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Saturday, May 13, 2023
Heat index in Legazpi City soars to 50°C, highest so far this year
May 12, 2023 06:18 PM
The highest heat index in the country so far this year was recorded on Friday, May 12 in Legazpi City, Albay, said the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA).
Based on PAGASA’s monitoring, the heat index in Legazpi City reached 50 degrees Celsius (°C) around 11 a.m. on Friday.
The city’s heat index falls under the “danger” category.
According to PAGASA, a heat index ranging from 42°C to 51°C indicates impending “danger,” as “heat cramps and heat exhaustion are likely,” and “heat stroke is probable with continued activity.”
(PAGASA)
Furthermore, dangerous heat indices were also recorded in 13 other locations.
These were in Butuan City, Agusan del Norte (46°C); Dagupan City, Pangasinan (44°C); Dipolog, Zamboanga del Norte (44°C); Iba, Zambales (44°C); Roxas City, Capiz (44°C); San Jose, Occidental Mindoro (44°C); Catarman, Northern Samar (43°C); Davao City, Davao del Sur (43°C); Masbate City, Masbate (43°C); Sangley Point, Cavite (43°C); Zamboanga City, Zamboanga del Sur (43°C); Ambulong, Tanauan, Batangas (42°C); and Tacloban City, Leyte (42°C).
PAGASA said the entire country will continue to experience warm and humid weather with isolated rain showers or evening rain showers and thunderstorms on Saturday, May 13.
However, from Sunday, May 14 to Friday, May 19, the entire archipelago will experience mostly cloudy skies with scattered rain showers.
By next week, PAGASA said thunderstorms will become more frequent in the afternoon or evening due to the oscillation of the intertropical convergence zone.
Warm, humid weather in most parts of PH on Saturday — PAGASA
May 13, 2023 10:52 AM
Warm and humid weather conditions will still prevail in most parts of the Philippines on Saturday, May 13, said the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA).
(MB Visual Content Group)
Filipinos throughout the archipelago may expect generally fair weather in the morning but warm and humid conditions in the afternoon. According to the state weather bureau, the occurrence of isolated rains is not ruled out, especially in the afternoon or evening, due to localized thunderstorms.
“[Ang mainit na panahon ay] sasamahan ng saglit na pagulan or localized thunderstorms dulot ng mainit na panahon at mataas na moisture content sa atmosphere (This warm weather will be accompanied by brief rains or localized thunderstorms caused by humid weather and high moisture content in the atmosphere),” said PAGASA Weather Specialist Benison Estareja in a public weather forecast.
Estareja said heat indices could still exceed 40°C on Saturday, specifically in the provinces of Pangasinan, Cagayan, Isabela, Ilocos, Palawan, and Albay.
Meanwhile, the intertropical convergence zone – a weather system that forms when winds from the northern and southern hemispheres converge – is affecting southern Mindanao. No weather disturbance or tropical cyclone is expected to develop or enter the Philippine area of responsibility (PAR) in the next 24-hour period.
Water shortage threatens food production
Water is an important resource that's needed for humans to survive and thrive. What happens when a shortage looms?
By Henrylito D. Tacio
“Many well-informed individuals see a future of water shortages, but few have connected the dots to see that a future of water shortages will also be a future of food shortages,” said Lester R. Brown, an American environmental analyst.
He is the founder of Worldwatch Institute and Earth Policy Institute, both based in Washington, D.C. “One of the great pioneer environmentalists” is how BBC Radio commentator Peter Day described him.
“Water shortages lag only climate change and population growth as a threat to the human future,” said Brown in an exclusive interview with this author. “The challenge is not to get enough water to drink, but to get enough water to produce our food. We drink, in one form or another, perhaps 4 liters of water per day. But the food we consume each day requires 2,000 liters of water to produce, or 500 times as much.”
A closer look at the available statistics proves him right. When this writer visited the regional office of Food and Agriculture (FAO) in Bangkok, Thailand, I found out that agriculture is by far the biggest consumer of water around the world. In thickly-populated Asia, agriculture accounts for 86% of the total annual water withdrawal, compared with 49% in North and Central America and 38% in Europe.
“Agriculture is where future water shortages will be most acute,” wrote Michael S. Serrill in “Time” some years back in a special report.
