This method of therapy against anger works for most common cases of your daily life and it helps a lot! Instead of becoming nervous with the other person’s behaviour or their actions, you make fun of the situation or what they are saying.

For example, your wife/husband, son, or friend gives you an order demanding many unreasonable things that will require many efforts and time. Instead of becoming nervous with their request, ask them if they want “something else!” This is a known ironic answer but you can improve it by asking if the person wants their absurd demands served in a dish.

Did someone steal your reserved parking spot? Has someone left trash outside the can and causing a stink? Did someone break your favorite cup? Never mind! Let it be. Learn to relax and accept what is happening without losing your temper.

Humor! Make fun of the negative situation. Try to justify what happened as if it was preventing you from making a mistake. Now you cannot park your car in the same place and the thief who wanted to steal it cannot find it. Perhaps you are lucky because only your parking place was stolen, not your car.

Is your neighbour an indifferent person? Keep the neighbourhood clean on his behalf and do it with humor, without complaining, but considering yourself a big hero who solves the problems caused by others without fighting and creating worse problems.

Go buy a new cup for you, because a new cup has the symbolic meaning of a new time in your life. Something different in your routine may help you feel better!

Give good explanations for whatever happens to you, justify people’s actions or simply make fun of what is wrong because nothing should be able to eliminate your good disposition and courage.

On the other hand, your good disposition and intelligence will easily eliminate your anger and nervousness in all situations.

This way, you will always be fine and happy and give wise lessons to many people!

Prevent Depression and Craziness through the scientific method of Dream Interpretation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by Christina Sponias, a writer who continued Jung's research in the unknown region of the human psychic sphere.

Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and http://www.booksirecommend.com

Click below to download your copy of the Free ebook
Beating Depression and Craziness

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christina_Sponias

Have you submitted Your own dreams for Free professional dream interpretation and psychotherapy?

Don’t waste time! This is a limited offer, only for this summer.

A single dream is not enough. We need a series of dreams in order to understand what is happening to the dreamer and to understand the guidance of the wise unconscious mind that produces our dreams.

So, write down your dreams every day if you want to see results for your efforts.  Your dreams and their special messages should be really important to you!

You need to start right now so you will have enough time to submit many dreams. If you put off this opportunity, time will pass and you won’t be able to send me anything…

Go to http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and learn more.

Christina Sponias

La ministre de l'éducation, Michelle Courchesne, a beau dire que "le régime parfait n'existe pas", il n'en demeure pas moins que le gouvernement doit souvent procéder à des saisies, se payer à même des remboursements d'impôts, ou même inscrire des hypothèques légales sur les propriétés des étudiants, qui ne se sont pourtant pas gênés quand fut le temps de demander des prêts.  Seulement en 2006-2007, pas moins de 1241 étudiants ont tout simplement déclaré faillite, au lieu de rembourser.

Le plus drôle, dans cet article, ce sont les réactions des porte-parole des fédérations étudiantes.  Le président de la Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec (FEUQ), David Paradis, se dit d'avis que "le programme d'aide financière est déconnecté de la réalité en surévaluant la capacité de payer des étudiants".  Je dirais plutôt que c'est David Paradis, qui est déconnecté de la réalité, parce que tout le monde sait, dans le vrai monde, que quiconque emprunte, que ce soit pour des études, pour financer une maison, ou pour acheter du "pot", doit un jour rembourser.

Pour sa part, Merlin Trottier-Picard, de la Fédération étudiante collégiale du Québec, affirme que des étudiants, qui ont cumulé parfois plus de 20,000$ de dettes, "frappent un mur" en terminant leur formation.  Il déclare que "C'est facile d'emprunter.  C'est plus difficile de rembourser".  J'ajouterais une suite, à sa déclaration.  Quelque chose comme "C'est facile de boire ses prêts et bourses dans toutes sortes de partys, dont plusieurs organisés directement sur les campus.  C'est plus difficile de réussir ses examens."  Ça revient à dire que si l'on décide d'entreprendre des études, il faut y mettre un peu de sérieux.  Il semble que nos deux porte-parole aient oublié ce petit détail.

Personnellement, je me demande quelle est la dette étudiante de ces deux individus, juste pour le fun.  Un tableau, qui accompagne l'article, mentionne que le prêt moyen attribué en 2006-2007 est de 3254$, et que la somme de 21,376$ représente la dette d'études moyenne d'un finissant au doctorat.  Il me semble qu'un finissant au doctorat, ça ne se retrouve pas à travailler au salaire minimum.  La dette moyenne d'un finissant au baccalauréat se chiffre à 11,467$, alors que 25,390 étudiants ont obtenu une aide financière, alors qu'ils vivaient toujours chez leurs parents.  Alors si je prends les paroles de Merlin Trottier-Picard, ses amis, qui ont accumulé parfois plus de 20,000$ de dettes ont dû user leurs fonds de culottes pas mal longtemps dans les CEGEPs.  À moins qu'il parle de ses amis universitaires.

À mon point de vue, ceux qui ont des dettes étudiantes mirobolantes, et qui n'ont pas les moyens de les honorer, malgré les plans de remboursement avantageux, parce que beaucoup moins sévères de n'importe quelle hypothèque, sont certainement ceux qui ont étudié dans des programmes de "sciences molles", qui sont impressionnantes sur un CV, mais qui ne valent rien de plus que la feuille de papier sur lequel leur diplôme est imprimé, quand vient le temps de faire la besogne pour laquelle ils finiront par être embauchés.  Ce serait probablement aussi le cas des "gosses de riches", qui passent le plus clair de leur temps au CEGEP ou à l'université, parce que leurs parents sont écoeurés de les voir flâner à la maison, et leur dit des trucs du genre "si tu veux pas travailler, au moins, fais quelque chose de ta vie, et vas étudier".  Ces "flancs mous" sont d'ailleurs d'excellents clients des concentrations de sciences molles, subventionnées par le gouvernement, pour flâner dans les institutions d'enseignement supérieur, et certains d'entre-eux pourraient même sûrement devenir porte-parole de fédérations étudiantes, tellement ça fait longtemps qu'ils passent d'un cours, ou d'une concentration, à un autre.

