HP Labs Using Laser-Powered Chips for Faster, Energy-Efficient Computing

Nothing is faster than the speed of light(except the Neutrinos). So you might think that is why HP Labs wants to use photonics (light) instead of electrons to set new computing speed limits. But you would be wrong.

HP Labs' laser-based chip project, codenamed Corona, would use light instead of electricity to communicate information between chip cores and also from the chips to memory in order to save space and to save energy.

Laser beam

A Short History of Data on the Wire

If you are old enough (or curious enough), you may have tested your soldering skills assembling electronic bits and pieces into primitive number crunchers consisting of transistors that are, literally, wired together. All those electronic parts and wires were replaced by the integrated circuits, aka microchips, which remain the basis of the modern computer.

An integrated circuit consists, typically, of a silicon wafer that carries thousands, or even millions, of electronic components (resistors, capacitors, and transistors) that are "wired" together by electrodeposited metals. The miniaturization and compression of these components are the subject of "Moore's Law", which observes that the number of components in an integrated circuit doubles every 18 months.

There are two major obstacles foreseeable with the continuing growth in computer processing speeds based on the current technology:

1. Miniaturization approaches non-negotiable physical barriers, and
2. Energy consumption increases wildly as data processing rates speed up.

Data transmission by laser addresses both issues.

Rainbows at Nano-scale

Communicating data by light already occurs on a wide-spread basis, via fiber optics. Scaling laser light generation and integrating it onto microchips lies at the heart of the HP Corona project.

MIT has demonstrated the technology to generate laser light using materials that are compatible with microchip manufacturing processes, meaning that tiny lasers could be built directly into integrated circuits. Once generated, the laser light beams along a nano-scale waveguide many times thinner than a single fiber optic cable.

The trick that really saves space copies a technique called Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM), which is currently used in telecommunications: light of different wavelengths can multiply the information sent over a single "light wire". HP Labs has demonstrated that up to 64 wavelengths can be managed in 64 "ring resonators", a circle along the path of waveguide, in less that one millimeter. Using electrical impulses at 10GHz to "tune" the ring resonators results in 10Gb/s of data transmission times 64 wavelengths for 640 Gigabits of data per second running along a single "wire".

Lightening the Energy Demand

Projecting from the energy consumption of current super-computers, an exascale computer (performing 10¹⁸ or a million trillion operations/second) would require its own Hoover Dam worth of power. Most of that power is consumed not in performing operations, but in communicating between parallel processors to schedule tasks and balance loads or in sending data to memory.

Laser-based data transmission reduces heat loads compared to electricity, and the greater bandwidths for communication significantly reduce the power requirements. According to Wired: "Using electronics for a 10-terabytes-per second channel between a CPU and external memory would require 160 watts of power. But HP Labs researchers calculate that using integrated photonics lowers that to 6.4 watts."

Even before exascale computing appears on every desktop, the energy savings could be significant.

Coming Soon to a Desktop Near You

Photonic data transfer between components within an integrated chip needs a decade more research, but data transfer between cores or from cores to memory could come to fruition soon. HP targets bringing a 3-D chip with high-bandwidth photonic communications between 256 processor cores to the market by 2017.

HP's Corona project races against other giants -- such as Intel (Runnemede), MIT (Angstrom), NVIDIA (Echelon), and Sandia National Labs (X-calibur) -- in the search to make high performance computing ubiquitous.

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Apple Advances Toward the iWallet: Is This Good or Bad?

Apple has received a major Granted Patent for a system that will allow it to link users' iTunes accounts to mobile purchases, reported Forbes. To put it extremely simply, this is Apple's war on cold hard cash: the iWallet. But what does the potential end of paper and metal currency mean for the planet, and just how much better or worse off would be off using iPhones and iPads instead?

The Upsides

A dollar bill has 3 grams of embodied greenhouse gases in it. (A dollar coin has 15 grams, but lasts longer and is recyclable, among other advantages.)

Taking the physical money out of the equation makes that carbon footprint go away. If Apple (and Google, which has a similar experiment going) can head off security questions, it could make carrying around cash at night a whole lot safer. Of course, you can still get mugged for your iPhone.

Also, shopping with your smartphone can make you a more sustainably-minded and informed consumer.

