The Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act - 858 Words

Comprehensive Health Reform: The Patient Protection and Affordable Care act Ken Davis February 13, 2016 PADM 550 –BO2- LUO Dr. Tory Weaver Defining the Problem The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (PPACA)is a highly complex and multifaceted policy in addition to being political controversial. Changes made to the law by subsequent legislation, focuses on provisions to expand coverage, control health care costs, and improve health care delivery system. Some changes require most U.S. citizens and legal residents to have health insurance. The problem with this that not all states accept PPACA and not all can afford health insurance, therefore, either get an exemption or pay a fee. May Biblical guidelines.†¦show more content†¦This means in the long run that all uninsured Americans will still have the option to buy health insurance through the state or federal exchanges. Can Political Feasibility. Keep in mind that upcoming elections will have a major impact on the success of reforming health care and health insurance in the United States. U.S. Supreme Court, No. 14-144, King Vs. Burwell (2015), challenged the IRS regulation imposed on the PPACA, because it allowed subsidies on both state and federally-established health insurance exchange (Competitive Enterprise Institute, (2015). Had there would have been a different decision in this case, millions could have lost health coverage and it could have sent us down a road to losing our â€Å"new benefits, rights, and protection, including guaranteed issue for those with preexisting conditions† (Obamacare Facts, 2015). Financial feasibility. Subsidies cost on average $3,5000 per enrollee with subsidies, while Medicaid and CHIP subsidies cost $4,500 on average (Obamacare Facts, 2015). As a result, uninsured rates dropped more in states that embraced the law. According to Gallup the uninsured rate was 11.9% for the 18 – 65 demographic in the 1st quarter of 2015, down from a high of 18% in 2013. By the second quarter of 2015 the uninsured rate fell to 11.4% (Obamacare Facts, 2015). Those are 2015 estimates and the costs rise over time with the

The Electronic Cigarette Free Essays

Electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, have become increasingly popular in recent years. Regular cigarette smoking has been on the decline due to many factors including price, health risks, and the fact that most public places no longer allow indoor smoking; making it an inconvenience to step outside and light one up. The convenience, affordability, and health benefits are just a number of reasons the electronic cigarette is rising in popularity. We will write a custom essay sample on The Electronic Cigarette or any similar topic only for you Order Now A comparison between e-cigarettes and regular cigarettes show a number of similarities and differences. E-cigarettes offer the same amount of nicotine regular cigarettes do, thus satisfying a smokers nicotine craving that is attributed with cigarette smoking. E-cigarettes just about look, feel, and weigh about as much as a real cigarette, so puffing on one won’t feel foreign to the seasoned smoker. Smoking regularly can get pretty expensive and buying the e-cigarette start up kit can be just as expensive too. As a smoker myself, I have noticed a number of differences between cigarettes and e-cigarettes. The taste of a regular cigarette to me is much more satisfying than that of an e-cigarette. E-cigarettes lack the authentic tobacco taste that cigarettes have and this leads to a less pleasing smoking experience. Cigarette smoke is full of harmful toxins, whereas e-cigarettes have about 1,000 times less toxins and there is no smoke, only water vapor. This leads to why most people who aren’t ready to fully quit smoking, to start smoking e-cigarettes. Cigarette smoking is also very expensive, whereas e-cigarettes require quite a heavy initial investment at first, around $100 for the start up kit, they pay for themselves in the long run and end up saving you money over time. How to cite The Electronic Cigarette, Papers

Dairy Industry In Australia- Free-Samples for Students- Assignment

Question: Select a particular sector of the Australian food Industry and identify and evaluate the competitive Challenges and Opportunities facing that particular Sector. Answer: Introduction Animal husbandry is one of the most potential and promising sectors in Australia. Among the animal husbandry, dairy sector is one of most promising sectors in Australia. Currently Australia is the third largest dairy exporter in the world (Douphrate et al. 2013). However, there are various challenges being faced by this industry in the recent time which is adversely affecting their potentiality. Overcoming these challenges will help to grab the huge opportunities that are being estimated for the Australian dairy industry. This report will discuss about the challenges and opportunities being faced by the dairy industry in Australia. In addition, various research and literature will be discussed for the analyzing and interpreting the current position of this industry. Review of Australian dairy industry According to the research done by Price water Coopers (PWC), more than 50 percent of the total dairy production in Australia is being exported (PWC.com 2017). Moreover, the dairy industry in Australia constitute of milk, yoghurt, butter and cheese. Thus, diversified customer requirement is being met by this industry. Victoria is the Australian state with the largest production of the dairy products. However, after the deregulation of the dairy industry in 2001, domestic producers faced the threat of survival due to the entry of various international firms. According to Dairy Industry Australia, various challenges are being faced by this industry in the recent time. Due to the reason of seasonal fluctuations and price, it is being estimated that the national milk production will be decreased by about 7.5 percent (Dairyaustralia.com.au 2017). According to Nettle, Brightling, and Hope (2013), there is an urgent need of innovation in the Australian dairy industry to cope up with the chal lenges being faced by them. Moreover, the global dairy industry is going through extensive innovation and Australian diary is no exception (Robinson 2012). Analysis of the current business scenario The current scenario of the dairy industry in Australia is not up to the mark. The estimated dairy production in this financial year will be the lowest in the last 21 years. It is being estimated that Australia will produce 8.8 billion lr. Of milk which is quite low compared to the average trend of dairy production in Australia. Key reason being concluded is the lower market demand and unfavorable weather condition (Long 2017). Victoria, the largest diary producing state in Australia has incurred the major reduction of the production by about 18 percent. However, in the recent time, it is also been seen that the market demand for the dairy products is rising. The market demand for dairy products got increased by about 2.4 percent in the last year. Thus, opportunities are there to tap. However, the internal issues in the dairy industry are reducing the potentiality of this industry. However, despite these challenges, it is been seen that the dairy farmers are optimistic about the future potential. According to them, the production will increase gradually in the next three years. Regarding to the dairy industry of Australia, it is been calculated that approximately more than 26000 people are being involved with this industry directly and indirectly (Legendairy.com.au 2017). The total and average milk consumption level of the customers is also increasing with average milk consumption per consumer per year is 105 litre. The export potential of the industry is also increasing with the increase in the market size overseas. Currently, the export of dairy products constitute of $ 3 billion (Abs.gov.au 2017). Majority of the dairy products are being exported to China and Japan. Challenges for the dairy industry One of the key challenges that is being identifies is the climatic change. Recent fluctuations in the climate in the Australian regions are posing threat to the dairy industry. The generation of the food stock for the animals is facing obstacles due to the climatic change. Deregulation of the diary industry caused entry of different global organizations. this caused threat to the domestic suppliers due to the reason that the global firms are offering at much lower prices due to economies of scale. Lack of innovation in the Australian dairy industry is further reducing their competitiveness. Compared to the global industry standard, the dairy industry of Australia is trailing behind in terms of latest technology and innovation. This is reducing the effectiveness and productivity of the industry. More than 50 percent of the dairy products are being exported. Thus, fluctuations in the global market will have adverse effect on the domestic dairy industry. Opportunities for the dairy industry The export market of the Australian dairy industry is increasing. The global diary market is witnessing a positive demand for the dairy products and being the third largest exporter of dairy in the world, the potentiality of the Australian dairy industry is increasing. Initiation of latest technologies and innovation is increasing the effectiveness of the dairy industry. It is also providing them the required competitiveness to tap the opportunities in the global market. The domestic demand for the dairy products is increasing in the Australian market. The price for the milk is projected to get increased in the following years, which will help the producers to have more revenue. Dairy industry of Australia is becoming more organized which will help them to compete in the global and domestic market more effectively. Conclusion Having discussed the market scenario of the dairy industry in Australia, it can be concluded that they are having huge opportunities in the domestic as well as global market. The industry is going through an extensive change in terms of innovation and technologies. Thus, the productivity and effectiveness of the industry is going to increase in future. However, there are various challenges that are being faced by the industry which need to be overcome. It is been analyzed that the dairy market in Australia is already generating a huge revenue from the market. Few challenges that are being faced by the industry are restricting their growth rate which is being projected to get solved in the following years. Thus, overcoming the challenges and initiation of latest technologies and innovation will help them to tap the extended opportunities in the market Reference Abs.gov.au. (2017).Year Book Australia, 2004. [online] Available at: https://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/B006A83A9127B0F5CA256DEA00053965?Open [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017]. Dairyaustralia.com.au. (2017).Situation and Outlook 2017. [online] Available at: https://www.dairyaustralia.com.au/industry/dairy-situation-and-outlook/situation-and-outlook-2017 [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017]. Douphrate, D.I., Hagevoort, G.R., Nonnenmann, M.W., Lunner Kolstrup, C., Reynolds, S.J., Jakob, M. and Kinsel, M., 2013. The dairy industry: a brief description of production practices, trends, and farm characteristics around the world.Journal of agromedicine,18(3), pp.187-197. Legendairy.com.au. (2017).Dairy Industry Statistics Information | Legendairy. [online] Available at: https://www.legendairy.com.au/dairy-farming/our-industry/industry-stats [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017]. Long, W. (2017).Australian milk production lowest in 21 years. [online] ABC Rural. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2017-02-22/australian-milk-production-lowest-in-21-years/8292426 [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017]. Nettle, R., Brightling, P. and Hope, A., 2013. How programme teams progress agricultural innovation in the Australian dairy industry.The Journal of Agricultural Education and Extension,19(3), pp.271-290. PWC.com.au, (2017). [online] Available at: https://www.pwc.com.au/industry/agribusiness/assets/australian-dairy-industry-nov11.pdf [Accessed 24 Aug. 2017]. Robinson, R.K., 2012.Modern Dairy Technology: Volume 2 Advances in Milk Products.

Interpersonal Relationship free essay sample

Chapter 9 – Interpersonal Relationships I. Advantages and disadvantages of interpersonal relationships A. Advantages 1. Lesson loneliness 2. Provide stimulation 3. Enhance self worth and self esteem 4. Maximize pleasure and minimize pain B. Disadvantages 1. Pressure to be vulnerable 2. Encroach on privacy 3. Increase obligations 4. Limit other relationships 5. Emotionally difficult to dissolve 6. Break your heart II. Relationship stages A. Created and constructed by the individuals B. People see their relationships differently C. Interdependence is primary quality of an interpersonal relationshipD. Six stage model (applies to all types of relationships) 1. Contact a. perceptual contact – physical appearance b. interactional contact (superficial and impersonal) *Flirting – verbal and nonverbal signals of romantic interest *Dark side of flirting – becomes harassment or stalking 2. Involvement – mutuality, connection, try to learn more about the other a. tests – find out how your partner feels about the relationship (start here but go throughout relationship) b. intensifying tokens of affection; increase contact; sexual intimacy; jealousy 3.Intimacy – further commitment; share social networks; quantity and quality of exchanges increase, talk more about the relationship Two phases of intimacy: a. We will write a custom essay sample on Interpersonal Relationship or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page interpersonal commitment – private commitments to each other b. social bonding – public commitment; you become an identifiable pair 4. Deterioration – weakening of bonds a. intRApersonal dissatisfaction b. IntERpersonal deterioration – withdraw, distance, conflict 5. Repair – change behaviors or expectations; not always pursued A. IntRAapersonal – analyze and try to solve yourself; consider changing your behaviors B.IntERpersonal repair – negotiate changes w/other *Recognize the problem *Engage in productive communication and conflict resolution *Pose possible solutions *Affirm each other – disclose, talk positively, compliments, nonverbals that say I care cherishing behaviors – small gestures you enjoy receiving from your partner (a wink, a smile, a kiss) *Integrate solutions into normal behavior vs. followed for a very short time and going back to previous behavior. *Risk – risk giving without certainty of receiving, risk rejection by making the first move, be willing to change, adapt.

