Images, news and opinion from the around the Bay of Fundy area and beyond.
The first Native American to arrive in Europe may have been a woman brought to Iceland by the Vikings more than 1,000 years ago, a study by Spanish and Icelandic researchers suggests.
The findings boost widely-accepted theories, based on Icelandic medieval texts and a reputed Viking settlement in Newfoundland in Canada, that the Vikings reached the American continent several centuries before Christopher Columbus traveled to the “New World.”.
Spain’s CSIC scientific research institute said genetic analysis of around 80 people from a total of four families in Iceland showed they possess a type of DNA normally only found in Native Americans or East Asians. .
“It was thought at first that (the DNA) came from recently established Asian families in Iceland,” CSIC researcher Carles Lalueza-Fox was quoted as saying in a statement by the institute. “But when family genealogy was studied, it was discovered that the four families were descended from ancestors who lived between 1710 and 1740 from the same region of southern Iceland.” .
The lineage found, named C1e, is also mitochondrial, which means that the genes were introduced into Iceland by a woman.
“As the island was virtually isolated from the 10th century, the most likely hypothesis is that these genes corresponded to an Amerindian woman who was brought from America by the Vikings around the year 1000,” said Lalueza-Fox. .
The researchers used data from the Rejkjavik-based genomics company deCODE Genetics. .
He said the research team hopes to find more instances of the same Native American DNA in Iceland’s population, starting in the same region in the south of the country near the massive Vatnajokull glacier. .
The report, by scientists from the CSIC and the University of Iceland, was also published in the latest edition of the American Journal of Physical Anthropology. .
The journal said 75 to 80 percent of contemporary Icelanders can trace their lineage to Scandinavia and the rest to Scotland and Ireland. .
But the C1e lineage is “one of a handful that was involved in the settlement of the Americas around 14,000 years ago. .
“Contrary to an initial assumption that this lineage was a recent arrival (in Iceland), preliminary genealogical analyses revealed that the C1 lineage was present in the Icelandic mitochondrial DNA pool at least 300 years ago” said the journal. “This raised the intriguing possibility that the Icelandic C1 lineage could be traced to Viking voyages to the Americas that commenced in the 10th century.” . (SOURCE)
There is nothing like the scepter of a CRA tax audit to put a chill in your Christmas Holiday plans. It's psychological warfare really. A Merry Christmas greeting from Big Oil! Ho Ho Ho.
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Entering the exclusion zone around the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant is an unnerving experience.It is, strictly speaking, also illegal. It is an old cliché to say that radiation is invisible. But without a Geiger counter, it would be easy to forget that this is now one of the most contaminated places on Earth.The small village of Tatsuno lies in a valley 15km (9.3 miles) from the plant. In the sunlight, the trees on the hillsides are a riot of yellow and gold. But then I realise the fields were once neat rice paddies. Now the grass and weeds tower over me.On the village main street, the silence is deafening – not a person, car, bike or dog. At one house, washing still flaps in the breeze. And all around me, invisible, in the soil, on the trees, the radiation lingers. [...]Back in the 1960s and 70s, getting rural Japanese communities to accept nuclear power plants was hard.[...] they were promised that nuclear power was completely safe.Now that the lie has been so tragically exposed, the feeling of betrayal is huge. [...]
Strategy. When I say have a solar marketing “strategy,” I’m talking about having a theoretical path to climb that marketing mountain goal. From the ground, you can see a lot of ways to the top. For example, “We’re going build brand trust and increase referrals through implementing dynamic social media” is one basic path. Or, “we’re going to build trust and referrals through massive public relations, media, and advertising” is another potential path. Most solar companies will (should) have strategies that use both paths.
Kimberly D. Bose, Secretary
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
888 First Street, NE Room 1A
Washington, DC 20426
eFiled on 2012 October 19
Re: Downeast LNG, Docket Nos. CP07-52-000, CP07-53-000, and CP07-53-001 Inappropriate Boilerplate Submission to FERC
Dear Ms. Bose,
On 2012 October 12 Downeast LNG filed responses to FERCʼs September 11 & 13 Information Requests (Accession Nos. 20120911-3001 and 20120913-3024). Included in those requests were inquiries into the proposed 20-foot-tall vapor fence specifications, and into how Downeast LNG would maintain those vapor fences.
In Accession No. 20121012-5103(27695846), in the very first paragraph, under 1.0 Purpose/Applicability, Downeast LNG claims it would install its vapor fence to ensure that natural gas concentrations of a certain level are contained within the EcoEléctrica facility.
Downeast LNG has obviously and carelessly pasted boilerplate text from a completely unrelated LNG project into its response to FERC. The EcoEléctrica LNG terminal near Peñuelas, Puerto Rico, is very different from the proposed Downeast LNG terminal in Robbinston, Maine. The settings and safety issues are different.
It is an offense to FERC, to the LNG industry, and to public safety that Downeast LNG has confused its
own application with the conditions at the Puerto Rico EcoEléctrica LNG terminal.
Save Passamaquoddy Bay suggests that Downeast LNG has demonstrated a lack of professional competence in its application, and that the applications be denied.