L'une des solutions à ce problème d'endettement, que tout le monde finit par payer, en bout de ligne, avec ses impôts, serait de ne fournir l'aide financière que dans les secteurs à grande demande, comme la médecine, par exemple.  Toutes les sciences molles, qui ne garantissent que peu - ou pas - d'emplois, ne devraient permettre ni bourse, ni prêt, et ce afin que les fonds disponibles encouragent la formation d'étudiants vraiment désireux de participer au développement et à l'avancement de la société.  Une autre passerait par le refus pur et simple de prêter de l'argent à un étudiant qui change de cours, et ce à partir de la troisième fois.  Il existe des processus d'évaluation très efficaces, qui permettent à un étudiant de se diriger vers la bonne formation dès le départ; aussi, on pardonnerait un "recommencement", mais les autres seraient aux frais de l'étudiant.  Je crois que ces deux mesures garantiraient une baisse du nombre de prêts non-remboursés, à long terme, parce que les étudiants seraient attendus sur le marché du travail, et ce dès leur graduation.  Ils pourraient ainsi rembourser promptement leur dette d'étude.

Mais je vais sûrement me faire dire que de telles mesures vont "à l'encontre du libre choix des étudiants d'étudier dans ce qu'ils veulent".  Mon but n'est pas d'empêcher les étudiants d'étudier dans ce qu'ils veulent.  Il est de faire en sorte que le gouvernement finance les futurs diplômés dont la société a vraiment besoin.

Amnesia or the lack of memory is sad and troublesome. Many times in your life you can get in difficult situations only because you don’t remember an important person’s name or something else that is much more important, such as the name of a medicine.

You should write everything you can if you have this problem. Be organized and careful.

The reason for the existence of amnesia is the existence of very traumatic experiences; in other words, this condition has a protective function. It appears when there is a trauma that the person wishes to forget, but this is not a conscious function. It works without the participation of the human conscience. For example, when someone suffers a disaster or something terrible happens in one’s life, amnesia protects him or her from remembering the horrible scenes or situations that he or she saw or lived.

Amnesia can have a psychological reason that cannot be logically justified if we ignore what is happening in the psychic sphere of the affected person. In this case, I recommend psychotherapy through dream interpretation with the unique and correct method of dream translation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by me. I continued Jung’s research in the unknown psyche, where craziness remains, and I discovered the existence of the wild conscience.

This wild, violent and evil content often obliges the unconscious that produces the dreams in order to protect us from craziness, to provoke amnesia to the human conscience in order to protect it from the memories projected by the wild side.

If your problem is not so serious, but you keep forgetting many important details and many things you must remember, here are my directions to help you improve your memory until you become able to remember everything you need and even what is not necessary:

1. Associations

The best way to remember names and difficult words is through associations. For example, if a person’s name is Walter Miller. In order to remember this name you have to think about a word that reminds it… How about “watermelon?” This way, the similar sounding word will help you remember the real name of the person. (If you don’t actually remember the real name of the person but you quickly say the substitute word that you associated with their name when you meet them, they will have the impression that you said their real name…)

The same tactic can be used for other things as well: you simply should associate names, substantives, titles, etc., with words easy to remember.

2. Attention

When you hear or read something important, pay attention to it. Say to yourself: “now this person is saying this and I should remember it” or “now I’m reading the most important part of the text, I have to keep it in my memory.”

3. Repetition

Repeat several times the words or sentences you have to learn, but not without thinking like a parrot. Think about what you are saying, visualize the things that you are repeating in your mind, and be in contact with what you are trying to memorize.

4. Make a Summary

Rewrite the most important parts of what you are trying to learn. Make a summary with the essence and keep it in mind. You don’t have to remember all the details. You can write them in your own words. Only the essence of what you are trying to remember must be memorized.

5. Exercise

Try to remember many things, even if you don’t need to. If you keep your mind working, you become more intelligent and your memory will be excellent!

Prevent Depression and Craziness through the scientific method of Dream Interpretation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by Christina Sponias, a writer who continued Jung's research in the unknown region of the human psychic sphere.

Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and http://www.booksirecommend.com

Click below to download your copy of the Free ebook
Beating Depression and Craziness

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christina_Sponias

Have you submitted Your own dreams for Free professional dream interpretation and psychotherapy?

Don’t waste time! This is a limited offer, only for this summer.

A single dream is not enough. We need a series of dreams in order to understand what is happening to the dreamer and to understand the guidance of the wise unconscious mind that produces our dreams.

So, write down your dreams every day if you want to see results for your efforts.  Your dreams and their special messages should be really important to you!

You need to start right now so you will have enough time to submit many dreams. If you put off this opportunity, time will pass and you won’t be able to send me anything…

Go to http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and learn more.

Christina Sponias

- Reggie Fils-Aime - "So for us really our challenge really is how do we satisfy all these consumers who are loving all of the product we make available on a download basis? Of course, it's not just download content that's putting a strain on the Wii's limited flash storage. As we continue to have things like Mario Kart that has its own channel when you're playing from an Internet perspective, we're just making this challenge tougher and tougher. So in our view this is becoming much more of a mainstream problem, which is why we have a sense of urgency to solve it."

