Nov. 23, 2008 at 14:47
by BrendaBee
It is nice to read that the drive towards oil independence is still going on. European cities are themselves taking responsibility for making themselves energy efficient even when they are forced to be rather inventive as to where to put the solar panels. In the meantime I believe we in the United States are waiting for the government to take over the job for us. It would be so easy when constructing a new build to make it energy efficient with solar panel on the roof, and the cost wouldn't be that much more.
I just have to wonder why we spoiled Americans can not seem to consider this type of action? And just think we have the space so we can leave our ancestors to rot in peace while perhaps making it possible for our posterity to survive in peace. BB
Headlines: Solar panels on graves give power to Spanish town
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081123/ap_on_re_eu/eu_spain_solar_cemetery
"Santa Coloma de Gramenet, a gritty, working-class town outside Barcelona, has placed a sea of solar panels atop mausoleums at its cemetery, transforming a place of perpetual rest into one buzzing with renewable energy."
"The power the 462 panels produces — equivalent to the yearly use by 60 homes..."
"The cemetery hold the remains of about 57,000 people and the solar panels cover less than 5 percent of the total surface area. They cost 720,000 euros ($900,000) to install and each year will keep about 62 tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere."
Note the price tag. But the way we do things here in the United States where construction companies are not held to the contracts they sign instead of 3 years to complete it will take nine and for half the panels at twice the cost....if we're lucky. BB
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Aug. 17, 2008 at 15:56
by BrendaBee
In 1978 my daughter had a project for the state Science Fair about the polluting of the worlds waters. As I read this article I saw little difference between it's message and the one my 14 year old daughter gave in her report and display. There were only two differences: 1) now it is politically correct to put some of the blame on the burning of fossil fuels. and 2) things a whole lot worse.
It is a really good and informative article so well worth your time to read. It not only explains what and where the "dead zones" are, but goes into what causes them and some possible solutions. Solutions we had better find and implement soon. BB
I have read science fiction stories about the Earth, or Mother Nature, rebelling and finally expelling this monster man. I await the day. BB
Headline: Oceanic Dead Zones Continue to Spread
Fertilizer runoff and fossil-fuel use lead to massive areas in the ocean with scant or no oxygen, killing large swaths of sea life and causing hundreds of millions of dollars in damage
By David Biello August 15, 2008 Scientific American
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=oceanic-dead-zones-spread&sc=rss
"More bad news for the world's oceans: Dead zones—areas of bottom waters too oxygen depleted to support most ocean life—are spreading, dotting nearly the entire east and south coasts of the U.S. as well as several west coast river outlets.
According to a new study in Science, the rest of the world fares no better (there are now 405 identified dead zones worldwide, up from 49 in the 1960s) and the world's largest dead zone remains the Baltic Sea, whose bottom waters now lack oxygen year-round."
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Mar. 14, 2008 at 12:04
by BrendaBee
"Bees' role in the natural order of our world is crucial, and their importance as pollinators, both for agriculture and for wild plants, can’t be underestimated. Nor can it simply be quantified in monetary terms. Bees are what is known as a 'keystone species' ensuring the continued reproduction and survival not only of plants but of other organisms that depend on those plants for survival. Once a keystone species disappears, other species begin to disappear too, thus Albert Einstein's apocalyptic and, these days, oft-quoted view: 'If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would only have four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man'
I suppose the above quote from this article just about says it all. We are in effect witnessing our own decline and extinction as we study that of the not so humble bumble bee. this article gives some theories as to what is happening and this I suppose is the beginning of finding a fix. But will it come in time to save the bee and therefore save us?
http://www.odemagazine.com/doc/50/give-bees-a-chance
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Mar. 14, 2008 at 12:02
by BrendaBee
While Duke Power is building a huge coal fired power plant that will pollute the air of several neighboring states as well as our own, others are learning to use the hot, CLEAN sun.
Power plants in North Carolina are already being sued by several states for the pollution the winds carry into their territory from the 13 power plants in the foothills of the Great Smokies. So why are they continuing to build these monsters of pollution, and why is the state government allowing it? For one reason: money. So far coal is the cheapest fuel for power plants and since the technology is already in place the coal fired power plants are also the cheapest to build. As for the suits that will end up costing Billions of dollars, well Duke Power won't pick up that tab, you and I will.
In the followingarticle (with picture of plant in Spain) see what a power company in Spain and one in Arizona are teaming up to do with solar. Headlines: Solar Without Panels, Utilities are using the sun's heat to boil water for steam turbines.
by Peter Fairley Friday, February 29, 2008
You are shaking your head and saying , okay this is fine as long as the sun is shining, but what happens when the sun goes down. Power plants must supply an even flow of power 24/7. Read the article, as they have found a unique and reliable method for storing the heat until it is needed using " tanks full of a molten salt that remains liquid at temperatures exceeding 565 °C. "It's basically two tanks with a lot of heat exchangers, pipes, and pumps," says Morse. For a sense of scale, consider that the 50-megawatt plants that Germany's Solar Millennium is building in Spain near Granada will employ 28,500 tons of molten salt in twin tanks standing 14 meters high and 38.5 meters in diameter."
