As the week draws to a close, here are our top stories:
- Obama Urges Israel to Extend Settlement Moratorium (NYT) — But will Israel listen? Within this context, I hope so.
- Obama awards living soldier the Medal of Honor (WashPost) — The U.S. casualties from a 2007 Taliban ambush would have been greater had not paratrooper Spec. Salvatore Giunta gotten up after being hit and plunged straight into the enemy fire to save three wounded comrades.
- California Gas Blast ‘Looked Like Hell On Earth’ (NPR) — This makes Hyundai’s unveiling of a new electric car all that more exciting. The whole fossil-fuel-extraction thing is looking more iffy by the day.
- SC nuclear plant shut down by turbine problem (thestate.com) — Looks like we need to build some new nuclear power plants; the old ones seem to be wearing out. We’ll need the new ones to power our electric cars.
- Iran ‘delays release of US hiker Sarah Shourd’ (BBC) — Notice how the BBC attributes, or puts in quotes, every assertion in their headlines? They don’t trust anybody, do they? They’re the embodiment of the journalistic proverb, “If your mother says she loves you, check it out.”
- County management of city police constitutional: McMaster (thestate.com) — Well, that’s one potential objection out of the way. Any others?
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The Beeb speaks in quotation marks, in fact. It’s part of the culture.
I’m quite fond of San Bruno. The west coast National Archives are there.
Tesla has been building lithium-ion powered electric cars for several years now. They go 240 miles on a charge and can whip a Corvette in 0-60 acceleration. The problem is the thing costs $100k. Tesla is supposed to team up with Toyota to build a sedan powered by electricity. Hopefully it will cost less than the the Nisson Leaf @ $30k+. Electric cars won’t take off until gasoline prices get really high. But the technology is emerging.
Article about batteries in today’s paper. Interesting. Right now, according to the article, $33k for one battery capable of 100 miles range per charge. With federal government assistance, tax incentives and breaks, price should come down to $10k per battery by 2015.
Wonder what plans are underway for disposal of these batteries once they are no longer capable of holding a charge? How many charges can one battery take? How many charging stations will be required, etc, etc, etc? If the load on our already stretched power plants is expanded, what will the answer be? More nuclear plants? More coal fired plants? Each provides a unique problem with environmental groups who have their own agenda and opposition to either source of electrical power production.
Solar? Can provide some gap coverage but cannot be depended upon for a national power grid, neither can wind. Batteries will need another source of power for recharging, thus adding to the need.
Battery powered vehicles. Good idea but has it been given enough advance planning and consideration to avoid as many potential difficulties as possible or is this another plan with no forethought or pre-planning done before jumping headlong into another “solution” to our energy future?
It doesn’t take a genius to understand the limitations of our natural resources and the need for alternative energy sources for the future.
However, along with the need to develop new technology and resources, there is the need to plan for their disposal once they are no longer useable. We have to deal with the problem of landfills, nuclear fuel disposal sites, contaminated soil storage sites, and the list goes on and on. At some point, someone, somewhere must take the lead in this aspect of developing new technology for public consumption.
There was a tiny story in Saturday’s State discussing new sports stadiums around the country. It focused on the brand new football stadium in New Jersey that will host Giants and Jets games. This monstrocity will cost over $1.5 billion dollars. And although the taxpayers won’t help fund the stadium directly they did pitch in for some expensive infrastructure improvements in the area.
This comes at a time when libraries in parts of NJ are shutting down or reducing their hours. What should be a crime is that the old stadium, currently being demolished, still has $100 million in unpaid debt that is owed by the taxpayers.
This is further evidence that the rich in this country are the big beneficiaries of government. The owners of the Jets and Giants are raking in millions, as are the players, while patrons of garden variety services suffer. It’s time to re-think are this welfare for the rich schemes in this country. Couldn’t we field quality pro-football teams to play in stadiums cost a lot less than $1.5 billion and pay the players a mere million a year? Would the quality of the experience really suffer that much? This is madness and I think something worthy of Brad’s Front Page.
Amen, Brother Bart!
I understand that the Holy Grail of green energy is a way to power a vehicle with renewable energy. It’s a lot easier to do clever things with current technology for stationary things….
Y’all–unplug all those electronic devices (or turn off the power strip) when you’re not using them, and check out the vastly improved CFLs! Turn off ceiling fans when you aren’t in the room. Ease off on the gas pedal. If everyone did a few little things, we’d be in a vastly better position.
And of course, CFLs (which I see stands for Canadian Football Leagues) contain mercury…
We used to smash mercury thermometors when we were kids and watch the little mercury balls roll around on the table. Now the very prospect of smashing a light bulb with a miniscule amount of the stuff sends people shrieking in horror.
You take them to Home Depot, where they are recycled and the mercury captured.
or buy expensive LED bulbs…
Our HVAC unit is an older one but still works well, cools and heats on demand. However, the wattage, therefore kilowatt hours does run much higher than we would like. But, an investment of several thousand dollars right now is not feasible and I will not go further into debt to buy one.
We leave our ceiling fans running constantly on low speed and direction according to the season. We are diligent in turning lights off when not in the room, etc. Things our parents chewed us out about on a regular basis. “Turn those damn lights off! You think money grows on trees? Wait until you have to pay the bills and see how it feels!” Sound familiar? However, we have found we save on our useage by running the fans – not to dispute you Kathryn. This is what works for us.
Retraining how we think and do the little energy savings things can mount up over a year. Imagine what it would be if everyone did it.
I am a major proponent in the power of the brain at the subconscious level. Several years ago, a very brilliant instructor taught me a simple way to change my way of doing things. This may not be of interest to everyone, but believe me, it works. A version of the technique has been used to eliminate phantom pain from people who have lost a limb and can still feel the pain and sensation of the lost limb. For those who used it, it was 100% successful. Everyone was able to eliminate their phantom pain.
If you want to save energy by being aware of waste, for a 30 day period, several times a day, do a positive reinforcement exercise. It is easy and it does work. However, it must be done for 30 days straight, no days off, and equally as important, it MUST be a positive reinforcement statement, no negative words used.
1. Make several cards, etc. with something like the following written on them. “Today, I will be aware of energy saving steps like turning off lights when I leave a room. Driving the speed limit. Recycling plastic.” Or whatever you want to improve on.
2. Take the cards and put them in places where you will see them on a regular basis and when you read the card, associate the words with a pleasant memory or event in your life.
3. Do this for 30 days straight and at the end of the 30 days, you will be very surprised at how much attention you pay to the things you wrote down.
This is not one of the quick seminars that pump you up for a few days then subsides, it is a permanent change and only requires a refresher every few months.
It works.