Yes you heard right they are currently working on a storage solution for the Wii, when this will happen and what solution Nintendo will bring us we will have to wait and see. Which is good news for us all whatever form it ultimately takes. I think after getting kicked in the nuts by its fan base at E3 Nintendo has finally gotten the message from the Nintendo fans. This is some good news it means that they are actually acknowledging there poor showing at E3, so maybe something good will come out of this whole E3 debacle.

Exams in school are similar to those things. The teacher announced the date of the exam ahead of time and you planned for studying strategy. You did the necessary preparation, went to the library, read and understood the concepts, practiced solving the problems, and everything seemed to be running smoothly. The day of the examination came and you were ready for it.

There are many things that might happen. One is due to unknown reason, your mind went blank and you could not think of any answer to the questions or way to solve the problems. You kept on looking at the exam paper and asked yourself what went wrong. So that was mental block and it was one of my depressing experiences in a Biology exam.

Another is your watch did not register the correct time and you were not aware of that. When you arrived at the examination area, you were five minutes late. The teacher was about to give you the exam when you suddenly remembered that your calculator was left in your house and it was a computational exam. When you informed the teacher, she told you to get back your calculator. Good thing if you are living near the university and the delayed time is lesser.

The third is when you felt your fully prepared, you did not sleep the other night just to practice solving problems, and the exam did not turn out the way you expect it. Others often asked why, what is wrong? They have done their best yet the questions in the exam are undoubtedly nerve-cracking and mind-puzzling plus the time limit.

These are just some of what I experienced in my previous exams. Sometimes, you thought you failed but luck happens and you are the top scorer in the class. Life is indeed unpredictable.

Home schooling / Home education is getting more common and popular these days due to the fact that some parents feel that their children are not given enough attention by educators in school. This is not a fault of the educators but that of the traditional educational system, where numerous children are placed in a group within a classroom to be educated by an educator. Over time, the number of students in a class has increased drastically, to a point where educators are facing the challenge of catering to the different personalities, learning and communication styles of the children. However, the cause of this challenge faced by the educators does not lie with the increase in classroom size but rather, in the fundamental mindset of group education.  From an idealistic perspective, each student should be educated by an educator on a one-to-one basis. This will enable the students to learn at their own time, considering the late developers and the fact that each student is different in their personalities, communicating and learning styles. But of course, the lack of manpower and resources almost makes this endeavour an impossible task.

This probably explains the sudden intrusion of the students' parents into their children's education. And in some cases, students are now doing better with home schooling / home education. Does this spell the end of all educators' responsibilities worldwide? I do not think so. Ultimately, not all parents have the time to engage their children in home schooling / home education, considering today's hectic work pace. So, there will still be a substantial number of children who will pursue a traditional education. However, as educators, we should not let these students down in terms of their opportunity to learn. We need to improve our students' learning progress.

To achieve this objective, a students' personality assessment test is recommended. This test should gauge a student's personality, communicating style and learning style. It should be introduced at the start of a student's first school term, before the commencement of classes. Implementing this test at secondary level and above will be ideal, since students younger than twelve might not be attuned to such test, thus rendering the test inaccurate. The results of the students' test should subsequently be stored in the school's online databases, to be retrieved by different educators who are coaching the students in class throughout the semesters. In this way, by reading through each student's personality, communication and learning styles, the respective educators are able to guide each student in their classes better.  This is probably the next best solution, after individual coaching. This technique may prove to be rather time-consuming for educators but the benefits of enabling students to learn better in their classes far outweigh any inconveniences that may be caused. I believe that any educators who regard teaching as a calling rather than a job will be able to identify with this.

Understanding each student's personality in a class is paramount to being an effective educator in the classroom.

I contemplated on the reasoning why these sights only happen when I'm thinking. My theory is like with regular eyes, if you see something odd and ask yourself what it is, you automatically focus onto the object to determine its nature. Same with "inspirational eyes," in that if I'm thinking about something, everything I see will be used in my mind to find a solution to my problem. What a great gift I have to view such wonderful things when I'm obviously going through some really weird and trying times.

There was a need of such a product that helps owners to manage their sims/lands in a way they don't need to be keeping track of each one individually, or even per simulator individually. So our goal will be to provide the tools they need, with a easy to handle interface for buyer and owner. Once we acomplish this, we will be adding more features. This way it won't happen like with similar products that attempted to get all at once, and they failed because of their lack to focus on each task, and this results on each feature appear to be incomplete or not well implemented.

If you are estate owner or sim owner, and you are interested in such product you can subscribe to our RSS channel to recive the lastest updates for this product. We will be posting progress in this site as it goes developed.

While common psychiatrists and psychologists examine many cases superficially, I examine only a few cases, but very well. I follow each drama, for years, being near each patient like a friend. I am, in fact, like a nun. Religiosity is indispensable when we deal with terror. And of course, a tragic suicide of a young mother means terror and despair for her husband’s and her child’s life…

Terror also for her brother and her nephew’s life, besides her mother’s life and so on… Such an unexpected fact means terror for everyone. Their lives ended with her suicide.

It was unexpected. She was working as a dentist and had normally marked consults with her clients on Monday, but on Saturday she committed suicide, jumping from the terrace of her building, while she seemed to be happy with her husband.

This fact was more than shocking for everyone that knew her… I knew her brother very well, who was my patient, because his wife abandoned him and his son. This was a problematic family… But they seemed to be common people, polite, with social prestige, money, a good appearance, good reputation, etc. Nobody could ever imagine that this family would have these problems… They seemed to be balanced and happy people, at the beginning of their lives.

