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You can learn about relative support for nuclear, wind and solar here: http://www.repp.org/repp_pubs/pdf/subsidies.pdf

This is a very inexpensive stove design that can be produced for around $1.

http://www.repp.org/discussiongroups/resources/stoves/apro/designp/Design%20Poster.pdf

It's basically a chimney stove, but adds insulation to keep the temperatures
higher in the combustion chamber which causes complete combustion (no smoke)
and tries to keep the cross sectional area of the chimney constant even as it flows
around the pot by making the hot gasses pass very close to the pot.
This results in higher heat transfer

These principles can be used in many different stoves. Here is one
cleverly developed by Ken Goyer which uses 6 bricks made from local
clay, fired and then wired together and can be produced for around 1 dollar. He has
produced 10,000 of these.

http://www.aiduganda.org/cgi-bin/s-mart.pl?command=showpic&currpic=Stoves/lira01454.jpg&start=0

More information can be found at the approvecho research institute

http://www.aprovecho.org/ or by googling for "rocket stove"

Methane gas is utterly renewable. You can make it from shit, literally, and without any special equipment. The only special thing you need is a way to compress it to store it... say 200 psi tops? The only thing I can't find is a small compressor suitable for this purpose on a household scale. You can actually just run your waste into the bottom of a pond along with a steady flow of water, tent it, and capture methane - you bubble it through water to purify it. The compressing is the only issue left...

Side note: While searching for goodies I found this url which attempted to root my computer. No idea how successful it was, I'm off to go run defender and spybot.

Wow - I appreciate all the sources. I'll take a closer look when I'm off work.

But a quick google search shows I'm not "wrong", just that there are a huge number of additional factors. CO2 increases do increase plant growth.

Another thing to remember is that our current plant population is quite well-suited to current CO2 levels. The few that are better-suited to higher CO2 levels aren't thriving because this isn't the right environment. I'd wager there are a number of genes in remission that would return after a few hundred years of high CO2 levels.

I don't want to minimize the concern - but would rather people didn't maximize it either.

I can grow a tree and pick my own food.

Not necessarily. Local authorities with guns can tell you to stop farming on your land, citing zoning regulations.

I can collect rain water.

Not necessarily. In Colorado, authorities with guns can tell you to enforce the rights of downstream property owners to receive the rainwater in the form of river water.

I can stand on a street corner and yell at the top of my voice.

Not necessarily. Local authorities with guns can enforce a noise ordinance.

I can pick up a rock and throw it.

Not necessarily. Guns beat rocks.

According to this, "after mounting in an open field or on a roof the EPBT [energy apayback time] will be 11.5 or 8.3 years respectively, [...] well short of the likely system lifetime of 30 years." Of course as measured under Sydney conditions.

I recognize the fact that under some circumstances (good weather, low power grid availability), PV panels are both power- and energy-economically more efficient. However, to seriously compete with other sources, solar panels require a lot of space per capita (about 62m2) and good weather conditions, preferably desert area. Even if the effects of permanent solar valleys on ecology and the riscs of the highly toxic mass-production (the arsenic and aluminium) are ignored, and the payback problem was just part of a nuclear power lobby, no one has proved that it is just a myth.

As this discussion has been held before, I will just quote that "the cost of the module is fixed at it's resale value and all the resources used to make it are included in that cost. If the target installation needs low power and the cost to bring in that power from a grid is greater than the cost of equal PV, then the PV solution costs less over it's operational lifetime than the cost to manufacture that PV. Should PV be installed in an area where there is cheap, reliable, and abundant electricty already produced, then the cost of a module over it's lifetime is greater than the resources used to make it. When discussing the cost of photovoltaics, or any power source for that matter, the hidden factor that needs to be considered is the CONTEXT OF INSTALLATION."

I agree that NEDRA drags are the motorsport where EV and HEV cars have done the best so far. Results elsewhere have been fairly mediocre. To put things into perspective:

The results of the final leg of the 2002 Midnight Sun to Red Sea Rally are here. The prius was in Class B (1400-1600cc engines in new cars) along with two other cars - the Toyota Corolla RSi and the Proton Satria . Nik Berg's Prius Rally Car finished 15th [not 14th, sorry about the previous misinformation] overall out of the 17 cars that finished the race. The two vehicles it beat were Keith Callinan's V-8 Holden Monero (picture here) in Class G and Tom Hayes' Volvo 122S (picture here here) in Class E, both of which are for cars 1971 or older. Unfortunately, the Prius finished last in Class B.

