Bengalaru to induct 150 electric buses - it will be the first city in the country to do so

Bengaluru had conducted trial runs of the first electric bus in February 2014 and, the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation's (BMTC's) board, has finally agreed to go in for purchase of 150 such buses for the city. It will, thus, become the first city in the country to launch city bus transport operations using such a large fleet of electric buses.
This has been reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com dated 24 October 2016.

Electric buses are the future of mass transit because it is not right to continue with fossil fuels in the long run and embrace alternate energy sources. Electric buses are environment-friendly, pollution-free and the maintenance and mechanical costs involved in operating these buses is very less compared to that of petro-diesel vehicles.
Of course cost is a major factor. In February 2014, the upfront cost of the electric bus launched in Bengaluru was then Rs 2.9 crore as compared to Rs 90 lakh for an air-conditioned bus. However, the low operational cost ( estimated at just Rs 7 per km as against Rs 18 per km incurred by a diesel bus) offsets the initial investments. Moreover, an Indian Institute of Science (IISc) study has revealed that each petro-diesel bus replaced by an electric bus was capable of preventing up to 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide emission annually. And, that is a huge benefit.


Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org


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Research has revealed that carbon released by the Oceans ended the Ice Age

#globalwarming #iceage #plankton #carbondioxide #antarctica A study carried out by the Southampton University has concluded that carbon dioxide released from the depths of the oceans brought to an end the last Ice Age. As per the study reported in bbc.com dated 12 February 2015, such release of carbon dioxide gradually drove the shift towards a warmer period.
The research has been published in the magazine Nature and the conclusions are based on analysis of chemical signals in the shells of ancient plankton. The oceans absorb nearly one third of the atmospheric carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels. Therefore, in the opinion of the scientists, as the oceans get warmer, their ability to absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide will be reduced. The result will be faster global warming.
Dr Miguel Martinez-Boti was the co-leader of the study and he has said that the findings indicated that there was a link between very high concentrations of dissolved carbon dioxide in parts of the ocean and rises in atmospheric carbon dioxide at the end of the last Ice Age.
The methodology adopted was simple enough – the research is based on analysis of ancient marine organisms that lived on the surface of the oceans thousands of years ago. In this case, the acidity of the seawater they inhabited can be calculated from the chemical signature left in their shells. This allows the amount of carbon dioxide in the water to be calculated.
Incidentally, the waters around Antarctica (or the Southern Ocean) are believed to play a key role in the movement of carbon between the atmosphere, land and sea.