Archive for the 'Environment' Category

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Buses staging a comeback

Friday, July 6th, 2007
Mindful of the need to get people out of their cars and on to public transport, the island authorities on Tenerife are looking to increase the frequency and coverage of the services. Just a few weeks after the launch of the new tram service that connects the island capital of Santa Cruz with the neighbouring town of La Laguna, the island bus operator, TITSA, has announced a raft of improvements to services in the north of the island. The frequency of services between the northern town of Icod de los Vinos and Santa Cruz (service 106) has been boosted by an additional eight journeys a day. Line 363, which runs from Puerto de la Cruz to Buenavista del Norte ...

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Posted by Ken

Comments: Leave a Comment » Categories: All about Tenerife, Buenavista del Norte, Buses, Environment, Icod de los Vinos, La Laguna, Los Realejos, Puerto de la Cruz, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Shopping, Tourism, Transport

Teide hits the world’s top spots

Monday, July 2nd, 2007
The decision by UNESCO’s world heritage convention to grant heritage status to Teide National Park led to a series of impromptu late-night parties around the island of Tenerife. The news came on Thursday June 28, several days earlier than expected, bringing a swift end to an anxious period of waiting for the island authorities. World Heritage status for Mount Teide means that the tiny island now has two favoured sites recognised by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). San Cristobal de La Laguna was admitted to UNESCO's list of World Heritage sites in 1999 as ‘the first non-fortified Spanish colonial town; its layout provided the model for many colonial towns in the Americas.’ In all, 37 sites around the world were under consideration at the 31st UNESCO world heritage convention in Christchurch, New Zealand. But Teide's case was given ...

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Posted by Ken

Comments: Leave a Comment » Categories: All about Tenerife, Environment, Mount Teide, Teide National Park, Tourism

‘Hot rock’ source of energy

Thursday, June 28th, 2007
Tentative steps are being taken to explore the potential ‘hot rock’ technology has to solve the need for a sustainable energy alternative source in Tenerife. In the drive for reduced emissions and cleaner sources of energy, 'hot rock' or, more precisely, geothermal technology has been largely ignored. Yet its potential to provide mankind with an environmentally-friendly and economically-viable energy available on a worldwide scale is immense. Geothermal technology involves the mechanically simple process of injecting water into a borehole several kilometres deep, where the temperature can be over 250C. The superheated water is then retrieved through one or more other boreholes. Keeping it under pressure prevents it from becoming steam so that any material dissolved in the water can be filtered and returned to the ground. At the surface the water is passed through a heat exchanger to extract most of the heat, which is then used to drive a turbine to ...

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Posted by Ken

Comments: Leave a Comment » Categories: All about Tenerife, Energy, Environment, Science

It’s Tajinaste time on Teide

Wednesday, June 27th, 2007
tajinaste.jpg Late spring and early summer is Tajinaste time up on Mount Teide, a time when the wild and rugged mountain landscape is briefly tamed by the blooms of a number of brightly coloured plants, most of which are endemic to the island of Tenerife. Tajinaste rojo, or Echium wildpretii to give it its correct name, is the most spectacular, a species of bugloss which can grow to over 10ft tall. Echium is a genus of around 60 species of flowering plant which flourish across Africa, Europe, Madeira and the Canary Islands. Some species are also found in east Asia and Australia. The sub-alpine zones of the ravines around Mount Teide are the native habitat of the Tajinaste variant, which thrives under the hot sun and the arid and dry conditions there. It can also tolerate temperatures as low as -5C. A herbaceous biennial, the Tajinaste’s two-year cycle sees it ...

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Posted by Ken

Comments: Leave a Comment » Categories: All about Tenerife, Environment, Mount Teide, Nature, Photo-Blog, Tourism

Tenerife plans to plant a million new trees

Monday, March 26th, 2007
The north of Tenerife is renowned for its magnificent forests that start at altitudes of around 400 metres and climb to a level of 2,000 metres at the foot of the equally magnificent Mount Teide, at 12,194ft, the highest point on Spanish territory. Mindful, however, that there aren’t nearly as many trees on the island as there used to be, the island authorities have announced a programme of reforestation that will see over a million trees planted in the coming months to cover an area of over 60 hectares, roughly the area that 150 football pitches would occupy. The trees will be of two ancient species common throughout the Canarian archipelago, the Canarian pine and laurisilva. The forests are important to the ecosystem of Tenerife, helping to prevent soil erosion and drawing moisture from the clouds to replenishing the island’s network of water underground water reserves.

Posted by Ken

Comments: Leave a Comment » Categories: All about Tenerife, Environment, Science

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