"While molten salt is the most popular storage option, developers are experimenting widely to find the best means of collecting heat in the first place, and integrating collection and storage. Abengoa's plant in Arizona will use a "trough" design in which arrays of parabolic mirrors concentrate sunlight onto a glass tube carrying a commercial heat-transfer oil such as therminol. Some of the heated oil heats the molten salt in storage while the rest directly generates steam. Abengoa Solar's vice president for technology development, Hank Price, says that the plant's trough energy-collection design is the one most commonly used today, thanks largely to improvements in the glass tubes. Ceramic-metal absorption coatings have increased the amount of heat captured by the tubes to the point that plants using them produce 30 percent more power than the first-generation solar thermal demonstration projects of the early 1990s."
Given a little time and the ingenuity that sets man apart from all other living creatures we can have our cake and eat it too, or have our power and save our planet with a cleaner and safer world. No filthy fossil fuels and no dangerous, radio active waste producing nuclear. BB
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Feb. 18, 2008 at 01:18
by BrendaBee
Any of you who have been reading my blog knows how vehemently opposed to the use of fossil fuels I am. Well if it at all possible I am even more opposed to the use of nuclear to produce energy.
Nuclear power was first introduced to the world in 1945 with the United States ending the long war with Japan by dropping two atomic bombs on two of their cities. We saw it's immense destructive power and the world was appalled. The atom bomb was the weak infant that soon died when it's far bigger and much more healthy nuclear brother bomb was born. Since then the world has been threatened with total devastation as countries race to obtain their own nuclear weapons. Weapons whose use is not to be contemplated, but still mankind musts needs stock pile these "exterminators".
The world has been in a long drawn out quandary and diplomatic hassle with a fanatic ruled Muslim country (Iran) in the Middle East over their secret production of a nuclear weapon. This process always begins with the so-called peaceful use of nuclear energy to a fuel power plants for electricity. However the process of creating nuclear weapons grade fuel is just a mere step beyond the nuclear power plant.
I am against mankind having and using nuclear power for energy because of the threat to mankind that comes from these innocent beginnings. In the case of Iran, they have almost unlimited and cheap oil so why would they want the vast expense of nuclear if not for nefarious purposes.
But beyond this obvious threat to mankind is one that is far more lethal and far more likely to be our doom, but it is never spoken of. With nuclear power there are waste products. Radioactive waste products that will remain deadly for thousands of years.
The United States has made some arrangements for storage of this nuclear waste, but the time table for activating the plan keeps going farther and further into the future. That is what the following article is about. The great and growing cost of storing the nuclear waste canisters above ground at over a hundred sites around the country while waiting for what is hoped to be a safer underground storage to become available. It is an off budget and almost hidden annual expenditure that requires no Congressional oversight. As our national debt rises and we as a country are facing dire economic times in our future we are carrying this hidden and outrageously expensive. We already have this unsafe and vulnerable burden while planning more and more nuclear energy plants. Pure idiocy!
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As Nuclear Waste Languishes, Expense to U.S. Rises
WASHINGTON , " Forgotten but not gone, the waste from more than 100 nuclear reactors that the federal government was supposed to start accepting for burial 10 years ago is still at the reactor sites, at least 20 years behind schedule. But it is making itself felt in the federal budget."
"Each reactor typically creates about 20 tons of waste a year, which is approximately two new casks, at roughly $1 million each. If a repository or interim site opened, clearing the backlog would take decades, experts say. At present, waste is in temporary storage at 122 sites in 39 states."
"If the repository opens in 2020, the damages would come to about $11 billion, he said, and for each year beyond that, about $500 million more. The industry says the total could reach $35 billion."
"The payments come from an obscure and poorly understood government account that requires no new Congressional appropriations, and will balloon in size, experts said."
For more information on nuclear and alternative fuels please see my categories in the far right column under Environment. BB
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Jan. 11, 2008 at 08:23
by BrendaBee
Here’s irony for you: Brazil, a country that is almost oil independent, has found a huge pool of oil just off its coast. Brazil uses ethanol made from the waste products of sugar cane. The manufacture of sugar from sugar cane for world markets is one of Brazil’s important exports. The government seeing a vital use for the sugar cane stalks after the sugar was extracted developed a large ethanol industry and required all automobiles to use ethanol for fuel. This gave the country the means to become oil independent, and now the discovery of oil has given the country another lucrative export since they themselves have little need for this liquid gold.
See story in today's New York Times business section.
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