Daily Current Affairs : 17-12-2020

1. Parliments winter session canceled due to COVID 19 pandemic

• Sessions of parliament is the period during which a House meets almost every day uninterruptedly to manage the business. There are typically three sessions in a year.
• Itis summoned by the President.
• In general, the sessions are as follows:
• Budget session (February to May) Monsoon session (July to September)
• Winter session (November to Deceh1ber)
• According to Article 85, the maximum gap between two sessions of Parliament cannot be more than six months.

Source: The Hindu

2. Geminid Meteor showers

• Geminid Meteor showers occur every year around the second week of December.
• A meteor is a meteoroid that enters Earth's atmosphere.
• Meteoroids are objects in space that range in size from dust grains to small asteroids.
• Geminid meteors are created by tiny bits of rocky debris shed from a small asteroid named 3200 Phaethon, which was discovered in 1983. Phaethon loops around the known asteroid.
• Sun every 1.4 years in an orbit that approaches the Sun closer than any other known asteroid.

Source: The Hindu

3. Anti-microbial chemical Triclosan

• In a recent study, it is found that triclosan can cause neurotoxic effects and damage the neurons.
• Triclosan is used as antimicrobial chemicals to increase the shelf life of consumer products.
• Itis added to personal care products, such as hand soaps and cosmetics, and materials ranging from athletic clothing to food packaging.
• US Food and Drug Administration has imposed a partial ban on its use. However, India lacks any such regulation so far on the use of triclosan-based products.

Source: The Hindu

4. Natioal Family Health Survey(NFHS) on use of Internet

• According to the survey, there is an urban-rural gap as well as gender divide with respect to the use of the Internet in 22 states and union territories
• Only an average of 42.6%of women ever used the internet as against an average of 62.16% amor1g the men
• In urban India, an average 56.81%women ever used the Internet compared to an average of 73.76% among men;
• A dismal 33.94%women in rural India ever used the internet as against 55.6% among men.

Source: The Hindu

5. 12 th Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment (GRIHA) Summit  

• The theme of the 12th GRIHA Virtual Summit is rejuvenating Resilient Habitats'.
• GRIHA  is the national rating system of  India for any completed construction on the building's environmental performance {like energy consumption, waste generation, renewable energy adoption, among other points).
• GRIHA  rating has been acknowledged as the tool to evaluate the reduction in emission intensity through habitats, as part of a mitigation strategy for combating climate change in  INDIA's "Nationally  Determined Contributions"(NDCs).
• It was developed by The Energy and Resources Institute {TERI).

Source: The Hindu

6. Mamallapuram

• Mahabalipuram or Mamallapuram is a historic city and UNESCO world heritage site in the state of Tamil Nadu.
• It was one of the major port c.ities by the 7th century within the Pallava kingdom and was the second capital of the Pallavas.
• King Narasimha Varman I gave the title Mamalla which means the great wrestler'.
• The architectural heritage of Mamallapuram: Shore Temple; Descent of the Ganges/ Arjuna's penance; Pancha Ratha, Varaha Cave etc.
•  

Source: The Hindu

7. Eswatini

• Also known as Swaziland, Eswatini is a landlocked country in southern Africa bordered by Mozambique to its northeast and South Africa to its north, west, and south.
• India has been extending training under the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program and Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) scholarships for VG/PG/Doctoral studies to Eswatininationals every year.

Source: The Hindu

8. Human Development Report(HDR)

• This year's report is themed on"Human Development and the Anthropocene".
• Anthropocene is an informal geological time that describes an era in which humans are a dominant force shaping the future of planet Earth.
• Human Development Index (HDI) is also released as part of HOR.
• HOI has traditionally measured average achievement across three dimensions of human development: life expectancy, education, and per capita income.
• HOR 2020 presents an adjustment to the index for "planetary pressures" called Planetary-Pressures Adjusted HDI.

Other key findings

• No country In the world has yet achieved very human development without putting immense strain on the planet.
• Covid 19 pandemic may have pushed some 100 million people into extreme poverty, the worst setback in a generation.
• The top three positions in HOIwere occupied by Norway, Ireland and Switzer, and Iceland.

India related finding

• India ranked 131 among 189 countries compared with 129 in the previous year.
• India's gross national income (GNI) per capita fellto $6,681in 2019 from $6,829 in 2018 on PPP basis.
• India in the bottom third for quality of health and education, adverse sex ratio and a high percentage of vulnerable employees

Source: The Hindu

9. Prime Minister (PM) lays foundation stone for the world's largest renewable energy park in Kutch, Gujarat

• Itis a 30 GW capacity hybrid renewable energy (HRE) park that will harbor solar and wind power generation infrastructure and an energy storage zone.
• It will be built along the Indo-Pak border at Khavda in Kutch district of Gujarat,
• Spread over 72,600 hectares of lands dubbed as the world's largest single-location on HRE.
• It will play a major role in fulfilling India's vision of generating 450 GW of power by 2030 and would enable overcoming the problems related to the intermittent supply of renewable power.
• Also, windmills at Kutch near the lndo-Pakistan border will help in border security (as it also acts as a boundary).
• HRE usually comprises two or more renewable energy sources combined in such a way to provide an efficient system with appropriate energy conversion technology connected together to feed power to the local load or grid.
• There are different types of HRE systems like Biomass-wind-fuel cell, Photovoltaic-wind, Hydro-wind and Photovoltaic-Biomass etc.
• Benefits of HRE: Low emission; Lower consumer price of power; Efficient use of land; Continuous power supply; etc.
• India is currently the fourth-largest producer of renewable energy in the world.

Source: The Hindu

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