I also had a neighbour who committed suicide jumping from his terrace, which was on the top floor. He was a lawyer, also working, with many appointments for the next day. He didn't have financial problems, but he had had an affair and before jumping he had hurt (superficially) a woman’s face with a knife.

Another neighbour knew his story and told me everything…
He lived in the building, to the left of mine. When I went to the terrace of my apartment after hearing all the noise of the ambulances, I saw the police carrying a woman in a stretcher. I didn't see the lawyer, because he didn't jump in sight of the street – he jumped on the back side of the building, falling in the building’s garden.

I saw the marks of the dentist, who fell in the front part of her building, while her husband went to the car in order to bring the fresh milk he had forgotten there.

She passed near the baby and his toys, before jumping, but she had the courage to go to the terrace and abandon the kid, who was a very sweet and quiet boy. He was a beautiful angel with brown hair and blue eyes, who was always smiling.

His father said that he was a rare child, that slept well, would eat and stay quietly without complaining. He was a baby that almost never cried.

This was her second marriage, after a first marriage without children because her first husband could not have kids. So, the baby she had with her second husband, who loved her very much, was the realisation of a dream, a fulfilment that should only make her very happy.

She seemed to be happy… however, craziness dominated her mind gradually, as I could understand examining her life in detail and examining her husband’s dreams, which were giving us information about her character.

I saw my Uncle Leonid shouting in the streets, drunk and crazy, whereas before he had been a consul, with a very important social position, respected by everyone. He had a very good heart, but his personality was very strange.

He was extremely generous, and he wanted very much to be good to everyone, but he made many mistakes because he followed his psychological type. His type was the introverted psychological type based on intuitions, the most complicated psychological type that exists. It is very hard for anyone to define this type’s ideals, because it is too complex.

The introverted psychological type based on intuitions cannot get adapted to the reality in which he lives. He can only keep his mental health for life if he becomes an artist, otherwise he will certainly become a victim of neurosis or worse.

My adored uncle became hysterical. He had panic attacks and various other problems with his health.

He somehow recuperated his conscious mind however, and we had many discussions, after the shock.

He suffered very much… His failure was due to craziness, because he became too absurd. He seemed to be absurd from the beginning to my eyes, when I first met him. I was only 15 years old (I first met him after the accident I suffered at this age, when I was almost 16 years old). He lived in Sweden and I lived in Brazil, but I travelled with my mother to Europe six months after the accident, and after visiting Greece we went to Calmar, in Sweden, where Uncle Leonid lived with his family.

It was our destiny to meet each other again in Greece, where we lived near one another for certain period of time, since our family is Greek.

I decide to live in Greece after going back to Brazil, but he decided to go back to Sweden, where he lived and died, near my aunt and cousins.

Craziness was always something I was afraid of, because my father was schizophrenic. Only with me, that had his facial features, was he very kind. With my mother and everyone else he was a monster. He pretended to be very kind however, and nobody could imagine that he was a true demon if they didn't know him very well, because he was very gentle.

He had a lot of money and people obeyed him, even though he was absurd.

His implications and demands were very strange. He was always suspicious of everyone. He didn't let us open the door to anyone at night, no matter if it was our neighbour and we knew him very well.

Craziness is very strange. It can attack anyone, at any time.

My other very tragic example is the suicide of my adored friend Arnold, who was like a brother to me. We belonged to the same gang of friends when we were teens.

He suddenly became psychotic when he was 20 years old, and committed suicide when he turned 26, after psychiatric psychotherapy with “heavy medicine” as he described it to me in his letters. I was living in Athens, while he remained in Sao Paulo, our home town. My mother helped his family, because she stayed longer in Sao Paulo, while I went back to Greece.

These are only a few examples… The truth is that more than too many people in this world become victims of craziness everyday, because the human being inherits a wild conscience that tries to destroy his human conscience through craziness, because it is schizophrenic.

Craziness exists “a priori” in the human brain. We are already born with a schizophrenic content in our psyche and if we don’t transform it into a positive part of our human conscience through psychotherapy, we become victims for this absurd content that exists in the anti-conscience, our primitive and evil conscience, which can easily destroy our humanity through craziness.

The crazy person becomes a cruel monster, because they lose their human sensitivity. This is not their fault, however, because they inherit this absurd content in their psyche.

Some people have more tendency towards craziness than others. Everything depends on the person’s psychological type and conditions of life.

If you want to be prudent and stay far from craziness, despair and terror, start caring about your dreams and learn how to translate them according to the scientific method.

If you don’t have time to learn, send me your dreams for professional translation. You may even take advantage of my summer offer – I’m offering free professional translation for this summer only. Learn more about it at my site.

You have to care about your mental health and protect it while you can, because you don’t know how much power the wild anti-conscience has on your psyche.

If all the people I mentioned had translated their dreams, they would have been guided by the unconscious mind and cured for sure, before they had arrived to the point of completely losing their human conscience.

Our dreams can save our mental health, but there is only one method that can help us achieve this aim: the scientific method of dream interpretation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by me, who continued his research in the unknown region of the psyche.

You can prevent depression, craziness and suicidal thoughts only by translating the meaning of your dreams and following the guidance you receive from the unconscious mind, which produces your dreams exactly in order to give you precious information about you, your life, other people and the world where you are, so that your mental health will be protected and your personality will be completely developed.

This way you’ll become more intelligent, your balance and mental health will be guaranteed, and you’ll be able to live peacefully and happily for life.

