A train line in western Switzerland now carries two kinds of traffic: passengers above, and sunlight below.

On a 100-meter stretch of active railway near the village of Buttes, 48 solar panels sit between the rails, low enough for trains to pass over them and removable enough for crews to take them away when the track needs work. The installation, developed by the Swiss startup Sun-Ways, is small. Its 18 kilowatts of capacity could generate about 16,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity a year, roughly the annual use of a few European households.

But this is just a pilot program. If the system works safely on a busy rail line, it could point to a new way of expanding solar power without covering farmland, forests or mountain slopes with panels. 

https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/solar-panels-over-train-tracks-switzerland/

#solarpunk

Capitalism used to be “sure we make a lot of bad people stupidly rich, but as a consolation prize you get cheaper consumer goods and a generally increasing quality of life”. Then it turned into “ok forget the quality of life thing but at least you get gradually cheaper & more powerful gadgets to distract yourself”.

And now finally it’s “oh actually all the gadgets now cost 3x as much, sucks to be you I guess, how about renting from us?”

It’s like they *want* a revolution

My bank emailed me "AI is changing check fraud. Here's what you can do to protect yourself."

Nonono, Mr. Banky-bank. Tell me what YOU are doing to protect me against check fraud. This is a you problem, caused by a system you designed and run. How about you don't externalize that cost onto me?

I have, since the 1980s, DESPISED any excuse like "oh sorry we got a new computer system" or "we can't do X anymore because of the computer". How you do business isn't my fucking problem. Don't give me excuses for not having your shit together.

This is the same as "we are experiencing unexpectedly high call volume." Well, that's pretty fucking poor planning on your part, then, innit? Hold times aren't long because of the forces of nature, they are because you're too fucking cheap to pay sufficient staff.

You don't often get sports analysts weighing in on political matters but it's getting harder to keep all forms of entertainment separate from what's happening in the world, especially when Israel continues to be allowed to participate.

Here's a wonderful response from RTÉ Sport's Richard Sadlier on the fixture of the Ireland v Israel football game.

Tbh, I kept expecting the network to cut him off and was both gobsmacked and grateful that they didn't.

#Ireland #Football #Soccer #Sport