Veronika Wild

Bees working hard in the Veronica bush    A bit slow this week . My computer did a little update and lost all my bookmarks , so while I am finding those again, I thought perhaps it's time for a little update , so that you don't come away from the site entirely empty -handed.   Busy bees   My bees have finally produced some honey instead of baby bees. Contrary to warnings that flow hives don’t work in cold climates, mine has worked beautifully. From what I’ve heard   from other beekeepers, it seems to depend on what the bees feed on. In the bush and especially when they gather pollen from tea tree, the honey apparently becomes much thicker and doesn’t flow as easily. The flow hive is much more expensive than conventional hives but it negates the necessity of having a lot more equipment such as extractors and so forth.   First harvest     Solar Panels With our long summer days, the solar panels are finally doing some good.  This mont...

 Tesla of the Skies? NASA's Maxwell X-57 zero emission, two -seater electric plane is set to take off in February 2022 This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY   I was hoping to bring you lots of good news about flying. I love flying. It was amazing being able to visit family or places I'd only seen in National Geographic or on the screen, and I’ll never forget my mother's tearful reunion with beloved people and landscapes she hadn’t been able to see for 25 years after she left for Australia. That wasn't possible before cheap flights came along in the 1970s. For short haul flights, things are looking quite good. I see for example, where two Australian tourist operators have ordered 6 0 electric planes between them for flights around Sydney and the Barrier Reef, yet for those long flights which we need to get out of Australia, not so much. Here’s what I’ve learned so far.   So what’s wrong with flying anyway? Aviation accounts for 2.3% of glob...

  To me, the Ever Given is a metaphor for the shipping industry itself, reflecting both its huge size and its vulnerability to the slightest perturbation.   - This Photo of the Evergiven by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY Creative Commons C3. Turning juggernauts around is never easy. So it is with the shipping industry, yet here too changes are underway. Until four days ago I would have said that to have big container ships such as the notorious Ever Given (above) which recently got itself stuck in the Suez Canal, run on batteries would take a battery the size of the ship itself with no room for cargo, but this has recently been challenged by the launch of a battery electric tanker by Japanese Asahi Tanker Co . Other technologies are emerging here too. They range from the use of rotor sails and wing sails where winds are favourable, to the use of alternative fuels such as hydrogen, ammonia, methanol and biofuels, along with improved logistics and efficienc...