Who is Scott Pruitt, the new EPA head?

On Friday, the US Senate voted 52-48 confirming Scott Pruitt as the 14th Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. His nomination and subsequent confirmation surprised many political pundits given the former Oklahoma Attorney General has long waged legal battles against the federal agency that he now heads.

Pruitt’s political career began in 1998 when he was elected to the Oklahoma Senate, representing Tulsa and Wagoner Counties. After 8 years, during which time he served as both majority whip and the Republican Assistant Floor Leader, Pruitt mounted an unsuccessful campaign to become the state’s Lt. Governor in 2006 but was successfully elected the Attorney General of Oklahoma in 2010.

During his tenure and Oklahoma’s AG, Pruitt routinely went to war with the EPA. After entering office he first dissolved the Environmental Protection Unit in the Attorney General’s office, arguing both that “a standalone unit was operationally inefficient” and that the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality, rather than his office, should be responsible for implementing and enforcing environmental laws in the state. He then proceeded to sue the EPA a total of 14 times — every one of them unsuccessfully — between 2010 and 2016.

For instance, in 2012, his office sued the EPA over the agency’s Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, which regulates the amount of mercury, cyanide and other pollutants that power plants can legally emit. More recently, he sued over the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, which caps the amounts of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide that plants can expel. In 13 of these 14 cases, energy companies operating within the state were listed as co-parties to Pruitt’s suits.

Pruitt is quite proud of his anti-EPA stance. His official bio page as Oklahoma AG states that he is a “leading advocate against the EPA’s activist agenda.” And when he was not actively suing the EPA, Pruitt did little to hide his support for energy companies like Exxon and Devon Energy (or the $300,000 that they donated to his campaigns).

As the New York Times reports, he once dropped a state lawsuit against companies dumping pollutants into state waterways. Pruitt “has advocated and stood up for the profits of business,” Mark Derichsweiler, head of the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality division, told the Times, “at the expense of people who have to drink the water or breathe the air.”

Pruitt has also been party to scandal during his tenure as AG. In 2011, he received a drafted letter from Devon Energy, one of Oklahoma’s biggest oil and gas companies, transcribed it to his official letterhead and submitted it to the EPA as an official complaint from his office, a move categorized by the Times as an “unprecedented, secretive alliance” between Pruitt and industry. “That’s actually called representative government in my view of the world,” Pruitt said in his defense.

“Scott Pruitt represents what we environmental lawyers call an ‘imminent and substantial endangerment’ to our health and environment,” Ellen Spitalnik, a former EPA attorney who served from 1980 to 2002, told Quartz. “He threatens the very integrity of EPA and must not be allowed to continue shutting down environmental enforcement, disregarding science, and putting private interests above public good.”

Pruitt’s confirmation hearings were not without scandal. He declined to specify whether he had submitted letters on behalf of companies related to the state’s air quality crisis which has seen the rate of childhood asthma spike in recent years. Currently one in ten Oklahoma children suffer from asthma, though Pruitt could not cite that figure when quizzed about it by Sen. Corey Booker. Additionally, more than 800 current EPA employees signed a petition urging the Senate to vote him down.

Even the timing of his confirmation has raised eyebrows. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse called his vote “an epic ram job” given that Pruitt only recently released 3,000 emails he wrote to oil and gas companies as Attorney General. These emails were ordered released by a state judge as part of a public records lawsuit two years ago but Pruitt has been fighting to keep them under wraps.”Emails! Remember emails?” Sen. Chuck Schumer asked during the confirmation hearings. “‘We should get them out!’ they said about Hillary Clinton… If they weren’t worried about them, then why rush?”

Now that he has been confirmed, Pruitt is expected to immediately sign orders beginning the roll-back of Obama-era protections. While the rules can’t be repealed immediately, these initial actions set the stage for replacing the rules with more industry-friendly options within the next two years.

Fire versus ice: Video shows what happens when thermite meets a frozen lake

Why it matters to you

Well, you gain a physics lesson in the power of thermite with some added pyrotechnics.

It’s one of the great philosophical brainteasers that generations of intellectuals have stroked their chins over: What happens if you detonate a whole lot of thermite on a frozen lake? That is the question the folks behind YouTube channel Beyond the Press attempted to answer in their latest video, which follows a previous variation that introduced a red hot 20-kilo weight made of steel to the thick ice on the lake.

“The thermite versus. frozen lake idea has been on my mind for quite a long time,” YouTuber Lauri Vuohensilta told Digital Trends.