Save Passamaquoddy Bay
A 3-Nation Alliance
(US • Passamaquoddy • Canada)
PO Box 222 • Eastport, ME 04631
(207)853-2922
info@SavePassamaquoddyBay.org
www.SavePassamaquoddyBay.org
Respectfully,
Robert Godfrey
Researcher & Webmaster
Even small streams could be turned into a source of water power for grist, flour, saw, and other types of mills. Sediment samples from mill ponds behind dams in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, showed the march of development across the area. During the 18th century, iron ore mining and paper mills began to deforest the region. The runoff left sand deposits in the ponds with traces of iron slag and charcoal.  From: Old dams hold a toxic legacy, Analysis by Tim Wall , Fri Oct 19, 2012 07:54 AM ET http://news.discovery.com/earth/old-dams-hold-a-toxic-legacy-121019.html#mkcpgn=rssnws1
The current talk about removing the Mactaquac dam begs the question … What does lurk beneath the surface and what energy losses will we incure? Perhaps its time to rethink conventional environmental management? Art MacKay
Slideshow. Click to advance or wait.
Three of these images are of a large boulder on the shore near Campobello’s Mulholland Point Light. The boulder appears to be sedimentary rock, similar in appearance to the rock found in the Red Beach area. Note in the close-up images of the boulder red arrows pointing to a series of holes and metallic objects. The objects are “feathers and wedges.”
Feathers and wedges were used (and still are today) to split stone into smaller pieces. First, using a hammer and hand-held drill, a series of holes were bored into this boulder along a line of desired split. Tight-fitting metal feathers were inserted on either side of each hole. Metal wedges were then inserted between the feathers and, in sequence, the wedges were repeatedly tapped along the line of feathers and wedges until a piece of the boulder broke off along a line of desired split.
It appears that in this last instance the hoped-for split did not take place, as the feathers and wedges remain in the rock. Interestingly, other splits were successful. Other pieces of stone split from this boulder were used in the stone foundation of Mulholland Point Light.
Harold Bailey
From tourism to whales to cotton-tail rabbits Downeast LNG doesn’t understand Passamaquoddy Bay. It’s now long past the time for FERC to reject the last outstanding application to place an import LNG terminal in Passamaquoddy Bay, a process that, if it weren’t so serious, would be a comedy about how the dead keep walking.
Just how crazy this process has been is well documented at www.savepassamaquoddybay.org. Below is the essence of our concerns relating to marine life in the area taken from an analysis of the Environmental Impact Statement provided to FERC by DeLNG. The full commentary can be read at:Â http://www.scribd.com/doc/110624491/Downeast-LNG-EIS-A-MacKay-comments-to-FERCÂ or below.
The primary elements of the “Quoddy Ecosystem” showing the proposed traffic route from the Fundy shipping lane to St. Croix Estuary and indicating the various proposals for LNG terminal development that have been considered or have made application to FERC. An alternate tanker route has been proposed through the Grand Manan Channel.
The Quoddy Region is well-known as a distinct ecosystem that encompasses St. Croix Estuary, Passamaquoddy Bay, Western Passage, Cobscook Bay, Head harbour Passage, West Isles, Grand Manan Channel, Owen Basin, and offshore areas reaching to Point Lepreau and Grand Manan (Buzeta, et.al, 2003) as shown in Figure 1. As can be seen from this aerial view, most of the ecosystem lies within Canada; although the Passamaquoddy Bay shore and Cobscook Bay form an integral and important part of this system. The shipping lanes into and out of Saint John Port are shown in the background. This clearly illustrates the considerable difference between a well-established, straight-in, commercial service route and the convoluted route into the proposed terminal at Robbinston, Maine.
While I have a number of comments and criticisms to make about the DeLNG EIS as it relates to marine mammals and whales in particular, I was pleased to see that the EIS takes note of and recognizes the threat to listed endangered species and moreover recognizes the tight confines that exist in the Head Harbour to Passamaquoddy Bay portion of their proposed tanker route. The EIS correctly identified the conflicts that will arise. However, it is not sufficient to simply state that their operation is not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of marine mammals. The proximity to endangered species that are protected under law in both Canada and the United States makes this a questionable venture. Breach of law becomes inevitable under these circumstances and, if, as we are all fond of saying, we believe in the rule of law, it makes no sense to test the obvious with an inappropriate sighting of a facility that could easily be placed elsewhere and out of harms way.
Like you, I am aware of the splendid efforts that are being made to avoid contact with right whales that
cluster around the shipping lanes into Boston and the Bay of Fundy. But, Head Harbour Passage is quite different. This is a narrow, pipe-like, passage that is full of whales, seals, fish, plankton and people and into which we will be inserting a huge ship the size ofthe QE2. Trust me, the passage at Green Island Shoal off Casco Island will barely accommodate an LNG tanker at low slack water. One minor little twist or tum in these turbulent waters and we will all be faced with an interesting problem.
During the Pittston oil refinery hearings, it was, in fact, the whales that led governments in the United States to tum down that proposal together, of course, with Canada’s scientific risk analysis on Head Harbour Passage and their firm position that still exists today. We are not being stubborn. We know what a special gift this place is and we know what we stand to lose!
