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submitted by Alister Wm Macintyre

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ushahidi.com - by Prateek Budhwar

The VGI data obtained from the Ushahidi-Haiti platform during the first 72 hours of Earthquake in Haiti can be used for predicting the locations of ‘Emergency and damaged areas’ using Ushahidi Reports in Port-au-Prince. Two rapid and very successful VGI deployments helped coordinate disaster response after a devastating magnitude 7 earthquake struck Haiti in January 2010.

OpenStreetMap (OSM) project volunteers working outside Haiti created a digital street map of Port-au-Prince and other places in Haiti very rapidly using fine-resolution imagery to trace vector maps of streets and other features.

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 submitted by Albert Gomez

Daniel Robison/WNED  After being delivered to JBI's Plastic2Oil facility, shredded plastic is melted down in a large tank before being vaporized and formed into fuel. John Bordynuik releases some of the substance to check for quality.

by Daniel Robison - npr.org - March 19, 2012

Only 7 percent of plastic waste in the United States is recycled each year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. A startup company in Niagara Falls says it can increase that amount and reduce the country's dependence on foreign oil at the same time.

It all starts with a machine known as the Plastic-Eating Monster.

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submitted by Samuel Bendett

Homeland Security News Wire - March 2, 2012

Following the massive 11 March earthquake and tsunami that rocked Japan, residents and experts there have grown increasingly skeptical of quake forecasts.

Last month two University of Tokyo seismologists released a study that predicted a major earthquake would hit Japan’s capital city within the next four years. Their study was sharply criticized by those who said their claims were likely incorrect.

Bowing to pressure, the university’s Earthquake Research Institute posted a notice on its site that stated the latest earthquake forecast was the opinion of two researchers and noted the study’s “large margin of error.”

“Many seismologists think this kind of study is too simple,” said Naoyuki Kato, a seismologist at the institute, in an interview with the Washington Post.

Japan, which has been frequently rocked by powerful earthquakes in the past, invests more money than any other nation in the world on earthquake prediction, yet despite spending more than $100 million annually, the art of predicting earthquakes remains elusive.