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Japan Striving For Energy Efficiency
diamond writes "The NYT has an article on how Japan is squeezing to get the most out of the costly fuel. 'The government recently introduced a national campaign, urging the Japanese to replace their older appliances and buy hybrid vehicles, all part of a patriotic effort to save energy and fight global warming.'"
Hopefully this starts a global trend
Hey! Maybe they'll make up for Australia and the USA not ratifying the Kyoto Protocol!
Or not. You never know.
It's extremely impressive, though, that they could manage to triple the output of their industrial sector for the same energy consumption - makes me feel guilty about doing nothing at all about climate change in my own home.
--- Egads, I glow in the dark!
In addition to other energy conservation techniques, they've asked Godzilla to take fewer showers. That guy, like, he uses a lot of water, man.
I admit I just skimmed TFA, but what qualifies as a "national campaign?" Is it just adverts on TV, or are there tax breaks involved as well? During the Carter administration in the US, there were numerous tax breaks for individuals who did things like convert their houses to solar power. The percentage of solar powered houses (whether for electricty or water heating) in Japan greatly outpaces that of the US, but do they get tax rebates from it, or is it just regular Japanese environmentalism?
Sono koro, bokura wa, sore ga sekai no shinjitsu da to shinjite ita.
Has anyone done research on how much fossil fuel is used to produce the electricity to charge these vehicles. How much harm is done by disposing of the batteries that are no longer of use? Where is the rest of the story?
... that means they got to trade in all their Intel x86 chips for AMD ones, right? ;)
:%s/Open Source/Free Software/g
YTARY!
let's not forget that,
Japan is a leading car manufacturer (especially when it comes to "green" vehicles) so this would also benefit their economy.
TODO: 753) write sig.
After all, Japan always had to import 100% of their petroleum needs, hence the reason why they've always emphasized high energy efficiency. That's why Japan has such excellent public transportation and why Toyota embarked on that research project in the early 1990's that resulted in the groundbreaking Prius hybrid drivetrain vehicle.
Also, because of Japan's very high population density and its huge demands on water, it's also the country where much of today's water-efficient plumbing originated. After all, it was the Japanese plumbing fixture company TOTO that helped originate the concept of not only low-flush toilets, but also toilets where you can choose the amount of water to use per flush for even higher water efficiency.
The easiest way to encourage people to use less energy is to tax energy consumption heavily.
I'll probably be modded down for this...
I can't open the article (link down?), but I would not be surprised if this is yet another shady deal between the Japanese government and major manufacturers to keep people buying new products.
The compulsory registration fees already make it expensive enough to run a car here, and suspect this is more of the same - "keep people purchasing, and keep the economy afloat." After all, it has worked for the last 50 years here.
As a geek, I love clever solutions. Japan has a great track record at applying technology to day to day problems. But a lot of Japan's creative energy has gone into miniaturization, which makes sense for a gregarious people who also happen to live on an island. But there's only so far you can go with that.Also, for us Americans, diminishing returns with diminishing gadget size comes a lot sooner than it does for the Japanese.
I also don't think as a country you can look to Americans to develop much in the way in efficiency technologies. Our mentality when faced with shortage is to go out and find or create some more. But efficiency is just as valid a sphere for creativity as production, and it works just as well I think; better in some scenarios.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I live in Japan and I haven't seen any national campaign. Besides, it's not like anyone keeps anything for more than 2 years here anyway. People are already replacing their old stuff with new stuff too frequently. As much as Japan loves to say how energy efficient they are, I have to wonder what all this facination with new products ends up costing energy-wise.
And it's not like the newer products have any reason to exist sometimes. I just got done fighting with my oven for an hour because my idea of an oven (a box that gets hot into which you put raw food and remove it when it's cooked) is very different from what the Toshiba marketing department came up with (a box with a million digital buttons on the front that ultimately control a big heating coil and a frickin' timer--but does so in the most circuitous and bizarre manner possible, so you know it's advanced).
In Sweden, experimental 0-liter houses (without heating at all except inhabitants and appliances) have already been built (sorry, Swedish only). Sweden is a bit colder than Germany (have lived in both countries so I have own experience about that one). Go figure. Or maybe we Swedes just tend to be more nerdy and more often have our own Beowulf clusters as heaters. :P
I have a really elegant proof for Fermat's last theorem. If this sig was only a bit longer...
Methinks this is more of the traditional brainwashing to get Japanese to buy more and newer things to stimulate a sagging economy.
With all the technological advances in the world, when will they (any country) ever be able to mass-produce energy and environment saving cars!
"The honest feeling of Japanese people is, 'How can we do more?' "
The Japanese, as you point out, are already very energy efficient. They have already picked the low hanging fruit. The decision that they need to go further is a serious one. I'm thinking that they are looking at their manufacturing sector going to China and wondering what they can do to re-invent their economy. Over the long term, energy efficiency will be mandated by the disappearance of oil. They probably feel that if they can be at the bleeding edge of energy efficiency, they will have a huge advantage. If nothing else, if they can mandate the use of appliances that are made no where else, they can at least save their domestic market. ie. if they set energy efficiency standards and their manufacturers are the only ones who meet them, then their manufacturers stay in business. This is basically the same way they kept American cars out of their market. The American cars simply couldn't meet the standards and therefore couldn't be sold there.
By underclocking their computers in order to save electricity and slow global warming.
What does this button do...
Whatever happens with Kyoto, I think it's great to see a few governments here and there finally leading by example, and getting involved in encouraging and providing incentives for saving energy. Hopefully it'll get some power saving technologies and industries much more established than they were before, and some people might actually begin to realise that there are more benefits to being efficient than possibly reducing the effects that power generation might have on the environment. Some of it may even carry over into countries that initially didn't sign on to Kyoto.
In New Zealand, where I am, finding ways to save energy has almost become a necessity, albeit one that the general population is noticing very slowly. (The main theme at the moment is everyone wanting to build more power stations, but nobody wanting them in their back yard.) Call it lack of planning if you like, but the power situation here is at the state where we're presently on the edge of getting brown-outs.
The geographic isolation makes it necessary to be entirely self-reliant with power generation, and saving energy becomes a definite alternative to generating more. (Not all the time, but certainly much of the time.) Being someone who's quite enthusiastic about reducing light pollution, it's helpful to finally have some government bodies to deal with whose actual purpose revolves around finding new ways to save energy, such as this one.
My understanding, from having spoken to people there, is that the US Federal government is comparably hopeless at implementing energy efficiency schemes, for whatever reason. (That'd mean less jobs for all those americans in the power generation industry, right?) Apparently it's a much healthier economy when a few billions of dollars extra are circulating, even if it is for energy that's not actually necessary... but whatever.
If you happen to have an interest in energy efficiency, though, I've heard that state governments and more local authorities in general are often a lot more receptive about promoting it. I presume that it's probably much easier in states that buy more energy from neighbouring states than they sell. eg. Calgary (okay, that's Canada but it's in the same direction as the US from here) recently went through a programme of replacing every one of their street lights. It's expected to pay off entirely within six to seven years, through operating costs of the lights alone.
