The U.S. wind power market — one of the fastest-growing in the world in 2011 — could see its expansion derailed by the expiration of key federal tax incentives coupled with continued low natural gas prices and modest electricity demand growth, the U.S. Energy Department said in its annual assessment of the industry.
Recently, I overheard a two people arguing about the relative efficiency of an old, small, inefficient, cold climate home in the Northeast versus a newly constructed large Southern California home using energy efficient methods. At first I guessed that because of the house size, the NE home would be hard to beat out, but then I realized that I was unsure. So I decided to do some back of the envelope math.
Most of us at this point have gotten in the habit of (or are at least working on) bringing our own reusable bags to the grocery store and refusing take-out food in polystyrene foam containers. (You know, that white foamy stuff we all like to call Styrofoam but actually isn’t Styrofoam because Styrofoam is a brand name that doesn’t actually make foodware.) But then we look around us and see plastic bags blowing down the street and polystyrene bits crumbling into the soil.
Although the U.S. is largest producer of corn crops in the world, it still comes as a surprise that cornfields cover a whopping 72.7 million acres of land in the country. A high yield of fibrous matter from the crop has brought about developments in processing corn fibers for spinning yarns and fabrics, alongside technologies that bond corn fibers together to create non-woven materials like diapers and plastic containers.
The cleanliness of your EV is directly proportional to your source of electricity. If you’re drawing current from a coal-fired powerplant, well that isn’t very clean, is it? But a new wind turbine design from GE and Urban Green Energy cleverly called the “Skypump” uses a compact design with urban areas in mind to deliver clean energy to electric vehicles.
The city of Los Angeles just had its very first electric vehicle DC fast charger installed – an ECOtality Blink charger public station that can fill up a compatible EV to roughly 80 percent full in 30 minutes. It was unveiled last week in downtown L.A.’s Arts District, across the street from several restaurants.
We’re all different, right? Right! So it’s no surprise that there are lots of different reactions to climate change. But here’s a new one: offense. Imagine saying it. “I’m offended by climate change.” What does that even mean? Imagine being offended by science. That’s like being offended by chairs, or zippers or sticking plasters. Oh well, there’s no legislating for idiots. The only thing you can really do is laugh. So have a giggle: here are four people who are so offended by the facts of science, and a little helping hand from two people who are not.