Rice, consumed by 60% of the world’s population, is a case in point. “Water has contributed most to the growth in rice production for the past 30 years,” said the Laguna-based International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). Irrigation-farmed rice draws heavily on the resource.
In his book, Water: The International Crisis, Robin Clark reports that an average farmer needs 5,000 liters of water to produce one kilogram of rice. “Rice growing is a heavy consumer of water,” agrees the IRRI report, “Water: A Looming Crisis.”
The IRRI report projected that most Asian countries, including the Philippines, will have severe water problems by 2025. This water shortage could seriously threaten rice production in the region.
This is bad news for Filipinos who consider rice as their “deepest comfort food.” On average, Filipinos consume 114-120 kilograms of rice per capita per year. That’s almost double the world average of 65 kilograms per capita per year, according to Dr. Eufemio Rasco, Jr., former director of the Philippine Rice Research Institute.
“The link between water and food is strong,” Brown reminded.
About 5,000 liters of water is needed to produce one kilogram of rice. (Henrylito Tacio)
British author John Robbins, the man behind the book The Food Revolution: How Your Diet Can Help Save Your Life, has managed to document the robust connection of these two resources. To produce one pound (0.453 kilogram) of lettuce or one pound of tomatoes, 23 gallons of water is needed.
For one pound of potatoes, 24 gallons of water is needed; 25 gallons for one pound of wheat, 33 gallons for one pound of carrots, and 49 gallons for one pound of apples, according to Robbins.
Meat production also consumes a lot of water. “Agriculture uses about 70% of the world’s available freshwater, and one-third of that is used to grow the grain fed to livestock,” the Worldwatch Institute reports.
Beef, the meat used in most fast food outlets, is by far the most water-intensive of all meats. “The more than 15,000 liters of water used per kilogram is far more than is required by a number of staple foods, such as eggs (3,300 liters per kilogram), milk (1,000 liters), or potatoes (255 liters),” the Worldwatch Institute says.
The US Department of Commerce 1992 Census of Agriculture’s Farm and Ranch Irrigation Survey, published in 1994, reported that one pound of pork needs at least 1,630 gallons of water to produce but in contrast one pound of beef requires 5,214 gallons of water.
“Producing beef is much more resource-intensive than producing pork or chicken, requiring roughly three to five times as much land to generate the same amount of protein,” the Worldwatch Institute points out.
Around the world, more than 40% of wheat, rye, oats and corn production is fed to animals, along with 250 million tons of soybeans and other oilseeds. “Feeding grain to livestock improves their fertility and growth, but it sets up a de facto competition for food between man and people,” the institute says.
Global meat consumption and consumption have increased rapidly in recent decades, with harmful effects on the environment and public health as well as on the economy, according to research done by the institute’s Nourishing the Planet project.
“Worldwide meat production has tripled over the last four decades and increased 20% in just the last 10 years,” it said. “Meanwhile, industrial countries are consuming growing amounts of meat, nearly double the quantity than in developing countries.”
A huge volume of water is also used in aquaculture or fish farming. “Fish farming is more advantageous than raising livestock. “For every kilogram of dry feed, we get one kilogram of fish meat,” said Dr. Uwe Lohmeyer of the Deutsche Gesselschaft fur Technische Zusammernarbeit (GTZ), a German Technical Cooperation. “This is far more favorable rate than in the case of say, pigs: to produce the same quantity of pork, a farmer – given the same quality of inputs – has to provide three kilograms of feed.”
Aquaculture needs a lot of water to raise fish. (Henrylito Tacio)
It goes without saying that water is indeed the world’s most important resource. “We’re surrounded by a hidden world of water,” pointed out Stephen Leahy, a Canadian journalist and author, told this author. “Liters and liters of it are consumed by everything we eat, and everything we use and buy.”
That’s what he calls a “water footprint.” In his book, aptly entitled Your Water Footprint, he defines it as the amount of water ‘consumed’ to make, grow or produce something. “I use the word consumed to make it clear this is water that can no longer be used for anything else,” he explained.