Prevent Depression and Craziness through the scientific method of Dream Interpretation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by Christina Sponias, a writer who continued Jung's research in the unknown region of the human psychic sphere.
Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and http://www.booksirecommend.com
Click below to download your copy of the Free ebook
Beating Depression and Craziness
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christina_Sponias

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[audio http://ftp.myblog.ma/~yac/Abderahim%20Souiri%20-%20Koddam%20Arrasd.mp3]

Les tentatives visant à entraver les négociations sur le Sahara sont «improductives», a affirmé jeudi le ministre de la communication, porte-parole du gouvernement, Khalid Naciri, soulignant la volonté et la bonne foi dont le Maroc fait preuve pour parvenir à une solution définitive à la question du Sahara.

En réponse à une question sur les informations faisant état d'un éventuel retrait du «polisario» de ces négociations, Naciri a rappelé, lors d'un point de presse à l'issue du conseil de gouvernement, que «les résolutions du Conseil de sécurité des Nations Unies et les déclarations du Secrétaire général de l'ONU et de son envoyé personnel ont clairement souligné que les parties aux négociations doivent faire montre de bonne foi».
«Le Maroc fait preuve dans ces négociations, d'ouverture, de volonté et de bonne foi en vue de parvenir à une solution», a-t-il dit, précisant que «si les négociations se heurtaient au manque de volonté des autres parties, la responsabilité des blocages sera établie au niveau international».

Appui du Sénégal
Par ailleurs, l'ambassadeur du Sénégal à Rabat, Ibou Ndiaye, a réitéré, jeudi à Casablanca, le soutien «sans réserve» de son pays à l'initiative marocaine pour une large autonomie des provinces du sud du Royaume. «Le Sénégal, on ne le dira jamais assez, appuie sans réserve l'initiative marocaine pour une large autonomie des provinces du sud du Royaume», a-t-il affirmé à l'ouverture de la 2ème Semaine culturelle du Sénégal au Maroc (26-28 juin). «Il en était ainsi avant les négociations de Manhasset et il en sera ainsi pendant et après ces négociations», a-t-il souligné.
«Le Sénégal continue d'apporter un soutien constant et actif au Maroc, en vue d'une solution politique à la question du Sahara, solution qui préserve l'intégrité territoriale et la souveraineté du Royaume'', a ajouté le diplomate sénégalais.

L'initiative marocaine saluée 
par la CEMAC
Dans le cadre de la politique traditionnelle d'amitié et de solidarité menée par le Royaume du Maroc envers les pays partenaires d'Afrique, une délégation d'Emissaires royaux composée de Taïb Fassi Fihri, Ministre des AE et de la Coopération, Mohamed Yassine Mansouri, DG des Etudes et de la Documentation s'est rendue à Yaoundé, en marge du Sommet de la Communauté Economique et Monétaire d'Afrique Centrale (CEMAC), qui s'est tenu du 23 au 25 juin 2008. Un communiqué du Ministère des AE et de la Coopération, parvenu jeudi à la MAP, indique que la délégation a été reçue en audience respectivement par les Chefs d'Etat des pays membres :
- Paul Biya, Président du Cameroun,
- Haj Omar Bongo Odimba, Président du Gabon, 
- François Bozize, Président de la République Centrafricaine,
- Théodore Obiang N'guema, Président de la Guinée Equatoriale, 
- Denis Sassou Nguesso, Président du Congo,
- Fradique de Menezes, Président de Sao Tomé et Principe (pays observateur). 
Les Emissaires royaux ont transmis aux Chefs d'Etat les salutations du Souverain, ainsi que Ses vœux de succès aux travaux du Sommet de cette Organisation.
Dans ce contexte, il est à relever que dans une déclaration finale, les Chefs d'Etat et de gouvernement de la CEMAC ont, à propos de la question du Sahara, «invité les parties concernées et intéressées à continuer à coopérer avec le SG de l'Onu et son Envoyé spécial pour un règlement pacifique à la question du Sahara dans le cadre des Nations unies et en conformité avec la légalité internationale.» 
Ils ont «salué, à cet égard, l'Initiative du Maroc du 11 avril 2007 comme pouvant maintenir l'élan imprimé au processus de négociations en vue d'une solution politique mutuellement acceptable».

This was actually created as a briefing and presentation. Many of the terms and concepts used would be familiar and shared with the intended audience.

Making the Case for Biofuels.

In 2008, with rapidly rising fuels costs from traditional hydrocarbon sources, there is increasing pressure on business and society to provide energy for our national needs, and for our growing and ever power-hungry global civilization. Currently, it is estimated that we use approximately 15 terawatts of electricity globally[1], much of this being use in the internal combustion engines of modern cars or in electrical power generation from liquid, solid, or gas fossil fuels. Rising costs of power have a cascading effect on all costs in our world, since all processes in the modern world require or rely on electrical powered industrial activities. If we are to keep increasing our energy demands, the cost of power will continue to rise if we continue to rely so heavily on non renewable energy. Some form of replacement power source that can expand with our demand expansion need to be found. This principle is generally known as scalability. For us to grow, we don’t need to merely do “more for less”. It is also crucial that we find new and expandable sources of energy.

[2]

There is another factor pushing our need for new energy sources to replace the traditional fossil fuels. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report has announced that anthropogenic[3] sources of greenhouse gases seem to be driving temperatures higher and higher. "Most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic (human) greenhouse gas concentrations," it says. According to the IPCC, this means a greater than 90 % chance.[4] A huge source of this temperature increase is likely to be from carbon and other “greenhouse gases” released into the atmosphere by the burning of fossil fuels. Whether or not one chooses to agree with the IPCC, it is hard to argue that liberating massive amounts of carbon formerly sequestered into the Earth over geological timescales, in the short span of a few hundred years, is completely benign. There is no question that human activity has changed the carbon cycle in the last 8,000 years.

The following chart shows carbon cycle flux of the earth, with boxes indicating reservoir values and the arrows indicating annual change. Red arrows indicate the changes made by human beings in the time we have been conducting the ecological experiment of civilization.

