"Never say die -Up man and try.."

When I was a kid, I was once taken to tea with two ladies who lived in the next lane.  As kids do, I was looking at the ornaments in their sitting room and I saw a tiny jug, made out of pottery, no bigger than a minute coffee cup.  On one side was painted the words "Never Say Die - Up man and try".
"I like that!" I said, and one of them immediately gave it to me as a present.  My mum was a bit upset.  She said no, of course, I wasn't to take it.
When we went home, she explained that I wasn't to say I liked other people's things.  (I had just meant that I liked it... not that I wanted it.)  It seemed a bit silly to me that you couldn't tell someone that you liked what they had, but I had learned and I didn't do it again.
However, the kind lady really did want me to have it, and later it was presented to me....and I have it still.
Well, I have been in all sorts of messes, most of which I have made myself, but I still draw strength from the words.
Just now, in the world, it seems a good time to look at it again.Things are pretty much of a mess, I mean really pretty much of a mess, but there are always the good guys who haven't stopped trying and really, I mean really, are succeeding.
What gives me a lot of hope is the way the younger generation are trying for better things. Take this year's award for the best student film in the 2013 International Uranium Film Festival. "No to a Nuclear Jordan".  The director, Solenne Tadros, explains that she aims to present the dangers that come with having a nuclear power plant and what the alternatives are... but let her tell it in her own words, on their website.... http://www.uraniumfilmfestival.org/index.php/en/thursday-23-may-2013/213-at-3-pm/441-no-to-a-nuclear-jordan
I decided, as I wasn't able to see the film, to come up with some of my own recent discoveries about renewable energy alternatives.. and I wondered if they matched any discoveries of yours!
Fact one: For over 90 hours in Denmark recently, the wind power produced more than the nation's electricity requirements, peaking at 122%  on October 28th at 2 a.m.
http://ecowatch.com/2013/12/13/wind-denmark-electricity-needs/
http://oncirculation.com/2013/11/19/denmark-passes-100-wind-power/ 

That's just wind! And when it comes to solar, look at this enthusiasm in the USA:
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/12/25/mosaic-encourages-people-put-solar-new-year/
We could do with a bit more of this in the UK!
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2013/nov/03/weatherwatch-solar-power-renewable-energy
Did you know that solar panels pay for themselves in six months to one and a half years for Southern Europe and under three years for the rest of Europe, which as the author of the article winningly states, has approximately the solar irradiance levels of Alaska?...Scroll down to the bottom of the post for this gem! http://cleantechnica.com/2013/12/26/solar-energy-payback-time-charts/

 All we need now is some decent storage... but the geeks are working on it. At present my favourite schemes are for the kind you have stored up even when the power lines are down, micro storage, so here are a couple from one extreme to another:
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/12/19/hydrogen-storage-large-scale-renewable-energy-storage-demonstration-projects/  If you are thinking big
to http://cleantechnica.com/2013/10/30/energy-storage-silicon-chips-new-supercapacitor-creates-interesting-possibilities-solar-cells/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+IM-cleantechnica+%28CleanTechnica%29
...if you want something that fits on the back of a silicon chip!


And here's a round up of just some of what's been going on.
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/12/23/13-huge-clean-energy-breakthroughs-2013/

 Meanwhile, what has been happening in Jordan?
The people are protesting..
http://jordantimes.com/tribesmen-azraq-residents-say-no-to-nuclear-reactor-location
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/11/jordan-nuclear-rosatom-environment-energy.html#

At this time of year, many of us Christians are remembering shepherds watching their flocks by night in a starlit field in Judea. Now, today, I am thinking of shepherds not so far away in the countryside of Jordan.  I wish you well.