As Vuohensilta noted, there are a number of popular videos online pitting thermite against ice, usually by burning thermite on top of an ice block, resulting in some pretty dramatic explosions. That is (we think) because the heat from the burning thermite decomposes the water into hydrogen and oxygen, which then explodes when heated.

However, most people have not tried this experiment on such a large scale using a frozen lake.

More: British mad scientist Colin Furze just built a fully operational thermite cannon

So did it turn out to be the YouTube explosion of the century? As you will see from watching the video, not exactly.

“I wasn’t completely happy with the results,” Vuohensilta continued. “I think I am going to double the amount of thermite for the next try and use a different vessel. [But] I don’t want to overdo it because the explosion throws molten metal stuff all over the place, and I want to keep everything safe as possible.”

It’s not a waste of time, though. There is something weirdly fun about watching people investigate the quantity of thermite needed to melt through a frozen lake, even if they didn’t quite manage it on this occasion. And, hey, we now know that we want to visit Ylojarvi, Finland –provided they’re not shooting their follow-up video at that time.

‘Liquid glass’ promises to protect your phone from bumps and scratches

Why it matters to you

ProtectPax might just be revolutionary. It’s a gel that claims to make your smartphone’s screen just as resistant to scratches as tempered glass protectors.

If you’re the type that worries about wayward car keys or nail files scratching your pricey smartphone’s screen, fret no more. ProtectPax, a new project on IndieGoGo, is a self-described “liquid glass” protector that claims to strengthen any display.

It sounds almost too good to be true. ProtectPax’s crowdfunding page describes it as a “nano protector” pioneered by titans in the aviation and aerospace industries. Titanium dioxide nanoparticles in the gel fill microscopic valleys on your smartphone’s screen, effectively reinforcing it against bumps and bruises.

More: These prototype eyeglasses from AVG make you invisible to facial recognition software

“It’s as hard as sapphire or ruby and acts like an optical filter,” the ProtectPax team says. “Your screen [will be] more uniform than when it left the factory.”

Applying it is relatively easy, apparently. All you need do is wipe your smartphone’s screen dry, rub ProtectPax across the surface with an included sealing cloth, and wait ten minutes until the gloss turns “shiny.” Once that’s done, the screen’s ostensibly protected from scratches, cracks, and even falls.

ProtectPax ranks 9H on Mohs Hardness Scale, which is higher than a knife blade and steel file. It lasts up to 365 days, and as an added bonus, it protects against electromagnetic radiation and improves touchscreen functionality.

More: Defang your keys: This liquid makes your phone screen as hard as sapphire

ProtectPax claims it’s good for more than smartphones, too. The team’s tested it with all manner of devices, including smart watches, regular watches, eyeglasses, TV screens, GPS navigation systems, laptops, eBook readers, and digital cameras.

The idea of a liquid screen protector just as effective as tempered glass may be difficult to wrap your mind around, but ProtectPax isn’t the first. Kristall, a liquid protector from Malaysian company E-Mark Global trade, shields screens with a layer nano-particle coating that gives screens a gloss finish, makes them a great deal less prone to fingerprints, smudges, and greasy smears, and protects them against objects up to 9H.

In a demonstration at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, an intrepid Digital Trends reporter saw a Kristall-smeared phone successfully deflect scratches from scissors and keys. Assuming ProtectPax measures up to the competition, it will provide a welcome alternative to the annoying glass and polymer shields that require you squeeze every last air bubble out from beneath the protectors’ surface.

Packs of ProtectPax start at $40.

‘Liquid glass’ promises to protect your phone from bumps and scratches

Why it matters to you

ProtectPax might just be revolutionary. It’s a gel that claims to make your smartphone’s screen just as resistant to scratches as tempered glass protectors.

If you’re the type that worries about wayward car keys or nail files scratching your pricey smartphone’s screen, fret no more. ProtectPax, a new project on IndieGoGo, is a self-described “liquid glass” protector that claims to strengthen any display.

It sounds almost too good to be true. ProtectPax’s crowdfunding page describes it as a “nano protector” pioneered by titans in the aviation and aerospace industries. Titanium dioxide nanoparticles in the gel fill microscopic valleys on your smartphone’s screen, effectively reinforcing it against bumps and bruises.

More: These prototype eyeglasses from AVG make you invisible to facial recognition software

“It’s as hard as sapphire or ruby and acts like an optical filter,” the ProtectPax team says. “Your screen [will be] more uniform than when it left the factory.”

