| and more and more... |
[Jul. 30th, 2006|04:01 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | climate adaptation, climatemodification, dinosaur fuels, evolution, extreme weather, food, greenfuture, i want one!!!, living machines, my happy place, prts | ] |
global warming is an existential threat that should affect our approach to just about every issue. To take it seriously, we would have to change the way we think about transportation, agriculture, development, water resources, natural disasters, foreign relations and more.
-in today's San Jose Mercury News "High energy prices compelling Americans to care about climate" |
|
|
| the 200 MPG Carburetor rises again!! |
[May. 5th, 2006|05:57 am] |
documents lost for over 50 years resurface!
This is Charles Nelson Pogue. In 1930's he announced the success of his patented carburetor in Winnipeg Manitoba. This invention shook the world back then because it made it easy for any car to get 200 Miles Per Gallon! They never did get manufactured though. In fact Pogue went overnight from impoverished inventor to the manager of a successful factory making oil filters for the motor industry. Ever since, suspicion has lingered that oil companies and car manufacturers colluded to bury Pogue’s invention. But that was decades ago, and now may be about to change...
Patrick Davies, 72, a retired mechanic from St Austell, Cornwall, had owned a dusty tool box for 40 years (someone who had been in Canada gave it to him for painting a house). But only recently, he decided to clean it out. And Inside it, he found the original Pogue work! As well as drawings of the carburettor, the envelope contained two pages of plans, three test reports and six pages of notes written by Pogue. They included a report of a test that Pogue had done on his lawnmower, which showed that he had managed to make the engine run for seven days on a quart (just under a litre) of petrol. The documents also described how the machine worked by turning petrol into a vapour before it entered the cylinder chamber, reducing the amount of fuel needed for combustion. Davies is now working with UK universities to start back up where Pogue left of.... c'mon we could use a little device like this!
[incidentally if you are looking for people who have been bearing the torch for these types of innovations-- vapor in particular-- check out Vapor Systems Technology: the mother of all fuel-vapor sites] |
|
|
| Extenginize your mind, and your sass will follow... |
[May. 4th, 2006|05:35 am] |
Novel new solution to reduce NOx from Biodiesel engines!!
Attention all DIY SVO & biodiesel peeps! ...and for that matter anyone who still uses regular diesel fuel in their diesel car (but why?):
...Sure, you like not-relying on foreign oil. And for you SVO'ers it's that mix of doing something better for the environment, and getting to drive for free. But as we all know, biodiesel still has emissions. There is some carbon monoxide, there's lots of carbon dioxide (which if you grow your hemp oil, or even rapeseed, you will be 'cycling' the carbon), and of course, it's no laughing matter that there are NOx emissions i.e. laughing gas (but in the air its damaging and another greenhouse gas). But now you don't have to!
Fullerton CA's Extengine has just released their ADECII Advanced Diesel Emission Control (they still sell the ADECI which is a little more for the self-starter) and it gets rid of your NOx emissions. It spays an ammonia mist into the exhaust before it leaves your tailpipe, and turns the Nitrous back into Nitrogen and Water Vapor (water vapor is still a greenhouse gas.. one day we'll have to cap that and sell it to the dry cleaners or something....). I like these Extengine people, not only do they have many many other great innovations, but like the company name, they all have these cool names like MaxTRAP (removes 99% of particulates from the exhaust) and many more...
[thanks to linton & Hugg] |
|
|
| |
[Apr. 29th, 2006|07:29 am] |
Straight From The Foxes Mouth
Thanks to babynutcase for yet one more peak oil tip. And wow. it's from Fox News (i really liked their first sloagn "we report, you decide" better than the F&B, but w/e): The Headline is "Global Oil Production May Peak Soon." Here's a tidbit:
Once we reach this tipping point, known as "Hubbert's Peak," also known as "peak oil," global oil production will begin an irreversible decline and less oil will be available with every passing year, scientists say. Energy experts no longer debate about whether Hubbert's peak will occur, but when. On this point, estimates vary wildly. Kenneth Deffeyes, a professor emeritus at Princeton University, believes it has already happened — in late 2005.
Wow. Just like with climate change; the crazies who (10 years ago) were saying we have about 20 years left are now joined in chorus by the likes of Hansen et al, all the experts, who now say that there's about 10 years left. And now with Peak oil, the crazies like Deffeyes (a student of Marrion King Hubbert), are being joined by the experts, and now people are taking it seriously. Is it human nature to ignore all the harbingers until you get smacked in the face with a brick wall? I know if I was driving a car, and the passenger tells me that there's a brick wall stopping the road in another 100 meters, I would at the very least slow down a bit to see if there is any validity. I wouldn't get Hannity & Combs to call the passenger an idiot and a tin-foil hatter. And now that it looks inevitable here comes the press to tell us a new discovery! Gee, thanks. Thanks for ignoring decades of information that didn't serve your purpose. Again like climate, what frightens me is that if they are telling is this now, then it must really be around the corner... |
|
|
| Der Loremo Liebe Ich! |
[Apr. 24th, 2006|04:03 am] |
156 Miles Per Gallon German sportscar!
Saw a brief posting about this over on the Peak Oil Community, about this new sports car called the Loremo. Hmmmmm, it's mileage is pretty amazing. If it's a SULEV or PZEV, I'm sold. For now... |
|
|
| who? |
[Apr. 7th, 2006|05:47 pm] |
 |
|
|
| My Fist Chevy commercial |
[Apr. 6th, 2006|02:32 pm] |
jam that culture!