5 Strategies for Private School Admissions Test Prep

5 Strategies for Private School Admissions Test Prep Most private schools require applicants to take a standardized test as part of the admission process. Essentially what the schools are trying to determine is how prepared you are for the academic work that they want you to be able to do. The most commonly used tests in independent schools are the SSAT and the ISEE, but ther are others that you may encounter. For example, Catholic schools use HSPTs and COOPs which are similar in content and purpose. If you think of the SSAT and ISEE like the college level SAT or its preparatory test, the PSAT, then you get the idea. The tests are organized in several sections, each designed to assess a specific skill set and knowledge level. Here are several tips to help you best prepare for this important exam. 1. Start Test Prep Early Begin final preparation for your admissions test in the spring for testing in the following fall. While these standardized tests measure what you have learned over the course of many years, you should begin working some practice tests in the spring and summer before you actually take the real thing in the late fall. There are several test prep books that you can consult.  Want some study tips? Check out this blog for some SSAT test prep strategies. 2. Dont Cram Last minute cramming is not going to be very productive when it comes to learning material you should have been learning over several years. The SSAT is designed to test what you have learned over time at school. Its not designed so that you have to learn new material, just master the material you have been learning in school. Instead of cramming, you might consider working hard in school and then during the last few weeks before the test, concentrate on three areas: know what is expectedtake practice testsreview subject material 3. Know the Test Format Knowing what is expected when you step through the door to the testing room is just as important as taking practice tests. Memorize the format of the test. Know what material will be covered. Learn all the variations in the way a question can be presented or worded. Think like the examiner. Paying attention to details like how youll take the exam and how it is scored can help you excel overall. Want more test prep strategies? Check out this blog on how to prepare for the SSAT and ISEE. 4. Practice Taking practice tests is critical to your success in these standardized tests. You have a certain number of questions which must be answered within a fixed time. So you must work to beat the clock. The best way to perfect your skills is to actually try to duplicate the test environment. Try to match the test conditions as closely as possible. Set aside a Saturday morning to work a practice test to the clock. Make sure that you do the practice test in a quiet room and have a parent present you the exam, just as if you were in the actual testing room. Imagine yourself in the room with dozens of your classmates taking the same test. No cell phone, snacks, iPod or TV. If you are really serious about honing your timing skills, you should repeat this exercise at least twice. 5. Review Reviewing subject material means exactly that. If you have pursued your studies in an organized manner, that  means pulling out those notes from a year ago and going over them carefully. Note what you didnt understand. Practice what you werent sure of by writing it out. Thats a common test prep strategy, writing things out, because for many people, this strategy will help them remember things better. As you practice and review, make a note of where you excel and where you need assistance, and then get help in the areas where you have deficiencies. If you plan to take the tests next year, understand the material now so that you can nail them. Dont put off thorough test preparation. Remember: you cannot cram for these tests. Article edited by  Stacy Jagodowski

Charlemagne the man values and orientation

Charlemagne the man values and orientation To understand Charlemagne as a ruler you have to understand Charlemagne â€Å"The Man.† From what we can tell from Charlemagne’s personal qualities, he was a man of great stature known for being a great warrior, scholar, and politician. He was well spoken and charismatic. He valued his family, he related well to foreigners, had a positive personality, and was strong willed and athletic. Because of these qualities he was often very well respected and admired. In playing those roles he would not only be able to conquer but build trust and unity amongst the people. He was an incredible warrior whom displayed an iron will. Although he was one of greatness on the battlefield he possessed the ability of establishing friendships and was known for his generosity. Charlemagne was also respected as a scholar based on his willingness to learn, and his desire to promote education throughout his kingdom. Charlemagne studied Greek, spoke fluent Latin, and was well versed in the libe ral arts. He used his love for learning to study the world around him in order to keep informed of this issues and cultures surrounding and throughout his empire. Charlemagne respected, defended, and supported the Catholic Church during his life, which reinforced his Christian morality and beliefs. It was his Christian orientation and moral Charlemagne 3 compass that helped give him direction in promoting not only unity, but most importantly, civilization within his kingdom. Because of the ferocity with which he defended his beliefs and convictions, and the open-minded way that he viewed the world and mankind, Charlemagne became a wise, multi-faceted, and charismatic leader that the masses first feared, yet came to revered and trust. Charlemagne was not only adept at organizing, making informed decisions, but quite willing to act on those decisions, while persuading and motivating others to willingly follow him. As a â€Å"MAN† then, he had the personality traits that not onl y made him a conqueror, but most importantly, an â€Å"empire builder† of civilized society. MILITARY LEADER/STRATEGIST Charlemagne was an aggressive and courageous warrior, and military leader. During the first thirty years of his rule as king, he had many successful military campaigns, which enabled him to expand and consolidate the Frankish nation, expand his landholdings, and strengthen his military forces. His conflicts included those against the Lombards, Bavarians, Spanish, Byzantines, Avars, and the Saxons (Snell, 2006). Charlemagne 4 His military strategy often included the use of heavy cavalry and a strategy of separating his army into two forces upon entering enemy territory so that he could envelope the enemy in a â€Å"pincer† type movement, attacking them from different directions. Charlemagne believed that by effectively using warfare he would be able defend his kingdom from potential enemies, increase the borders of his realm, and promote the spread of Christianity. Because of his exceptional military accomplishments on the battlefield including his willingness to lead from the front, Charlemagne deservingly earned the title of a â€Å"warrior king†, making himself a force to be reckoned with throughout western Europe as well as gaining the respect from the noble class which helped provide him with political leverage that he would later need to help him to unify the diverse population that he conquered.

Present the closing argument for the prosecution in the case of The Essay

Present the closing argument for the prosecution in the case of The Tell Tale Heart - Essay Example As he states this, he is quick to suggest to the officers that he is innocent despite there being no inquisition into this. It is evident at this point that he is directed by his guilty conscience. When the villain is presenting his thought in the event of planning to execute the move that would help him bring to a stop the evil eye, he argues that he had no problem with the old man when he says, â€Å"True enough. The old man had never done me harm. But he had this one sickly eye. It was like the eye of a vulture†¦.† (Edgar 12) . How is this possible if yet the eye was part of this old man? I suppose the villain is playing psychologist to find a reason to claim innocence and ignorance of the ultimate ending. It beats logic to show pity to one you claim is a source of your curse. In this the villain claims the old man has a vulture like eye that causes a chill deep down his bones, for the reason that it had something in hiding. It is most certain that the villain simply uses this as an excuse to achieve his goal. When the villain plans to commit the crime, he does it in the dark, and he is fully aware that he needs a lantern light that will help him see what he does and how he does it. And this is done stealthily which he knows well that is the only way to avoid the attention of the old man that has always been so sensitive in his sleep. He speaks of adjusting the lantern just to produce a single ray of light so as to strike directly into the old man’s â€Å"evil eye† when he says, â€Å"†¦And then I shone my light, a single beam, upon THE EYE.† (Edgar 13) This, remember is done in the dark. A falsification of this statement is by the fact that the villain claims to clearly or instinctively shine the single ray of light into the old man’s evil eye. As this is done, the old man kind of goes into a shock; a condition that enables the villain do his action with much ease as the old man is unaware of what happens from this point. Once

Critically discuss the application of traditional rules of offer and Essay

Critically discuss the application of traditional rules of offer and acceptance in English contract law in the context of (i) standard term contracts; and (ii) electronic communications - Essay Example Offer is referred to as an expression of desire to contract on specific terms which are made intentionally to become a binding after the person to whom it was addressed accepts it. It can also be defined as the statement of terms that the offeror is ready to be bound with. Acceptance requires that both parties should have engaged in conduct that manifests their assent in subjective perspective. The traditional approach that is applied in contract law is involves analyzing contract formation in terms of one party doing an offer and the other one accepting the offer. It has been argued by some scholars that not all contracts are analyzed in terms of offer and acceptance. They instead argue that one should focus on correspondence and the parties conduct as well as the parties’ terms of agreement Contracts which can not be analyzed in this perspective of offer and acceptance are said to be exceptional (Hedley, 230). Some critics have argued that the principles of offer and acceptance have a marginal relevance in business conduction. Different rules that are related to contract formation appear inform technical and schematic contract law. Practically, the law can adopt a fair and flexible pragmatic approach. Although most contracts are made using the offer and acceptance process, some agreements cannot be explained fully using the traditional approach. There are cases th at may proof hard to reconcile using the traditional approach and they include contract not resulting from parties’ agreement. The court may imply a contract in the bases of public policy or on the bases of expediency which makes it difficult to analyze. Generally contractual terms are settled using two methods that is by express negotiation and standard terms. English law when contrasted with other legal systems uses the analysis traditional offer and acceptance in cases of standard

When a Car is More Than Just a Car Essay Example for Free

When a Car is More Than Just a Car Essay The first time I heard the song, â€Å"Fast Car† by Wyclef Jean, I really liked it because it was catchy. After listening to it a few more times, I realized there was a lot of meaning to it. To me, the main goal of this song is to teach the young listeners a difficult lesson to be careful before they do something that could potentially ruin their lives. Also, Jean is showing his listeners there is help out there and tomorrow is not promised – everybody needs take advantage of their available resources so they do not harm themselves. Basically, Jean wants everyone to be careful with the life that they currently have rather than wasting time here on earth. Jean explains his story by using a type of music that will get to young people without making them feel like they are being scolded. He also relates his verses to famous people such as Kanye West, Notorious B.I.G., Tupac, Sean Bell, Left Eye Lopez, and an innocent 16 year old girl; by using this type of song writing style, young people will listen to the song and learn from it rather than avoiding the topic. The first verse of the song is allduding to Kanye West having a major car accident. He was driving home from a recording studio in Los Angelos at three in the morning when he fell asleep at the wheel. He totaled his car and broke his jaw severely. After this accident, Kanye wrote a song called â€Å"Jesus Walks.† It was part of the album called â€Å"Through the Wire,† which Kanye West actually produced while he had wires holding his jaw together(â€Å"Kanye West†). The first verse of Wyclef Jean’s song says â€Å"I heard a man say Jesus walks, me myself I heard Jesus talk.† This line shows how Jesus is real and how both West and Jean have personally had encounters with Him. The next lines say, â€Å"Cause when I heard his beat I felt Jesus force, I heard it Through The Wire that he made it out the coma, from a fast car.† This line shows West’s devastating accident and the aftermath of it. Kanye was in a coma and nearly died because he failed to be responsible with his car. The purpose of verse one is to show the list eners that driving at late hours of the night or while tired is not safe. It is better to stay somewhere rather than risking a life by driving a car. West was lucky to survive his accident; not all situations have fortunate outcomes however. West dealt with a lot of pain personally, while other peoples’ problems involve their enemies. The second verse of this song is about Tupac and Notorious B.I.G., who is also known as Biggie. Tupac and Biggie had a feud that went on for days before anything was done about it. Biggie was a bad boy, and Tupac was an outlaw. This is explained in the song when Jean writes, â€Å"Some of us are Bad Boys, Some of us are outlaws.† Biggie took the name â€Å"Bad Boys† when he and his producer decided to pair up to make music. Tupac was considered an outlaw because he did not necessarily have any place where he belonged. One day, during November of 1994, Biggie shot Tupac multiple times in the lobby of a recording studio in New York and stole a large amount of jewelry. Everyone suspected Biggie, but he denied it and never got the full blame for it (Huey). During the song, Jean says, â€Å"Unsolved mystery, the killer gets away.† It is very clear he is talking about the incident between Biggie and Tupac. Eventually, their dispute carries on into Vegas and LA, where Tupac is murdered in his SUV from a shot by a neighboring car. The song also explains this because Jean talks about the drama moving on to Vegas and LA and driving a fast car. This rivalry was out of control, especially when Tupac was eventually murdered. Everyone thought the world would become a better place because people would learn from the situation. This was not the case, however, because the rivalries got bigger and America became more violent in the 20th century. Jean is once again trying to show everyone the importance of our lives; he does not want anyone to get into trouble so badly that their lives are ultimately ended by the violence. The chorus speaks the loudest in terms of meaning of the song. The first half is, â€Å"you don’t got to be no billionaire, to get a ticket up to the moon. We all know somebody up there, you need a helping hand, look, I’m right here.† Basically, Jean means everybody goes to the moon, or heaven, one day. However, a person does not have to be rich to take a trip up there. We all know people who have passed away and gone to heaven; it is never easy to say goodbye to people who leave Earth. He wants everyone to know that there is plenty of help on Earth. Jean does not want anybody to mess up their life to the point that it isn’t worth it to fix it. This part of the song has the most symbolic meaning. Cars symbolize the journey of life – from birth to death, just as they help you travel from one place to another. Jean uses the verses to show literal meanings of why we need to be careful with cars; he uses the chorus to show the symbolic meaning associated with fast cars and why they have the ability to be so dangero us. Also, he prefers not to have any hardships to control his listeners’ lives either. The verse goes on to say, â€Å"†¦to help you see clearly now.† Jean wants to be the helping hand for everybody. Why die, when you could fix your problems and live as a happy individual? The whole purpose of the song is to be smart and not let our cars or problems control us. The bridge of the song emphasizes the dangers of cars. A person might be drinking or not in the right mental state to drive, however if they pick up their friends to drive, most of them will probably get in the car. Paul Simon comes into the song at this point and says, â€Å"When that fast car picks you up, you will have no choice. You may hear the tires screaming, but you will have no voice. But as the fast car picks you up, you will weep and smile. And see heaven in the headlights, mile after, mile.† This is a very good representation about what life is really like. People don’t want to stand up to their friends because they will be the only one. However, making the choice to not spe ak up might cost a person their life. Even if it does not ultimately end their life, they will feel regret as they â€Å"see heaven in the headlights, mile after mile.† People know they are making a mistake by getting in a car with people who have been drinking. Yet most people just go along with it in order to fit in. The danger with cars is they do not seem like weapons and people are not very careful with them because they see them as a toy. They can be a weapon though because they can easily hit somebody and injure them or the people in the car. After this song, hopefully everybody begins to see the importance in safety and good decisions. Jean is not even close to done – he keeps bringing in more examples so he can really get is message across. The third verse of this song references the Sean Bell shooting that occurred in November of 2006. Bell held his bachelor party at a Queens Strip Club in New York City. He was drinking and then got into his Nissan Altima with two of his friends. He began to drive and he ran into a New York officer. The rest of the officers thought Bell was a danger so they began to shoot at his car. They killed Bell while injuring two of his friends. All together, they shot 51 times. The officers involved in the incident were indicted, â€Å"charging the two who had fired the bulk of the shots, Detective Michael Oliver and Detective Gescard F. Isnora, with first-degree manslaughter, and the third, Detective Marc Cooper, with reckless endangerment† (â€Å"Sean Bell†). This is explained in the song when Wyclef Jean writes, â€Å"what would you do after your bachelor party? In the bar celebrating with all your homies,† and â€Å"over fifty one shots but you ain’t ready to die.† Jean shows how everybody has a bachelors party and makes bad decisions, but that does not mean he or she deserves to die, or wants to die. Bell made a bad decision by getting in his car when he was under the influence of alcohol, howeve r he did not think it would cause him his life. Jean is showing his listeners a lesson through Bell’s story. He is showing the importance of responsibility, especially when people are under the influence of alcohol. Nobody wants to die, especially right before their wedding. Jean’s lesson is to be careful and mindful of our actions. The fourth verse of the song is about a member of the hip-hop band, TLC. Her name was Lisa – left eye – Lopez and she was on a spiritual trip to Honduras to get her life in order (â€Å"TLCs Lisa Left Eye Lopes dies in wreck.†). Jean explains this by saying, â€Å"Everybody needs some TLC, so she headed to Honduras for some TLC (Tender Loving Care).† Lopez died an innocent death. She was a passenger in a van; she died instantly, while the other seven passengers were uninjured. Jean states, â€Å"Well she was a passenger, never a driver, in that fast car.† At this point in the song, Jean turns to people who are trying to save their lives, yet they still suffer deaths. Lopez was on a journey trying to figure out her problems, but she was killed by a dangerous fast car. She was not ready for heaven, but she ended up taking her trip early. The fifth and final verse of the song is about an innocent 16 year old girl who just had her sweet sixteenth birthday party. She was crossing the street when she was hit by a car and died. The verse says, â€Å"Sweet sixteen, I see her leaving the scene. Crossing the street, she won’t see seventeen.† The person that hit her was under the influence of alcohol. Just as Jean says, â€Å"Blink of an eye, DWI. Hit and run, the assailant flees, in that fast car.† This verse goes along with the chorus very well because the girl was innocent, not ready to die, and she probably was not going through anything difficult that caused her to want to end her life. Instead, she was the victim of a fast car and bad decisions that ultimately ended her life. This song is full of meaning and lessons that meant to be passed on to the reader. Jean is looking out for his listeners while he sings this song. My favorite part will always be, â€Å"You don’t got to be no billionaire, to get a ticket up to the moon.† This line defines the song; it is all about safety and using street smarts so we do not die prematurely. I like to be adventurous and live my life to the fullest, but safety always comes first. I would feel terrible if I left my family behind by making a bad decision – we have to think about our own safety, as well as the way life would change for our loved ones if we took our trip to the â€Å"moon.† This song made an impact on my life, and I hope it changes other peoples’ lives too. Works Cited Huey, Steve. â€Å"The Notorious B.I.G.† Bad Boys Forever. Bad Boys. 2002-2010. http://www.badboyforever.com/artists/the-notorious-big. 21 Feb 2011. â€Å"Kanye West.† Chicago Tribune. Chicago Tribune. n.d. http://www.chicagotribune.com/topic/entertainment/music/kanye-west-PECLB004230.topic. 21 Feb 2011. â€Å"Sean Bell.† NY Times Online. NY Times. 28 July 2010. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/sean_bell/index.html 21 Feb 2011 â€Å"TLCs Lisa Left Eye Lopes dies in wreck.† CNN Entertainment. CNN. 26 April 2002. http://articles.cnn.com/2002-04-26/entertainment/obit.lopes_1_watkins-and-thomas-tionne-t-boz-watkins-rozonda-chilli-thomas?_s=PM:SHOWBIZ. 21 Feb 2011.