Air conditioning increases power consumption by about 10%. Driving with open windows has about the same effect. So I'd say don't use AC unless temp exceeds 30C (about 86F), and drive with closed windows. Oh, and lose some weight, too.
What are you, marketing department for one of the big oil companies? Hybrids aren't perfect but you're talking out of your *arse*.
_ release.html?id=20040623
The batteries used in hybrids last as long as the vehicle, 150,000 - 200,000 miles at least and are guaranteed for at least 8 years. The batteries are NiMH, not lead acid or Nicad.
e.g.
http://pressroom.toyota.com/photo_library/display
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Is that China uses 11.5x the energy of Japan for the same industrial output. (I'm assuming that means equal in $). Are factories in China that much less efficient than their Japanese counterparts? Or is it the type of manufacturing currently done in China is in general more energy hungry than the manufacturing done in Japan?
Monstar L
-Unbelievable that this little piece of junk could be such a big problem. NO wonder this circuit failed. It says, 'Made in Japan'.
-What do you mean, Doc? All the best stuff is made in Japan.
-Unbelievable.
You can't handle the truth.
FWIW, australia's state level governments (such as the Victorian Bracks government) are all imposing tough emissions controls in line with the kyoto protocol.
The reason why australia didn't ratify kyoto is because kyoto also counts all forest fires as emissions of CO2, because, well, they are emissions of CO2.
Australia has forest fires larger than engliand in the western australian forests every year. If australia ratified kyoto and got on the emissions trading scheme, australia would be economically crippled by having to buy emissions credits all the time. So Howard looked after the bottom line and refused to sign.
Now, if only we could find a way to prevent forest fires. I have a friend who is trying to get a job as a postgraduate research assistant at the Victorian Fire Prevention Center with her very good botany degree... maybe she can help.
Because whales are cheap and oil is dear.
... tried the same thing with the "One-Tonne-Challenge" http://www.climatechange.gc.ca/onetonne/english/in dex.asp.
The results? A lot of angry fatties.
Are you blind, stupid, or both? To begin obtaining a clue, go to your local friendly electronics store such as Yodobashi and ask them about the incredible discounts they're offering this summer on super efficient air conditioners (GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIZED). Or go call Tokyo Denryoku and ask them about the campaign they've been doing for the past few years on encouraging people to use LESS energy (imagine that, from the nation's largest electricity supplier!)
A) Fuck off
B) How often do you get 36C+ temperatures?
I remember reading some research done by Audi in the late 1970's that showed it's actually more fuel efficient to run the air conditioner than to open the window of your car if you drive faster than 70 km/h (43.5 mph). That's because open windows on a car cause considerable aerodynamic drag at high speeds, which can severely cut into fuel efficiency. Besides, today's automotive air conditioners are far more efficient in design, so they impose far less a drag on the engine than in the past.
In conjunction with that slap a heavy tax on offices for night time use of power to force them to force their employees to turn off all non-essential equipment like desktop computers, monitors, lights etc. when no one is there to use them.
my oven is older than i am and probably eats 10x more energy than yours, thats why i never use it. who needs an oven except that old wich in Hansel and Gretel?..
Noticed when you buy something now you can choose whether to pay the recycling tax now, or wait until the end-of-life in the hope it will be cheaper then? PET bottles in our area have to be returned to convenience stores and can't go in our trash. We also have to sort our trash into into abotu 6 categories. A fried down south has to sort into 12 categories. The ubiquitous water pot now uses up to 70% less electricity than models 3 years ago. All white goods have to carry efficiency ratings. 30% of the flat surface of new buildings must be grassed, including the roof. There's less wrapping on gifts at department stores now. Thermostats in government offices have been increased from 25 to 28 or 29 C for the summer. Government employees are being encouraged to stop wearing jackets and ties from June to September. Trucks and buses are encouraged not to idle when stationary. I dunno, maybe you don't watch Japanese TV.
How the hell can we "run out of energy" anytime within the next few hundred thousand millenia??
.. but paranoia of running out of energy ?? A few liters of sea water will contain more energy than we know what to do with (once we have mastered fusion power).
.. we'll be able to reverse global warming by CO2 recapture. Why not improve nations economies through industrialization so that they can have the wealth to fix the environmental issues ??
Look at the total energy of the solar system.
We lack the greed and capability of growing fast enough to exploit even one hundredth of one thousandth of a percent of the sun's energy output.
Heck just the earth.. The earth's core is a sphere of lava thousands of miles thick and damn hot. Thats why one volcanic eruption alone can power the whole US for months.
I can undertand wanting to prevent global warming
In the long term once we build more power plants
Seems like people want to force others in developing countries to starve and die (not to mention take away the human right to reproduction) because of misguided and hateful paranoia.
It's real. Just about all major Japanese firms are taking serious steps to reduce environmental impact and also to comply with personal information protection act, all the way down to rewriting their articles of incorporation. The former is part due to the government and part due to pr benefits. The government is serious about it mainly I would expect because their claim to fame on the global stage, i.e. the proof they are fit to get a permanent seat on the security council, is their ability to lead Asia and be a diplomatic power.. the result of the Kyoto accord however is that it is very hard to live up to their promise. As it happens the Chairman of Toyota is also the head of the federal industry organization, and is located in Nagoya which is where the World Expo is currently running, neither of which hurt. Not versed in what other incentives may be provided though. Environmental programs are extremely visible in all parts of Japanese companies now, including product R&D, sales, advertising, etc. For example there is an air conditioner out now (EcoCute) that uses carbon dioxide as a refrigerant, and uses a heat pump to pull heat from the air and use only nighttime electricity for a 300% efficiency gain IIRC.
So it's not just about throwing away a car for a more efficient one. More efficient city planning would have prevented rising temp costs. But the Japanese culture is very heavily oriented to the business suit, and even on weekends, nobody wears shorts except for kids, and that's what part of the campaign is starting with first.
Battery technology has been around for years which would allow cars to travel hundreds of thousands of miles before having to be replaced, disposed of or recycled.
In fact, Toshiba have a li-ion which charges in minutes and has negligible degradation even after thousands of charges. At around 300 miles per charge and thousands of charges we have vehicles which will travel half a million miles, a million miles before the batteries are an issue. The *batteries* are no longer the problem.
"hydrogen storage technology is far from ideal, but with a bit of engineering..."
Engineering isn't magic fairy dust, you can't just sprinkle some engineering on something and make it better. Hydrogen gas doesn't remotely have the energy density required. Liquid hydrogen has to be cooled to near absolute zero. Metal hydrides are *heavy* and stripping hydrogen off of fossil fuels or similar using a reformer drops the overall efficiency of the cell to little better than current internal combustion engines.
Fuel cells, are a red herring.
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it's lovely how everybody thinks japan is doing this for the benefit of a clean environment. the japanese government is only playing at this angle. their economy is suffering from a 15 years recession, their people are the most thrifty (thrifty != economically sound) and they see a way to get a couple misers to cough up some cash for philanthropic ideals.
these technologies can reduce the amount of energy consumed, and given how most driving in japan is equivalent to sitting in traffic, a hybrid car is going to save a ton of gas, given that their better MPG is when they're idling.
so, i hope you all keep your sunny, bears-eat-honey attitudes, but just realize, you're being afforded it by others.
