The Obtain: recycling wind turbine blades, and safeguarding AI

The information: Wind generators are essential for addressing local weather change, however once they’ve reached the tip of their lives, turbine blades may add as much as a number of waste. Now new analysis, printed in Nature, may symbolize a primary step towards constructing renewable-energy infrastructure that doesn’t find yourself in a landfill.

Why it’s a problem: Wind turbine blades should be robust to be helpful. But on account of their sturdiness, they’ll’t at present be recycled. The new work describes a option to recuperate the principle elements of wind turbine blades, breaking down the plastic that holds them collectively with out destroying the fabric’s main constructing blocks. 

Why it issues: This is the primary time that researchers have been in a position to break down a strengthened epoxy materials to recuperate each the plastic’s constructing blocks and the glass fibers inside with out damaging both. Read the complete story.

—Casey Crownhart

How fearful ought to we be about AI?

Geoffrey Hinton, the AI pioneer who simply stepped down from Google so he may freely focus on his issues concerning the expertise, shall be in dialog with Will Douglas Heaven, our senior AI editor, this afternoon at 1pm ET. It’s a part of our EmTech Digital lineup, and in case you haven’t already, it’s not too late to register for tickets.
 

The must-reads

I’ve combed the web to seek out you at present’s most enjoyable/essential/scary/fascinating tales about expertise.

3 Google remains to be funding local weather misinformation
Despite its guarantees to cease operating local weather denial content material on YouTube. (NYT $)
+ The flawed logic of speeding out excessive local weather interventions. (MIT Technology Review)

4 Things are getting loopy over on Bluesky 🍑
No, severely. Go and see for your self. (The Verge)

5 A Russian spy community is fueling the nation’s conflict efforts
It’s managed to covertly receive chips, ammunition, and different sorts of EU tech. (FT $)

6 Amazon’s Alexa is getting a ChatGPT-style makeover  
Making the once-ubiquitous voice assistant smarter is the goal of the sport. (Insider $)
+ There’s a brand new chatbot on the town—and this one’s referred to as Pi. (FT $)

7 Is your automotive promoting your non-public information?
A brand new instrument may enable you to discover out. (Motherboard)

8 How the colossal Photo voltaicWinds cyberattack unfolded
Two years on, investigators are nonetheless attempting to piece it collectively. (Wired $)
+ Three methods AI chatbots are a safety catastrophe. (MIT Technology Review)

GETTY IMAGES

December 2021

Volkan Yazici is a member of the Log4J undertaking, an open-source instrument used extensively to file exercise inside varied sorts of software program. It helps run big swaths of the web, together with purposes starting from iCloud to Twitter, and he and his colleagues are desperately attempting to take care of a large vulnerability that has put billions of machines in danger. 

The vulnerability in Log4J is extraordinarily straightforward to use. After sending a malicious string of characters to a weak machine, hackers can execute any code they need—and years later, there’s nonetheless no clear finish in sight. Read the complete story.

—Patrick Howell O’Neill

We can nonetheless have good issues

A spot for consolation, enjoyable and distraction in these bizarre occasions. (Got any concepts? Drop me a line or tweet ’em at me.)

+ Recognize these archive Met Gala seems? They seemed even higher the primary time round.
+ Ever seen a child crab earlier than? They’re surprisingly cute.
+ If you’re questioning how all the pieces’s going with Twitter, this useful web site ought to fill you in fairly shortly.
+ There’s rather a lot happening creating this colourful rug (at the least, I believe it’s a rug)
+ A cocktail get together the place everybody’s the identical top? Why not!