Treehugger has just run a story about carbon sequestration; a name for techniques which reduce our emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by putting them into other places. Personally I've always been a little skeptical of the idea, due perhaps to a limited understanding of it. But the recent Treehugger story has, for me at least, really driving the point home about how it can be a good and useful thing.

Why did this seemingly innocuous story about a popular subject among environmentalists make so much more of an impact on me than others?, you might be asking. Well, the answer is that this story has a direct relation to another interest of mine: pre-Columbian American civilizations.

The story talks about one method of carbon sequestration that brings about other benefits beyond reducing our emissions. It's referred to as 'incorporating bio-char into the soil', which is another name for creating terra preta (and you'll notice a similarly named link at the end of the story). Terra preta is the name for a type of soil found in Amazonian regions of South America. Ordinarily the soil in the Amazon is nearly completely devoid of nutrients due to the near constant 'rainfall' caused by the rainforest. There are, however, patches of earth which not only defy this trend but are incredibly fertile. These patches, termed terra preta, or 'dark earth', because of their uncharacteristically dark coloration for the region, are believed to have been purposefully created as a soil management project by pre-Columbian American civilizations perhaps as early as 720 B.C.

I was already familiar with the nature and benefits of terra preta due to my archaeological interests, and so the mention of using it as a form of carbon sequestration really brought the whole concept into focus for me. An important component of terra preta is the high levels of charcoal in the soil (hence the term 'bio-char'). Charcoal, as we all know from our high school chemistry classes, is a form of carbon, and therefore one possible destination for the carbon that would otherwise be forming carbon dioxide to be pumped into the atmosphere.

This, I suppose, is the perfect example of why I'm interested in archaeology. Not only are ancient cultures fascinating in their own right, but they can actually have important lessons, and even technologies, to teach us that can help us with our own modern problems.

A Massachusetts politician, Boston Mayor Thomas Menino no less, may actually be doing something in a way that isn't completely moronic and doomed to fail! Menino's wireless task force, charged with coming up with a solution to providing a free wireless network for Bostonians, has created a new 501(c)(3) non-profit entity called openairboston.net that will be in charge of providing this service under the leadership of the former CEO of Lightbridge Inc. Pam Reeve.

Now, I'm not going to make the claim that this is the best way to provide a city-wide, free wireless network, or even that Boston should provide a city-wide, free wireless network, but I am going to claim that this is the first time that I've every heard a plan that sounds even vaguely reasonable and designed to succeed come out of Massachusetts politics at any level. This is not, of course, to say that this new 501(c)(3) won't fail miserably, but at least the approach seems well thought out and maybe even good.

Way to go Mayor Menino! Now if you'd just stop trying to prevent Bostonians from being safe in their own homes and decrying the state of parking in Boston while simultaneously—and hypocritically—actively working to make it worse, I might even put you on the list of reasonable, if not good, politicians.

If you've been reading my blog for a while, you may recall my mentioning that myself and two friends of mine were planning on starting a company to work in concert with some amazing web designers that we know. Well, that has now happened, and the three of us are now managing partners of Triworks America, LLC. We are working in concert with Triworks, a Portugese based web design company who, in my opinion, are by far the best designers I have ever seen. If you don't believe me you can check out not only their web page linked to above (which will soon be updated to include information on our little triumvirate), but the College Poker Association (a project by my two fellow triumvirs by which they discovered Triworks' amazing talent), and any of the sites in their portfolio (the link's at the bottom of the Triworks.net page). You can also, of course, consider the fact that every single Triworks site that has been submitted for an award has won that award.

This venture, I think, will turn out very well. As is blatantly obvious, Triworks has absolutely amazing talent when it comes to design. The only thing holding them back in the past, I think, has been that they're located in Portugal and, while they can speak English well enough, doing business in a non-native language is not easy. My friends and I (and yes, I'm pushing to have the title 'Triumvir' included on our business cards) should hopefully be able to provide the cultural and linguistic bridge needed to help bring their amazing talent to the US. Incredibly enough, we've already receive and RFP a very big name international client. Hopefully this augers well for our future success. (Yes, I've probably been watching a little too much Rome. Blame Titus Pullo.)

In other news—also oddly Portugal-related—you can vote for the New 7 Wonders of the World, which is pretty cool. My votes:

• Angkor Wat
• Roman Colosseum
• Easter Island Statues (Moai)
• Great Wall of China
• Kremlin
• Petra
• Stonehenge

Sadly of those I voted for I've only been to the Roman Colosseum (which ranks as by far the coolest thing I've ever seen), the Great Wall of China, and Stonehenge (probably the second coolest thing I've seen). Of those I didn't vote for I've only been to two: the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty, both of which, though iconic, I don't think quite rate as Wonders of the World.