Completely random fact, but the TV show Mythbusters tested this and found that (at around 55mph) open windows is .7mpg more efficient.
How often do equatorial countries get 36C+ temperatures. Stop pretending that you need air conditioners to live. You may say they're poor so they can't afford them. They seem to be not dying from the heat just fine to me. Maybe if you decreased the smog in your city by biking to work you wouldn't have this problem.
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You forgot to mention that the second article describes a house that is not without heating per se, but rather, describes a house that uses heating/cooling/electricity so efficiently that it is designed to survive off-grid (and still have today's expected standards with AC, lighting, heating etc) -- it's built to be self-sufficient energy-wise.
Quite a step forward from just "not having heating". Especially considered it's not a residential house, but a business conference center.
Subsidized farming and protectionism is murdering Africans and farmers in developing nations. These farmers cannot sell their products due to developed nations subsidizing farms in Europe, the US, and Japan.
.. they are preventing affordable irrigation technology from being utilized. Even desert land can be irrigated by desalinated sea water. This method can result in a lush green Sahara (instead of the desert of today). This is technology we have today .. Israel supplies 30% of the Negev's agricultrual water from salty sources.
.. with hydroponics .. food can be created in factories (skyscrapers so land use is maximized). After all, food is just energy stored in a tasty format the body can absorb).
Also, by forcing developing nations to reduce their energy usage
Africa needs to be allowed to industrialize. And yes, this includes allowing African countries to have fusion power plants.
Also
And Japan will succeed. Meanwhile, here in America, our government and big bisiness seem to be each others' ally as their policies still encourage heavy dependence on foreign oil and the use of fuel-inefficient vehicles! No wonder the best selling cars are Japanese.
It seems all the so called American innovation is no where to be seen. I'd like to know in which field America is leading the world.
We fly the oldest fleet of passenger aircraft among the industrialised countries,
All our electronics are Asian imports,
We are outsourcing our industrial base to the extent that the home grown textile industry is under seige,
I hear with the present policies, almost one-half of our defense hardware will be manufactured by foreign companies by 2018!
Briliant academicians now rather to to Scandinavia than come to USA,
Our healthcare system is the worst performer in the G7, even Cuba beats us in some cases, and on and on and on.
I pitty the generations to come.
In Japan, old people are fossil fuels.
- These characters were randomly selected.
all part of a patriotic effort to save energy and fight global warming...
Yeah right...they're saving energy so they can drill to the center of the earth.
Whadayaexpect? This IS /. Didn't really read it before posting, would you? :)
I have a really elegant proof for Fermat's last theorem. If this sig was only a bit longer...
This made TV news in Poland: they go as far as encouraging office workers to NOT wear a tie to save energy on air conditioning. Be cool ;) They even apparently have an appropriate office clothing line promoted by the prime minister.
How often do equatorial countries get 36C+ temperatures. Stop pretending that you need air conditioners to live. You may say they're poor so they can't afford them. They seem to be not dying from the heat just fine to me. Maybe if you decreased the smog in your city by biking to work you wouldn't have this problem.
They get them so friggin' often they invented the siesta. That's Spanish for "it is so damn hot I'm just gonna sit around on my ass all afternoon and wish I had A/C."
Decreasing the smog? Smog makes it hot? Gee whiz maybe if the smog was thicker it'd keep the sun off all the concrete and bricks and asphalt that hold heat so friggin' long they're still warm to the touch at midnight.
Go out and get a job where you work in the direct sun and it's 100 degrees int the shade. After you get heat stroke a couple of times come back and tell us how "They seem to be not dying from the heat just fine to me."
Given how close we are to the worldwide peak in oil production, and the fact that the natural gas peak isn't as far off as we'd like, that's your reaction to a country taking an intelligent approach to energy conservation???
Fine, enjoy your tinfoil hat. Maybe it will help keep you warm in coming winters.
Japan is a mad consumer economy. Their success relies a lot on their constant upgrading.
This just sounds like a move to boost their economy by having everyone spend more money upgrading their home appliances...
It's odd, but the Nihon government is trying to urge the military to get more single troops to move to my base instead of families because they are paying for our utilities.
who can't spell 'pity'.
It's a stretch, but I think 'pitty' means - 'like or similar to, under an armpit'.
-not from the wonderful, built-in Oxford Dictionary on my Mac.
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
is that Hybrids are more efficient then an pure-petro powered car in stop & go driving.
In ordinary cars, hitting the brakes coverts it's kinetic energy directly into heat (on the brake rotors) and is basically lost forever... Hybrids get to 'cheat' this by reclaiming this energy, which is why their city mpg is very similar to highway mpg.
Call that a fire?
This is a fire.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
This is working out quite well, I must admit. If we get Japan and other countries to decrease their energy usage and drop their demand for oil, we'll get cheaper oil if the production does not slow down!
With that, I will finally be able to get a Ford Excursion or a Hummer (H2, not the pussy H3 version) a good gas-loving asphalt-ripping sports car and cheap gas that I can pump on a daily basis without destroying my wallet.
This was tested by the famous Mythbusters, as seen on Discovery channel. The actual test showed that the vehicle with open windows and airco off could drive significantly further than the one with windows closed and airco on. Bert
Energy is as just as important as food and water. No matter how much you tax it, the increased cost of running industry will be passed on to the consumer. Also, every citizen still needs to drive to work. Increasing taxes will only piss people off with a perportional increase in crime.
Want to start a riot in America. Go ahead, go fuck with peoples life blood to maintain the current standard of living.
Life is not for the lazy.
Anyone else read this as a deal to exchange older appliances in exchange for cash towards a new hybrid? Well, maybe just me... :)
In any event, I'm not sure how this is news: the Canadian government long ago introduced the 1-tonne challenge, and apparantely we receive tax breaks for buying a hybrid.
Other than the facts provided in the article, how is this 'promotion' any different from what many other countries are doing already?
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
They don't like white people in japan. So I wouldn't call them gregarious.
Ok, let's make a reality check here. I drive a Nissan XTerra 6cyl. (medium sized SUV) Why? Becuase I can tow boats/jet skis, carry 6 people, camp inside of it, carry luggage on top, and have a kid or two in the back playing around. I tend to do these fairly regularly. You couldn't do this in two of your 4 bangers, or at least not down here. Not without over-heating the engine (pulling all of that). I actually make use of my SUV, unlike many others. But if you want to discuss who is going to make use of it, you might as well start putting restrictions on other things: Food (we don't need that unhealthy junk food... too many people litter anyways), batteries (oh come on, you haven't gone to rechargables yet? they only take 15 minutes to recharge), games (some of these games are 'eevil'). I have seen the soccer mom with the Excretion.. err, I mean Excursion. On the other than, soccer mom sometimes takes 8 kids with her. For Japan or New York, it's pointless and stupid -- but for Texas, it's not. Now, if they did have a descent SUV (that wasn't dog ass slow getting on the highway) that was energy effecient, I would get one in a heartbeat. In a side note, the Kyoto Protocol was stupid to being with. Do you realize that it would have *destroyed* our economy? (ours as well as Australias). It would have made getting oil financially impossible (or so low of profit, it's not worth it) and would have put allot of people out of a job.