Applying it is relatively easy, apparently. All you need do is wipe your smartphone’s screen dry, rub ProtectPax across the surface with an included sealing cloth, and wait ten minutes until the gloss turns “shiny.” Once that’s done, the screen’s ostensibly protected from scratches, cracks, and even falls.

ProtectPax ranks 9H on Mohs Hardness Scale, which is higher than a knife blade and steel file. It lasts up to 365 days, and as an added bonus, it protects against electromagnetic radiation and improves touchscreen functionality.

More: Defang your keys: This liquid makes your phone screen as hard as sapphire

ProtectPax claims it’s good for more than smartphones, too. The team’s tested it with all manner of devices, including smart watches, regular watches, eyeglasses, TV screens, GPS navigation systems, laptops, eBook readers, and digital cameras.

The idea of a liquid screen protector just as effective as tempered glass may be difficult to wrap your mind around, but ProtectPax isn’t the first. Kristall, a liquid protector from Malaysian company E-Mark Global trade, shields screens with a layer nano-particle coating that gives screens a gloss finish, makes them a great deal less prone to fingerprints, smudges, and greasy smears, and protects them against objects up to 9H.

In a demonstration at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, an intrepid Digital Trends reporter saw a Kristall-smeared phone successfully deflect scratches from scissors and keys. Assuming ProtectPax measures up to the competition, it will provide a welcome alternative to the annoying glass and polymer shields that require you squeeze every last air bubble out from beneath the protectors’ surface.

Packs of ProtectPax start at $40.

Best app deals of the day! 6 paid iPhone apps for free for a limited time

Everyone likes apps, but sometimes the best ones are a bit expensive. Now and then, developers make paid apps free for a limited time, but you have to snatch them up while you have the chance. Here are the latest and greatest apps on sale in the iOS App Store.

These apps normally cost money, and this sale lasts for a limited time only. If you go to the App Store and it says the app costs money, that means the deal has expired and you will be charged. 

More: 200 Awesome iPhone Apps | The best Android apps for almost any occasion

Trader’s Way

Trader’s Way is a mind-challenging game in which you are introduced to the ups and downs of the stock market. It will allow you to master your trading skills and practice how to use strategy.

Available on:

iOS

Soccer Kick

Kick the ball to the target on the roof to score.You lose one ball if a ball falls to the ground. It’s a simple game, but one that’s challenging to master.

Available on:

iOS

Crazy Tapper +

You’ve got just 60 seconds to set a record. Just tap and tap stars as quickly as possible and compete with players worldwide.

Available on:

iOS

TopScanner

This app turns your iPhone or iPad into a full-featured PDF document scanner so you can stop taking photos of important documents.

Available on:

iOS

myCal Pro

No more dots in your calendar — get myCal PRO instead to display the events you need to see, and this app just may replace your other calendars.

Available on:

iOS

Ruler

To use this iPhone ruler, put your finger on the screen and slide your phone with your other hand. Pull the arrow down to reel off and see your measurements.

Available on:

iOS

Time-tested tech: The Linc Moto Mod turns your smartphone into a walkie-talkie

Why it matters to you

For all those times that you wanted to use a walkie-talkie instead of your cellphone, now you can have the best of both worlds.

If you thought the cellphone was an improvement upon the walkie-talkie, think again. Apparently, we’ve made so much progress we’re now going in circles.

Meet the latest Moto Mod, one of the many add-ons to a Motorola smartphone that will allow you to transform your handset into something a little … extra. It’s called the Linc and it is branded as a smart walkie- talkie attachment. That is right: You can now attach a walkie-talkie to your phone. Redundant or brilliant?

The Linc is the result of a contest Motorola launched in November to drum up interest around its Moto Z. So now, when you get bored by your cell phone’s capacity to connect you to distant friends and family, perhaps you will be excited by its capacity to help you communicate with folks that are nearby. You see, the Linc lets you chat with people in areas where there isn’t any cell phone coverage, provided that they are within five miles of you.

More: Lenovo challenged developers to create new Moto Mods — here is what they built

The Linc supports 22 channels and features SMS, GPS location sharing, and an emergency alert button that will send out an SOS signal should you be distressed. It’s also capable of communicating with two-way radios by way of its radio-over-IP gateway and its 1,500mAh battery lasts 20 hours on standby.

Really, it seems as though Linc is best suited for outdoor enthusiasts who may need a walkie-talkie to stay connected to friends and family members on a remote hiking expedition. The Linc team points out that the device differentiates itself from other walkie-talkies on the market by way of its slim design that “barely changes the look of the typical smartphone.” Of course, it barely changes the functionality either.