Frida Kahlo Exposed Her Soul on Canvas Essay -- Biography Biographies

Frida Kahlo Exposed Her Soul on Canvas Frida Kahlo was born in Mexico City on July 7, 1907. Though she wanted many to believe that she was born in 1910, the year of the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution. Her father was a photographer of Hungarian Jewish decent, and her mother was Spanish and Native American. From an early age Frida's life would be marked by years of physical suffering. At the age of six she was stricken with polio, this left her right leg to appear much thinner than the other, as well as leaving her with a limp. Though she suffered dearly as a child, she was fearless and brave. She was also extremely intelligent. In 1922 she entered the Preparatoria, the most prestigious educational institution in Mexico, which had only just begun to admit girls. She was one of the only thirty-five girls out of the two thousand students. It was there that she met Diego Rivera, the man that she would eventually marry. In 1925, Frida was involved in a horrific bus accident that would alter the way she would live her life from that point on. She seriously injured her spine, abdomen, pelvis, and right foot. Frida was forced to stay flat on her back, encased in a plaster cast and enclosed in a box like structure for months. Though she survived the accident, the wounds that she suffered led to a lifelong physical battle with pain. Frida eventually regained her ability to walk, but she had many relapses, which caused her to be hospitalized for long periods of time, and also caused her to undergo numerous operations (32 throughout her life). It was her accident that led her to the path of becoming an artist. Frida in itially started painting out of boredom. She would go on to paint many of her masterpieces while being confined to... ...he opening, she of course refused to listen to the doctors and at the last minute she arrived at her exhibition on a hospital stretcher. A few months later she had to have her right leg amputated below the knee, due to a persistent infection. This caused her to spiral into a deep depression. She eventually attempted suicide several times. On July 13, 1954, Frida died. No official autopsy was done, it was a rumored suicide. Her last words in her diary read "I hope the leaving is joyful and I hope never to return". Frida Kahlo would leave behind a legacy of paintings that illustrates the beautiful and talented woman that she was. She offered the world so much beauty, though her time here was spent in such tremendous pain. I only wonder if she would have been able to create such masterpieces without going through such physical and emotional difficulties. Probably not.

Multiple Learning Styles Essay

More than one student in Kindergarten through College has complained of boring courses and tedious homework that had no discernible connection to their immediate environment. Many students describe their courses as lectures that force them to sit and listen to a professor for one to three hours, sometimes without a break in between. It is rare, or even unheard of, for a student to participate in a class-related activity that involved groups, going outside, discussions, or movement. The physical, social, emotional, and cognitive aspects of the classroom are not often addressed, leaving school a less safe and less stimulating environment (Sprenger, 2008). Not surprisingly, school is labeled as a stagnant place lacking in the stimulation of our senses. Students would rather be with friends, play a sport, master a hobby or skill, or even immerse themselves into fantastic games than go to school. Yet these same students appreciate learning new ideas, growing stronger, and having fun in a wide array of visual, audial, and kinesthetic activities. Shouldn’t public and private education use the best methods to impart history, math, science, language, and philosophy to younger generations? While there is no â€Å"best† method to accomplish this, I believe that using multiple learning styles to approach teaching and learning is more effective than using one style to accommodate multiple unique individuals. In its entirety, a learning style is â€Å"the complex manner in which, and conditions under which, learners most efï ¬ ciently and most effectively perceive, process, store, and recall what they are attempting to learn† (Lujan and DiCarlo, 2012). Most professionals and students have used three major learning styles to categorize themselves: Auditory, Visual, and Kinesthetic. These perspectives can be defined in simpler terms to be â€Å"hearing†, â€Å"seeing†, and â€Å"moving/doing†. In the 1980’s, a fourth category was added to differentiate â€Å"visual† and â€Å"read/write† learners, since people like Neil Fleming noticed that â€Å"some students had a distinct preference for the written word whilst others preferred symbolic information as in maps, diagrams, and charts (Fleming, 2006). As a result, the VARK questionnaire was created to identify an individual’s â€Å"preferences for particular modes of presentationâ₠¬  (Lujan and DiCarlo, 2012). Learning style dimensions are connected and related to one another, not â€Å"either/or† categories (Felder and Spurlin, 2005). Some people excel at interpreting locations on maps, while others would rather hear a location described; some would rather draw the map itself. Thus, if a teacher is monotonously lecturing a topic to sophomore students in college, some students will interpret and make connections with the information presented more easily than others. Those students that â€Å"learned less† or â€Å"slower† than other students in that example would have benefitted from other styles of teaching, such as a visual diagram of the information, a mind map, written bullet points, or physical interaction with the subject matter. Without this insight, flexibility, or desire, most teachers would remain unaware that the students who performed worse in their courses might have scored higher on tests or assignments if they had understood the class material from anot her perspective related to learning styles. The use of multiple learning styles outside of the classroom has even more important and practical implications that could lead to more effective problem solving, safety prevention, and innovations that would stimulate more than one sense. Signs on streets could be renovated to accommodate audibly-inclined (or deaf) people while driving their car: their eyes can focus on the road, while their ears would be notified (via radio-wave, for example) of changes in speed limits, lane rules, and traffic congestions. Medical students, who spend roughly two to six more years in school than other college graduates with a bachelor’s degree, would benefit from this in the classroom and during residencies. These future and current professionals are responsible for memorizing and utilizing a multitude of technologies, medications, and other holistic treatments that must be understood through scholarly research papers and on-site administration of those same procedures. How else would they do this without being taught and teaching this complex information via multiple learning styles? In an experiment done by Heidi Lujan and Stephen DiCarlo (2005), only 36.1% of their study’s sample preferred using a single learning style over multiple learning styles. Not only are models and demonstrations useful in imparting information, but peer-to-peer interactions and roleplaying can also foster a student’s ability to create connections between ideas. Some researchers categorize learning styles into eight components: Sensing or intuitive, visual or verbal, active or reflective, and sequential or global. This is also known as the Felder-Silverman Model (Felder & Spurlin, 2005). Each set of words are opposites to each other in terms of ways of interpreting information. According to the Index of Learning Styles (ILS), which adapts these eight ideas into a measureable tool, each of us is a mixture of each learning style, represented by a numerical gradient that connect each paired learning style to itself. When comparing the VARK questionnaire to the ILS, the latter seems to take the four modes in VARK and categorize them even further. However, the audial aspect of the VARK isn’t clearly synonymous to any set of categories in the ILS, but rather, it is a part of the ILS in its entirety. This might be due to the fact that each of us learns things using a unique combination of the VARK, so instead of separating major senses into a questionnaire, the ILS separates major preferences into an index. The accuracy of these tools is always questionable, even by Neil Fleming (2006), who says that the VARK should be used to create conversations that pertain to how each individual learns, and how those learning preferences connect to decisions made by those individuals. As our technological advances increase, teachers, students, and other people will find newer, cost-effective, and dynamic ways to impart and absorb new information (Solvie & Kloek, 2007). Positive uses of virtual reality and MRI’s can lead humans to understanding the way our brains send and receive information. Nano technology might eventually allow us to physically connect our brains to each other’s through the tiniest circuits. This eventual phenomenon will have the potential to collect our natur al resources, connect to each other, and commit to providing excellence in education, our professions, and our daily lives. References Solvie, P., & Kloek, M. (2007). Using technology tools to engage students with multiple learning styles in a constructivist learning environment. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education, 7(2), 7-27. Fleming, N., and Baume, D. (2006). Learning Styles Again: VARKing up the right tree! Educational Developments, 7.4, 4-7. Heidi E. Lujan and Stephen E. DiCarlo (2005). First-year medical students prefer multiple learning styles. Adv Physiol Educ, 30, 13-16. Marilee B. Sprenger (2008). Environments for Learning. Differentiation through Learning Styles and Memory, 2, 1-10. Richard M. Felder and Joni Spurlin (2005). Applications, Reliability and Validity of the Index of Learning Styles. Int. Engng Ed, 21, 103-112.