"Do or do not. There is no try." -- Master Yoda (Half man, half muppet)
I can handle 39C+ just fine. Just adjust clothes, use shade, open your windows and drink water. Your skin is the most efficient A/C. Google for liquid evaporative cooling.
Two suggestions for Japan if they would like to save energy.
1) Start using daylight savings time -- right now, Japan uses the standard time all year.
2) Join an appropriate time zone in the first place. Tokyo is in the same zone (UTC+9) as Korea.
As a result of this, in Tokyo during summer, it starts getting light out before 4AM, and the actual sunrise is before 4:30. I live in Tokyo and can tell you this is almost as traumatic as the summer humidity.
The sun never almost never sets later than 7:00 and seemingly everyone here stays up under lots of electric light pollution until the last train rush around 11:30-12.
So additional ways for Japan to save energy and be less reliant on imported oil do present themselves imho.
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
The first hybrid vehicle was produced almost a hundred years ago by one of the parent companies of what is now known as Audi.
It wasn't practical then, it isn't practical now- it is estimated that Toyota (not to mention, the Japanese government) subsidized the Prius to the tune of at least $17,000. Which means that a Prius would cost almost $40,000 if it wasn't. How many people do you think would buy one then?
It's a common myth that the hybrid system is what gives it such good gas mileage. It isn't. It's narrow, hard tires and good aerodynamics. Numerous older models from Toyota, Honda, GM, and other manufactuers, not to mention millions of TDI-powered cars in Europe, get the same or better gas mileage, and they're far easier to make and service; they can also run on renewable energy sources like biodiesel, whereas the Prius runs on the same gasoline as everyone else. Oh, and you don't need to be a rocket scientist to "drive them properly".
PS: on the actual subject of the article, the "initiative" isn't about saving energy. It's about pumping money into the economy from people buying the most expensive consumer goods- appliances and vehicles.
Please help metamoderate.
A little googling places the Model T at 25 mpg (see http://www.climateark.org/articles/reader.asp?link id=23218).
y ing/ reckons can get 22mpg city and 34mpg on the motorway).
:)
This is slightly better than something like a porsche Carrera 2 (which http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/transportation/personal/bu
Now is the Porsche an average vehicle? Not round here it isn't
No, they kill them in the the name of science, they need acurate scentific data to keep the whales healthy.
The scentific process involves
1) Kill all the whales to determine how old they are.
2) Cart the whale meat thousands of miles back to the mainland
3) Prepare the whale meat for scientific analysis by cunsumers in restaraunts.
Well duh, from Slashdot you can even get information about Earthquekes before you actually feel them.
Look to see who is financially behind this push, and pretend to be surprised when you find out the list includes:
Major appliance manufactureres and retailers
Automobile manufacturers and retailers
Air-conditioner manufacturers and retailers
Basically anyone who will benefit financially from people throwing things away and buying new.
Well, the thing is you simply can't upgrade it enough. A typical energy density for gasoline is 8KWH/l [1], which translates to a good 400KWH in a tank. If we assume that an electrical car is twice as efficient in terms of getting energy out of batteries (which is probably optimistic), 200KWH of batteries would be needed. I found [2] a figure of 300V for a hybrid car battery, so that gives us a recharge rate of 666AH.
s html
To recharge your car in 1 hour, you'd have to connect it to the ditribution transformer with solid copper plates.
Jw
[1] http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2003/ArthurGolnik.
[2] http://www.hybridcars.com/battery-comparison.html
So, it's news that Japan is pushing for more efficient poweruse, but Slashdot have never mentioned how the Bush Energy Plan promotes the use of high efficiency appliances, such as no-power standby devices which don't consume power to maintain a ready state. In spite of the obstruction from members of Congress, Bush has already allocated some $77 million for research and development of high efficiency appliances like waterheaters that use a heat pump to efficiently warm water instead of a wasteful heating element (the element also corrodes and taints water).
I have a live, and can't be here to pimp the President's energy policy 24/7. It's disconcerting to see that Slashdot goes all the way to Japan for a story taking place in their own back yard.
I bought a new Honda Civic last year (not the hybrid). One of the selling points is the new air conditioning system that is claimed to only require about 1 HP to operate. In previous Hondas, when driving up into the mountains here, you could feel the loss of drive power when the air conditioner compressor kicked in. No such effect with the new system. I'm impressed.
The post above you claims .7 mpg better for open windows. Assuming a gas tank of 13 gal, that's ~9 miles. Considering that I can usually go at least 330-350 mi on that 13 gallons of gas, 9 miles doesn't sound that significant.
Just drop it in the crusher... with him still at the wheel.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
55mph?
Their lawyers / safety engineers / etc. wouldn't let them drive that fast, so they drove 45mph.
They also never switched the vehicles, as they may have been tuned differently, so it was a completely unscientific test. (they were the same year and model, but that means next to nothing, due to the tolerances allowed in the engines and such).
Also, Jamie (the one who was driving with air conditioning), was wearing a heavy coat the whole time, because he put the air conditioning on maximum the whole time, rather than trying to get it to a comfortable level. He even complained that it was rather cold in the vehicle.
There's also no consideration given for any other vehicle make and model.
I'm normally a big fan of the show, but I can't believe that they messed up that particular experiment as badly as they did.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Ever ask yourself why the Kyoto Protocol excluded China, India, Brazil, etc? If you were really trying to solve global warming (ignoring the warming and cooling periods that happened for millenia before industrialization), wouldn't you at least want to include China? Wouldn't you want to encourage nuclear power plants to replace coal-fired ones?
OTOH, if you just wanted to screw a low-population-density nation like America that's heavily dependent on cars/trucks/etc, Kyoto's an effective way to do it.
Meanwhile, the trendy leftists here in the People's Republic of Ann Arbor won't allow high-density housing to be built so half the workers can't live near their jobs in the city, assuming they could afford the property taxes in the first place. But they'll scream bloody murder about President Bush not signing a treaty that very few of its signatories have a prayer of living up to, and tut-tut about how all the farmland surrounding the city is disappearing.
On the bright side, the feds recently made government agencies stop specifying Intel PCs, so maybe they'll start buying relatively efficient Athlon 64's instead of Intel blast furnaces. The EPA "Energy Star" program has been brilliant too, giving the marketing weasles something to latch onto. So there's a little progress.
When that sort of thing gets started in the US, states start punishing people for having too efficient cars so they tax them by the mile instead...
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
It's nice to see that Japan is taking it seriously. I was a bit worried when I first started reading the article when I saw that the government was 'urging' people instead of offering incentives. Then a bit later I saw that they'd give tax breaks on hybrid cars. Whew... This is precisely why the U.S. wouldn't sign the Kyoto agreements - there is no incentive because all we've been doing is cutting taxes for everyone, well, everyone except those of us in the middle. I've caught flak for proposing that the U.S. implement a simple rule. If you wish to use an interestate highway or major secondary road, you must have more than one person in the vehicle, otherwise a hefty fine ensues. But we have to do something. I don't hear any other ideas being put forth.
