Discover 05/08 and 07/08

I've been neglecting my homages to Discover magazine of late. Here are a few items that caught my eye in recent issues.

May 08 was a "better planet special issue," featuring the cover headline "How Science Will Heal the Earth." The issue started off a bit oddly, with a two-page ad for the new Chevy Tahoe Hybrid... Chevy is proud to report that in two-wheel-drive mode, this behemoth gets 20 mpg city and 14 mpg highway. Gosh. Makes you wonder how bad the mileage is on the regular one, if they're so proud of those numbers.

But compared to the many scooters, motorcycles, and motorized rickshaws that have two-stroke engines, maybe the Tahoe hybrid isn't such bad thing. In a story called "Better Air," writer David Kushner reports that a single two-stroke engine produces "pollution equivalent to that of 30 to 50 four-stroke automobiles." In response, a small business called Envirofit in Colorado has created a retrofit kit that decreases emissions from the two-strokes by 90 percent, and raises fuel efficiency by 35 percent. Better yet, because the kit saves the owner the expense of fuel and oil, the cost is recovered quickly and actually nets out as much as $600 in the owner's favor.

The May issue also included an article called "The Paper Trail," in which Discover analyzed its own carbon footprint. This included a wonderful information graphic that made the whole process of producing the magazine very clear. The part I found most amazing was that 66 percent of their carbon is emitted in making the paper used to print the magazine. The second largest amount was the magazine's "afterlife" -- because statistics show that only 20 percent of the magazines are recycled, while 80 percent end up incinerated. (Not at my house! They're all saved for posterity in a pile. ; - )

The July 08 issue has a wonderful little short called "Tech Against Toxins," which briefly reports on several recent discoveries:

• a type of bacteria that loves to consume the chlorinated wastes from dry-cleaning fluids and paint thinners,
• a fungus that oxidizes pesticides and PCBs, leaving them benign,
• a process that converts the fly ash from coal-powered electric plants into bricks that soak up toxic mercury from the air.

Finally, there was this little ditty from July's closing story, "20 Things You Didn't Know About Oil": Those fuel tankers we all pass on the highway "may be carrying 4,000 gallons of gas, which, if in a crash, can explode with the energy of 200 tons of TNT."

Gee, thanks!