By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay In the last week of June after al-Quds day, Iran’s Parliament unanimously passed a legislation banning any cooperation with Israel–specifically the use of Israel’s computer hardware and software as a crime against God. Iran Supreme Ayatollah leader Ali Khamenei and his Parliament has resorted to criminalizing Israeli tech, that any
July 6, 2020
By Engr. Egdar Mana-ay World leaders, including our own, do not dwell on the theological reasons why this COVID 19 pandemic happened, wreaking havoc to tens of millions of people, because that would be entering the realm of religion which will be very controversial and bias. However, a Jerusalem-based Elijah interfaith institute through its
June 29, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay Let’s start with potable water supply comparison. Metro Manila (population: 16.3 million) is supplied with 4 million cubic meters per day (cmd). One cubic meter of water is 1,000 liters and that’s roughly 250 liters per person per day. Las Vegas with 2.2 million people, uses 2.3 cmd of water and
June 22, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay Around the world, there were many unusual events that happened as an off shoot of the Covid-19 pandemic. About 600 tons of gold worth more than $35 billion was physically added to the Comex warehouse in New York, the epicenter of the pandemic in the U.S. This is roughly equivalent to
June 15, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay Israel is best known for its IRON DOME Missile Defense System, where a missile strike even from nearby Gaza Strip or from far away sources such as Iran or Syria, can be detected in real time and effectively intercepted. The man behind this, a former IDF (Israel Defense Force) senior officer,
June 9, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay As a senior in this age of information technology (IT), the only thing I know about cyber warfare was the simple hacking of my laptop that I experienced in Houston. When I had my laptop on, there was this terrible sound and it cannot be put off anymore, then pretty soon
June 1, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay Israel Defense Force (IDF) Chief of Staff Major General Aviv Kochavi recently announced that Israel Air Force’s most decorated and famous 117th Squadron will cease to exist by October of this year. According to the Chief of Staff, this move is part of a series of plans to promote efficiency, along
May 25, 2020
By Edgar Mana-ay Amid the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, the conflict between Israel and Palestine continues with sporadic clashes along the Gaza and the West Bank borders. Peace, indeed, in the Middle East is very elusive despite the recent peace formula of US Pres. Trump brokered by his son-in-law Jared Kushner which the Palestinian outright rejected
May 18, 2020
By Edgar Mana-ay The empty streets for more than two months now due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) lockdown resulted in adverse effects to the oil industry worldwide and some profound favorable effects to the environment. Due to the lockdown condition imposed by most countries around the world, demand for petroleum fuel was reduced
May 11, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay Water is still the very basic need of any economy but because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which tremendously reduced economic activities, demand for water was greatly reduced. This summer should have been the new normal of abundant water supply (no malls, no restaurants) but as usual we are now experiencing water
May 4, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay The petroleum industry supplies all the basic materials required to manufacture plastics that we use today – from the grocery bags to the casing of ball pens, to the fake leather in upholstery and fake Gucci bags, and tens of thousands of other consumer items that we use every day. Plastic
April 27, 2020
By Engr. Edgar Mana-ay Texas, also known as “The Lone Star State” in the US, leads the nation in crude oil reserves and also in oil production. It has almost one third of the US petroleum reserve and in April alone of this year, Texas produced 4.33 million barrels per day or mbpd, (one barrel
April 20, 2020