Creativity and Innovation in Indian Banks

Topic: Innovative products by Indian organizations in the Banking Sector Akshita Shetty Student K J Somaiya Institute of management studies and research PGDM (RM) Roll no: 56 Email id:[email  protected] com Abstract During the past one decade, one of the sectors which underwent visible sea-change through innovative strategies is undoubtedly the banking sector. The sector has been growing at a fast pace in India and is challenged with several aspects like new regulations from time to time, changing customer needs and perceptions, changing technology and changing operations.Technology has been playing a crucial role in the tremendous improvement of banking services and operations. Indian banking industry has moved way ahead both in terms of offering value added services and delivering quality service. It was thought that the world financial crisis would impact the Indian banking sector in a serious manner. But, because of the strong foundations of Indian banking system with the suppo rt from well structured financial systems, the anticipated impact of the world crisis was almost insignificant. Instead, it helped the banks to get strengthened further and become closer to the customer with innovative approaches.Banks appear to be on the path of achieving sustainability and a long-term survival because of innovation. Keywords: Innovation in banking, technology in banking, changes in banking, transformation in banking, IT in banking, Indian banking. Introduction Technology has brought about a complete paradigm shift in the functioning of banks and delivery of banking services. Gone are the days when every banking transaction required a visit to the bank branch. Today, most of the transactions can be done from the comforts of one’s home and customers need not visit the bank branch for anything.Technology is no longer an enabler, but a business driver. The growth of the internet, mobiles and communication technology has added a different dimension to banking. T he information technology (IT) available today is being leveraged in customer acquisitions, driving automation and process efficiency, delivering ease and efficiency to customers. Many of the IT initiatives of banks started in the late 1990s or early 2000 with an emphasis on the adoption of core banking solutions (CBS), automation of branches and centralization of operations in the CBS.Over the last decade, most of the banks completed the transformation to technology-driven organizations. Moving from a manual, scale-constrained environment to a global presence with automated systems and processes, it is difficult to envisage the adverse scenario the sector was in the era before the reforms, when a simple deposit or withdrawal of cash would require a day. ATMs, mobile banking and online bill payments facilities to vendors and utility service providers have almost obviated the need for customers to visit a branch.Branches are also transforming from operating as transaction processing points into relationship management hubs. The change has been very productive for banks bringing in an increase in productivity and operational efficiency to be more competitive. Better risk management due to centralization of information and real time availability of critical data for decision making. With most of the banks being technology-enabled, the focus is shifting to computerizing regional rural banks (RRBs).In addition, banks are moving toward decision making and business intelligence software and trying to optimize the IT infrastructure created The banking system in India has created a niche for itself in the current competitive global arena where adoption of new and innovative technological developments carries the key to expansion of business and its future development. The Indian banking system has come a long way from being a player restricted to domestic boundaries to a leading giant in the world of financial services across the globe.Credit for this progress goes to a mix of factors like, the introduction of various economic reforms which gave a boost to the banking sector, adoption of new technology by banks in order to streamline their line of businesses and increasing profits by improving cost efficiency and offering doorstep banking convenience to their customers. Banking ‘Then' and ‘Now' Indian villages were deprived of various financial products like mutual funds, insurance and equity trading hitherto, which are now accessible through proxy banking in the form of Internet kiosks and ATMs.The alias given to banking which is not routed through branches is ‘Channel Migration'. Through this route, a bouquet of services is at the customers' disposal in today's banking system. This is possible because banking transactions are stored in a centrally located server with which all other branches of a bank are connected. The technological systems in India are considered far more advanced than those of Russian and Chinese banking sy stems but are lagging far behind the UK, USA and Singapore.Connectivity takes root Today almost all scheduled commercial banks are connected to all the branches on a real time basis extending the anywhere banking facility to the customers, which means that it is not necessary for a customer now to visit the branch personally in order to conduct transactions. Now a customer has various other options available with him like internet banking, mobile banking, ATMs (automated teller machines), phone banking which offers 24 X 7 banking, etc.Whenever and wherever a transaction is done in a bank account, the updated status is reflected in all the branches, thus making anywhere banking possible. ATMs have revolutionalized the banking sector by making cash and other banking services available to customers at all times. Future Outlook The future of Indian banking lies in increased investment in technology platforms and a greater focus on end-to-end solutions provided by IT majors like core ban king products, vertical specific CRM and risk management software. Body scopeInnovation by Indian banks in aspects such as: Service banking ATMS’s Net banking Mobile banking ECS/RTGS/NEFT Debit card/credit cards CRM (customer service) Case studies: (for example) South Indian Bank: The salary disbursement of corporates , firms and such others who maintain accounts with any of the 511 CBS branches would be managed by the Bank, hassle-free and free of any bank charges. The employer would be benefited in that the salary could be disbursed to any employees/any single employee who are/is working even in far-off places where SIB has no presence.Dr. V. A. Joseph ,Chairman & CEO of the Bank and Mr. M. P. Gopalakrishnan,President ,CMS Trust jointly launched the product . In his inaugural address Dr. Joseph said, †This convenience banking product, which is designed for the convenience of both employers and employees, leverages the bank's strong technology platform, which connects all the 511 branches and 26 extension counters of the Bank under Core Banking Solutions network offering anytime banking to its customers. GSSA can be opened with zero balance†.The Chairman and CEO of the Bank also stated, â€Å"South Indian Bank, being a customer – oriented Bank is striving hard to render personalized customer service using the latest technological capabilities. The technological capability of the Bank was recognised when the Bank could bag the banking technology excellence award from IDRBT which is the technical arm of RBI. The service quality of the Bank has also been recognized when the Bank was selected in the ‘Outlook Money – C Fore’ survey as the best private sector Bank in India in the service quality segment. . Dr. Joseph also referred to the facility recently started for online booking of offerings, free of bank charges , through South Indian Bank payment gateway-the first bank to go online booking -by the customers of the bank who are devotees of Guruvayur Sreekrishna Temple which is described as the Dwaraka of South India. This facility is being utilized by the NRIs also to effect offerings, hassle –free with greater transparency and security at the click of a button ,either for themselves or their aged parents resident in India.. South Indian Bank had completed on 26. 03. 07 the project ‘SIBertech’ by introducing a centralised Core Banking Solution in technology partnership with Infosys Technologies when many banks had not even started implementation of CBS . SIB, had started this project in 2001 to render personalized customer service. The new product now launched would confirm this belief†, the Chairman concluded his inaugural address.With the following carefully thought-out value additions of this innovative convenience banking product , banking for employers and their employees, is made extremely easy and comfortable: – * ;Free International ATM-cum-Debit Card for which annual maintenance charges are not collected * Online booking of offerings for Lord Sri Guruvayurappan, free of bank charges * O  Withdrawal of cash from the ATMs of other Banks free of bank charges (As charges would be borne by SIB) * O  Free utility payment and e-commerce services * ;No stipulation on minimum balance ;The depositor enjoying many freebies can earn the usual SB interest * ;The depositor can operate his SB account –during his travel/temporary transfer /transfer- hassle-free * ;The account can be closed /transferred to another branch with out any charge * ;Free of cost cheque leaves (subject to limits in each category ) * ;Free fund transfer facility through RTGS/NEFT/Fast Money /DD Customers of this feature-rich Savings Bank account are also provided with facilities to open Depository account and also enjoy mobile banking facility. Indian bank:Indian Bank has won the ‘Golden Peacock Innovative Products/Service Award' for 2011. The award was received by the bank's Chairman and Managing Director, Mr T. M. Bhasin, at the World Congress on Total Quality, held in Bengaluru on Saturday. The award was given to the bank â€Å"in recognition of its contribution to promotion of self help groups (SHGs)†. SHGs have turned out to be major vehicles of women empowerment. In the current year, Indian Bank has so far disbursed Rs 1,360 crore to 55,391 SHGs, taking the total exposure under the SHG portfolio to Rs 2,336 crore, benefiting 175,390 SHGs, says a press release from the bank.State Bank of India: State bank of India, the largest public sector bank in India, offers the following innovative services. 1. SMS Unhappy This innovative idea was initiated by Mr. Siva Kumar, Dy. Managing Director of SBI. Any customer who wants to lodge a complaint sends the message â€Å"Unhappy† to a specified number (8008202020). The Happy Room then calls the customer and records the details of the complaint. The complaint is then forwar ded. SBI has received thousands of such messages since its commencement and this service is a great success.Other banks have also started imitating this service. 2. Crorepati Only Branch SBI has launched first of its kind branch for High Networth Individuals (HNI) where it takes minimum Rs 1 crore to open an account, and that too on invitation only. This branch offers specialized banking facilities like relationship managers, 24/7 lockers, extended banking hours, doorstep pick-up and drop facilities, in addition to pampering customers five-star amenities at the branch. â€Å"We have opened as many as 50 accounts so far.We are confident of opening another 150 by the end of the current fiscal,† as per Mr. Shiva Kumar, Chief General Manager, SBI4. According to SBI, an attractive feature of the branch is 24 hour open lockers. The bank also is providing special dressing rooms for customers to cater to the needs of late night function goers segment. References -Y. Ramakrishna, Serv ice Innovation in Banks for Sustainability, IJMBS Vol. 2, Issue 2, April – June 2012 -Indian banking System: Epitome of continuous innovation, 2008. -Process innovation in the Indian banking industry, 2009 Indian Banking Sector: Challenges and Opportunities -Keertiman Sharma, Innovations in rural financial products and services, VOL. 2(1) – 2011: 35-37 -Outsourcing in the Indian banking sector: gaining momentum, 2008 -Innovation in retail banking -India PRWIRE, South Indian bank launches another innovative convenience product, 2008 -Vortex engineering, Solar power to enable banking and ATM facilities for rural india, 2011 -J U Ahmed, Services Rendered by Commercial Bank: A Customer Oriented empirical Evidence from State Bank of India, Vol. I No. – 2, Jan-2011 ——————————————– [ 1 ]. Service Innovation in Banks for Sustainability [ 2 ]. technology in banking: I nsight and foresight [ 3 ]. Indian banking system: epitome of continuous improvement [ 4 ]. Solar power to enable banking and ATM facilities for Rural  India [ 5 ]. Y. Ramakrishna, Service Innovation in Banks for Sustainability, IJMBS Vol. 2, Issue 2, April – June 2012

Barbarous Mexico essays

Barbarous Mexico essays Barbarous Mexico is a book which fully explains the Mexican revolution of 1910. The author John Kenneth Turner travelled to Mexico during the end of Porfirio Diazs rule. Turner gives a shocking portrayl of the abusive planatations were mass amounts of indians lost their lves. Diazs flow of power was downward. This created a dictatorship that allowed Diaz to control every aspect of the peoples lives. The main objection of Barbarous Mexico is to expose the total authoritarian rule Diaz posseses. During the rule of Diaz the people were left behind. They would enivitabley revolt against oppression and try to liberate themselves. Turner has three main parts to this mexican story. First is the slave life on the plantations, the second is the elite society of the Diaz adminstation, and last is foriegn countries. The first chapter sets the tone for the book. The author gives us grim look into the life of the plantation slave. Probaly the worst job in the mexican labor system. The chance of living more than ten years is near immpossible. There is no hope on the plantations. The platations Turner witnessed first hand were in the Yuctan and Valle Nacional. ...

Critical review Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Critical review - Essay Example 118). What emerges are relationships characterized by â€Å"homoscoial desire and dominance† and â€Å"power and dominance over women, gay men, and other straight men† (Kiesling 2006, p. 118). Hirammoto (2010) states that Kiesling’s work is demonstrative of the constructs that reproduce the dominance of heterosexual male models not only outside of a specific group but how they are used to â€Å"claim power in a same-sex social group† (236). Hirammoto (2010) also states that Kiesling’s work is reflective of the findings in the literature relative to theories about heterosexual masculinity. Kiesling informs that the way that men display their heterosexuality is deeply connected to communal practices that segregates heterosexuality and other sexual orientations. This assertion finds currency with McEhinny (2004) who argues that theories about relations among heterosexuals typically err when they take position that gender is an attribute and ignore the fact that it is likewise a practice (150). For McEhinny (2004) Kiesling’s study lends greater weight to heterosexual studies in that it emphasizes heterosexual practices as evidenced by language and speech patterns. To this end, Kiesling (2006) takes the position that heterosexual practices together with â€Å"rituals of speech events† and communal activities contribute toward establishing homosocial and heterosexual identity (p. 118). Keisling (2006) demonstrates this assertion by reference to the Greek alphabet and the concept of Greek sororities and fraternities. As Kiesling (2006) informs: The ‘greek’ letter society system is arranged through an ideology of sexual difference, such that fraternities are all-male, sororities are all-female (p. 118). Even events arranged by the Greek society are predicated on the sexual differences and power differences that emerge as a result. For instance mixers and open parties are designed to distinguish between males and females and emphasize the significance of â€Å"heterosexual desire† and â€Å"sex and alcohol† (Kiesling 2006, p. 119). Kiesling (2006) demonstrates the point by providing an excerpt of a dialogue from a male participant at one of these parties. The excerpt reveals a rather high regard for heterosexual sexual activities. As Kiesling (2006) reports: This high evaluation of heterosexual activity creates a social context in which heterorsexual sex is glorified as an end in itself, thus creating an ideology of heterosexual desire as an important social goal (p. 119). In the dialogue excerpt sexual activities such as â€Å"hook-up† were identified (Kiesling 2006, p. 119). Kielsing (2006) explores these speech activities further by seeking clarification by conducting an interview with another member the male group. During the course of this interview, Kiesling was able to identify a number of heterosexual driven speech activities such as, â€Å"throwin’ raps†, â€Å"scamming† , â€Å"a drunk thing and a do your commitment thing†(p. 121). The last two speech activities demonstrate how men categorize the difference between their heterosexual desires in terms of instant or long-term sexual gratification. The â€Å"drunk thing† is not only for instant sexual gratification but is also a male bonding affair in which these men express their â€Å"sexual prowess† (Keisling 2006, p. 121). The long-term sexual gratification desires are treated differently among the members of the fraternity. It demonstrates that that the male

Nike Case Study on their Supply Chain Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Nike Case Study on their Supply Chain - Essay Example People from various places across the globe have different tastes for different products hence the need to satisfy these as a way of gaining competitive advantage globally. The other competitive priority for Nike is the need to be cognisant of the changes in consumer behaviour. Consumer wants and needs are different from various parts of the globe hence the need to make an effort to identify and satisfy these so as to be able to remain viable. The cost advantage is another competitive priority for Nike. This is seen as a strategy that is meant to bring goods of an acceptable quality to the market with comparatively lower production costs than its competitors (Strydom 2004). This is achieved through careful and effective management of the cost drivers for the business where it seeks to be a low cost producer while at the same time retaining competitive advantage (Strydom 2004). The other competitive priority that can be adopted by Nike is differentiation. According to Porter (1985:120), differentiation is â€Å"the process when the company provides something unique that is valuable to buyers beyond simply offering low price.† Thus, differentiation strategy is mainly concerned with identifying unique features about a particular product that have a broad perceived value in the market. 2. Nike should reduce product proliferation in an attempt to reduce their supply chain complexity and costs. Product proliferation suggests that there is a rapid growth of a particular product which may be counter-productive as far as demand and supply are concerned. According to the law of demand and supply, when there is high demand the price is likely to go up and this means an increase in the production of new products where costs are likely to be recovered while at the same time an increase in supply will lower the prices (Kotler 1999). Oversupply of products can result in

Disaster management assignment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Disaster management assignment - Essay Example Why was there such a deficiency in the aid provided? Was there any effect on the extent of Hurricane Katrina of the human activities? Was the catastrophe prompted by the land use practices along the Gulf Coast? Can Global Warming be considered as one of the factors that impelled the storm to such appalling proportions? What effect would it have on the over all nation’s economy? These are just some of the questions that started arising in the utter confusion after the disaster. Since the time that Katrina hit, the tropical storms and hurricane activity in the Atlantic have been well above normal. The arrival of Katrina actually signified a continuation of the trend in 1995 (Hurricane Katrina: A Scientist’s Response). The development of hurricanes had an average of 7.7 hurricanes and 3.6 major hurricanes yearly between 1995 and 2005, while in the previous 25 years the average had been 5 hurricanes and 1.5 major hurricanes. (Hurricane Katrina: A Scientist’s Response 2005) New Orleans, which was directly in the eye of the hurricane, sits in the middle of the flood plain of the Mississippi river. This mighty river like most rivers of such a scale overflowed its banks inundating the surrounding area which threatened the wellbeing of the communities surrounding that area. Katrina arrived in the busiest hurricane seasons of the Atlantic Ocean by the end of which 24 tropical storms had formed. Out of these thirteen became hurricanes including seven classified as being category-3 and higher. (Hurricane Katrina: Possible Causes 2005) Hurricane Katrina was one of the most calamitous hurricanes to have ever hit the American soil. It completely devastated New Orleans, Louisiana and other communities settled on the Gulf Coast when it came ashore on August 29, 2005 (Hurricane Katrina: Possible Causes 2005). It made landfall on Louisiana after crossing South Florida and gaining strength over the Gulf of Mexico at 6:10 A.M local time. At 9:45 A.M, the Katrina centre

Elements of Moral Philosophy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Elements of Moral Philosophy - Essay Example The utilitarian primary goal is to maximize happiness. John Mill defined happiness as an existence exempt as far as possible from pain and highest possible enjoyment in both quality and quantity. In other words, if people want to embrace utilitarianism moral viewpoint, they would consider these principles to be morally binding. He claims that happiness is a foundation of morality since people desire to be happy. He also supports the claim, arguing that everything that human desires are to bring happiness. Mill argues that justice is based on utility since the rights are put in place for the human happiness. However, there is no agreement about the goals as people view happiness with considerable disagreement. People from varying cultural background may disagree more profoundly with these views. Utilitarian do not put more emphasis on the importance of motive when analyzing the moral of the action. Motives may be acceptable for an action if they deliver a positive outcome and overall best consequences. For instance, an individual may rescue people from an accident to get recognition; however, this does not take away from the good outcome. However, this theory has been criticized by arguing that happiness is not the only important thing. Critics argue that the theory does not provide enough protection for individual rights, as well as not everything cannot be measured by the same standards. Other issues have not been considered such as rights, justice, depression personal relationships, and neglecting our normal lives.

