Dec 2008-jan 2009

CURRENT GENERAL KNOWLEDGE: DEC 2008-JAN 2009 ABBREVIATIONS EIR: Equipment Identity Register (EIR). IMEI: International Mobile Equipment Identity. NIA: National Investigation Agency.

AWARDS International Jurists Award, 2008: Veteran lawyer Ram Jethmalani, a former Law Minister, has been bestowed with the International Honour for Jurisprudence along with Canadian Chief Justice Beverley Mclachlin (Administration of justice), Law Society of England and Wales (Bar affairs), United Nations office on drugs and crime (Law enforcement), Dr Peter Mutha-rika (Legal education), and Rohit Kochhar (Corporate laws and Legal entrepreneurship).

PURSE Award, 2008: Panjab University has been awarded the Promotion of University Research and Scientific Excellence (PURSE) award based on its performance in research. The award includes a grant of Rs 10 crore per annum for the next three years.

BOOKS Respected Memsahibs: A unique anthology of 19 women who lived and worked in India between World War-I and independence in 1947 has been produced at the University of Cambridge. Compiled by Mary Thatcher, the anthology draws on the letters, memoirs and narratives of the 19 women.

DEFENCE India signs plane deal with Boeing: India has signed a $ 2.1 billion (Rs 10,164 crore) deal with US aerospace giant Boeing Co. to buy maritime surveillance aircraft for the Indian Navy. The agreement to buy eight P-81 long range reconnaissance aircraft marks India’s biggest military aircraft deal with the US. The largest buyer of armaments among emerging nations, India plans to spend $ 30 billion until 2012 to modernize its 1.23 million strong military, the world’s fourth largest.

DRDO develops stealth parachutes: The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has developed a new stealth-parachute, capable of paradropping soldiers at three times the normal height at which they are presently being dropped. The parachute will help the troopers to jump from a height of 30,000 feet as compared to the current jump height of 10,000 feet and will also help to avoid detection from the enemy as the sound of aircraft at this height would be inaudible.

The new system comes equipped with lightweight oxygen cylinders to avoid suffocation, as at these heights oxygen becomes scarce. The new parachutes also sport directional gadgets that will keep the para-jumper abreast of his landing directions.

DISCOVERY The earth’s magnetic field has got a big hole: Recent satellite observations have found the largest breach yet seen in the magnetic field that protects earth from most of the sun’s violent blasts. The discovery was made by Themis, a fleet of five small satellites from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

Scientists have long known that the earth’s magnetic field, which guards against severe space weather, is similar to a drafty old house that lets in violent eruptions of charged particles from the sun. Such a breach can cause brilliant auroras or disrupt satellite and ground communications.

Observations from Themis show the earth’s magnetic field occasionally deve-lops two cracks, allowing solar wind, a stream of charged particles spewing from the sun at 1.6 million kph, to penetrate the earth’s upper atmosphere.

Scientists initially believed the greatest solar breach occurred when the earth’s and sun’s magnetic fields are pointed in opposite directions. But data from Themis found that 20 times more solar wind passed into the earth’s protective

shield when the magnetic fields were aligned.

The Themis results could have bearing on how scientists predict the severity of solar storms and their effects on power grids, airline and military communications and satellite signals.

ENVIRONMENT World’s first energy market in India: India will have the world’s first market for trading in energy savings. Under the National Action Plan on Climate Change, the power ministry has prepared the blueprint for trading in energy by industrial plants that save energy beyond the target set for them.

Under the plan, formulated by the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) under the National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency, the government will set mandatory targets to be achieved by each large industrial unit and plant in energy intensive sectors, which include cement, aluminium, steel, power, textiles, fertilizers, railways, paper and pulp industries.

Named the Perform, Achieve and Trade or PAT scheme, energy reduction targets would be set in terms of the specific energy consumption for each plant individually, to ensure that there are no blanket benchmarks that create an uneven turf for different sizes and type of players.

While the methodology for ascertaining the energy consumption in each identified sector has been finalized, it will take a year to ascertain the target for each large unit.

Once the targets are set by end of 2009, the industry will be given three years to achieve them. Those units that surpass their targets will be tradable on the existing power exchanges in the country. Companies that fail to meet the targets set for them will have to buy these certificates under an open market mechanism.

If the failed units do not meet their target either by achieving energy savings or by buying the energy certificates, they would be penalized by the government under the energy conservation act.

Under the plan, BEE will accredit private agencies to audit the actual energy consumed by the industrial units and retain the powers to carry out random checks. 2008 is tenth warmest year, ever: A report released on behalf of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) says that 2008 is the tenth warmest year ever, with the average global temperature at 14.3 degree C. The 10 warmest years on records since 1850 have occurred since 1997. Global temperatures between 2000 and 2008 have been almost 0.2 degree C warmer than the average for the decade 1990 to 1999. In 2008 global average was 0.31 degree C above the 1961-90 average. In the northern hemisphere in 2008, the mean temperature was 0.51 degree C above average (eighth warmest) and in the southern hemisphere it

was 0.11 degree C above average (twentieth warmest).

N-ENERGY First Uranium imports in three decades: India will receive its first uranium imports in three decades from countries such as France and Canada by April 2009, ending the isolation from nuclear commerce that ensued from its first atomic test.

The imports are expected to boost power capacity at the 17 reactors of India by at least 17%, or 700MW. The reactors are now operating at 46% of their capacity because of a shortage of uranium, the fuel that powers them.