According to this reprint from the Atlanta Journal Constitution, The Panoz Q9 (a hybrid modification of a GTR-1) finished third in the GT1 Class. Unfortunately, that makes it the last in the GT1 class, and only number 12th overall in a field of 14 cars that finished the race. The results are here

Jeri Unser's ER3 climbed Pike's Peak in 14:33.12. The fastest climb that year was 11:34.70. (The results are here here.) 44 of the 57 cars that entered the race actually completed the hill climb. The ER3 placed 40th, beating a 2003 Nissan Z33, a 2001 Chevy Monte Carlo, a 1997 Subaru Impreza , and a 2003 Mitsubishi Lance. The ER3 *did* set a new record in its class, but was the only vehicle in that class. Unfortunately, both of the semi-trucks in the race(a kenworth and a freightliner) were faster.

In NEDRA Drag Racing, the current world record for the quarter mile is 8.801. It was set by Dennis Berube's Current Eliminator IV. That car is running about 250-275 hp. That time is *really* good for, especially for a car with that little horsepower.

The problem is that there are not enough electric cars racing to make them very visible. Until there are hundreds of EV dragsters with full sponsorship (so that they can actually go to events around the country instead of just setting records at their local track) instead of dozens with little or no sponsorship the visibility will never get high enough.

I think it will be hard for hobbiest to front the money to do this. It won't work unless we have big corporate sponsors...It would be cool if the Big Three would try an HEV in NASCAR....maybe skipping a pitstop would be enough to win a race. *THAT* would open some eyes.

All the misinformation about EVs out there and a century of being used to the ICE makes it all the more difficult to interest the public as well.

I agree. Unfortunately, I don't think we'll change that until we have EV/HEV cars that finish in the top 10% in a race instead of the bottom 15% of the field when they race.

I agree that NEDRA drags are the motorsport where EV and HEV cars have done the best so far. Results elsewhere have been fairly mediocre. To put things into perspective:

The results of the final leg of the 2002 Midnight Sun to Red Sea Rally are here. The prius was in Class B (1400-1600cc engines in new cars) along with two other cars - the Toyota Corolla RSi and the Proton Satria . Nik Berg's Prius Rally Car finished 15th [not 14th, sorry about the previous misinformation] overall out of the 17 cars that finished the race. The two vehicles it beat were Keith Callinan's V-8 Holden Monero (picture here) in Class G and Tom Hayes' Volvo 122S (picture here here) in Class E, both of which are for cars 1971 or older. Unfortunately, the Prius finished last in Class B.

According to this reprint from the Atlanta Journal Constitution, The Panoz Q9 (a hybrid modification of a GTR-1) finished third in the GT1 Class. Unfortunately, that makes it the last in the GT1 class, and only number 12th overall in a field of 14 cars that finished the race. The results are here

Jeri Unser's ER3 climbed Pike's Peak in 14:33.12. The fastest climb that year was 11:34.70. (The results are here here.) 44 of the 57 cars that entered the race actually completed the hill climb. The ER3 placed 40th, beating a 2003 Nissan Z33, a 2001 Chevy Monte Carlo, a 1997 Subaru Impreza , and a 2003 Mitsubishi Lance. The ER3 *did* set a new record in its class, but was the only vehicle in that class. Unfortunately, both of the semi-trucks in the race(a kenworth and a freightliner) were faster.

In NEDRA Drag Racing, the current world record for the quarter mile is 8.801. It was set by Dennis Berube's Current Eliminator IV. That car is running about 250-275 hp. That time is *really* good for, especially for a car with that little horsepower.

The problem is that there are not enough electric cars racing to make them very visible. Until there are hundreds of EV dragsters with full sponsorship (so that they can actually go to events around the country instead of just setting records at their local track) instead of dozens with little or no sponsorship the visibility will never get high enough.

I think it will be hard for hobbiest to front the money to do this. It won't work unless we have big corporate sponsors...It would be cool if the Big Three would try an HEV in NASCAR....maybe skipping a pitstop would be enough to win a race. *THAT* would open some eyes.

All the misinformation about EVs out there and a century of being used to the ICE makes it all the more difficult to interest the public as well.

I agree. Unfortunately, I don't think we'll change that until we have EV/HEV cars that finish in the top 10% in a race instead of the bottom 15% of the field when they race.

REPP has a paper on how wind the top five or so wind farfarm projects have affected housing and property values. See the report in PDF here:
http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/binaries/win d_online_final.pdf They refer to "view shed" as a way of indicating how far around the area the wind generaters are visible. Very interesting look at wind energy.

In the 80's a large percent of the car run with alcohol, but then the oil prices fell and the program became economically less interesting. But there are still cars running with alcohol in Brazil, and the technology of burning alcohol instead of gasoline is perfectly mastered in the country. Alcohol is also mixed in the gasoline (at 30%) used by regular gasoline cars.

A few people have built hobby vehicles that way. Surplus APU turbines aren't that expensive if you don't insist they be flight-qualified. Perhaps that's what they did, and they had an APU failure.