JUNE 2021 - 3 MOST INTERESTING ARTICLES OF THE MONTH

?GENERAL MOTORS & WABTEC PRODUCING ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVES

There is a huge focus worldwide on reducing our carbon footprint and being “greener” and kinder to our planet.

Transportation is a huge industry that has a drastic impact on the environment and we are starting to see more and more organisations in these domains take action – with manufacturers driving electrification/e-mobility.

On this note, General Motors have been focusing on e-mobility within the automotive world, and are now expanding these plans to the locomotive industry too ??

General Motors have reached a new agreement with rail technology company “Wabtec” to develop new eco-friendly powertrains.

Back in May, Wabtec introduced the world’s first hybrid electric train – powered by batteries. This showed an 11% reduction of diesel – which is a great start ??

Now with a partnership with General Motors, Wabtec plan on building on this and reducing fuel consumption and carbon emissions even further – ideally up to 30%. General Motors are experts in powertrain technology, battery management systems and Hydrogen Fuel Cell technologies.

30% reduction in emissions is just the start and will hopefully be reached in a few years time. The main end goal is to reach zero-emission locomotives eventually! ??

Watch this space!!!!

WHAT’S THAT COMING OVER THE HILL IS IT A MONSTER? OH NO IT’S 6G…

 6G? What!? Have we even really seen 5G yet? ??

5G is only just starting to become a bit more mainstream, but as we all know technology waits for nobody and is always evolving!

6G is already in progress and Samsung have demonstrated its first 6G prototype system this month in an over-the-air test using terahertz (THz) frequencies! ??

Currently, 5G telecommunications operate at circa 40 GHz frequencies, and 6G would more than double this.

This means 6G will of course be faster and the peak data rate is expected to eventually be up to 50 times faster than 5G! ?

So what will 6G be used for… this should help people transmit bigger amounts of data faster and introduce things like 8K resolution and fast, clear & secure holographic video. With the ever-expanding Internet of Things and emerging technologies like AR/VR, we constantly require faster data transfer speeds and lower latency in order to keep up!

This all sounds great but don’t hold your breath, as 6G isn’t expected to be commercially available until about 2030… ?

IT’S OFFICIAL – WE HAVE THE WORLD’S FIRST LAB-GROWN MEAT FACTORY

OK confession, this one has nothing to do with Software I admit, but this is such a big step that I had to include this too.

You’ve probably seen lab-grown meat experiments popping up in the news or on my LinkedIn feed over the last few years, however this month we have big news in this area ??

The world’s first industrial production facility for lab-grown meat has officially opened in Israel. The company are called “Future Meat Technologies” and this should really start to move things along in this field at a pace!

Lab-grown meat has most definitely been a work in progress, with first attempts looking rather questionable but researchers have now been able to produce TASTY looking steaks and burgers! ????

There are a couple of methods to creating these cultured meats. One way is to use various plant based products as the starting point, or alternatively start the process using real cells harvested from live animals.

These approaches are obviously a lot more ethical and better for the environment when compared to the current meat production processes.

Future Meat Technologies claim that their processes generate 80% less greenhouse gas emissions, uses 99% less land and 96% less freshwater than typical meat production! ??

So how much meat can this factory produce? At first it will have the capacity to produce 500 kg of chicken, pork and lamb a day which is around 5000 burgers a day ??

This sounds great but surely they are going to be expensive? Nope – Future Meat Technologies claim that they can produce cultured chicken breasts for $3.90, and it is expected that these costs should fall even further as it scales up ??

It might be slightly more expensive than “real” meat at the moment, however I expect that this will eventually drop and meat will be really affordable for everyone. Food will be sustainable, ethical and still remain delicious!!!