According to Leahy, one of the biggest surprises (while writing the book) was learning how small direct use of water for drinking, cooking and showering is by comparison. For instance, he found out that flushing toilets is the biggest water daily use – not showers, as commonly believed. While low-flow shower heads and toilets are great water savers, the water footprint concept can lead to even bigger reductions in water consumption.
“For example, green fuels may not be so green from a water consumption perspective,” Leahy wrote. “Biodiesel made from soybeans has an enormous water footprint, averaging more than 11,000 liters per liter of biodiesel. And this doesn’t include the large amounts of water needed for processing. Why so much water? Green plants aren’t ‘energy-dense,’ so it takes a lot of soy to make the fuel.”
Cattle’s meat, beef, also has a big footprint, over 11,000 liters for a kilo, according to Leahy. “If a family of four served chicken instead of beef they’d reduce their water use by an astonishing 900,000 liters a year. That’s enough to fill an Olympic size pool to a depth of two feet.”
“Water isn’t just a commodity. It is a source of life,” says Dr. Sandra Postel, director of the Massachusetts-based Global Water Policy Project.
In an article we wrote for Reader’s Digest, she believed water problems will trail climate change as a threat to the human future. “Although the two are related, water has no substitutes,” she explained. “We can transition away from coal and oil to solar, wind and other renewable energy sources. But there is no transitioning away from water to something else.”
The Philippines is touted to be a water-rich country. “We are an agricultural country and that says a lot regarding the importance of water supply,” said Senator Grace Poe in a statement some years back. “We have provinces that have year-round sufficient water supply, enabling their farmers to plant and harvest year-round, as well.”
On a macro-level, it appears there is plenty of water. “But we are now experiencing problems and, in some instances, some areas (of the country) are suffering from lack of water,” said Elisea Gozun when she was still the head of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).
Today, the problem is getting worse. The reason: watersheds are being denuded of their forest cover. “We cannot talk of providing sustainable water to the people unless we protect the sources of the commodity – the watersheds,” Gozun said.
About 5,000 liters of water is needed to produce one kilogram of rice. (Henrylito Tacio)
Watersheds constitute about 75% of the total land area of the Philippines. “Our country has a total of 119 proclaimed and 154 priority watersheds with a total land area of 1,376,455 hectares and 11,690,695 hectares, respectively,” wrote Leila C. America in The PCAARRD Monitor, published by the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development.
The areas of proclaimed watersheds range from 20 to 180,460 hectares while the area of priority watershed ranges from 365 to 837,149 hectares. “Water is a key watershed resource that can be used for power generation, agriculture, industry, domestic, drinking and others,” America wrote.
Water covers over 70 percent of the earth’s surface and is a major force in controlling the climate by storing vast quantities of heat. About 97.5 percent of all water is found in the ocean and only the remaining 2.5 percent is considered fresh water. Unfortunately, 99.7 percent of that fresh water is unavailable, trapped in glaciers, ice sheets, and mountainous areas.
“Put in another way,” the UN food agency explains, “if all the earth’s water were to fit in a gallon jug (4 liters), the available fresh water would be just over one tablespoon.”
The famous Brown has this suggestion about the looming water crisis: “The most important thing we can do to cope with water scarcity is to use water more efficiently in agriculture.”
Photos by Henrylito D. Tacio
Marcos eyes nuclear energy use to stave off power crisis
May 12, 2023 01:55 PM
AT A GLANCE
President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. has once again pronounced his intention to tap nuclear energy to avert possible power crisis in the country
He said the Philippines is "open to everything" as it needs additional power supply at present
His statement came after the Philippine Nuclear Research Institute (PNRI) urged the public to support the plan to adopt nuclear technology for power generation to cut down the increasing energy costs in the country
President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. is keen on tapping nuclear energy to beef up the country's power supply and avert a possible power crisis.
President Ferdinand 'Bongbong' Marcos Jr. answers questions from the media on board a flight back to Manila after attending the 42nd ASEAN Summit in Indonesia on May 11, 2023. (Photo courtesy of Yummie Dingding / PPA POOL)
Marcos revealed that even before assuming the presidency, he had been looking to nuclear energy as an option to address the power shortage in the country.