Analysis of Vietnams Energy Supply and Production

Analysis of Vietnams Energy Supply and Production Vietnams economy has expanded rapidly in recent years, with its real gross domestic product (GDP) growing 7.7% in 2004 and 8.4% in 2005. Growth is forecast at 8.0% in 2006. Vietnam has had Normal Trade Relations status with the United States since late 2001, with 2002 marking the first time Vietnam shipped more goods to the United States than to Japan. Despite rising exports, Vietnam currently runs a slight trade deficit, but is projected to begin having trade surpluses by 2007. Much of Vietnams large rural population relies heavily on non-commercial biomass energy sources such as wood, dung, and rice husks. As a result, Vietnams per capita commercial energy consumption ranks among the lowest in Asia. The countrys commercial energy consumption is predicted to rise in coming years, primarily due to increases in the use of natural gas. Vietnam claims ownership of a portion of the potentially hydrocarbon-rich Spratly Islands, as do the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, China, and Taiwan. Vietnam, China, and the Philippines agreed in March 2005 to conduct a joint seismic survey for potential oil and natural gas reserves in a portion of the disputed area. Vietnam also claims the Paracel Islands, which China first occupied in 1974. Oil: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003, internal EIA estimates.). Enlarge: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003, internal EIA estimates.) Vietnam has 600 million barrels of proven oil reserves, according to data from Oil and Gas Journal, but that total is likely to increase as exploration continues. Crude oil production averaged 370,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) in 2005, down somewhat from the 403,000 bbl/d level achieved in 2004. Bach Ho (White Tiger), Rang Dong (Dawn), Hang Ngoc, Dai Hung (Big Bear), and Su Tu Den (Ruby) are the largest oil producing fields in the country. Although it is a significant oil producer, Vietnam remains reliant on imports of petroleum products due to a lack of refining capacity. Overall, Vietnam had net exports of 111,000 bbl/d of oil in 2005. Most of Vietnams crude oil is exported to refiners in Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. Vietnams largest oil producer is Vietsovpetro (VSP), a joint venture (JV) between PetroVietnam and Zarubezhneft of Russia. VSP operates Vietnams largest oil field, Bach Ho. Other foreign partners include ConocoPhillips, BP, Petronas, and Talisman Energy. Following the October 2003 commencement of drilling operations in the Su Tu Den (Black Lion) crude field, PetroVietnam reported increasing production volumes. PetroVietnams April 2003 discovery of an oil deposit in Dai Hung, estimated to have a capacity of 6,300 bbl/d, was expected to further increase Vietnamese production. The decline in production overall from 2004 to 2005 was primarily the result of declining production at the Bach Ho field. The planned development of several new oil fields in coming years is expected to increase Vietnamese production. A new well at Block 15-1s Su Tu Trang (White Lion) field flowed 8,682 bbl/d in early 2004 and is scheduled to be developed by 2008. In October 2004, Japanese oil companies Nippon Oil Exploration (35 percent interest), Idemitsu Kosan (35 percent), and Teikoku Oil (30 percent) announced plans to fund the development of Blocks 05.1b and 05.1c in the Nam Con Son Basin. Two months later, the Korean National Oil Corporation (KNOC), along with several Korean partners, finalized terms for the $300 million development of Block 11-2, which includes the Flying Orchid Field. PetroVietnam has a 25 percent interest in the joint venture. Exploration in Vietnam continues to yield new discoveries. In 2002, large oil and gas deposits were discovered in the Ca Ngu Vang (Golden Tuna) and Voi Trang (White Elephant) fields. SOCO Vietnam estimates that its Ca Ngu Vang well may contain up to 250 million barrels of oil. In July 2004, VSP discovered new stocks of oil in its Dragon field. Three months later, a joint venture comprised of American Technologies, Petronas, Singapore Petroleum, and PetroVietnam announced a 100-million-barrel oil discovery off Vietnams northeast coast. In September 2004, the Vietnamese government offered nine exploration blocks in the Phu Khanh basin off its southern coast. In November 2004, Japanese oil companies Nippon Oil Exploration, Idemitsu Kosan, and Teikoku Oil signed an agreement to explore in two offshore blocks southeast of Ho Chi Minh City. They plan to drill a test well in 2006 and complete exploration by 2007. In December 2004, Talisman Energy was awarded the right to conduct exploration in the Cuu Long Basin, and received additional acreage in an adjacent area in April 2005. ONGC of India was awarded drilling rights in the deepwater Block 127 in the Phu Khanh Basinoff Vietnams central coast in October 2005. ChevronTexaco also received acreage in the Phu Khanh Basin in the most recent round of awards, with an award for Block 122 in October 2005. PetroVietnams storage and transportation division, Petrolimex, recently completed a new oil storage facility in the central Khanh Hoa province. The depot is largest in the country, with a total storage capacity of 3.68 million barrels. Refining: Vietnam is in the process of building its first refinery. The $1.5 billion Dung Quat Refinery, located in Quang Ngai province, will have a crude distillation capacity of approximately 140,000 bbl/d. After several years of delays in financing the project, construction finally began in November 2005. Commercial operation of the refinery is expected to begin in early 2009. Vietnams distribution infrastructure is discontinuous, with the north and south of the country functioning largely as separate markets. Completion of the Dung Quat Refinery, located in the center of the country, should lead to greater interaction between the regions. A second refinery project is under consideration at Nghi Son, north of Hanoi in the Thanh Hoa province. The Vietnamese government has estimated the 150,000 bbl/d plant will cost $3 billion. In August 2004, Mitsubishi Corporation agreed to participate in building Nghi Son for completion in 2010. In December 2004, Vietnam contracted the International Business Company (IBC) of the British Virgin Islands to conduct a feasibility study for a third oil refinery, to be located at Vung Ro in the southern Phu Yen province. The Vietnamese government hopes to complete the refinery within 12 years. Natural Gas: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Enlarge: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Vietnam has proven gas reserves of 6.8 trillion cubic feet (Tcf), according to Oil and Gas Journal. Vietnams natural gas production and consumption have been rising rapidly since the late 1990s, with further increases expected as additional fields come onstream. Natural gas is currently produced entirely for domestic consumption. The Cuu Long basin offshore from the Mekong Delta in southern Vietnam, a source of associated gas from oil production, is the largest Vietnamese natural gas production area. Only two fields in Vietnam have been developed specifically for their natural gas potential: Tien Hai, with a potential output of 1.76 million cubic feet per day (Mmcf/d); and Lan Tay/Lan Do of Nam Con Son, which began producing over 5 Mmcf/d in 2002. In the Nam Con Son Basin, a $565 million, 230-mile pipeline was completed in June 2002 connecting the Lan Tay and Lan Do fields to the mainland at Vung Tau. The Nam Con Son project consists of five subsea wells linked to a production platform and a pipeline leading to an onshore treatment plant. Gas is piped to three generating plants at the Phu My industrial complex, where electricity is provided primarily to areas surrounding Ho Chi Minh City. In December 2004, the Vietnamese government announced that output from Nam Con Son was expected to reach 88 billion cubic feet (Bcf), exceeding planned production by 90%. The project currently supplies the Phu My 1, Phu My 3, Phu My 2.1 power plants and the extended Phu My 2.1 plant. Phu My 2.2 will begin using output from the field soon thereafter. In December 2002, a consortium headed by Korea National Oil Corporation (KNOC) signed an agreement to install facilities to pump and supply 130 Mmcf/d of natural gas to Vietnam. The natural gas, located in the Rong Doi and Rong Doi Tay fields on Block 11-2 of the Nam Con Son Basin, is sold to PetroVietnam under a 23-year contract. PetroVietnam resells most this volume to Electricity of Vietnam (EVN). Production at the fields began in mid-2005. In December 2004, KNOC and PetroVietnam signed agreements to further exploit natural gas in both Blocks 11 and 12. Construction of an additional pipeline to bring ashore natural gas from block 11 began in October 2005, and is scheduled for completion in October 2006. The Su Tu Den and Rang Dong oil fields, both of which have considerable Vietnamese reserves of associated natural gas, are located near the 62-mile pipeline from the Bach Ho field. An estimated 60 Mmcf/d of gas from the fields is earmarked for consumption in power plants in southern Vietnam. Both TotalFinaElf and ChevronTexaco (originally Unocal) have found natural gas in exploratory drilling of the Malay basin. Additionally, Talisman Energy has found natural gas at the Cai Nuoc field in block 46. The discovery is close to block PM-3-CAA, which straddles the maritime border with Malaysia, and is expected to contain up to 100 Bcf of recoverable gas reserves. A contract was awarded to McDermott International in March 2006 for construction of a 200-mile pipeline, which will transport natural gas from the PM3-CAA block to Ca Mau province in southern Vietnam. It is scheduled for completion in 2007. In December 2004, PetroVietnam announced that it was reconsidering the $70 million Phu My gas pipeline project from Phu My to Nhon Trach due to increased expenses associated with land costs in compensation areas. The pipeline was initially planned to transport associated gas from the Bach Ho and Rong fields for power generation. Coal: Vietnam contains coal reserves estimated at 165 million short tons (Mmst), the majority of which is anthracite. Production has increased dramatically over the last decade, with Vietnam producing over 18 Mmst in 2003. As a result, Vietnam exported a record 7 Mmst of coal, primarily to Japan and China, in 2003. Although Vietnam has historically relied on hydropower for electricity, it has recently promoted the construction of coal-fired power plants. Vinocoal plans to build eight coal-fueled thermal power plants with a total capacity of 2,900 megawatts (MW) by 2010. Six are currently in various stages of planning and construction. In December 2004, the Vietnamese government approved Vinacoals proposal to invest in a 200-MW, coal-fired thermal power plant in the Son Dong district. The plant is scheduled to begin operation in 2007. Coal-fired power plants are expected to eventually account for 25% of Vietnams total electricity production. The Vietnamese government estimates that 10.2 Mms t of coal is needed per year to meet increasing domestic demand, projected at 20,000 MW by 2010. Vietnam continues to exploit new coal reserves within its borders. In March 2003, a significant coal bed was discovered in the Red River Delta region of northern Vietnam. Vinacoal plans to use the reserve for thermal power plants. In October 2004, Vinacoal entered talks with Chinas Fujian Province Coal Industry Corporation to jointly exploit the Bac Coc Sau mine in the Quang Ninh province. Electricity: Vietnams Electricity Generation, 1980-2003. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Enlarge: Vietnams Electricity Generation, 1980-2003. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Although Vietnams per capita electricity consumption is among the lowest in Asia, demand has risen in recent years, straining the countrys limited generating capacity. Rapid commercial sector growth, population migration to major cities, and elevated living standards have all contributed to a growing demand for electricity. In 2003, Vietnam had a total electric generating capacity of 8.8 gigawatts (GW) and generated 39.7 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, of which 52 percent was hydropower. Electricity demand in Vietnam is forecast to grow 15 percent per year until 2010. Vietnam currently buys power from China to prevent shortages in the north, and plans to begin purchasing from Laos in 2008. The majority of thermal electricity generation in Vietnam depends on coal-fired plants, though natural gas use is expanding. EVNs Pha Lai is the largest coal-fired power project in Vietnam, with the second of two 300-MW units coming into service in 2003. In order to meet increased demand, construction or expansion is planned for 32 power stations (7,547 MW) before 2010. The state power company, Elà ©ctricità © of Vietnam (EVN), plans to commission 16 hydropower plants by 2010 and increased capacity at the Uong Bi coal-fired plant to 400 MW in 2005. Vinacoal also has plans to construct eight additional coal-fired power plants. Vietnam currently has five hydroelectric expansions underway. The countrys Son La project, which began construction in late 2005, is anticipated to have a generating capacity of 2,400 megawatts (MW) by 2012, will be the largest hydroelectric project in Vietnam when completed. In September 2004, construction began on the Ban Ve hydroelectric power plant, expected to begin operations in 2008. EVN began work on four additional hydroelectric projects in late 2004. The Dong Nai 3 and Dong Nai 4, both located in the Central Highlands region, are expected to be completed within four years and to provide approximately 520 MW of generating capacity. In December 2004, EVN began construction of the Se San 4 hydropower plant in the central highlands provinces of Gia Lai and Kon Tum. The plant is anticipated to have a capacity of 330 MW and to generate 1,390 million kWh per year. Vietnam also plans to build three additional plants in the region before 2010. In March 2004, EVN announced plans to spend $1.3 billion to build and refurbish power plants with a combined capacity of 1,510 MW. The projects include the combined cycle power plant Phu My 2.1, the hydroelectric facility Can Don, the Phu My 3 and Phu My 4 thermal plants, and Na Duong. Additional projects include the Song Ba Ha, Bac Binh, Se San 4, Dong Nai 3 and Dong Nai 4 hydrostations, the Quang Ninh, Ninh Binh extension, and the O Mon 600-MW thermal plant. The development of natural gas-fired plants in the Phu My complex of the Ba Ria-Vung Tau province has helped to offset Vietnams heavy reliance on hydropower, which can be vulnerable to disruption when monsoon rainfall is unusually low. In March 2003, the 720-MW Phu My 3 power plant commenced operations. The $450 million plant, owned by a consortium led by UKs BP, was Vietnams first foreign-invested, build-operate-transfer (BOT) project. EVN has contracted to purchase the output under a 20-year power purchase agreement. Mitsubishi received an award in February 2006 for the construction of a 330-MW natural gas-fired power plant in the southern Mekong delta. The plant will come online in early 2009, running initially on fuel oil, and switching to natural gas when pipeline infrastructure is completed. More foreign companies are beginning to enter the growing Vietnamese power market in the form of Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) projects. EVN and a consortium including Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO), Sumitomo, and Elà ©ctricità © de France (EdF) began BOT construction of the Mekong