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Fuel-cell Vehicles for Americans
hey writes "An article titled Fuel-cell vehicles run clean, but is their future clear? in the Japan Times says Honda is leasing fuel-cell cars to individual Americans. The article mentions: 'Honda officials said it is easier for the automaker to start leasing in the U.S. because there are more hydrogen gas installations there than in Japan.'"
...a lot of countries are going to get nervous about potential invasion. If you thought things were bad with us taking your oil, wait till we come calling for your precious precious hydrogen.
They designed specifically for advancing the future of fuel cell vehicles:
http://www.cafcp.org/aboutus.html
They have 15 installations now, and have 9 more planned.
http://www.cafcp.org/fuel-vehl_map.html
There are 65 fuel cell vehicles in California.
but it won't actually matter until its cheaper to buy a Fuel Cell powered vehicle, and its ridiculously expensive to buy ridiculous cars like the Ford Excursion.
You know, it's funny how people become completely blind about the cost of owning a vehicle: buying and using a Ford Excursion *is* ridiculously expensive. So is buying and using most other cars. It's strange, but most people only consider the price of gas when they think about how much a car costs them.
I go around by bike and public transportation myself, and I occasionally call a cab, or rent a car whenever I need to. I'm not particularly ecology-minded, but I calculated that driving about 20000 miles per year (which isn't much really) in the mid-sized sedan I had costed about 5 grand a year. That included gasoline, insurance, amortization, repairs, parking tickets, etc etc etc... With my current scheme, I stay healthier and it costs a grand total of $1000 on bad years.
$5000 is a big hole in many people's budget, yet they don't seem to realize. And I dare not imagine what it is when people buy cars on credit...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Why should the government interfere? It's the free market that's finding a replacement for gasoline.
Because the free market does not at this time account for the real cost of environmental pollution.
The free market is so good because it provides very accurate price signals to account for time humans spend to make something. But (car manufacturers) are able to build cars and people are able to run their cars that cost pollution that they are not charged for.
Somebody, eventually, will pay that cost though. Either through increased health care or by eventually being forced to use and even cleaner vehicle because the environment has absorbed all it can.
Remember, purchasing a low-emission or no-emission does nothing to clean my air, so there's a huge free rider problem.
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
If you base your nuclear power on burning thorium (3 times more common than uranium), you gain certain advantages such as no plutonium production, less radioactive garbage to contend with, and greater safety.
h tm
http://www.cavendishscience.org/bks/nuc/thrupdat.
The thorium fuel cycle has been known since the 1950s but was discarded due to cold-war politics in favour of uranium burning reactors that bred plutonium. Additionally, thorium reactors can be used to get rid of existing plutonium in a safe manner.
So if the Indian and Russian experiments pan out (and it looks like they will), expect nuclear power to become a more attractive option. Perhaps the Iranians could jump on the thorium bandwagon as well; it would go some way towards keeping that madman in Washingtom at bay.
Some of the adverse environmental impact is already in place in the form of water rentention dams, and with modifications these dams could be producing electricity.
I few months ago I attended a lecture at the University of Kentucky by Jack Spadaro (http://www.jackspadaro.com/), an accomplished mining engineer who helped draft much of the (poorly enforced) regulations for surface mining in the United States. At one point in the lecture he claimed that if all of the currently installed water retention dams in the West Virgina were converted to hydroelectric dams West Virginia could meet all of its power needs without using a single lump of coal.
As for wind power, I agree that it only works in certain areas, requires large tracts of land, and can be unreliable. But modern wind turbines have significantly reduced noise by improvements in production techniques and aerodynamics, and are no more noisy than traditional power plants (Buffalo Mountain in Tenneesee is a prime example). Also, the bird deaths at sites like Altamont should be seen in context - proportionally automobiles, radio towers, and skyscrapers each kill more birds than wind farms do, and newer wind turbines are designed to prevent birds from perching/nesting on them and rotate at slower speeds. I would suggest going here (http://www.cogreenpower.org/Wind.htm) for more information on the subject.
Well in my opinion we should be looking for the "technological silver bullets" becauase that is were the future resides. Bush is worried that the US economy would be wrecked by taxing energy consumption, then what does he think a disastrous war that is costing hundreds of billions of dollars is going to do.
I use to think that people were naive if you thought the war in Iraq was about oil and now I think you are naive if you think it wasn't about the control of oil and contracts in oil field development. Lets just put it this way, the war in Iraq was not about WMD and it wasn't about terrorism.
It is good tho to see Bush acknowledging that our dependance on oil is a national security. Amory Lovins has been saying this for years. In fact, our dependence is not unlike a chemically dependent junkie who will do things to get his next fix that he would not normally do.
Regardless imagine if the money that was spent in Iraq was spent on the development of new demand and supply side technology such as hybrid vehicles, cheap diode lighting, solar sail lighting, better building techniques and terrestrial and extraterrestrial solar energy production, safer and cleaner nuclear, wave energy and of couse the holy grail of fusion energy.
Further the taxing of energy consumption would not create economic disaster as Bush states and as you note in the UK. It would harm certain segments such as traditional energy suppliers but creates and fosters others industries that are self sustaining and pay long term dividends. It would create a whole new economy dedicated to supplying new forms of energy and using what we have more efficiently.