The uranium imports are meant for the Rajasthan units of Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd, or NPCIL, who’s Rajasthan Atomic Power Station (RAPS) located at Rawatbhata in Kota district has a total capacity of 740 MW.

India, which has an installed nuclear power capacity of 4,120 MW, plans to boost it by almost five times by 2020 as it tries to close the gap between galloping energy demand and deficient supply. The country’s installed power generation capacity is around 145,000 MW. But a significant portion of this capacity is idling because of scarcity of fuels such as coal, gas and uranium.

Coal-based generation accounts for 76,000 MW, while the country’s gas-based capacity is 14,600 MW, which is operating at 52% efficiency.

India’s estimated uranium reserves are sufficient to generate only 10,000 MW. The quality of the domestic uranium ore is also low (0.1% uranium content against global standards of 12-14%). Uranium mining in India is insignificant and in most parts of the country is resisted by local people on health grounds, leaving little scope for stepping up production.

PERSONS Hasina, Sheikh: She has been elected as the Prime Minister of Bangladesh in the country’s first election since 2001. Born in 1947, Hasina is the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh’s independence leader and first head of State.

She and her younger sister, Sheikh Rehana, were in Europe when Sheikh Mujibur Rehman was assassinated and survived, later taking political asylum in India. She returned to Bangladesh in 1981 and inherited the leadership of her father’s Awami League party, returning the party to power after 21 years. Since then she has traded power with Khaleda Zia in a rivalry that has been blamed for much of the corruption and mismanagement that have plagued Bangladesh.

PLACES Burj Dubai: Iconic skyscraper Burj Dubai has become the world’s tallest structure after reaching a record height of 780 metres and crossing 160 stories in the process. The tower achieved the distinction of being the world’s tallest structure

surpassing the KVLY-TV mast (628.8 metres) in North Dakota, US.

The high-rise is already taller than Taipei 101 in Taiwan, which at 508 metres and has held the tallest building in the world title since it opened in 2004.

Burj Dubai has also surpassed the 31-year-old record of CN Tower, which at 553.33 metres and has been the world’s tallest free-standing structure on land since 1976. Gaza: The Gaza Strip is a silver of towns, villages and farmland at the southeast end of the Mediterranean, 45 km long and 10 km wide. It is wedged between Israel to the north and east, and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula to the south. Gaza city has been continuously inhabited for more than 3,000 years and was a crossroads of ancient civilizations. It is believed to be the burial place of the Prophet Mohammad’s great grandfather.

Israel captured the Gaza Strip from Egypt in the 1967 war and started settling Israelis there. It, however, pulled Jewish settlers and soldiers out of the territory in September 2005.

In June 2006 Israel conducted large-scale ground operations after militants tunnelled across the Gaza border and captured an Israeli soldier, who is still being held. A year later, Hamas Islamists took control of the Gaza Strip after routing President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah forces. Subsequently, Israel tightened the closure of its borders with Gaza, curbing fuel supplies and limiting movement of

people. Under an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire, Hamas agreed to halt rocket fire in return for Israel easing the blockade. Hamas, however, declared the end of the truce on December 18, 2008 and in retaliation of rocket fire on Israeli positions by militants in Gaza, Israel again invaded Gaza on December 27, 2008. The war resulted in more than 800 people getting killed in first week itself.

PROJECTS World’s longest causeway: The world’s longest marine causeway, a $ 3 billion project which will link Bahrain and Qatar, will come up by 2013. The over 40 km twin carriageway, running across 22 km of viaducts over the sea and 18 km of embankments, will reduce travel time by car between the Gulf countries by about four hours. Travel time from Qatar to Bahrain by car is expected to be reduced from four-and-a-half hour to around 30 minutes. The causeway will also provide a connection for future high-speed freight and passenger rail lines between the countries.

SPACE RESEARCH NASA

robots

mark

five

years

on

Mars: NASA’s

Mars

Rovers

Spirit and Opportunity marked their fifth anniversary on the red planet in January 2009, where they have endured harsh conditions and revealed a deluge of information.

The twin robots, which landed on Mars, three weeks apart in January 2004, were initially expected to have just 90-day missions, but have since sent back a quartermillion images, toured mountains and craters and survived violent storms.

The rovers have sent back to earth some 36 gigabytes of data, have greatly advanced NASA’s understanding Mars’ geology, including peeks into its wet and habitable past. Analysts say the wealth of information will keep scientists busy for years as they further unravel the vast banks of data.

Since 2004 the machines have covered 21 km of Mars’ red rock desert, driving inch by inch to avoid chasms and rocky obstacles, picking up samples and snapping images to beam back to earth.

After moon odyssey, it’s ‘mission sun’ for ISRO: Scientists at ISRO are in an advance stage of designing a spacecraft, named Aditya, to study the outermost region of the Sun, called corona. Aditya is the first space-based Solar Coronagraph intended to study corona and would be the first attempt by the Indian scientific community to unravel the mysteries associated with coronal heating, coronal mass ejections and the associated space weather processes and study of these would provide important information on the solar activity conditions.

MISCELLANEOUS India’s first electronic waste recycling company: Ecoreco is India’s first fully compliant electronic waste recycling company. You can now dispose all your electrical and electronic waste with the help of Ecoreco. The company also offers India’s first mobile shredding facility for data destruction.

Ecoreco provides: Nationwide collection of e-waste; Safe and secure destruction of confidential data; Equipment refurbishment and resale; Disassembly and demanufacturing; Hazardous substance disposal by designated facility.