How A Battery System In Malawi Solves More Than Blackouts

IMG_3557

Lithium battery system about the size of a few shipping containers, installed near Lilongwe, Malawi.

4KAYA

On a cloudy afternoon in Lilongwe, the sun disappears behind a bank of clouds, and with it goes a fifth of the country's electricity supply. That is what solar power does when nothing backs it up. For much of the past four years, the African nation of Malawi had nothing standing behind it. In January 2022, Tropical Storm Ana tore through the Kapichira Dam, ripping roughly 129 megawatts of hydropower off the national grid in a single stroke. What followed were blackouts stretching up to 18 hours a day—a gap that expensive diesel generators could not fill.

“We’re Going For It”: JPop Duo YOASOBI On Grammy Aspirations And Being Main Characters

yoasobi13

Ayase and Ikura of YOASOBI

yoasobi

YOASOBI on Zoom are the most dressed down I’ve ever seen them. Which is not saying much, because I’ve seen them only twice before this, but somehow they’re still exuding chic more effortlessly than most artists I’ve met.

Billionaire MacKenzie Scott Is Releasing Third Novel For Free On Substack

Topline

Philanthropist and Amazon billionaire MacKenzie Scott said Saturday she will self-publish a new novel, her third, on Substack throughout the month of August, but has so far provided few details on what the book is about.

The San Francisco Giants Suspended Harrison Bader Without Pay

Chicago White Sox v San Francisco Giants

Harrison Bader's left foot may never be the same after he crashed a scooter into the back of a fire truck at the end of July. He is currently suspended without pay. (Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)

Warren Buffett's successor is finally spending the huge cash pile he built at Berkshire Hathaway

By

Lauren Edmonds

You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email.

and

Theron Mohamed

You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email.

‘Michael’ Streaming Shifts To STARZ This Week As Sequel Filming Nears

Jaafar Jackson as Michael Jackson in "Michael."

Jaafar Jackson as Michael Jackson in "Michael."

Lionsgate/Glen Wilson

The Michael Jackson biopic Michael, starring the late pop icon’s real-life nephew Jaafar Jackson, begins its streaming video on demand run on STARZ this week as production on Michael 2 looms.

D-Wave’s $550M Quantum Computing Bet Makes Error Correction 10X Cheaper

A D-Wave quantum computing CPU

A D-Wave quantum computing CPU

San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

The hardest problem in quantum computing isn’t building more qubits. It’s stopping the ones you have from making mistakes. A new peer-reviewed paper in Nature shows that D-Wave’s dual-rail qubits can now entangle with each other cleanly. That’s been a critical missing puzzle piece for solving quantum error correction efficiently. D-Wave says its new qubit design could reduce logical error rates 10X at each step, and clears a path to a commercially useful 100-logical-qubit system by 2032.

Why Luxury Fashion Brand Akris Chooses Independence After One Hundred Years

Photo by Andrew Bruah - Courtesy of Akris

Akris flagship store Chicago

Courtesy of Akris, Photo by Andrew Bruah

Consolidation is increasingly the story of the luxury market. Over 70% of luxury brands are owned by conglomerates, according to Bloomberg. Just one conglomerate—LVMH—accounted for roughly 20% of the $413 billion (€358 billion) personal luxury market last year. And Kantar reports only ten luxury brands—led by Hermès, Louis Vuitton and Chanel—command some $322 billion in total brand value.

NYT Connections Hints And Answers: Saturday, August 8

0x0 (2)

Connections

NYT

Looking for Friday’s NYT Connections hints, clues and answers instead? You can find them here:

ForbesToday’s NYT Connections Hints And Answers: Friday, August 7By Kris Holt

Banning Chinese Robots: Will It Work?

Beijing Holds Humanoid Half Marathon

BEIJING, CHINA - APRIL 19: The fastest humanoid robot, an H1made by Honor, runs beside human runners at the start on its way to winning the Beijing Humanoid Half Marathon on April 19, 2026