The Downsides

It's not all good. First of all, this is more of what Apple does best: promote and enable consumerism, which provokes existential questions about the green movement, not to mention our economy and society. But that's another discussion.

Assuming that we would buy as much with cash as with an iWallet, e-money comes with its own carbon footprint. However many good green things you can do with them, smartphones and tablets take an enormous toll on the planet through their production. Not to mention the ethical firestorm Apple just rode out over its factories in China.

So?

Apple and Google aren't the only ones attempting to "cash in" on this wave of the future: Square and Intuit already process payments via smartphone. If they all fail, more attempts will likely be made anyway. Like books, money is moving more and more out of our hands and onto our screens.

Ultimately, tacking consumerism, and not its 21st century incarnation, must be the way to go. Kill the snake by cutting off its head.

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United Arab Emirates Speeds Up Ban On Disposable Plastics

The United Arab Emirates has moved forward a ban on all disposable plastic products, except those made from oxo-biodegradable plastics, from 2013 to the end of this year.

Though oxo-biodegradable plastics cannot be composted as some biodegradable plastics can, if left in the open they will decompose within 2-18 months. In a landfill decomposition occurs much more slowly however, though still far more quickly than ordinary plastics.

The ban, enacted by the Ministry of Environment and Water, was precipitated over concerns about plastic waste in the desert and the sea, and the effect of that on wildlife.

Covered in the ban are all packaging and disposable plastic products such as shopping bags, packaging for food, magazines, garbage bags, shrink and pallet wrap, cling film, as well as other plastic designed to be used over short periods and discarded. (Packaging Gateway)

The regulation also includes a standard for registration of companies manufacturing and importing biodegradable plastics. The Intelligent SMEquotes Eng. Mohammed Saleh Al Badri of the Emirates Authority for Standardization and Metrology:

ESMA officials will visit each factory and see that the manufacturing process complies with our specification. So, basically, the raw materials, additives, and manufacturing process, will be pre-approved by us. The companies will have regular monitoring, and we will collect finished samples, as well as the ones still being made for testing. Unannounced visits will be made to ensure consistency. At this point, we don’t have a testing centre, so all samples are sent abroad, but we are encouraging labs to take up this facility within the country. This regulatory measure will ensure that all the plastic bags used in the country will be degradable to harmless substances that will not affect the environment.

East Africa Pushes For Plastic Ban
All of this comes as the East African Community legislative assembly—an intergovernmental organization for Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda—has passed 'The East African Community Plastics Control Bill'.

If all heads of state of the member countries sign it, the bill would provide the legal framework for the outright banning of the manufacturing, sale, import and use of polyethylene material.

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ALL DESIGN TEWind Chime Charges Up With The Breeze For Outdoor Lighting

What if the pleasantness of a wind chime did double duty as an energy generator that powered an LED light? A team of designers including Chen Yan Zhuang, Zhou Li, Peng Qixuan, Liu Huan-jung, Ke Qi Ling and Zhong Zhida came up with the idea that shifts a wind chime into a energy-gathering device for evening lighting. Yanko Design writes, "The only difference is that the wind movement causes the lamp to harness energy to power the lamp rather than sound the soothing 'clinks'."

I think I'd like it better if it included the clinks. This is vaporware to the nth degree, but if we're in design la-la-land, I'd like to put in a request that the pleasant clinks still be included. Not only does the wind chime generate electricity for the LED light, but the wind-catching board is also a touch board for the user to write down "hopes." If we can do that then we can certainly keep it clinky.

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Climate Change May Bring '100-Year Storms' Every 3 Years

When Hurricane Irene made landfall along the Eastern seaboard last summer, crippling dozens of communities with record flooding, many folks called the storm a '100-year event' -- but a new study suggests that it will be much sooner than century until we see the next one.

A team of scientists from MIT and Princeton University utilized hurricane simulators to determine with what frequency powerful storms could lead to flooding under a variety of climate model projections, and what they found makes all previous usage of the term 'storm of the century' mere hyperbole. According to researchers, climate change's effects on weather systems might mean storms like Hurricane Irene, once considered rare, occur every 3 to 20 years.

From MIT News Office:

To simulate present and future storm activity in the region, the researchers combined four climate models with a specific hurricane model. The combined models generated 45,000 synthetic storms within a 200-kilometer radius of Battery Park, at the southern tip of Manhattan.