That said, even though Linc is meant to work with the Moto Z, you can actually use the attachment with any Bluetooth-enabled device. If you are keen to get one of these yourself, you can order one from Indiegogo for $99. As of publication on Friday, the campaign has raised 13 percent of its $12,000 goal.

Watch a wooden topographical map rise before your eyes when you turn the handle

Why it matters to you

Do you think the clockwork-inspired Game of Thrones intro is pretty cool? Then check out this gorgeous hand-cranked topographical creation that rises up when you turn the handle.

Game of Thrones fans are no doubt familiar with the show’s excellent title sequence, in which the fictitious world the show depicts is illustrated for the viewer via a map animated with various clockwork mechanisms.

Well, three industrial design students from Philadelphia University — Charles Barilo, Peter Holderith and Zachary Samalonis — have just brought a similar idea to life with a hand-cranked machine that causes a topographical map to emerge from a flat surface when its handle is turned.

More: 3D-printed topographical maps could help bring classroom lessons to life

“The inspiration was the painting ‘Grand Canyon of the Colorado River,’ by Thomas Moran,” Barilo, 19, one of the freshmen involved with the project, told Digital Trends. “The portion of the map you see rising is an actual bend in the Colorado River. The thought of being able to create a moving topographical map seemed very appealing to the three of us and our professors.”

The piece was created for the final project of the trio’s first semester. It answered a design brief called “exploration through motion” that has been run by the department for more than a decade, and is always a favorite of the class.

The team started by visiting the Philadelphia Museum of Art to pick a painting to base their machine around. After developing the idea of bringing the topography to life, they then designed a concept in Adobe Illustrator, before getting to work with a CNC router and laser cutter to create the different complex pieces.

“Assembly for the device took four or five days, in which we made necessary adjustments to make sure the gears meshed correctly, and ensure the entire machine flowed seamlessly,” Barilo continued. “Throughout the whole process we took, videos and documented it to create a process video so people could see how it all came together.”

In something of a rare move, though, the three aren’t taking their much-admired design down the crowdfunding route now that it’s finished — which means you’ll have to shelve those dreams of having it as the stylish centerpiece in your apartment. For now, at least.

“While we don’t have any current plans to sell the machine, or build more to sell, we still have all of the Illustrator files and CAD files if we ever decided to create another machine of this sort,” Barilo said. “The current machine takes a lot of tinkering to get it to work seamlessly, and a lot of time to construct, but if we could make something similar that could be reproduced and also provide the feeling that we felt when it rose from its base in front of our entire design department on the day of the presentation, that would be pretty amazing. Unfortunately, with all three of us still being full-time students, and having professors to please, these plans probably won’t come to fruition in the near future.”

That doesn’t stop it from being an awesome piece of work, however. Something tells us we haven’t heard the last of these three talented creators.

Elsa delivers the first single-slot GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, but only in Japan

Why it matters to you

If you have a really small PC that can only fit a single-slot graphics card, then Elsa gives you some hope with its newest GeForce GTX 1050 Ti.

Nvidia’s Pascal GPU architecture spawned some excellent graphics cards, from the low-end GeForce GTX 1050 that can fit in a small PC and sips power from the motherboard to the high-end GeForce GTX 1080 that rips through every modern gaming and virtual reality title. While Nvidia’s newest GPUs can be used in a host of different systems, there have been a few holes to plug.

One specific form factor where the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti can’t fit, for example, are space-constrained PC cases where only a single-slot graphics card will comfortably fit. That is all changing, as Elsa announced a new GTX 1050 Ti card that can squeeze into a single slot, Anandtech reports.

More: Nvidia’s new GTX 1050 and 1050 Ti aim to put your aging desktop back in the game

The Elsa GeForce GTX 1050 Ti 4GB SP fits into such a tight space by compacting its cooling system. The card uses a fairly typical fan and aluminum heatsink. The Elsa GTX 1050 Ti is also a 75-watt card, meaning it doesn’t need any additional power supply than what can be pulled from its PCIe slot.

In terms of other specifications, the ELSA GTX 1050 Ti offers three display connectors, including HDMI 2.0b, DisplayPort 1.4, and dual-link DVI-D. That means it should work well with just about any modern single-monitor setup and support up to three displays with perhaps a few adapters. The GPU is a GP107 with 768 stream processors, 48 texture units, and 32 ROPs, clocked at 1,290MHz base speed and boosted up to 1,392MHz. That means it’s a full GTX 1050 Ti implementation, with 4GB of GDDR5 video memory.

