Word: steeled
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...English Mathematician Charles Babbage had an idea for a machine that would perform mathematical calculations rapidly and infallibly. This was long before the age of electrical circuitry, so Babbage's plan called for the machine to be executed in brass and steel and powered by a hand crank. If it had been completed, his Difference Engine would have been a magnificent beast, requiring 25,000 parts and weighing about 15 tons. But he ran out of money and patience and had to abandon it unfinished...
...imagine if Babbage hadn't abandoned it. Fork the timeline. Imagine if computing technology had developed along the lines of Babbage's vision: brass and steel instead of silicon and plastic; clockwork instead of electronics. In fact, imagine if all the great technological revolutions of the past 100 years hadn't happened. Our world would run on Victorian tech--it would be a handmade, steam-powered world, finished in leather and mahogany. It's an elegant, romantic vision. And it has a name: steampunk...
...same way punk took back music, steampunk reclaims technology for the masses. It substitutes metal gears for silicon, pneumatic tubes for 3G and wi-fi. It maximizes what was miniaturized and makes visible what was hidden. Where the iPhone is all stainless steel and high-gloss plastic, steampunk is brass and wood and leather. Steampunk isn't mass-produced; it's bespoke and unique, and if you don't like it, you can tinker with it till...
...Toranagallu, the Jindal plant continues to expand as the company pursues carbon credits by generating power through the burning of waste gas created during steel manufacture. In a bid for more carbon dollars, a second power plant was built. "The carbon revenues were a major factor in taking up these projects," says Suresh Iyer, the chief coordinator of carbon trading at Jindal South West. If a project is reducing carbon, he says, "we do take the initiative and put up the plant because of that." The second plant, which Iyer estimates cost the company $50 million to build, was approved...
...carbon financial windfall has yet to trickle down to the villagers in Toranagallu, many of whom say life has gotten worse, not better, since the steel mill first arrived. What they don't know is that, like it or not, the global battle against climate change is being fought in their backyard...