[5]

In addition to the above reasons to investigate alternative fuels and sources of energy, one can include a grab-bag of other agendas and motivations. “The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007”, recently signed by U.S. President George W. Bush may be one.[6] This act mandates the inclusion of biofuel into the traditional gasoline available at the pumps, in part the key provisions include "Near-term usage requirement goes to 9 billion gallons in 2008 and 15.2 billion gallons in 2011" and “expands mandate for U.S.-grown biofuels such as ethanol, to 36 billion gallons in 2022, versus current levels near 6.5 billion gallons”. Other similar provisions in Canada[7] and Europe[8] seem to suggest a shift of public and governmental direction in the use of energy.

[9](The “The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007” seeks to provide energy security for the United States against uncontrollable import irregularities.)

There are a number of interesting proposed methods to supply this power, but due to the above mentioned legislations, as well as the popular and media interest, I will look at biofuels directly. It is also my personal feeling that biofuels can be made to work well in replacing traditional energy sources and providing a crucial bridge from current technologies to a truly energy independent future.

Biofuels, in particular biodiesel, can be made to work with existing technology and using existing infrastructure, which is an important step since an ‘energy-constrained’ future also means a future in which large scale infrastructure change is more difficult. They provide a solution with minimum disruption that can be easy fit into our existing economic models. They are also, as I will demonstrate, capable of remediating the negative impact we have already caused on the biosphere that is condemned by the IPCC report.

Challenges posed by biofuels

There are a number of problems associated with the wide scale use of biofuels. One of these is the ecological damage they can cause when unregulated market forces drive economic activity that is destructive to the ecology that we seek to protect. According to the CBC:

“Rainforests are now being cleared to make way for palm oil plantations, a rich source of biodiesel. The problem is particularly serious in Malaysia where the palm oil industry began in 1917. The country hopes to apply its experience to meet the rising demand for biofuels coming from Europe and India.”[10]

This pattern is repeated in the Amazon and other tropical forest areas around the world, as poor nations attempt to cash in on the high price of energy and food. This pattern is not new, however it is exacerbated to supply energy when every newly cleared section of forest becomes a potential “oil well” for vegetable and cellulose energy. The ‘vanishing rainforest’ problem of the 1980s has not disappeared, in fact it has accelerated.[11] Much of the worlds forest cover has already disappeared, as evidenced on the following map created by Canadian Geographic:

Converting our already farmed cropland into “Oil well” can also have very negative consequences, as we have witnessed in the lead up to summer 2008. Bob Macdonald of the CBC observes:

“In North America and Mexico, another disturbing trend is developing: The use of corn as biofuel stock. Other than the fact that it takes a lot of energy to grow corn in the first place, corn is food. With the rising threat of droughts brought on by climate change, and a growing world population, how long will our thirst for fuel go before we’re putting food in vehicles instead of mouths?”[12]

So, biofuels threaten to exacerbate already current problems and negate any gains they might make with unseen offsets and consequences. Is there a way to keep the benefits of plant-based fuel solutions while mitigating or controlling the consequences?

Algae?

Algae is one of the oldest known forms of life on earth, and it has a wide variety of species filling a wide variety of ecological niches. Algal farming has been practiced by humans for thousands of years, and is currently farmed industrially in the west to provide nutrient and health products as well as various chemical food applications. It is known to be a prolific grower, and a primary producer getting its energy directly from the sun. The photosynthesis performed by algae gives us an opportunity to tap the enormous power of the sun to meet our current and future fuel needs.

"While a number of bio-feedstock are currently being experimented for biodiesel (and ethanol) production, algae have emerged as one of the most promising sources especially for biodiesel production, for two main reasons (1) The yields of oil from algae are orders of magnitude higher than those for traditional oilseeds, and (2) Algae can grow in places away from the farmlands & forests, thus minimizing the damages caused to the eco- and food chain systems. There is a third interesting reason as well: Algae can be grown in sewages and next to power-plant smokestacks where they digest the pollutants and give us oil!"[13]

I will break down this claim and see it if stands up to facts.

To begin with, how productive can algae farming be? Algae is a single celled organism, its not carrying around a lot of superfluous specialized equipment. It is extremely efficient at using light and available nutrients to its advantage. Its growth and productivity is 30 to 100 times higher than crops like soybeans. It has the potential to be remarkably productive.

Secondly, it is claimed that “Algae production does not compete with agriculture. Algae production facilities are closed and do not require soil for growth, use 99% less water than conventional agriculture, and can be located on non-agricultural land far from water. Since the whole organism converts sunlight into oil, algae can produce more oil in an area the size of a two-car garage than an entire football field of soybeans.”[14] We will explore this further later, to see if other scientists agree. As for the third claim, “Algae thrive on a high concentration of carbon dioxide. And nitrogen dioxide (NO2), a pollutant of power plants, is a nutrient for the algae. Algae production facilities can thus be fed exhaust gases from fossil fuel power plants, and even breweries, to significantly increase productivity and clean up the air.” This is in fact one of the impetuses that lead us to look at biofuels in the first place, that is their potential to clean up the environment and scrub our industrial activities. Algae live specifically on the gas that we would like to remove from effluent. [15](Algae LIVE on CO2)

The comparisons between algae productivity and other biofuel feedstocks can be summed up as follows:

Yield of Various Plant Oils

Crop Oil in Liters per hectare

Castor 1413

Sunflower 952

Safflower 779

Palm 5950

Soy 446

Coconut 2689

Algae 100000

[16]

The numbers represented here seem to be a fairly accurate representation of much of the literature I surveyed. The numbers for algae may be slightly on the high side, and probably represent a “bioreactor” factory process. Nevertheless all the sources seem to agree that algae is extremely prolific and productive, with up to 50% of their weight taken up by lipids[17], depending on the species.