Elsa will be shipping the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti 4GB SP in Japan on February 24. There is no word yet on pricing and the company hasn’t announced it for any other countries. As Anandtech notes, you will be able to buy the card from Amazon Japan, but you will pay a little more given the import taxes and presumably support might be a bit spotty. It is likely that other manufacturers will also make single-slot GTX 1050 Ti solutions, but until then, we are left hoping that Elsa decides to expand the card’s availability.

Leaked technical slides reveal Ryzen’s carefully monitored cores

Why it matters to you

AMD is gearing up for a comeback with its Ryzen processors and these potential features should help ensure it goes smoothly.

Ever since AMD announced the new Ryzen processors in early December, there has been a steady stream of information leaks, alleged benchmarks, and even a handful of possible stock keeping units a few days ago. So it should come as no surprise that a handful of slides have made their way onto the web going more in-depth with AMD’s latest and greatest.

In fact, it appears most of the presentation is uploaded on the Japanese site PC Watch despite the fact that none of the information was intended for the public, at least yet. There is a lot to parse through there and a lot of it is overly technical, but at least a few slides may have implications on the end-user experience.

More: AMD’s Ryzen desktop processor box art, details, and pricing leak before launch

Notably, AMD takes the time to compare the new Zen core with an unnamed-but-probably-Intel competing chip. Not only does the Zen die come in at a slightly smaller footprint than the competitor, which is also 14nm, but it manages to squeeze in L2 cache much more efficiently.

There is also some information on the way the Zen chips handle heat and power. Through a combination of more than 1,300 path monitors, 48 power supply monitors, 20 thermal diodes, and nine droop detectors, the chip is constantly gathering massive amounts of data. This usage data can be flipped back around and used for identifying stronger cores, providing perfect power to every part of the chip, and pushing clock speeds to their absolute maximum.

There are some other interesting facts stashed away among the slides. The Zen architecture will adopt simultaneous multithreading, a more traditional multi-tasking process akin to Intel’s Hyper-Threading. Per-core voltage and frequency control appear to be platform-wide features and despite a huge possible voltage range, all chips carry a 3.4GHz or higher base clock speed.

While it is always good to take leaks and rumors with a grain of salt, it is hard to see much benefit in leaking fake processor technicalities. We are also close enough to an alleged release that this sort of information should be making its way to possible partners and engineers. These modern features should help accelerate the hype on an already promising release and, if they are true, we’ll know soon enough.

Get $150 off a top-notch 2-in-1 laptop — the Microsoft Surface Pro 4

Any PC ends up performing best when you keep in mind how you’ll be using it before you actually make a purchase. Some are better for stationary activities, while others are completely portable, ideal for multitasking. If the latter more accurately describes your lifestyle, consider the Microsoft Surface Pro 4, currently available for $650 — a $150 discount — at Best Buy.

A robust PC, the Surface Pro 4 is the latest model of the series and comes packed with some noteworthy improvements. Digital Trends got its hands on the Surface Pro 4 last year and concluded that it’s a top-notch 2-in-1 PC. Highlights include an impressive new type cover, a high-performing pen, a pixel-dense display, loud and clear speakers, and strong overall performance. The screen is a notable upgrade from the Surface 3 — it’s gone from 12 to 12.3 inches — with a pixel count that’s been upped to 2,736 x 1,824, which produces more pixels per inch than the iPad Pro. Other hardware upgrades include 16GB of RAM, up from 8GB, and a base hard drive that now offers 128GB, up from 64GB.

More: The Best Laptop You Can Buy

The device is lightweight, weighing in at about 1.7 pounds without accessories, and just over 2.3 pounds with the type cover and pen included. It’s bulky for a tablet, but light for a computer, meaning Microsoft has set up the Pro properly for use as either a PC or tablet. Buttons are conveniently placed and the laptop brick itself has a USB port, so you can charge your phone without using the USB 3.0 port. The type cover is larger than those of previous models, works as well as most dedicated laptops, and offers a major edge over many competitors. The pen is also a major upgrade — it has four times the sensitivity of the Surface 3’s pen and has a real eraser that makes it more useful than the keypad at times.

The Surface Pro 4 runs Windows 10 Pro, Office, and other professional software, has 128 GB of storage, with extra storage capacity available via the MicroSD card slot. It has two dual cameras with autofocus: a 8-megapixel camera in the rear and a 5-megapixel camera in the front. It also has an integrated kickstand and attachable keyboard.

The Microsoft Surface Pro 4 normally retails for $800, but you can snag one on Best Buy for only $650, saving you $150, or 19 percent.

$650 on Best Buy