of Black Holes – Dr. Becky – Becky Smethurst – 11 mins
Redox Flow Batteries – Just Have a Think – Dave Borlace – 12 mins
Lunar Radio Telescope? – PBS SpaceTime – Matt O’Dowd – 15 mins
Do chatbots understand what they say? – Sabine Hossenfelder – 22 mins
Looking Deep Into Milky Way’s Center with JWST – Fraser Cain – 34 mins
Thank you for joining me this week. Stay curious,
Dave Almandsmith, Bay Area Skeptics
“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.”
– Stephen Hawking (1942 – 2018) English theoretical physicist