Deltas 715-MW Phu My 2-2 in January 2003. The plant is fueled by gas from Nam Con Son Basin. EVN plans to develop a national electricity grid by 2020 by patching together several regional grids. The countrys distribution infrastructure is poorly maintained, but has benefited from recent improvements. A North-South power cable transmits electricity from Vietnams largest generator, the Hoa Binh hydropower plant in the North, to large population centers in the South, linking the country into one electricity grid and helping alleviate electricity shortages in Ho Chi Minh City. The $56 million project was funded by the World Bank. Vietnam is considering the construction of a 500-KV, 188-mile power line from Pleiku to Danang city at a cost of $130 million. The Vietnamese government has estimated that an additional 9,300 miles of high-voltage transmission lines and 173,600 miles of medium- and low-voltage transmission lines will be necessary to accommodate new capacity by 2010. In September 2004, EVN announced plans to invest $330 million over five years to upgrade transmission lin es surrounding Hanoi. Vietnam plans to complete its first nuclear power plant by 2020 as an alternate means on meeting demand. In December 2004, the Vietnamese Ministry of Science and Technology submitted a pre-feasibility study for the 2,000-megawatt (MW) nuclear plant to the National Assembly. Fossil Fuels Coal, Oil and Natural Gas: Where Fossil Fuels Come From: There are three major forms of fossil fuels: coal, oil and natural gas. All three were formed many hundreds of millions of years ago before the time of the dinosaurs hence the name fossil fuels. The age they were formed is called the Carboniferous Period. It was part of the Paleozoic Era. Carboniferous gets its name from carbon, the basic element in coal and other fossil fuels. The Carboniferous Period occurred from about 360 to 286 million years ago. At the time, the land was covered with swamps filled with huge trees, ferns and other large leafy plants, similar to the picture above. The water and seas were filled with algae the green stuff that forms on a stagnant pool of water. Algae is actually millions of very small plants. Some deposits of coal can be found during the time of the dinosaurs. For example, thin carbon layers can be found during the late Cretaceous Period (65 million years ago) the time of Tyrannosaurus Rex. But the main deposits of fossil fuels are from the Carboniferous Period. For more about the various geologic eras, go to www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/help/timeform.html. As the trees and plants died, they sank to the bottom of the swamps of oceans. They formed layers of a spongy material called peat. Over many hundreds of years, the peat was covered by sand and clay and other minerals, which turned into a type of rock called sedimentary. More and more rock piled on top of more rock, and it weighed more and more. It began to press down on the peat. The peat was squeezed and squeezed until the water came out of it and it eventually, over millions of years, it turned into coal, oil or petroleum, and natural gas. Coal: Coal is a hard, black colored rock-like substance. It is made up of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and varying amounts of sulphur. There are three main types of coal anthracite, bituminous and lignite. Anthracite coal is the hardest and has more carbon, which gives it a higher energy content. Lignite is the softest and is low in carbon but high in hydrogen and oxygen content. Bituminous is in between. Today, the precursor to coal peat is still found in many countries and is also used as an energy source. The earliest known use of coal was in China. Coal from the Fu-shun mine in northeastern China may have been used to smelt copper as early as 3,000 years ago. The Chinese thought coal was a stone that could burn. Coal is found in many of the lower 48 states of U.S. and throughout the rest of the world. Coal is mined out of the ground using various methods. Some coal mines are dug by sinking vertical or horizontal shafts deep under ground, and coal miners travel by elevators or trains deep under ground to dig the coal. Other coal is mined in strip mines where huge steam shovels strip away the top layers above the coal. The layers are then restored after the coal is taken away. The coal is then shipped by train and boats and even in pipelines. In pipelines, the coal is ground up and mixed with water to make whats called a slurry. This is then pumped many miles through pipelines. At the other end, the coal is used to fuel power plants and other factories. Oil or Petroleum: Oil is another fossil fuel. It was also formed more than 300 million years ago. Some scientists say that tiny diatoms are the source of oil. Diatoms are sea creatures the Picture of oil formationsize of a pin head. They do one thing just like plants; they can convert sunlight directly into stored energy. Oil has been used for more than 5,000-6,000 years. The ancient Sumerians, Assyrians and Babylonians used crude oil and asphalt (pitch) collected from large seeps at Tuttul (modern-day Hit) on the Euphrates River. A seep is a place on the ground where the oil leaks up from below ground. The ancient Egyptians, used liquid oil as a medicine for wounds, and oil has been used in lamps to provide light. The Dead Sea, near the modern Country of Israel, used to be called Lake Asphaltites. The word asphalt was derived is from that term because of the lumps of gooey petroleum that were washed up on the lake shores from underwater seeps. In North America, Native Americans used blankets to skim oil off the surface of streams and lakes. They used oil as medicine and to make canoes water-proof. During the Revolutionary War, Native Americans taught George Washingtons troops how to treat frostbite with oil. As our country grew, the demand for oil continued to increase as a fuel for lamps. Petroleum oil began to replace whale oil in lamps because the price for whale oil was very high. During this time, most petroleum oil came from distilling coal into a liquid or by skimming it off of lakes just as the Native Americans did. Then on August 27, 1859, Edwin L. Drake (the man standing on the right in the black and white picture to the right), struck liquid oil at his well near Titusville, Pennsylvania. He found oil under ground and a way that could pump it to the surface. The well pumped the oil into barrels made out of wood. This method of drilling for oil is still being used today all over the world in areas where oil can be found below the surface. Oil and natural gas are found under ground between folds of rock and in areas of rock that are porous and contain the oils within the rock itself. The folds of rock were formed as the earth shifts and moves. Its similar to how a small, throw carpet will bunch up in places on the floor. To find oil and natural gas, companies drill through the earth to the deposits deep below the surface. The oil and natural gas are then pumped from below the ground by oil rigs (like in the picture). They then usually travel through pipelines or by ship. Oil is found in 18 of the 58 counties in California. Kern County, the County where Bakersfield is found, is one of the largest oil production places in the country. But we only get one-half of our oil from California wells. The rest comes from Alaska, and an increasing amount comes from other countries. In the entire U.S., more than 50 percent of all the oil we use comes from outside the countrymost of it from the Middle East. Oil is brought to California by large tanker ships. The petroleum or crude oil must be changed or refined into other products before it can be used. Refineries: Oil is stored in large tanks until it is sent to various places to be used. At oil refineries, crude oil is split into various types of products by heating the thick black oil. Oil is made into many different products fertilizers for farms, the clothes you wear, the toothbrush you use, the plastic bottle that holds your milk, the plastic pen that you write with. They all came from oil. There are thousands of other products that come from oil. Almost all plastic comes originally from oil. Can you think of some other things made from oil? The products include gasoline, diesel fuel, aviation or jet fuel, home heating oil, oil for ships and oil to burn in power plants to make electricity. Heres what a barrel of crude oil can make. In California, 74 percent of our oil is used for transportation cars, planes, trucks, buses and motorcycles. Well learn more about transportation energy in Chapter 18. Natural Gas: Sometime between 6,000 to 2,000 years BCE (Before the Common Era), the first discoveries of natural gas seeps were made in Iran. Many early writers described the natural petroleum seeps in the Middle East, especially in the Baku region of what is now Azerbaijan. The gas seeps, probably first ignited by lightning, provided the fuel for the eternal fires of the fire-worshiping religion of the ancient Persians. Natural gas is lighter than air. Natural gas is mostly made up of a gas called methane. Methane is a simple chemical compound that is made up of carbon and hydrogen atoms. Its chemical formula is CH4 one atom of carbon along with four atoms hydrogen. This gas is highly flammable. Natural gas is usually found near petroleum underground. It is pumped from below ground and travels in pipelines to storage areas. The next chapter looks at that pipeline system. Natural gas usually has no odor and you cant see it. Before it is sent to the pipelines and storage tanks, it is mixed with a chemical that gives a strong odor. The odor smells almost like rotten eggs. The odor makes it easy to smell if there is a leak. Energy Safety Note! If you smell that rotten egg smell in your house, tell your folks and get out of the house quickly. Dont turn on any lights or other electrical devices. A spark from a light switch can ignite the gas very easily. Go to a neighbors house and call 9-1-1 for emergency help. Saving Fossil Fuels: Fossil fuels take millions of years to make. We are using up the fuels that were made more than 300 million years ago before the time of the dinosaurs. Once they are gone they are gone. So, its best to not waste fossil fuels. They are not renewable; they cant really be made again. We can save fossil fuels by conserving energy. Natural Gas Distribution System: We learned in Chapter 8 that natural gas is a fossil fuel. It is a gaseous molecule thats made up of two atoms one carbon atom combined with four hydrogen atom. Its chemical formula is CH4. The picture on the right is a model of what the molecule could look like. Dont confuse natural gas with gasoline, which we call gas for short. Like oil, natural gas is found under ground and under the ocean floor. Wells are drilled to tap into natural gas reservoirs just like drilling for oil. Once a drill has hit an area that contains natural gas, it can be brought to the surface through pipes. The natural gas has to get from the wells to us. To do that, there is a huge network of pipelines that brings natural gas from the gas fields to us. Some of these pipes are two feet wide. Natural gas is sent in larger pipelines to power plants to make electricity or to factories because they use lots of gas. Bakeries use natural gas to heat ovens to bake bread, pies, pastries and cookies. Other businesses use natural gas for heating their buildings or heating water. From larger pipelines, the gas goes through smaller and smaller pipes to your neighborhood. In businesses and in your home, the natural gas must first pass through a meter, which measures the amount of fuel going into the building. A gas company worker reads the meter and the company will charge you for the amount of natural gas you used. In some homes, natural gas is used for cooking, heating water and heating the house in a furnace. In rural areas, where there are no natural gas pipelines, propane (another form of gas thats often made when oil is refined) or bottled gas is used instead of natural gas. Propane is also called LPG, or liquefied petroleum gas, is made up of methane and a mixture with other gases like butane. Propane turns to a liquid when it is placed under slight pressure. For regular natural gas to turn into a liquid, it has to be made very, very cold. Cars and trucks can also use natural gas as a transportation fuel, but they must carry special cylinder-like tanks to hold the fuel. When natural gas is burned to make heat or burned in a cars engine, it burns very cleanly. When you combine natural gas with oxygen (the process of combustion), you produce carbon dioxide and water vapor; plus the energy thats released in heat and light. Some impurities are contained in all natural gas. These include sulphur and butane and other chemicals. When burned, those impurities can create air pollution. The amount of pollution from natural gas is less than burning a more complex fuel like gasoline. Natural gas-powered cars are more than 90 percent cleaner than a gasoline-powered car. Thats why many people feel natural gas would be a good fuel for cars because it burns cleanly. Biomass Energy: Biomass is matter usually thought of as garbage. Some of it is just stuff lying around dead trees, tree branches, yard clippings, left-over crops, wood chips (like in the picture to the right), and bark and sawdust from lumber mills. It can even include used tires and livestock manure. Your trash, paper products that cant be recycled into other paper products, and other household waste are normally sent to the dump. Your trash contains some types of biomass that can be reused. Recycling biomass for fuel and other uses cuts down on the need for landfills to hold garbage. This stuff nobody seems to want can be used to produce electricity, heat, compost material or fuels. Composting material is decayed plant or food products mixed together in a compost pile and spread to help plants grow. California produces more than 60 million bone dry tons of biomass each year. Of this total, five million bone dry tons is now burned to make electricity. This is biomass from lumber mill wastes, urban wood waste, forest and agricultural residues and other feed stocks. If all of it was used, the 60 million tons of biomass in California could make close to 2,000 megawatts of electricity for Californias growing population and economy. Thats enough energy to make electricity for about two million homes! How biomass works is very simple. The waste wood, tree branches and other scraps are gathered together in big trucks. The trucks bring the waste from factories and from farms to a biomass power plant. Here the biomass is dumped into huge hoppers. This is then fed into a furnace where it is burned. The heat is used to boil water in the boiler, and the energy in the steam is used to turn turbines and generators . Biomass can also be tapped right at the landfill with burning waster products. When garbage decomposes, it gives off methane gas. Youll remember in chapters 8 and 9 that natural gas is made up of methane. Pipelines are put into the landfills and the methane gas can be collected. It is then used in power plants to make electricity. This type of biomass is called landfill gas. A similar thing can be done at animal feed lots. In places where lots of animals are raised, the animals like cattle, cows and even chickens produce manure. When manure decomposes, it also gives off methane gas similar to garbage. This gas can be burned right at the farm to make energy to run the farm. Using biomass can help reduce global warming compared to a fossil fuel-powered plant. Plants use and store carbon dioxide (CO2) when they grow. CO2 stored in the plant is released when th Analysis of Vietnams