, Hawaii)[18]

Here we must address scalability. Is it possible to grow enough algae in North America to supply our needs? After all, as Nathan Lewis has pointed out, using traditional biofuels it would take a significant portion of the Earths total biotic production to power our civilization.[19]

According to some, the growing area needed using an ‘open pond’ system is actually quite reasonable when compared to other crops. Information from the University of New Hampshire indicates the following:

"NREL[20]'s research showed that one quad (7.5 billion gallons) of biodiesel could be produced from 200,000 hectares of desert land (200,000 hectares is equivalent to 780 square miles, roughly 500,000 acres), if the remaining challenges are solved (as they will be, with several research groups and companies working towards it, including ours at UNH). In the previous section, we found that to replace all transportation fuels in the US, we would need 140.8 billion gallons of biodiesel, or roughly 19 quads (one quad is roughly 7.5 billion gallons of biodiesel). To produce that amount would require a land mass of almost 15,000 square miles. To put that in perspective, consider that the Sonora desert in the southwestern US comprises 120,000 square miles.”[21]

Or approximately 1/8^th of the size of the Sonora desert in the United States. This compares favorably not only to other crops considered for biofuels, but also with space needs for projects like a Photo Voltaic power system proposed by Mr. Lewis.[22]

B. Greg Mitchell is a Research Biologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. He works on algae, and has an apparently keen interest in using algae as a renewable energy. According to him,

"Soybean Based Biodiesel will never contribute more than a few percent of the possible US diesel fuel market… (however) approximately 20-30 million acres of algae would supply ALL U.S. transportation fuel"[23]

This is a little less optimistic than the previous estimate we looked at from University of New Hampshire, which for comparison converts to 9.6 million acres. However, they are clearly in the same ballpark. B. Greg Mitchell goes on to detail what he considers to be the biggest benefits of developing an algae feedstock for biofuel production.

Advantages of Algae

• Uses all nutrients, minimizing eutrophication

• Uses underutilized land, e.g. deserts

• Yields >10x those for land plants

• Can grow in salt, or brackish water

• Non-fuel fraction is high in protein

• capture CO2 at point source

• Can produce high yields of – Lipids for biodiesel & starch / polysaccharides for ethanol

You will recall that the University of New Hampshire estimates placed the hypothetical fields in the Sonora desert. This is not merely for comparison; it highlights one of the strengths of algae farming. Namely, that it can be done in conditions that are suboptimal for other agriculture. Algae needs sun, carbon, and water. Just about any water will do, depending on the species.

As noted by B. Greg Mitchell, salty or brackish water is fine so there is no need to divert precious drinking water. So is sewage waste, which algae could actually help clean up by using the carbon and nitrogen found there. Ideally then, water treatment facilities could use algae ponds to help them clean up their waste mimicking services already performed by natural systems. The non fuel components are high in protein, so dead algae could be used as animal feed or even supply more human foods.

We already use oil for food, why not use algae?

[24]

So harvest the algae from salt water desert ponds, put it through a digester process like that shown above, and out comes food, fuel, and probably some Ambrosia[25] from Olympus. At least, that’s the model. Is this a reality or a fantasy? Is this kind of progress achievable and if so how close are we?

What we have, what we need.

Stephen Mayfield[26] of the Scripps research Institute (a college of Dr. Mitchells), gives an assessment of where we are at. According to Mayfield, these are the things we need to achieve in order to get to the vision above:

-"We need Bigger and better knowledge base on algae."

-"We need to identify and characterize a large number of diverse algal species; Genomic, proteomic and metabolic profiles."

-"We need to develop molecular tools for breeding”

-"We need to develop molecular tools for engineering"

-"We need to develop agricultural practices for algal growth, harvesting, and processing." i.e. “Industrializing algae”

And this is what we now have:

-"We have many species identified with limited characterization, but showing ...fantastic potential."

-"We already know how to grow algae on a modest scale"

-"We have a few algal genomes sequenced and annotated."

"We have nuclear and chloroplast transformation for a handful of species." (engineering)

"We know that algae can be grown at agricultural scale at costs approaching agricultural costs."

What would an algae feedstock farm business look like?

It turns out that there are already quite a few companies who are developing or have developed what they consider to be a workable business model. One particularly interesting company is Greenfuel technologies.

According to their website,

“Using technology licensed from a NASA project, GreenFuel builds bioreactors--in the shape of 3-meter-high glass tubes fashioned as a triangle--to grow algae. The algae are fed with sunlight, water and carbon-carrying emissions from power plants. The algae are then harvested and turned into biodiesel fuel.”[27]

According to Smart Economy, quoting New Scientist[28]:

"To produce fuel from CO2, the flue gases are fed into a series of transparent “bioreactors”, which are 2 metres high and filled with green microalgae suspended in nutrient-rich water.  The algae use the CO2, along with sunlight and water, to produce sugars by photosynthesis, which are then metabolised into fatty oils and protein.  As the algae grow and multiply, portions of the soup are continually withdrawn from each reactor and dried into cakes of concentrated algae.  These are repeatedly washed with solvents to extract the oil.  The algal oil can then be converted into biodiesel through a routine process called transesterification, in which it is processed using ethanol and a catalyst.  Enzymes are then used to convert starches from the remaining biomass into sugars, which are fermented by yeasts to produce ethanol."