OK well it's not the best, in fact it's kinda repetitive, but i decided to finally enter my own commercial into that Chevy Taho Donald Trump debacle of a neat idea gone wrong... So check it out, my first Chevy commercial, watch it , or better yet, make your own!
[BTW found out from my VJ Forum that this is the product of Alaska Action who are running their own campaign for culture jammers to see who can spoof Taho the best... mad props to them!] |
|
|
| Cool Drivers |
[Feb. 24th, 2006|07:35 pm] |
Hey! Wanna stop 1,000 lbs of CO2 from getting
into the air every month? Then read on...
Clean Air Cool Planet is at it again! They've started a new campaign called coolDriver and it looks like one of those trends that will just build and build... They say it's a way to make your car "carbon neutral" (now who doesn't want that?)
How does it work? CoolDriver step #1: Sign up with CoolDriver CoolDriver step #2: drive no more than you need to, keep your tires properly inflated, and try to use efficient vehicles to get where you need to go. CoolDriver step #3: “offset” the carbon dioxide from your driving, so your driving will have a net-zero impact on global warming! So, you end up building new renewable energy sources, like new wind farms and farm-methane projects... Oh! And they send you a tub of Ben & Jerry's Ice cream as a way of saying thanks! So what are you waiting for? If you drive a car, click it out! |
|
|
| That day is dawning, Ken |
[Feb. 24th, 2006|02:00 pm] |
Nigerian court tells Shell to pay $1.5 billion in damages
"I repeat that we all stand before history. I and my colleagues are not the only ones on trial. Shell is on trial here, and it is as well that it is represented by counsel said to be holding a watching brief. The company has, indeed, ducked this particular trial, but its day will surely come and the lessons learned here may prove useful to it, for there is no doubt in my mind that the ecological war the company has waged in the delta will be called to question sooner than later and the crimes of that war be duly punished. The crime of the company's dirty wars against the Ogoni people will also be punished.
On trial also is the Nigerian nation, its present rulers and all those who assist them. I am not one of those who shy away from protesting injustice and oppression, arguing that they are expected of a military regime. The military do not act alone. They are supported by a gaggle of politicians, lawyers, judges, academics and businessmen, all of them hiding under the claim that they are only doing their duty, men and women too afraid to wash their pants of their urine.
We all stand on trial, my lord, for by our actions we have denigrated our country and jeopardized the future of our children. As we subscribe to the subnormal and accept double standards, as we lie and cheat openly, as we protect injustice and oppression, we empty our classrooms, degrade our hospitals, and make ourselves the slaves of those who subscribe to higher standards, who pursue the truth, and honour justice, freedom and hard work."
-Nigeria's Poet Laureate Ken Saro-Wiwa's final statement before his execution |
|
|
| Lee Raymond: World's most obtuse CEO |
[Feb. 24th, 2006|08:52 am] |
Everybody Hates Raymond:
I know I know I know, there is no US and there is no THEM. We're all in this together. And so i am biting my tongue, and trying really hard to not be so vehement when talking about this latest lameass attempt by Exxon to get out of jail free. See, 17 years ago (just before a few of you were even born) an Exxon supertanker, el Valdez, with an allegedly drunk captain, spilled 11,000,000 gallons of Alaskan North-Slope crude (and I mean crude) oil into Prince William Sound in Alaska.
This place:
What did it cost to clean up this mess? It's pretty hard to calculate, especially since even now the deadly effects are continuing... but estimates are in the Billions. Which is why they were fined billions ($4.5Bn). But what does the Zorrero company do? Why, they spend $3.5Bn fighting in it court for 17 years. And they're going to lose (although tbh, $4.5Bn is only like 6 weeks of profit for these pinche pendjos).
[to find out more about these, um, what Grist calls "souless fuckwits", click right here] ( ... ) |
|
|
| the definitive ethanol study |
[Feb. 5th, 2006|07:43 am] |
It seems that the folks at UCBerkeley have decided to put their foot down when it comes to The ethanol debate. They just released the ERG Biofuel Analysis Meta-Model. So now we can even do the math ourselves! For years, ecologists and hippies have been saying that the way we're making ethanol is insane, taking pretty much one unit of gasoline energy to make anywhere from 1.1 to 1.2 units of ethanol energy. And while they may smell funny, the hippies had a good point (*although according to UCBerkeley, maybe not quite that gooda point). The study shows that many processes for making corn ethanol are not quite as wasteful as once deemed (though they still stink, pretty much. That';s a scientific term, basically they are still not that efficient).
But now there's a lot of change coming down the pipe. There's "cellulostic ethanol" made from pretty much any agricultural waste. And that gives us great yields.. and then, of course, there's Switchgrass which has even greater yields (this is in the report).
Thankfully, the report will hopefully put to rest the idea of using corn (or strawberries, eclaires, or any food) to make fuel. In terms of environmental impact corn ethanol decreases greenhouse gases only 14% when compared to gasoline, while cellulosic ethanol has a much greater reduction of 88%. Additionally they show that the net energy value (energy out-energy in) was calculated to be 4.5 MJ/liter for corn ethanol and 22.8 MJ/liter for switchgrass! So if you want to read in detail the work from the Berkeley researchers click away |
|
|
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
scalarparty's journal