From BBC news: "Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi is leading the way A wave of informality is due to sweep through Japan with a government campaign to persuade office workers to abandon their jackets and ties."
8 329.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/459
Even if it was correct (CATO's impartiality is doubtful), it is four years out of date. Less than two years later Toyota was reporting per-vehicle profits on the Prius. Batteries and the like have only gotten cheaper since then, and it's not like Toyota has to offer incentives to move them!
If you are talking about constant-speed cruise on flat highways, you'd be right; a car with only those features and no hybrid hardware would be lighter and get even better mileage (as long as it didn't have to climb hills). But that isn't "where the rubber meets the road"; hybrid drivetrains pay off big due to:- Regenerative braking in traffic.
- Reduced engine friction due to smaller engine.
- Reduced throttling losses, ditto.
- Idling losses reduced or eliminated under many operating conditions.
Then there are the people putting bigger batteries in their Priuses and running off grid electricity for short trips. They may or may not be saving energy, but it's a fact that the juice is not coming from petroleum and it has the potential to come from non-polluting sources either now or in the future. That's going to be the next big thing.Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Surely anything that needs a soft-off option could have a small solar panel and battery so that remote controls etc could still work to turn them on?
I've seen AWOL Bush's 'energy plan' and I can tell you it does very little except put cash into the pockets of very large Texas energy corps. It does nothing to foster reduced demand for imported oil. Go and drink your MTBE now.
"Only in their dreams can men truly be free 'twas always thus, and always thus will be."
--Tom Schulman
So?
Curbing oil use seems like a good idea - whatever the motivation may be..
I agree with you, but it is a pain to drive in business suit with no AC in the car. Suits are usually dark, and always have long sleve trousers)
Hopefully a lot of other countries follow suit.
k +oil%22
0 .html?tw=wn_tophead_2
This peak oil thing is huge.
From this year to 2010, we're going to reach the peak of oil production, then it's a downward spiral after that. Basicly, we're screwed!
Look for yourself:
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=ca&q=%22pea
Also:
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,67679,0
"The problem is that Japan won't be able to meet their obligations from the Kyoto Agreement."
Right. A relatively small island nation is having troubles meeting it's commitments to Kyoto. Is it any wonder why the U.S. didn't sign on? The requirements are near impossible - especially for an energy PRODUCING nation.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Of course, a search on "car manufacture energy consumption" would have turned up this page which shows that manufacture accounts for about 10% of life-cycle energy; fuel accounts for nearly 75%.
(I can't believe someone rated you "Insightful".)
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Producing a 100 MPG car is doable NOW - but it isn't practical because you'd have to make the following sacrifices:
- Safety for less weight
- Distance for less energy storage capability
- Convienience for 'warm-up' times
- Speed for less horsepower
No matter how you split it up, there's only so much kinetic energy produced by hydrogen/gasoline/electricity. We are not yet close to being able to replace gasoline vehicles without making HUGE sacrifices. Better batteries, ways of storing hydrogen, and/or other power sources (nuclear) will change that.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Yup. I agree. We're screwed. It's all about peak oil. It's all over the news:
k +oil%22&btnG=Search+News
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q=%22pea
No more computer jobs! No more shit. We're screwed. It's time to think about farming and cooking jobs!
Do some research, Japan already uses nuclear power.
And while 3 Mile Island and Chernobyl are well-known,
Japan doesn't exactly have a sparkling record.
Were that I say, pancakes?
Hollywood. Entertainment. Yup.
Why do you think the RIAA and MPAA are so powerful, and government makes them more so with each passing bill? It is our last great 'resource'.
You think that's funny, right? Take a look at what these movies and games are pulling in and remember that this is all taxable profit. What other industries do the U.S. invest so heavily in and protect so much?
Yes, I think a day of reckoning is coming - unless the rest of the world will continue to put up with our B.S. as long as we get out the next sequel to Star Wars...
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
If you just want 15 miles of all-electric range to get rid of gasoline for all your local trips, the batteries would be $2700. As gasoline heads towards the $2.50/gallon mark and upwards, it would only take a few years for most people's investment in batteries to pay off. Best of all, the price of batteries keeps coming down.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
SAFETY (or at least the perception of it). Go ahead. Drive the D.C. beltway a while in a Prius in the company of Excursions and Hummers. Every day there is an accident involving the 'jaws of life' with some poor bastard trapped in his cage of twisted steel. You just know that if you are in an accident, you're toast. At least, that's how people think. Actually, it depends on the type of accident. But I digress.
A lot of soccer moms out there are buying SUVs for the big and brawny factor. They've seen those accidents and panic no different than when you see those Discovery Channel animal videos - you know, the ones that have wild-eyed wilderbeests crossing a river full of crocs. If you really want to cut down the sales of these things, than you need to prove to people that driving a Civic or Prius is a safe endevour.
Don't belittle people for their fears - help them through it. Or... Do they really have something to be afraid of.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Japan doesn't have a sparkling record because Japan has been using poorly designed reactors for half a century and don't want to replace them. I understand the safest reactors right now are the Canadian CANDU which supposedly cannot suffer meltdowns or leak contaminants because of their encasings and kill-switches. It's a shame Japan has had so many reactor accidents because nuclear power right now has the least impact, waste aside (which we'll eventually figure out how to dispose of, but that's my faith in science talking). Three generations of my family, including me, have lived/grown up outside a nuke plant and I've got no concerns whatsoever. And I'd have no problem with another being built right beside it. Better nuke than coal, and our options otherwise are pretty limited.
These are real-world numbers. The lithium-ion tzero carries 60 kWh of batteries and can run almost 300 miles on a charge.
60 kWh / 300 V = 200 Ah. The house I grew up in has 300 amp service; if you charged the car over the same cables it would take 40 minutes, and if you kept the same energy storage but boosted the battery voltage to 480 volts you could cut that to 25 minutes.Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
I'm sure you can. I work with South Asians who laugh and say they handle over 44C every year and have no problem with puny Canadian 33C summer days. But then those same guys insist on keeping the office thermo at that temperature from autumn to spring and even bring in space heaters from home while I personally feel fine with -10C and no heat on at home or in the car. Funny how human beings acclimatize themselves to different temperatures based on where they grew up, physiology, and life experiences. Unless you happen to live in a perfect, year-round temperate zone then there's going to be some season in which you exercise climate control, either through heat or AC. Do you keep your heat off all winter? Stop pretending you need it to live.
