The energy crisis in Ecuador has not yet been resolved. Although the conditions of the Mazar reservoir are good, according to the president of the College of Electrical and Electronic Engineers of Pichincha, Marco Acuña, the blackouts could return in April.

Acuña indicated that the reservoir is five meters from reaching its maximum level, so that “in the dry season it could provide energy for about 30 days and its capacity will depend on the rains that occur in the next months” and the new dry season is expected in April.

The January rains have delayed the rationing of electric power a little, according to analysts. However, they suggest that the authorities take several measures to avoid strong rationing, such as analyzing “the need to guarantee transparency in access to technical information on thermal and hydroelectric plants, in addition to ensuring the supply of spare parts for the maintenance of these facilities.”

On the other hand, they have asked the country’s authorities to present the real data on the state of the thermal park and its operational condition, considering that there may be approximately 1,200 recoverable megawatts (MW).

They have also asked for “transparency and breadth in the contracting processes for energy generation that the Government undertook last year, which includes renting barges, buying thermal generators on land and others.”

The “lack of adequate maintenance and the limited capacity to incorporate new electric generation put at risk the stability of the energy supply in the country” are among the reasons that stand out for this energy crisis. According to the Advisory Council, it is urgent to recover the thermal park that is not working, “which could deliver more than 500 MW to the National Interconnected System (SNI).”

M.Pino

Source: americaeconomia

(Reference image source: Andrey Metelev on Unsplash)

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The German pharmaceutical company Biontech plans to offer data on the inoculation against the coronavirus with its vaccine in children between five and 11 years old at the end of September. The dose for this age group will be 10 micrograms, a third of the adult dose, Özlem Türeci, co-founder of Biontech, said in statements published in Bild am Sonntag.

Biontech announced on September 10 that it will apply for approval of its coronavirus vaccine for children between the ages of five and eleven in the coming weeks. According to the report, the results of the study are already available and only need to be prepared for the regulatory authorities.

Vaccination data for even younger children will be available by the end of the year, according to Türeci. “(For that group) we will lower the dose again,” she added.

Risks prevention

For its part, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) stated that it could not yet give a deadline for a possible authorization. The German pharmaceutical company is already preparing production. The director of the German Pediatric Association, Jörg Dötsch, stressed that vaccination in the age group would especially benefit children at risk.

Dötsch added that Germany’s Standing Committee on Immunization (Stiko) could start by recommending vaccination at that age for children at risk, just as it did for children 12 to 17 years old. The risk of unexpected side effects must be weighed against the benefit of vaccination, he stressed.

Regarding booster vaccines, Ugur Sahin, co-founder of Biontech, commented that it depends on the desired strategy. “If you want to keep infections at a low level in general, you need a high level of antibodies to be able to prevent infections. For this purpose, the third vaccination makes sense.” But if you want to prevent serious diseases and the overflow of intensive care units, you can certainly follow a different strategy and wait longer for booster shots.”

Sahin was optimistic about the evolution of the pandemic in Germany. In his opinion, in the next European spring almost the entire population will be immune, either because it is vaccinated or because it was immunized after passing the infection. “The virus will still be there, but the strategies on how society deals with it will no longer be controversial. The virus will no longer be a threat.”

Source: dpa

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About 54 % of the Spanish population prefers to pay with a debit card and 36.6 % choose to pay with bills and coins. This was demonstrated by the national survey on the use of cash in 2020, carried out by the Bank of Spain to the general population, hoteliers and small merchants.

The results of the survey allow us to conclude that the habit of paying with cash has decreased since the confinement period due to the global Covid-19 pandemic, which has stimulated the use of other means of payment and the hygienic measures derived from the sanitary alert.

The study notes that 2.5 % of the population admitted that they had stopped using cash for hygiene reasons. 69.1 % of citizens and 61.3 % of commercial establishments stated that they will continue to use the electronic card and payments through mobile phones in the future.

The trend of using debit cards has generated that every day Spaniards have less cash availability in their pockets. More than 70 % of the respondents admitted not having more than five coins in their wallets, which is equivalent to approximately 5 euros.

A similar situation occurs with high-denomination banknotes. 89.4 % of those surveyed stated that they had not had a 200 or 500 euro banknote in their hands during the last year, while 56.6 % of merchants rejected payment with banknotes over 100 euros.

M. Rodríguez

Source: 20minutos.es

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