Geo-engineering

A friend sent me this really interesting article on geo-engineering and how it's being used to stall real climate change measures: http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/009784.html

Top Gear

I think I've confessed before that in spite of my green leanings, I'm a bit of a gear-head. I love exotic cars. I've resigned myself to the fact that I will never own one because I couldn't justify the carbon output. Still, there is a glimmer of hope: The Tesla still has a chance to succeed, and Britain's Lightning GT looks to be a close contender.

This week on Top Gear, the team will take some time away from guzzling gasoline to review some electric and alternative fuel vehicles (looks like they'll cover the Tesla and the Honda Clarity FCV). I can't wait to see what they come up with: Monday, March 23, 8pm eastern, BBCA.

Electric ATVs hitting the trail

From the Washington Post (AP) Barefoot Motors is soon to release it's new electric ATV. At almost three times the price, I wonder how it will sell against the Zap ATV. The difference being that the Zap uses lead acid batteries and requires a much slower charge, while the new Barefoot model uses lithium-iron-phosphate batteries like those in the Chevy Volt.

The Zap tops out at 25mph and has a range of 25, while the Barefoot Model 1 has a top speed of 35 and a range of 20.

Banner Weeks for Electric Cars

The last couple of weeks have been big for electric cars. GM finally debuted the Volt (to be released in 2010) with a newly revamped exterior. It's more generic than the original design, but not nearly as ugly. They're still planning to get 40 miles off of a charge and they say, "The car will cost 'less than purchasing a cup of your favorite coffee' to recharge, and use less electricity annually than a refrigerator."

For those not in the know, the Volt is a series hybrid. Unlike the Prius (a parallel hybrid), the Volt does not use its gasoline engine to supply torque to the wheels. the gasoline engine in a series hybrid serves only to generate electricity to recharge the batteries. All of the motive force comes from the batteries/electric motor. The advantage to this is that you can travel the full forty miles of your charge without ever using any gasoline. It may not be great for those in the exurbs, but for carting around town it can't be beat.

Using this tool from the Brammo website, I calculated my daily miles. I found that on my heaviest driving days (go to Kung Fu in the morning, pick up the boy at school, bring him to his Kung Fu class in the afternoon, hit up Trader Joes in the mean time) I may do 30 miles. With a little bit of planning, I could easily stay below that. Now if I could just get a garage...

All fine and good for pure electrics, but if you already have a Prius, don't dispare! In other news last week, There's a Prius chop shop now open in San Francisco that will convert your prius to a plug-in. Luscious Garage is open for business and it sounds like things might really start to pick up for them. Converting your Prius costs around $7500, but that's down $2500 from the estimated cost from calcars about a year ago. Scroll down on this calcars page and find a list of companies who do conversions.

Conversions are also on the radar at Wired magazine.

And still there's more. Electrics made a grand showing at the Paris Auto Show. The Time article highlights the Nissan NuVu. More pictures of it can be found here.

Holy Water

Looking at the ads that google so thoughtfully serves up for this site, I have often wondered about the "hydrogen-powered car" ideas. These are NOT about future fuel-cell vehicles, but about retrofitting your gasoline engine to "run on water." I went to a couple of the advertised sites and found very little to indicate credibility. The sites themselves neither look nor feel professional, the rough sketches they offer of the theory behind their miraculous invention are uninformative and offer no real evidence of success. I've been planning to write about it for ages, but planning is no substitute for action. Thankfully, Adam Stein at Terrapass has had a go at these scheisters.

Mythbusters did a segment on hydrogen powered cars as well, proving that it didn't work. The only info I could find on that episode is in the forums. It's mostly telling them that they did it wrong or overgeneralized their conclusions.

Don't buy this stuff. These people are preying on your desperate desire to save money at the pump. If you want to use less gas, drive less. Buy a bicycle. Walk.

Enjoy.

Lifestyles

Mark Morford has a great column in todays sfgate. In it he speculates about our near future of petroleum deprivation. How will people react to 8 dollars per gallon? It seems that even though the price of crude is dropping (today anyway) the price at the pump is not expected to go down any time soon. CNNmoney offers Six Fixes for High Gasoline Prices. These fixes are rife with short-sightedness and are largely supply-side oriented. Most would be likely to have little impact at the pump, while some could have dramatic environmental impact. The article ends on a sage note:

The fact that these proposals have so many caveats, and would likely bring prices down only moderately or not at all, leaves some analysts saying there's not much the government can do to lower prices.

High gas prices are here to stay, and consumers are just going to have to bear the burden until they figure out how to use less fuel, they say.

""Like the president said, it's an addiction," said Lee Schipper, a visiting scholar at University of California Berkeley's Transportation Center. "There's going to be a time when going cold turkey hurts."

Moreover, even if the government could lower prices, it might not be in everyone's long-term interest.

"It's only when the price is high that people actually do things" to conserve, said Schipper. "Gas at $2 a gallon underprices the real cost to the environment and the nation."

Morford's speculation is entertaining, but here's what's happening NOW: People are driving less, driving more efficiently, and making better decisions about how to live. Hell, maybe we'll even get our rail and streetcar systems back.

JetBlue goes Green

CSRwire reported this morning that JetBlue has announced a green initiative. The press release from carbonfund.org addresses several steps that JetBlue is taking to clean up their act. They will be making operational changes (read: increasing efficiency), working in conjunction with Airbus, Honeywell Aerospace and International Aero Engines to develop a sustainable jet-bio-fuel, and offering carbon offsets to their customers through carbonfund.org.

This move to help customers purchase carbon offsets for their flying is one that I have been expecting for a while. It seems natural. PG&E has an offset program that goes right on your monthly gas bill (I wrote about it here).

I have been wondering why car dealerships aren't offering Terrapass offsets right from the salesperson. They could even offer offsets as an incentive.