(A Greenfuel Bioreactor)

They have a pilot project, which has successfully created biodiesel for local school buses. This process uses a carbon stream straight from a heavy carbon source and ideally it would use the carbon and prevent it from being released into the atmosphere. Unfortunately, there have been a few design hitches, including a problem with the algae actually growing over abundantly and clogging up the system. Algae deep in the reactor could not get sunlight and died. The Biofuel reactor had to be shut down for redesign, but the company hopes to have it up again shortly.

Another company which shows some promise is Global Green Solutions. They have solved a problem that Greenfuels has encountered, by growing their algae in thin tubes, constantly circulating to allow all the algae to receive the necessary light. Global Green Solutions have a very interesting website, on which can be seen a video of their process in action along with interviews with their scientists explaining the process.[29] They also claim to have various strains of algae which produce for them various types of fuel, such as jet fuel, gasoline, etc.

A third company is Solix Solutions[30], which has an interesting website that provides a lot of basic information. They are the descendant of the NERL National Renewable Energy Lab Government program in the U.S. Solix has a second generation prototype of a bioreactor which they are currently testing.

It seems that there are a lot of good concepts out there, and some workable proofs-of-concept, but very little that’s ready to roll out right now for a profitable industry. This concern cannot work as a charity. One of the bigger problems is that the algae must themselves be harvested and digested in order to get at the oils they are producing and storing in their systems. In essence, everything we have been talking about up till now has been a ‘crop’ model.

(Industrial Algae Process)

Another model

Can we cut out the harvesting and processing altogether? Scientists have known for some time that algae will produce very small amount of hydrogen under certain conditions. Enter Tesios Melis and other new geneticists to rethink the entire process and bring some economy to the whole system.

"Researchers have found a metabolic switch in algae that allows the primitive plants to produce hydrogen gas -- a discovery that could ultimately result in a vast source of cheap, pollution-free fuel."[31]

Tesios Melis at the University of Berkeley discovered this in 2000, experimenting with an algae species called Chlamydomonas reinhardtii in the lab. He explains that ``an alternative metabolic pathway'' exists in the algae to exploit stored energy reserves anaerobically -- in the absence of oxygen. A hydrogenase enzyme was activated, splitting large amounts of hydrogen gas from water and releasing it as a byproduct. The algae still doesnt produce all the hydrogen that it should. A "hydrogen gap" exists between what it should be producing, by the laws of chemistry, and what it is. If that hydrogen gap is solved it could boost the hydrogen production up to levels needed to be industrially feasible.

"Switching 100 percent of the algae's photosynthesis to hydrogen might not be possible."The rule of thumb is, if we bring that up to 50 percent, it would be economically viable," Melis says. “With 50 percent capacity, one acre of algae could produce 40 kilograms of hydrogen per day. That would bring the cost of producing hydrogen to $2.80 a kilogram. At this price, hydrogen could compete with gasoline, since a kilogram of hydrogen is equivalent in energy to a gallon of gasoline."

This is a factory model of algae fuel production, with the algae acting as tiny living factories.

Carbon inà(algae growth)àharvestingàprocessingàfuel

Vs.

Carbon inà (algae growth and processing) à fuel

Designing life

Tasios has done some work for another likeminded scientist, Dr. J. Craig Venter. Dr. Venter has been widely regarded in the biosciences community as a saint and a devil. Dr. Venter has made friends, gathered often worshipful attention from the media, and angered a lot of people including his own shareholders who still seem to easily forgive him and flock to the next project.

Venter is the former president and a co-founder of Celera Genomics, famous for running a private version of the Human Genome Project of its own, for economic commercial purposes, using so called “shotgun sequencing” technology. His method widely criticized by the international scientific community who doubted its effectiveness. The aim of the Celera project was to create a database of data to which users could subscribe – for a price. However when Both Celera and the Human Genome project both announced jointly the completion of their projects, much of the criticism stopped. However, giving in to international pressure to reveal their results, Celera failed to recoup much of their investment and Venter was hounded out of his position.

This however did not deter him. He set up the private foundation “J. Craig Venter Institute” and launched a sloop to sail around the world taking surveys of the ocean life. According to the Institute[32]:

“In a quest to unlock these mysteries, the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) launched the Sorcerer II Global Ocean Sampling (GOS) Expedition in 2004. Inspired by 19th Century sea voyages like Darwin’s on the H.M.S. Beagle and Captain George Nares on the H.M.S. Challenger, The Sorcerer II circumnavigated the globe for more than two years, covering a staggering 32,000 nautical miles, visiting 23 different countries and island groups on four continents."

There have been some amazing discoveries made on that trip, the details of which I won’t delve into here. Much of it, however, concerned the most basic of life; bacterial, algal, photosynthetic organisms.

Venter also set up Synthetic Genomics[33] which now leads the world in bioinformatics[34] research, and hard science. Their list of current projects reads like a wish list of future biological technologies. The crown jewel, the centerpiece of his work, is a stripped down “minimal cell”. That is, a cell that is capable of living at the most basic level, with the barest minimum of genes. With this cell, they will then be able to insert any other genes they want, in packages. The combined effect will be like building any custom designed cell you want, out of lego blocks. Want a cell that produces hydrogen? Or any other product you care to name?

(Minimal cell)+(Tasios Melis’ Metabolic Pathway for Hydrogen)+(Photosynthesis)+(Highest available Algae reproduction rates)+(Squid gene for luminosity) = An algae cell that will glow while its delivering you cheap, fast hydrogen from the sun.

Sitting on a salty wastewater pond in the middle of the desert.

Too good to be true? Maybe. But if anybody can deliver on something like this, it’s probably Nobel Laureate, first man to have a full sequence of his own DNA, J. Craig Venter. He says he’ll have it in two years.

Is it worth looking forwards to? Absolutely.