"Even before I took office, pinag-uusapan na namin tingnan ‘yan. It turns out there are many nuclear technologies, iba-iba. Ang dami naming natutunan in our last visit to Washington and then --- even yung nasa EU (European Union) kami, marami palang iba-iba (we were already talking about that. It turns out there are many nuclear technologies, of different kinds. We learned a lot in our last visit to Washington and then even in EU, we learned there were actually a lot of technologies)," Marcos said in a media interview onboard his flight back from Indonesia on Thursday, May 11.
The President said when it comes to power, the Philippines is "open to everything" as the country needs additional power supply at present.
“So, what else can we do? Find new sources. That’s what we’re trying to do. The situation with renewables is also improving but we may have found some other technologies na hindi mag-antay ng lead time ng (that won't have lead time of up to) six, seven years,” the President added.
Marcos' statement on nuclear energy came days after the Philippine Nuclear Research Institute (PNRI) urged the public to support the administration's plan to adopt nuclear technology for power generation to cut down the increasing energy costs in the country.
Philippine Nuclear Research Institute (PNRI) Director Carlos Arcilla stressed the need to lower the cost of electricity to attract more investors, boost economic activity, and reduce the burden of consumers.
Island provinces or those not connected to the grid, will particularly benefit from using small modular nuclear reactors, the PNRI official said.
Marcos earlier eyed a “cutting-edge” micro nuclear fuel technology to solve the country’s power crisis particularly after he met with officials of Ultra Safe Nuclear Corp., a US-based firm global leader and vertical integrator of nuclear technologies and services.
USNC officials expressed interest in bringing clean and reliable nuclear energy to the Philippines, describing the move as "probably a very important way for us to enter the market.”
They are also considering the Philippines for its first nuclear energy facility in Southeast Asia and vowed to help address the series of blackouts that hit several areas of the country.
Love, commandments, truth
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By Fr. Roy Cimagala
Chaplain
Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE)
Talamban, Cebu City
Email: roycimagala@gmail.com
WE need to know the intimate relation among this triad. Christ said it very clearly, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” (Jn 14,15) And more than that, he also said that it is when we love him by following his commandments that the Spirit of truth would be with us and would lead us to the truth.
This is what he said: “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows him. But you know him, because he remains with you, and will be in you. (Jn 14,16-17)
It is important that we meditate on these words of Christ very closely if only to understand the relation of how love of Christ is achieved by keeping his commandments and how that love can lead us to the truth that nowadays is being twisted and distorted according to one’s whims and caprices, one’s biases and prejudices, creating all sorts of spins and narratives to suit one’s interest at the expense of truth itself.
This distortion of truth is most especially noticed nowadays in the fields of politics, journalism, and even in the sciences, philosophies and ideologies. Even open, unmitigated lies are peddled, and done with so much self-confidence and aplomb that it would seem that the devil, the father of lies, is having a heyday.
Many people nowadays just say and write, opine and claim or proclaim something with hardly any regard to our duty to check things with Christ first. They seem convinced that God has nothing to do with whatever they would be saying or claiming.
As a result, in spite of the powerful means of communication we are having, what we are having are more and worsening differences and conflicts. Instead of unity, we have graver division. Instead of generating more understanding and charity, we have growing cases of anger and hatred.
We need to remind ourselves strongly that we can only manage to achieve real love for God and for one another, and to be in the truth, when we truly follow and love Christ. We should dismiss any thought that tells us that we can manage to have them outside of Christ.
These days, it’s clear that the pressure to just say and write with hardly any reference to Christ is quite strong and seemingly irresistible. But we should just fight against that tendency.
With Christ, not only would we be in the truth. We would also be charitable, knowing when and how to say or assert anything. We have to be reminded that for truth to be real truth, it has to be charitable. Truth and charity always go together, though we should not understand charity as simply being sugary and always pleasing. Charity can have a bitter taste too.
And to be in the truth does not mean that we only use facts and data. Christ used many literary devices like parables, similes, metaphors, hyperboles and oxymorons to proclaim the truth. These literary devices were not meant to deceive us. They were not lies.
We too can use these literary devices but they should always be inspired by the spirit of Christ, for that can only assure us that these devices would point us to the truth. Again, let us realize more deeply the close and indispensable relation among love, the commandments of Christ, and the Spirit of truth.
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