You can run any diesel engine on any sort of veggie oil (Corn, canola, sunflower, peanut, hemp, palm, rape seed, olive oil you name it, put it in the tank and it will work). It's clean, renewable, has no sulphur and the CO2 emitted is less than the CO2 absorbed when the plants were growing, so simply by using veggie oil in your diesel car you are curbing CO2 emissions
Here in the UK, you can get kits to modify the diesel engine (www.dieselveg.com) - all the mod is is a heat exchanger that heats the oil up to 70 degrees C, so it loses its viscosity and can be injected into the combustion chamber. Vegetable oil also has a slightly higher calorific value than regular dirty diesel, so if anything, you ought to get a small performance boost from using veggie oil. Alternatively, you can just mix veggie oil with dirty diesel without any modifications to your engine.
When the growing season in the northern hemisphere ends, the industrialised world could pay farmers in developing nations to grow the stuff - pay them a fair price, and give them an opportunity to earn real hard currency, instead of giving them handouts all the time.
IIRC, growing an area the size of Devon and Cornwall with rape seed specifically for diesel engine use would meet the energy requirements that cars in the UK need...
It's totally amazing that we have a clean, renewable energy source already here in front of us, that can be used with existing cars, buses tractors and trucks, yet governments around the world haven't bothered looking into this in a serious way. They're all so seduced by wind farms and tidal power....what a joke.
-- Fuck Beta
Not quite. Jimmy Carter did. That why he was run out of office when he ran for reelection, he was considered to be a "environmentalist wuss." I mean, how dare he ask America to conserve energy. Go to any big city in the nation and they will tell you that a lightbulb turned off is a lightbulb wasted (Houston in particular looks like day in the middle of night).
Open Source Sushi
Biodiesel.
-Simple *mechanical* engines
-Use existing energy distribution network
-Almost zero net contribution of carbon pollutants
-No need for rare-earth materials or complicated refineries/production centers
-Self-sufficiency is possible for small communities
I'm really hoping that the algae-based production methods pan out. I'm also hoping that Toyota releases it's diesel engines in the US soon so I can get an FJ that runs clean.
If the Japanese want to save energy, they could try using thermal insulation in their houses. One of my friends lived in Japan for three years, teaching English, and his house and paper thin walls and no insulation. I visited him in April and May of two different years and when the sun went down, it would get very cold in the house. We'd have to turn on his electric heaters to stay warm.
And it wasn't just his house, his friends out there had similar problems with their houses.
Coming from the UK, it was wierd, them not having roof insulation or central heating.
America! FUCK YEAH!
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
Ironically enough, because it wasn't SAFE ENOUGH to run a large SUV at those speeds for any kind of extended period. Ha-ha!
70-80mph is a standard cruising speed on the freeway here, and it IS more efficient to use the AC than open the windows there. Drag is not a linear effect.
..don't panic
I'd like to know in which field America is leading the world.
Weapons.
Yeah - all those dvd players pulling 150ma of idle current are the root cause of our energy problems. Way to go after the big issues, Georgie. $77 mil research budget? Boy, that'll put us out at the forefront of technology in no time. We're spending about 3x that PER DAY in the Iraq debacle. But yeah, it shows George *really* cares about energy efficiency....it's certainly not just a token gesture so they can claim positive energy initiatives. They'd never stoop to that, not the Bush Republicans.
A Toyota Prius or Honda Civic Hybrid model that I could plug into a wall outlet for the night to reduce fuel consumption even further. It's a pity they can't recharge like that.
Even better, a _diesel_ Toyota Prius that can recharge the same way. That thing would get 50mpg from the engine alone, plus synergy drive would probably drive fuel consumption down even further.
Parent did not even have courtesy to label link as not safe for family or work.
encourage people to use less energy is to tax energy consumption heavily
I believe this is incorrect. We don't care about emission-free energy usage. We don't want people to use less energy. We want people (and our societies) to:
* create less global-warming-inducing greenhouse gasses like CO2;
* reduce our interaction with and/or dependence on strife-ridden regions of the world that produce fossil fuels;
* have the solution minimize any negative impacts on our economy;
* have the solution (optimally) result in worldwide solutions to the problem not just local ones;
* reduce mercury and other heavy metals emissions from coal-fired power plants;
* reduce smog other asthma-inducing emissings (including nitrogen oxides) from all sources;
* reduce risks of nuclear contamination as a result of both power plants and nuclear weapons proliferation;
* reduce consequences of mining and drilling for coal, oil, etc. ecosystems both foreign and domestic.
Ideally, we should concentrate on accurately auditing and taxing the damage to the commons (atmosphere, water, land, etc.). I believe it would behove us to create protocols where we divide ownership and tax such emissions, and/or create a trading environment to allow free-market forces to reduce the levels of pollution. IANAE I'm not an economist, but this would seem prudent.
Let's not tax electricity blindly; exempt taxes for power from renewable and clean sources.
Eliminate the tragedy of the commons with protocols for the trading of rights to emit pollutants. The market will determine quickly how much a kg of CO2 costs to sequester, how much a kg of mercury likewise. At some point, all emitters must have permits they can purchase on the open market. To reduce emissions, have the government buy back the emission rights. Put a bounty on enforcement loopholes and you'll find cheaters. Free markets do great things, but we have to help with the 'commons' problems.
-- Kevin
Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
The real concern is not really peak oil per se.
Japan imports nearly all of its oil. A rival power, the USA, controls oil-rich regions. What would you do in their situation? Probably the same thing powers like France and Germany did- reduce reliance on fossil fuels.
Having a less energy-intensive industry means they win big if oil prices go up. Balance-of-trade issues also factor in; some of the policies discussed in the article were started over a decade ago.
And anyone concerned about Peak Oil and wanting to get the government to act on it would probably have used the above arguments. Fear isn't a very good motivator.
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
I was under the impression that the idea of Gojira-as-America was explicitly acknowledged by the creators of the films.
Good for them. I think one of the most ridiculous things in the US is the cold temperature of the office buildings during the summer.
It has gotten so bad that I am much more likely to get a cold in the summer than in the winter just from walking into freezing buildings from the over heated outside.
SUV sales are still rising.
When you go backwards, you're going where you've been before.
But since the late 1990s, fuel economy in the US has been exploring... er.. 'uncharted territory'.
These two together expand the available fuel supply by about a million times. We also can extract uranium from seawater, and there is a LOT of it in the ocean.
Being a cynic I interpret this as a political move. OTOH, Japan DOES have to import all it's fuel, and they are very aware that this is a crucial vulnerability. So it makes a lot of sense to do anything they can to reduce their dependance on it.
But I think that the "reduce global warming" bit was just tacked on because it looked good.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Only idiot government don't do it. Huge majority, unfortunately.
Japan and others must be careful that the march to higher fuel efficient devices does not lead them to spend such a large amount of wealth, wealth created through energy consumption, that the net effect is that more energy is consumed than would have been if they had simply kept their older devices, used them closer to the point where the repair cost would be excessive, and then purchased more energy efficient devices once prices have been reduced through a longer period of market competition. While increased energy efficiency is a laudable goal, the Japanese, as well as everyone else, must look beyond the hype and ensure that they are not making a shortsighted mistake and working against their stated goals, but ensuring that their goals indeed are being achieved through introspection and economic analysis. It may indeed make more sense to hold onto a servicable 10 year old fridge than purchase a new model, but perhaps the case with a 15 year old fridge the case would be reversed. Businesses have much to gain from a large uptake in appliance sales, and the buyer must ask himself if his interests always coincide with what a business is asking of him. Japanese, as well as all consumers, must not look at energy efficiency through a religious-mania tinged prism, but do the math to ensure that the net benefits are indeed larger than the net drawbacks.