Energy Supply and Production Analysis of Vietnams Energy Supply and Production Vietnams economy has expanded rapidly in recent years, with its real gross domestic product (GDP) growing 7.7% in 2004 and 8.4% in 2005. Growth is forecast at 8.0% in 2006. Vietnam has had Normal Trade Relations status with the United States since late 2001, with 2002 marking the first time Vietnam shipped more goods to the United States than to Japan. Despite rising exports, Vietnam currently runs a slight trade deficit, but is projected to begin having trade surpluses by 2007. Much of Vietnams large rural population relies heavily on non-commercial biomass energy sources such as wood, dung, and rice husks. As a result, Vietnams per capita commercial energy consumption ranks among the lowest in Asia. The countrys commercial energy consumption is predicted to rise in coming years, primarily due to increases in the use of natural gas. Vietnam claims ownership of a portion of the potentially hydrocarbon-rich Spratly Islands, as do the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, China, and Taiwan. Vietnam, China, and the Philippines agreed in March 2005 to conduct a joint seismic survey for potential oil and natural gas reserves in a portion of the disputed area. Vietnam also claims the Paracel Islands, which China first occupied in 1974. Oil: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003, internal EIA estimates.). Enlarge: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003, internal EIA estimates.) Vietnam has 600 million barrels of proven oil reserves, according to data from Oil and Gas Journal, but that total is likely to increase as exploration continues. Crude oil production averaged 370,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) in 2005, down somewhat from the 403,000 bbl/d level achieved in 2004. Bach Ho (White Tiger), Rang Dong (Dawn), Hang Ngoc, Dai Hung (Big Bear), and Su Tu Den (Ruby) are the largest oil producing fields in the country. Although it is a significant oil producer, Vietnam remains reliant on imports of petroleum products due to a lack of refining capacity. Overall, Vietnam had net exports of 111,000 bbl/d of oil in 2005. Most of Vietnams crude oil is exported to refiners in Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. Vietnams largest oil producer is Vietsovpetro (VSP), a joint venture (JV) between PetroVietnam and Zarubezhneft of Russia. VSP operates Vietnams largest oil field, Bach Ho. Other foreign partners include ConocoPhillips, BP, Petronas, and Talisman Energy. Following the October 2003 commencement of drilling operations in the Su Tu Den (Black Lion) crude field, PetroVietnam reported increasing production volumes. PetroVietnams April 2003 discovery of an oil deposit in Dai Hung, estimated to have a capacity of 6,300 bbl/d, was expected to further increase Vietnamese production. The decline in production overall from 2004 to 2005 was primarily the result of declining production at the Bach Ho field. The planned development of several new oil fields in coming years is expected to increase Vietnamese production. A new well at Block 15-1s Su Tu Trang (White Lion) field flowed 8,682 bbl/d in early 2004 and is scheduled to be developed by 2008. In October 2004, Japanese oil companies Nippon Oil Exploration (35 percent interest), Idemitsu Kosan (35 percent), and Teikoku Oil (30 percent) announced plans to fund the development of Blocks 05.1b and 05.1c in the Nam Con Son Basin. Two months later, the Korean National Oil Corporation (KNOC), along with several Korean partners, finalized terms for the $300 million development of Block 11-2, which includes the Flying Orchid Field. PetroVietnam has a 25 percent interest in the joint venture. Exploration in Vietnam continues to yield new discoveries. In 2002, large oil and gas deposits were discovered in the Ca Ngu Vang (Golden Tuna) and Voi Trang (White Elephant) fields. SOCO Vietnam estimates that its Ca Ngu Vang well may contain up to 250 million barrels of oil. In July 2004, VSP discovered new stocks of oil in its Dragon field. Three months later, a joint venture comprised of American Technologies, Petronas, Singapore Petroleum, and PetroVietnam announced a 100-million-barrel oil discovery off Vietnams northeast coast. In September 2004, the Vietnamese government offered nine exploration blocks in the Phu Khanh basin off its southern coast. In November 2004, Japanese oil companies Nippon Oil Exploration, Idemitsu Kosan, and Teikoku Oil signed an agreement to explore in two offshore blocks southeast of Ho Chi Minh City. They plan to drill a test well in 2006 and complete exploration by 2007. In December 2004, Talisman Energy was awarded the right to conduct exploration in the Cuu Long Basin, and received additional acreage in an adjacent area in April 2005. ONGC of India was awarded drilling rights in the deepwater Block 127 in the Phu Khanh Basinoff Vietnams central coast in October 2005. ChevronTexaco also received acreage in the Phu Khanh Basin in the most recent round of awards, with an award for Block 122 in October 2005. PetroVietnams storage and transportation division, Petrolimex, recently completed a new oil storage facility in the central Khanh Hoa province. The depot is largest in the country, with a total storage capacity of 3.68 million barrels. Refining: Vietnam is in the process of building its first refinery. The $1.5 billion Dung Quat Refinery, located in Quang Ngai province, will have a crude distillation capacity of approximately 140,000 bbl/d. After several years of delays in financing the project, construction finally began in November 2005. Commercial operation of the refinery is expected to begin in early 2009. Vietnams distribution infrastructure is discontinuous, with the north and south of the country functioning largely as separate markets. Completion of the Dung Quat Refinery, located in the center of the country, should lead to greater interaction between the regions. A second refinery project is under consideration at Nghi Son, north of Hanoi in the Thanh Hoa province. The Vietnamese government has estimated the 150,000 bbl/d plant will cost $3 billion. In August 2004, Mitsubishi Corporation agreed to participate in building Nghi Son for completion in 2010. In December 2004, Vietnam contracted the International Business Company (IBC) of the British Virgin Islands to conduct a feasibility study for a third oil refinery, to be located at Vung Ro in the southern Phu Yen province. The Vietnamese government hopes to complete the refinery within 12 years. Natural Gas: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Enlarge: Vietnams Oil Production and Consumption, 1980-2005. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Vietnam has proven gas reserves of 6.8 trillion cubic feet (Tcf), according to Oil and Gas Journal. Vietnams natural gas production and consumption have been rising rapidly since the late 1990s, with further increases expected as additional fields come onstream. Natural gas is currently produced entirely for domestic consumption. The Cuu Long basin offshore from the Mekong Delta in southern Vietnam, a source of associated gas from oil production, is the largest Vietnamese natural gas production area. Only two fields in Vietnam have been developed specifically for their natural gas potential: Tien Hai, with a potential output of 1.76 million cubic feet per day (Mmcf/d); and Lan Tay/Lan Do of Nam Con Son, which began producing over 5 Mmcf/d in 2002. In the Nam Con Son Basin, a $565 million, 230-mile pipeline was completed in June 2002 connecting the Lan Tay and Lan Do fields to the mainland at Vung Tau. The Nam Con Son project consists of five subsea wells linked to a production platform and a pipeline leading to an onshore treatment plant. Gas is piped to three generating plants at the Phu My industrial complex, where electricity is provided primarily to areas surrounding Ho Chi Minh City. In December 2004, the Vietnamese government announced that output from Nam Con Son was expected to reach 88 billion cubic feet (Bcf), exceeding planned production by 90%. The project currently supplies the Phu My 1, Phu My 3, Phu My 2.1 power plants and the extended Phu My 2.1 plant. Phu My 2.2 will begin using output from the field soon thereafter. In December 2002, a consortium headed by Korea National Oil Corporation (KNOC) signed an agreement to install facilities to pump and supply 130 Mmcf/d of natural gas to Vietnam. The natural gas, located in the Rong Doi and Rong Doi Tay fields on Block 11-2 of the Nam Con Son Basin, is sold to PetroVietnam under a 23-year contract. PetroVietnam resells most this volume to Electricity of Vietnam (EVN). Production at the fields began in mid-2005. In December 2004, KNOC and PetroVietnam signed agreements to further exploit natural gas in both Blocks 11 and 12. Construction of an additional pipeline to bring ashore natural gas from block 11 began in October 2005, and is scheduled for completion in October 2006. The Su Tu Den and Rang Dong oil fields, both of which have considerable Vietnamese reserves of associated natural gas, are located near the 62-mile pipeline from the Bach Ho field. An estimated 60 Mmcf/d of gas from the fields is earmarked for consumption in power plants in southern Vietnam. Both TotalFinaElf and ChevronTexaco (originally Unocal) have found natural gas in exploratory drilling of the Malay basin. Additionally, Talisman Energy has found natural gas at the Cai Nuoc field in block 46. The discovery is close to block PM-3-CAA, which straddles the maritime border with Malaysia, and is expected to contain up to 100 Bcf of recoverable gas reserves. A contract was awarded to McDermott International in March 2006 for construction of a 200-mile pipeline, which will transport natural gas from the PM3-CAA block to Ca Mau province in southern Vietnam. It is scheduled for completion in 2007. In December 2004, PetroVietnam announced that it was reconsidering the $70 million Phu My gas pipeline project from Phu My to Nhon Trach due to increased expenses associated with land costs in compensation areas. The pipeline was initially planned to transport associated gas from the Bach Ho and Rong fields for power generation. Coal: Vietnam contains coal reserves estimated at 165 million short tons (Mmst), the majority of which is anthracite. Production has increased dramatically over the last decade, with Vietnam producing over 18 Mmst in 2003. As a result, Vietnam exported a record 7 Mmst of coal, primarily to Japan and China, in 2003. Although Vietnam has historically relied on hydropower for electricity, it has recently promoted the construction of coal-fired power plants. Vinocoal plans to build eight coal-fueled thermal power plants with a total capacity of 2,900 megawatts (MW) by 2010. Six are currently in various stages of planning and construction. In December 2004, the Vietnamese government approved Vinacoals proposal to invest in a 200-MW, coal-fired thermal power plant in the Son Dong district. The plant is scheduled to begin operation in 2007. Coal-fired power plants are expected to eventually account for 25% of Vietnams total electricity production. The Vietnamese government estimates that 10.2 Mms t of coal is needed per year to meet increasing domestic demand, projected at 20,000 MW by 2010. Vietnam continues to exploit new coal reserves within its borders. In March 2003, a significant coal bed was discovered in the Red River Delta region of northern Vietnam. Vinacoal plans to use the reserve for thermal power plants. In October 2004, Vinacoal entered talks with Chinas Fujian Province Coal Industry Corporation to jointly exploit the Bac Coc Sau mine in the Quang Ninh province. Electricity: Vietnams Electricity Generation, 1980-2003. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Enlarge: Vietnams Electricity Generation, 1980-2003. (Source: EIA, International Energy Annual 2003.). Although Vietnams per capita electricity consumption is among the lowest in Asia, demand has risen in recent years, straining the countrys limited generating capacity. Rapid commercial sector growth, population migration to major cities, and elevated living standards have all contributed to a growing demand for electricity. In 2003, Vietnam had a total electric generating capacity of 8.8 gigawatts (GW) and generated 39.7 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, of which 52 percent was hydropower. Electricity demand in Vietnam is forecast to grow 15 percent per year until 2010. Vietnam currently buys power from China to prevent shortages in the north, and plans to begin purchasing from Laos in 2008. The majority of thermal electricity generation in Vietnam depends on coal-fired plants, though natural gas use is expanding. EVNs Pha Lai is the largest coal-fired power project in Vietnam, with the second of two 300-MW units coming into service in 2003. In order to meet increased demand, construction or expansion is planned for 32 power stations (7,547 MW) before 2010. The state power company, Elà ©ctricità © of Vietnam (EVN), plans to commission 16 hydropower plants by 2010 and increased capacity at the Uong Bi coal-fired plant to 400 MW in 2005. Vinacoal also has plans to construct eight additional coal-fired power plants. Vietnam currently has five hydroelectric expansions underway. The countrys Son La project, which began construction in late 2005, is anticipated to have a generating capacity of 2,400 megawatts (MW) by 2012, will be the largest hydroelectric project in Vietnam when completed. In September 2004, construction began on the Ban Ve hydroelectric power plant, expected to begin operations in 2008. EVN began work on four additional hydroelectric projects in late 2004. The Dong Nai 3 and Dong Nai 4, both located in the Central Highlands region, are expected to be completed within four years and to provide approximately 520 MW of generating capacity. In December 2004, EVN began construction of the Se San 4 hydropower plant in the central highlands provinces of Gia Lai and Kon Tum. The plant is anticipated to have a capacity of 330 MW and to generate 1,390 million kWh per year. Vietnam also plans to build three additional plants in the region before 2010. In March 2004, EVN announced plans to spend $1.3 billion to build and refurbish power plants with a combined capacity of 1,510 MW. The projects include the combined cycle power plant Phu My 2.1, the hydroelectric facility Can Don, the Phu My 3 and Phu My 4 thermal plants, and Na Duong. Additional projects include the Song Ba Ha, Bac Binh, Se San 4, Dong Nai 3 and Dong Nai 4 hydrostations, the Quang Ninh, Ninh Binh extension, and the O Mon 600-MW thermal plant. The development of natural gas-fired plants in the Phu My complex of the Ba Ria-Vung Tau province has helped to offset Vietnams heavy reliance on hydropower, which can be vulnerable to disruption when monsoon rainfall is unusually low. In March 2003, the 720-MW Phu My 3 power plant commenced operations. The $450 million plant, owned by a consortium led by UKs BP, was Vietnams first foreign-invested, build-operate-transfer (BOT) project. EVN has contracted to purchase the output under a 20-year power purchase agreement. Mitsubishi received an award in February 2006 for the construction of a 330-MW natural gas-fired power plant in the southern Mekong delta. The plant will come online in early 2009, running initially on fuel oil, and switching to natural gas when pipeline infrastructure is completed. More foreign companies are beginning to enter the growing Vietnamese power market in the form of Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) projects. EVN and a consortium including Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO), Sumitomo, and Elà ©ctricità © de France (EdF) began BOT