They studied each climate model under two scenarios: a “current climate” condition representing 1981 to 2000 and a “future climate” condition reflecting the years 2081 to 2100, a prediction based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s projections of future moderate carbon dioxide output. While there was some variability among the models, the team generally found that the frequency of intense storms would increase due to climate change.

As was proved last year by Hurricane Irene, the floods resulting from such powerful storms are among the chief contributors to property damage and loss of human life, which makes building infrastructure to withstand them all the more important. In the wake of Irene, flooding left hundreds homeless and stranded whole communities as swollen rivers washed away roads and bridges -- some of which had stood for a century's worth of strong weather.

In light of these new findings on the increasing frequency of powerful storms, MIT researcher Ning Lin says that coastal cities must prepare to brace for these once-rare storms:

“When you design your buildings or dams or structures on the coast, you have to know how high your seawall has to be. You have to decide whether to build a seawall to prevent being flooded every 20 years.”

To make matters worse, another study out of Yale warns that climate change isn't the only factor that is likely to lead to deadlier and more expensive storms over the next century. As Tree Hugger Mat explained earlier this month, "tropical cyclones will cause more than four times the damage in 2100 than they do today, increasing from $26 billion to $109 billion." The reason? A rapidly increasing human population, accompanies by more and more development along flood-vulnerable coastal regions.

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Climate Adaptation Difficult for Europe's Birds

For the past 20 years, the climate in Europe has been getting warmer. Species of bird and butterfly which thrive in cool temperatures therefore need to move further north. However, they have difficulty adapting to the warmer climate quickly enough, as shown by new research published in the journal Nature Climate Change.
Åke Lindström is Professor of Animal Ecology at Lund University, Sweden. Together with other European researchers he has looked at 20 years' worth of data on birds, butterflies and summer temperatures. During this period, Europe has become warmer and set temperatures have shifted northwards by 250 km. Bird and butterfly communities have not moved at the same rate.

"Both butterflies and birds respond to climate change, but not fast enough to keep up with an increasingly warm climate. We don't know what the long-term ecological effects of this will be," says Åke Lindström.

Butterflies have adapted more quickly to the changing temperatures and have moved on average 114 km north, whereas birds have only moved 37 km. A likely reason is that butterflies have much shorter lifespans and therefore adapt more quickly to climate change. Because birds like to return to the same breeding ground as in previous years, there is also greater inertia in the bird system.

"A worrying aspect of this is if birds fall out of step with butterflies, because caterpillars and insects in general represent an important source of food for many birds," says Åke Lindström.

Sweden shows the strongest trends with regard to birds; however, there is no corresponding Swedish data for butterflies. For the study, the birds have been divided into 'cold' and 'warm' species, i.e. birds that thrive in slightly cooler or warmer temperatures. For example, chaffinches and reed buntings are 'colder' species and blackcaps and goldfinches 'warmer' species. In general, the researchers have observed that 'warm' birds are on the increase and 'cold' birds are in decline. When new species are seen in an area and others disappear, it is more often 'warm' species that arrive and 'cold' species that disappear.

"Over the past 50 years the main factors affecting bird and butterfly numbers and distribution have been agriculture, forestry and urbanisation. Climate change is now emerging as an increasingly important factor in the development of biodiversity," says Åke Lindström, continuing: "For Sweden, this will probably mean more species of bird in the long run; many new species are already arriving from the continent."

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Australia passes landmark carbon price laws

 Australia's parliament passed landmark laws to impose a price on carbon emissions on Tuesday in one of the biggest economic reforms in a decade, giving new impetus to December's global climate talks in South Africa.

The scheme's impact will be felt right across the economy, from miners to LNG producers, airlines and steel makers and is aimed at making firms more energy efficient and push power generation toward gas and renewables.

Australia accounts for just 1.5 percent of global emissions, but is the developed world's highest emitter per capita due to a reliance on coal to generate electricity.

"This is a very positive step for the global effort on climate change. It shows that the world's most emissions-intensive advanced economy is prepared to use a market mechanism to cut carbon emissions in a low-cost way," said Deutsche Bank carbon analyst Tim Jordan.

The vote is a major victory for embattled Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who staked her government's future on what will be the most comprehensive carbon price scheme outside of Europe despite deep hostility from voters and the political opposition.

