Steel, space and sandwiches

Some good news this week comes from Teesside where Sahaviriya Steel Industries is expected to announce that it is hiring over 800 staff.

Sahaviriya Steel Teesside plant is an integrated iron and steel making facility, with the second largest blast furnace in Europe with an expected annual slab production capacity of 3.5m tons. Thailand’s Sahaviriya Steel Industries acquired the plant from Tata Steel UK for $469m in February this year.

The news is tempered by some reports that suggest around 10,000 people will likely apply for the 800 positions.

Over on Lord Howe Island in the Pacific, delegates are set to gather this weekend for the first international conference dedicated to the creation of a Global Artificial Photosynthesis (GAP) project.

The organizers believe that if promoted globally, GAP could assist crop production on marginal lands, reduce atmospheric CO2 levels, lower geopolitical and military tensions over fossil fuel, food and water scarcity and create carbon-neutral hydrogen fuel for domestic, community and industrial storage.

Over 40 confirmed speakers include leaders in photovoltaic and hydrogen fuel production research.

The aim of this conference is to foster international collaborations and strategies for funding through a global effort in five key areas of artificial photosynthesis: global collaborations, governance and policy structures and models; energy capture; energy conversion and storage (including hydrogen production); carbon fixation and modified and synthetic biological processes.

On Thursday NASA’s Dawn spacecraft is scheduled to begin the first of four science orbits around the asteroid Vesta, at an altitude of around 1,700 miles, with observations expected to help understand the earliest chapter of the solar system’s history.

It took nearly four years and 1.7 billion miles for Dawn to travel to Vesta, ending up around 114 million miles away from Earth, with the spacecraft entering orbit last month.

Vesta is the brightest object in the asteroid belt as seen from Earth and is thought to be the source of a large number of meteorites that fall to Earth.

This comes a few days after the Juno spacecraft was launched from Cape Canaveral to begin a five-year journey to Jupiter and NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter revealed possible flowing water during the warmest months on Mars.

From today it will be possible to make bookings for London’s Open House programme, which takes place on 17 & 18 September.

Over 700 of London’s buildings will be open to the public with full details of buildings and events available from today.

One of the highlights is expected to be Closed Loop Recycling’s plant in Dagenham. The recycling facility is able to convert 35,000 tonnes of waste plastic bottles into food-grade plastic per year.

Still with leisure time and news that the Chemistry Centre, Burlington House, London hosts ‘What flavour is my lunchbox?’ on Wednesday.

According to the organisers, flavour is more than mere taste; rather, it is the collaboration of vision, taste, touch, sound and smell that create flavour and food scientist Dr Jane Parker will be on hand to explain more. 

Lunch is provided as part of this event (let the organizers know if you have any particular dietary requirements) and tickets (including lunch) £10 (£6 for a child with a full-paying adult).