construction of the Mekong Deltas 715-MW Phu My 2-2 in January 2003. The plant is fueled by gas from Nam Con Son Basin. EVN plans to develop a national electricity grid by 2020 by patching together several regional grids. The countrys distribution infrastructure is poorly maintained, but has benefited from recent improvements. A North-South power cable transmits electricity from Vietnams largest generator, the Hoa Binh hydropower plant in the North, to large population centers in the South, linking the country into one electricity grid and helping alleviate electricity shortages in Ho Chi Minh City. The $56 million project was funded by the World Bank. Vietnam is considering the construction of a 500-KV, 188-mile power line from Pleiku to Danang city at a cost of $130 million. The Vietnamese government has estimated that an additional 9,300 miles of high-voltage transmission lines and 173,600 miles of medium- and low-voltage transmission lines will be necessary to accommodate new capacity by 2010. In September 2004, EVN announced plans to invest $330 million over five years to upgrade transmission lin es surrounding Hanoi. Vietnam plans to complete its first nuclear power plant by 2020 as an alternate means on meeting demand. In December 2004, the Vietnamese Ministry of Science and Technology submitted a pre-feasibility study for the 2,000-megawatt (MW) nuclear plant to the National Assembly. Fossil Fuels Coal, Oil and Natural Gas: Where Fossil Fuels Come From: There are three major forms of fossil fuels: coal, oil and natural gas. All three were formed many hundreds of millions of years ago before the time of the dinosaurs hence the name fossil fuels. The age they were formed is called the Carboniferous Period. It was part of the Paleozoic Era. Carboniferous gets its name from carbon, the basic element in coal and other fossil fuels. The Carboniferous Period occurred from about 360 to 286 million years ago. At the time, the land was covered with swamps filled with huge trees, ferns and other large leafy plants, similar to the picture above. The water and seas were filled with algae the green stuff that forms on a stagnant pool of water. Algae is actually millions of very small plants. Some deposits of coal can be found during the time of the dinosaurs. For example, thin carbon layers can be found during the late Cretaceous Period (65 million years ago) the time of Tyrannosaurus Rex. But the main deposits of fossil fuels are from the Carboniferous Period. For more about the various geologic eras, go to www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/help/timeform.html. As the trees and plants died, they sank to the bottom of the swamps of oceans. They formed layers of a spongy material called peat. Over many hundreds of years, the peat was covered by sand and clay and other minerals, which turned into a type of rock called sedimentary. More and more rock piled on top of more rock, and it weighed more and more. It began to press down on the peat. The peat was squeezed and squeezed until the water came out of it and it eventually, over millions of years, it turned into coal, oil or petroleum, and natural gas. Coal: Coal is a hard, black colored rock-like substance. It is made up of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and varying amounts of sulphur. There are three main types of coal anthracite, bituminous and lignite. Anthracite coal is the hardest and has more carbon, which gives it a higher energy content. Lignite is the softest and is low in carbon but high in hydrogen and oxygen content. Bituminous is in between. Today, the precursor to coal peat is still found in many countries and is also used as an energy source. The earliest known use of coal was in China. Coal from the Fu-shun mine in northeastern China may have been used to smelt copper as early as 3,000 years ago. The Chinese thought coal was a stone that could burn. Coal is found in many of the lower 48 states of U.S. and throughout the rest of the world. Coal is mined out of the ground using various methods. Some coal mines are dug by sinking vertical or horizontal shafts deep under ground, and coal miners travel by elevators or trains deep under ground to dig the coal. Other coal is mined in strip mines where huge steam shovels strip away the top layers above the coal. The layers are then restored after the coal is taken away. The coal is then shipped by train and boats and even in pipelines. In pipelines, the coal is ground up and mixed with water to make whats called a slurry. This is then pumped many miles through pipelines. At the other end, the coal is used to fuel power plants and other factories. Oil or Petroleum: Oil is another fossil fuel. It was also formed more than 300 million years ago. Some scientists say that tiny diatoms are the source of oil. Diatoms are sea creatures the Picture of oil formationsize of a pin head. They do one thing just like plants; they can convert sunlight directly into stored energy. Oil has been used for more than 5,000-6,000 years. The ancient Sumerians, Assyrians and Babylonians used crude oil and asphalt (pitch) collected from large seeps at Tuttul (modern-day Hit) on the Euphrates River. A seep is a place on the ground where the oil leaks up from below ground. The ancient Egyptians, used liquid oil as a medicine for wounds, and oil has been used in lamps to provide light. The Dead Sea, near the modern Country of Israel, used to be called Lake Asphaltites. The word asphalt was derived is from that term because of the lumps of gooey petroleum that were washed up on the lake shores from underwater seeps. In North America, Native Americans used blankets to skim oil off the surface of streams and lakes. They used oil as medicine and to make canoes water-proof. During the Revolutionary War, Native Americans taught George Washingtons troops how to treat frostbite with oil. As our country grew, the demand for oil continued to increase as a fuel for lamps. Petroleum oil began to replace whale oil in lamps because the price for whale oil was very high. During this time, most petroleum oil came from distilling coal into a liquid or by skimming it off of lakes just as the Native Americans did. Then on August 27, 1859, Edwin L. Drake (the man standing on the right in the black and white picture to the right), struck liquid oil at his well near Titusville, Pennsylvania. He found oil under ground and a way that could pump it to the surface. The well pumped the oil into barrels made out of wood. This method of drilling for oil is still being used today all over the world in areas where oil can be found below the surface. Oil and natural gas are found under ground between folds of rock and in areas of rock that are porous and contain the oils within the rock itself. The folds of rock were formed as the earth shifts and moves. Its similar to how a small, throw carpet will bunch up in places on the floor. To find oil and natural gas, companies drill through the earth to the deposits deep below the surface. The oil and natural gas are then pumped from below the ground by oil rigs (like in the picture). They then usually travel through pipelines or by ship. Oil is found in 18 of the 58 counties in California. Kern County, the County where Bakersfield is found, is one of the largest oil production places in the country. But we only get one-half of our oil from California wells. The rest comes from Alaska, and an increasing amount comes from other countries. In the entire U.S., more than 50 percent of all the oil we use comes from outside the countrymost of it from the Middle East. Oil is brought to California by large tanker ships. The petroleum or crude oil must be changed or refined into other products before it can be used. Refineries: Oil is stored in large tanks until it is sent to various places to be used. At oil refineries, crude oil is split into various types of products by heating the thick black oil. Oil is made into many different products fertilizers for farms, the clothes you wear, the toothbrush you use, the plastic bottle that holds your milk, the plastic pen that you write with. They all came from oil. There are thousands of other products that come from oil. Almost all plastic comes originally from oil. Can you think of some other things made from oil? The products include gasoline, diesel fuel, aviation or jet fuel, home heating oil, oil for ships and oil to burn in power plants to make electricity. Heres what a barrel of crude oil can make. In California, 74 percent of our oil is used for transportation cars, planes, trucks, buses and motorcycles. Well learn more about transportation energy in Chapter 18. Natural Gas: Sometime between 6,000 to 2,000 years BCE (Before the Common Era), the first discoveries of natural gas seeps were made in Iran. Many early writers described the natural petroleum seeps in the Middle East, especially in the Baku region of what is now Azerbaijan. The gas seeps, probably first ignited by lightning, provided the fuel for the eternal fires of the fire-worshiping religion of the ancient Persians. Natural gas is lighter than air. Natural gas is mostly made up of a gas called methane. Methane is a simple chemical compound that is made up of carbon and hydrogen atoms. Its chemical formula is CH4 one atom of carbon along with four atoms hydrogen. This gas is highly flammable. Natural gas is usually found near petroleum underground. It is pumped from below ground and travels in pipelines to storage areas. The next chapter looks at that pipeline system. Natural gas usually has no odor and you cant see it. Before it is sent to the pipelines and storage tanks, it is mixed with a chemical that gives a strong odor. The odor smells almost like rotten eggs. The odor makes it easy to smell if there is a leak. Energy Safety Note! If you smell that rotten egg smell in your house, tell your folks and get out of the house quickly. Dont turn on any lights or other electrical devices. A spark from a light switch can ignite the gas very easily. Go to a neighbors house and call 9-1-1 for emergency help. Saving Fossil Fuels: Fossil fuels take millions of years to make. We are using up the fuels that were made more than 300 million years ago before the time of the dinosaurs. Once they are gone they are gone. So, its best to not waste fossil fuels. They are not renewable; they cant really be made again. We can save fossil fuels by conserving energy. Natural Gas Distribution System: We learned in Chapter 8 that natural gas is a fossil fuel. It is a gaseous molecule thats made up of two atoms one carbon atom combined with four hydrogen atom. Its chemical formula is CH4. The picture on the right is a model of what the molecule could look like. Dont confuse natural gas with gasoline, which we call gas for short. Like oil, natural gas is found under ground and under the ocean floor. Wells are drilled to tap into natural gas reservoirs just like drilling for oil. Once a drill has hit an area that contains natural gas, it can be brought to the surface through pipes. The natural gas has to get from the wells to us. To do that, there is a huge network of pipelines that brings natural gas from the gas fields to us. Some of these pipes are two feet wide. Natural gas is sent in larger pipelines to power plants to make electricity or to factories because they use lots of gas. Bakeries use natural gas to heat ovens to bake bread, pies, pastries and cookies. Other businesses use natural gas for heating their buildings or heating water. From larger pipelines, the gas goes through smaller and smaller pipes to your neighborhood. In businesses and in your home, the natural gas must first pass through a meter, which measures the amount of fuel going into the building. A gas company worker reads the meter and the company will charge you for the amount of natural gas you used. In some homes, natural gas is used for cooking, heating water and heating the house in a furnace. In rural areas, where there are no natural gas pipelines, propane (another form of gas thats often made when oil is refined) or bottled gas is used instead of natural gas. Propane is also called LPG, or liquefied petroleum gas, is made up of methane and a mixture with other gases like butane. Propane turns to a liquid when it is placed under slight pressure. For regular natural gas to turn into a liquid, it has to be made very, very cold. Cars and trucks can also use natural gas as a transportation fuel, but they must carry special cylinder-like tanks to hold the fuel. When natural gas is burned to make heat or burned in a cars engine, it burns very cleanly. When you combine natural gas with oxygen (the process of combustion), you produce carbon dioxide and water vapor; plus the energy thats released in heat and light. Some impurities are contained in all natural gas. These include sulphur and butane and other chemicals. When burned, those impurities can create air pollution. The amount of pollution from natural gas is less than burning a more complex fuel like gasoline. Natural gas-powered cars are more than 90 percent cleaner than a gasoline-powered car. Thats why many people feel natural gas would be a good fuel for cars because it burns cleanly. Biomass Energy: Biomass is matter usually thought of as garbage. Some of it is just stuff lying around dead trees, tree branches, yard clippings, left-over crops, wood chips (like in the picture to the right), and bark and sawdust from lumber mills. It can even include used tires and livestock manure. Your trash, paper products that cant be recycled into other paper products, and other household waste are normally sent to the dump. Your trash contains some types of biomass that can be reused. Recycling biomass for fuel and other uses cuts down on the need for landfills to hold garbage. This stuff nobody seems to want can be used to produce electricity, heat, compost material or fuels. Composting material is decayed plant or food products mixed together in a compost pile and spread to help plants grow. California produces more than 60 million bone dry tons of biomass each year. Of this total, five million bone dry tons is now burned to make electricity. This is biomass from lumber mill wastes, urban wood waste, forest and agricultural residues and other feed stocks. If all of it was used, the 60 million tons of biomass in California could make close to 2,000 megawatts of electricity for Californias growing population and economy. Thats enough energy to make electricity for about two million homes! How biomass works is very simple. The waste wood, tree branches and other scraps are gathered together in big trucks. The trucks bring the waste from factories and from farms to a biomass power plant. Here the biomass is dumped into huge hoppers. This is then fed into a furnace where it is burned. The heat is used to boil water in the boiler, and the energy in the steam is used to turn turbines and generators . Biomass can also be tapped right at the landfill with burning waster products. When garbage decomposes, it gives off methane gas. Youll remember in chapters 8 and 9 that natural gas is made up of methane. Pipelines are put into the landfills and the methane gas can be collected. It is then used in power plants to make electricity. This type of biomass is called landfill gas. A similar thing can be done at animal feed lots. In places where lots of animals are raised, the animals like cattle, cows and even chickens produce manure. When manure decomposes, it also gives off methane gas similar to garbage. This gas can be burned right at the farm to make energy to run the farm. Using biomass can help reduce global warming compared to a fossil fuel-powered plant. Plants use and store carbon dioxide (CO2) when they grow. CO2 stored in the plant is released when th