Slashdot: Playing Favorites Since 1997
What we need is to reduce number of crappy web sites, and XXX PRON sites. That alone will save over 30% of energy use in this country per year.
:)
Move everyone to highspeed broadband will save another 20% as everyone will spend less time download craps.
I just save 50%
I guess it might help if you watch the news.
Take a look at the cars on the road. The tiny green circular sticker on the back of at least 60% of the cars you see is the "Eco Car" sticker. They get better gas milage, produce less emmisions and are better for the enviroment. These cars give a great beneift not only to the environment, but also the owners, who pay a great deal less on their car tax ever year. Hybrids pay even less (I've heard rumors of none at all, but since I don't own one, I don't know).
The same can be said for the new energy efficient refridgerators, ovens, TVs, washers, etc that are pretty much all that is sold any more. It's hard to find non-energy efficent appliances that aren't at a used product store.
Sure, people in Japan are obsessed with the newest thing. Same in america. But unlike in america where you just chunk the old one to the curb, in Japan you either sell it to a used goods store, or pay a nice bit of change to properly recycle it. The new models are often more energy efficient, so it makes sense to buy them and save on your electric bill.
And as one of the "little things" Prime Minister Koizumi has had his "No necktie" campaign in the works since last summer, where he urges salarymen to wear no neckties and jackets in the office during summer to cut down on the use of Air Conditioners, which eat up electricity like no one's business. It's a small thing, but yet another way that Japan is attempting to conserve energy.
--------
Nothing can be done before the tremendous power!
RabidComics
Nah, Budo. It's Japan, remember?
"OH SHIT, THERE'S A HORSE IN THE HOSPITAL!"
As for your oven problem, try reading the instruction manual.
;)
I mean, you're complaining about not being able to use your micorwave oven on Slashdot.
The bar for nerds must be dropping.
--------
Nothing can be done before the tremendous power!
RabidComics
Arghh.. I hate trying to decipher Japanese appliances. Almost all of the appliances sold where I live are imported from Japan.. so, when trying to figure out how to operate my AC (while I do enjoy the fact that it's remote controlled) not only did I have to get used to using celsius, but I had to figure out the difference between arrows in a circle and arrows in a square. I guess it should be patently obvious what the difference is, but it makes no sense to me. The only thing I know for sure is that the snowflake makes it cold. Good snowflake.
(No, the instruction manual doesn't help. "Please to make you happy air with much joy." They might be able to translate the words, but translating the meaning is a whole nother ballgame).
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
I saw this movie on DVD about a year ago after reading references to it since the 1970's.
I noticed the same idea. All the long scenes of actor Michael Caine making coffee with a French press, grinding the beans, measuring the grounds, etc... I couldn't understand why these ordinary pedestrian things were taking so much time in a movie that had gotten so many positive reviews since its release.
Finally after a half-hour of this stuff, I gave up. One more movie that lost its cinematic impact over time. This happens to most movies and only a few become classics. And of the capital-C Classic films, few remain watchable even after only a few decades. Either the social conflicts that made them so intense on their release have ended, or the film techniques become too irritating to watch after years have passed and new film 'grammars' become common.
This has happened, in my opinion, to most of the European New Wave films of the late 1950s and 1960s that are so acclaimed. Upon checking out their DVDs from the library and viewing from contemporary perspectives, most are simply unwatchable now.
I too live in Japan, and agree that while the cost of manufacturing all this new stuff may be a huge consuption, don't forget the amount of recycleing done here. i don't mean stuff like bottles and cans, I mean recycle shops where you can get anything from electronics to tyres and rims to mufflers and GPS systems or jewlery or toys and housewares , most in damn good shape as the origional poster pointed out, "it's not like anyone keeps anything for more than 2 years here anyway."
Don't even get me started on the cost of gasoline, I drive a 3 Litre nissan gloria and 3/4 of a tank cost me 6800 yen yesterday. My parents just got here from a trip to China and they tell me that gas is only about $.50us a gallon... so shake down your big corps. in the US and do something about it seeing how you all be democratically publically represented by your elected officials.
As to your oven, I do believe it is a Range, so Press the button that says Ranji, select your wattage with the Up/Down arrows, set your time with the knob and hit Sutato.
flinging poop since 1969
honestly, a lot of what the Japanese accomplish is a result of what they truly believe to be important. if Americans truly believed in achieving the levels of efficiency that the Japanese have, we wouldn't be as wasteful as we are. did you read the article? we consume 3 times the energy to produce the same amount of work...
Concerns not only cars. Think of buildings. I live in northern Japan (snowy winters, hot summers) and assure you that most of buildings seem to have been constructed without much concern for thermal insulation.
What campaign are they talking about anyway?
p.s. Am I to understand that "Patriotic" is a good thing when applied to countries other than the US? Reading posts here, I had been led to believe that patriotic=fascist. Perhaps I am just not "nuanced" enough to understand!
Sometimes at night I imagine the darkness is filled with horrible things with too many teeth, like Julia Roberts.
No, I don't watch Japanese TV very much. Just the news sometimes. And I guess for me to know about it, a national campaign would have to have posters all along my bike ride to work, and perhaps on the door to my office, and one on my pillow, since that's about all I see these days.
That being said, most everything you just mentioned has been going on for years. I guess I was looking for some big "Kyampeen Chuu" posters or something.
Moreover, I live 30 minutes from Tokyo Station and I just had to furnish another Japanese apartment. I bought a fridge, my hated oven, a combo washer/dryer (that eats tons of electricity and does a terrible job on the latter to boot), and a gas range all at once. My Japanese is excellent (I have taught university Japanese courses in the US) and I can tell you there was no discussion of a recycling tax on my 20 man en (about $2000 US) order. I have purchased other such items since and still haven't heard a word of it. I separate my trash into burnable, non-burnable, and conmingled recycling--just like everywhere I've lived around this country, except the one place where recycling was not even an option--you put that into the non-burnable. My office is running at 23 (granted, it is private). I don't see grass on any buildings anywhere... I'd understand if I were still out in Hokuriku, but I'm in the heart of Kanto, and I'm not seeing many of the things you mention at all. So where do you live???
mhhhh... nihongo ha wakaru ? (Can you understand Japanese) ? If you do , you should see the news more often. It has been recently there, starting with the 28C inside offices and the no - tie campaign !
"We all know Linux is great...it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." -- Linus
Check out The End Of Suburbia for a movie about how the suburbs will end up as the slums of the future - and all because of oil.
No, I'm not associated with them. I just like the movie.
Okay, okay, here's the real link.
You'd compare the defense sector to building a hot water heater?
Don't quit your dayjob. You're just... not funny.
Devices on standby power consume 30% of all power.
.150 mAh. Now mutiply that by every adapter you have plugged in at home and at work, then by 320 million people using electricity in the US, and you come up with a few terawatt hours of electric power that we can reclaim.
