Apollo News Snippets – August 2020

This month’s list of tech news features a wide range of advancements from a variety of fields:
These wind turbines are erected from the ground up to save power used for construction.
The first room temperature synthesis of graphite.
Sound waves and oil combine to make a chip for biomedical devices, weird!
Locally-produced, sustainable ammonia fertilizer could significantly reduce greenhouse gases.
New fuel cell technology that is even more powerful than hydrogen-based cells.
Wastewater could supercharge biofuel production.

As is common with these temperature departure maps, they tend to be a whole lot of red and not some much blue–and well the June 2020 version is no different with record warmth over every continent other than North America, and no record cold.

If you figured the June 2020 NOAA global climate report found really warm temperatures across the planet, then you guessed correct! To be fair, it’s really easy to guess right since it’s been hot as heck for many years running. How hot was June 2020? Well it was the third warmest June on record, tying 2015; and it was the 426^th consecutive month exceeding the 20^th Century average at 1.66°F (0.92°C) above. And in not so astonishing news, as the planet continues to warm, Trump continues to move to destroy our environment for this and the next generation.

Did you know that August 1^st is DOGust, the universal birthday for shelter dogs? Nor did I but in honor of our 4-foot friends, my Google search for the month was, “Shelter dogs and GIS.” And if you look through the results, you might find this Master’s thesis by Courtney Brock (cool last name J) that looks at stray dog and cat occurrences in Albuquerque, New Mexico. In this study, Brock looks at 11 demographic variables and their relationship to the spatial distribution of stray pet occurrences.