The scheme is a central plank in the government's fight against climate change and aims to halt the growth of the country's growing greenhouse gas emissions from a resources-led boom and age-old reliance on coal-fired power stations.

It sets a fixed carbon tax of A$23 ($23.78) a tone on the top 500 polluters from July 2012, then moves to an emissions trading scheme from July 2015. Companies involved will need a permit for every tone of carbon they emit.

"Today marks the beginning of Australia's clean energy future. This is an historic moment, this is an historic reform, a reform that is long overdue," Finance Minister Penny Wong told the upper house Senate as she wrapped up the marathon debate.

DECADE OF DEBATE

Australia has been debating a carbon price scheme for a decade and through 37 parliamentary inquiries, with the legislation instrumental in the 2007 fall of former conservative prime minister John Howard and Labor's Kevin Rudd in 2010.

The laws will see Australia join the European Union and New Zealand with national emissions trading schemes. California's starts in 2013, while China and South Korea are working on carbon trading programs. India has a coal tax, while South Africa plans to place carbon caps on its top polluters.

The government hopes securing the carbon price laws will help re-ignite the push for a global agreement to curb emissions and fight global warming ahead of a international talks in Durban in December.

The carbon price will impose a cost on every tone of carbon emitted, giving companies a financial incentive to curb pollution, and will help Australia reach its goal to cut emissions by 5 percent of year 2000 levels by 2020.

Farmers will be exempt from the scheme, but will be able to cash in by selling carbon offsets under separate laws for a carbon farming initiative.

The package of 18 new laws sets up the carbon price as well as billions in compensation for export-exposed industries and local steel makers, as well as personal tax cuts for 90 percent of workers, worth an average A$300 a year.

Emissions-intensive trade exposed industries such as aluminum, zinc refiners and steel makers, will receive 94.5 percent of carbon permits for free for the first three years of the scheme.

A convoy of trucks protesting against the Australian government's proposed carbon tax drive past Parliament House (L) in Canberra August 22, 2011. REUTERS/Tim Wimborne

CLEAN ENERGY GOLD RUSH

The passing of the bill was greeted with applause from the public galleries, with Green Leader Bob Brown -- a major proponent of the scheme -- shaking hands with Government senators.

Attendees at a carbon expo conference in Melbourne were ecstatic with the result.

"The atmosphere is electric. This is fantastic," said Nick Armstrong of emissions trading firm COzero.

The government expects the scheme to spur a multi-billion-dollar investment rush in new cleaner energy sources including natural gas and renewable power stations to replace Australia's aging coal-fired plants.

Canberra has committed more than A$13 billion for renewable and low emissions projects, including a A$10 billion independent Clean Energy Finance Corporation, with around A$100 billion in renewables sector investment expected by 2050.

However, full introduction of the Australian scheme remains uncertain, with conservative opposition leader Tony Abbott promising to scrap the carbon price if he wins power and with Gillard's minority government holding power by only one seat.

The next election is not due until late 2013, but opinion polls show Gillard's government would be easily swept from office, and Abbott could potentially take power at any time in the event of a by-election in a government-held seat.

Abbott, who has campaigned tirelessly against the new laws, was overseas for Tuesday's vote, but he issued a statement to reaffirm his promise to repeal the laws if he takes power.

"The longer this tax is in place, the worse the consequences for the economy, jobs and families. It will drive up the cost of living, threaten jobs and do nothing for the environment," Abbott said.

A poll on Tuesday showed the conservatives leading ruling Labor by 53 to 47 percent, although the government's popularity had improved slightly as voters warmed to Gillard's handling of economic and industrial relations problems.

The carbon price is one of the three key policies Gillard promised to finalize when she became prime minister, alongside a planned 30 percent tax on iron ore and coal mines and new measures to deter asylum seekers.

But dead-heat elections last August forced Gillard to negotiate details of the carbon price with the Greens and three independent lawmakers.

Climate Minister Greg Combet said the government would stick to its A$23 a tone price, despite it being almost double the European cost of between $8.70 and $12.60 a tone, which is four-year-lows on the back of global economic uncertainty.

"I'd certainly hope and anticipate that in the course of the next three-and-a-half years, the crisis in Europe is overcome, markets will stabilize and recover and our carbon price will mesh well," Combet told Australian radio.

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