150 ma of idle current is a tad high, by the way. It's closer to
If you can pull your head from your rectum long enough, you might find that there is this concept known as "common ground", and while you'd rather be bashing Bush, you should be working with him.
This coming from a country that classifies garbage as "burnabale" and "unburnable". sheesh.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
LOL. I just find it a little funny, because our government alone has killed many more millions than anyone they encourage the bleating masses to call "terrorist." And yet people still worry about a "suicidal maniac." I think we capitalist maniacs are already winning the "contest of terror"!
-- thinkyhead software and media
During the early 1990's, there was a competition sponsored by the US government to develop a vehicle that could get 80 miles per US gallon fuel efficiency. GM approached Toyota with doing a co-operative venture on such a vehicle, but Toyota rejected the idea. But during the negotiations with GM, Toyota engineers got a lot of insights (pun not intended) on how to dramatically improve gasoline fuel efficiency, and started work on a drivetrain that allowed for a smaller gasoline-fuelled engine because battery-powered electric motors would do much of the work on moving the car, with the gasoline engine providing a way to recharge the batteries under partial-load or regenerative-braking conditions. That research done by Toyota alone resulted in the Prius, a truly groundbreaking automobile that stunned automobile companies around the world when it was unveiled in 1997.
In the tune of saving energy a new engine rotary valve design has been developed which should drastically decrease fuel oil consumption as well as get more power from the engine. Sadly only a Canadian Gas company and British auto makers are seeing this as a good thing. Way to go for the retard and fuel hogging American vehicle manufactures. Maybe they will actually wake up the day after gas is over $5 USD/Gal at the pump. Probably not...
For more information on this design go to:
http://www.coatesengine.com/
Actually, it's more along the lines of 6-10 years of bracken, but still true.
Heck, even the Native Australians and Americans had controlled burn policies.
I don't read AC A human right
While I'm sure that extensive research was done to make sure the environmental impact to manufacture the replacement items did not outweigh the benefits of using them, one has to wonder what kind of unstated bias was inherent in any such research?
If the United States (or any national government, for that matter) wants to really get serious about energy conservation, they need to send this generation a shock to correct a lot of bad habits. I'm proposing a tax on all *new* goods, directly proportional to the overall environmental impact of producing the good. Since energy return per energy invested is so very high for oil right now, we're buying many goods at about 3-10% of their total actual cost to produce. I'm not suggesting a 3000% tax, but customers need to be educated in a meaningful, lasting way about the problems we will soon face. And such a tax, if properly (that is to say, directly) funneled into energy research and the development of new, cleaner energy infrastructure, would help our society far more than any short-term economic impact could hurt it.
Jasin NataelTrue science means that when you re-evaluate the evidence, you re-evaluate your faith.
Tell me about it. It's 5 am and over 70 and will be mid 90's today more then likely. Everyone here at work is either wearing a jacket or has one on chair.
I separate my gomi into burnable, non-burnable, PET, plastic/vinyl, milk cartons, newsprint, color magazines, glass/lightbulbs, batteries, cloth. If you're in an area that allows black trash bags, you're part of the minority now. If you're in an area that has calcium-rich translucent bags, you need to sort your trash and you can get inspected by the garbage police. Inside the 23, you need a sticker on new products to show the recycling tax has been paid at the point of purchase, otherwise you will be dinged 3000 to 10000 yen at its end of life. That's why the roaming recycling trucks have suddenly come back into fashion: they take stuff for free if it's working.
I will admit to not being a farmer, although I grew up in a fairly rural area, but my understanding is that today, we produce too much food, enough that governments (particularly the US government) have had to subsidize not growing certain products to keep the market from crashing. *shrug* The problem, as usual, is distribution.
Well, you *CAN* have it!
Just get the PRIUS+ kit from California Cars !
Of course, (tsk tsk) it may not be made in Japan...
.
- aqk
F U
Where did you get this figure?
- Does it include the losses from refining the oil?
-
Does it include the up to 20% loss from transporting the energy to the places where it will be used?
-
Does it include the periodic need to drive the vehicles to service stations, an otherwise wasted trip?
-
Indirect costs? Extra road maintenance? Extra costs of idle engines in bumper-to-bumper traffic (if not electric)? (etc.)
Getting the oil out of the ground is only part of the energy needed to use it. I think if all of the costs were added up, the 30/1 figure wouldn't apply.And, naturally, after using the oil, the costs of cleaning up the air, water and keeping the land farmable are not taken into account, but one study placed a figure of $400 billion on that, IIRC, if I didn't underestimate it. That doesn't include the health costs, either...
http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/convkp/kpeng.html
It appears I was working off an old draft of the kyoto protocol. Instead article 3 of the current protocol only stipulates that forests play an important role as a carbon sink... and it can only be a carbon sink if it is not burning.
see earlier posts about how combustable australian bush is.
You've got to be ready to cross-check numbers to be sure they're legit.
Really? What facts brought you to that conclusion? Kilowatt-hours are units of energy, not power. Your question is incoherent, like asking how fast you have to drive to travel 50 miles. I strongly suggest that you begin by learning enough physics so that you understand these issues thoroughly, and can answer the questions yourself (they aren't difficult).A Newton is the force required to accelerate one kilogram at one meter per second squared (kg-m/sec^2). A Joule is a unit of energy equal to one Newton-meter. A Watt is a Joule per second. That's where you start.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Clearly we're going to have to wittle this down for challenged individuals such as yourself.
.150 mAh of power is .018 Watts/hour.
First of all, nobody (least of all myself) asserted that mAh is a 'measurement of standby power'. It represents current sinked over time. Since the US standard electrical voltage is 120 volts, you can infer then that the power disappated by a device drawing
Now, go around and count every device pluggin into something in your house. If it lights up, beeps, or cannot otherwise operate immediately after being plugged in, it's using power. Now multiply that number by 5 watts per hour, times 8,760 hours, and tell me that this is not a problem.
Then there are the people who say "kilowatts per hour" and arrogantly assert that they actually know something; they're either trolls or ignoramuses and I'm heartily sick of them. It's good to prove that you aren't one of them at the outset.
There are two factors to that: charging overvoltage and coulomb efficiency. If the cell needs- 70% coulomb efficiency for NiCd, nearly 100% for Li-ion.
- Another claim of 100% coulomb efficiency for Li-ion, and 85-90% overall efficiency.
You can probably find more with a more targeted search.I understand that lead-acid efficiency is particularly poor because of the need to overcharge them to prevent sulfation, but my cursory search found nothing on that. Familiarity with their web site did let me find the efficiency graph on page 41 of this paper, but I doubt that a search engine would have. Those figures are interesting, showing small-cycle efficiency no lower than 90% over the entire charge range even for lead-acid batteries.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
First time I've ever been foe'd by someone I went out of my way to help.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
The difference is that I probably do need my heat on in the winter to live. ;)
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Secondly, smog does make it hot. The denser atmosphere traps sunlight increasing the temperature.
Thirdly, what good would an air condition do outside? Think before you post.
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