If I remember correctly USA has access to every single blackberry email.
Is this actually the case? I was under the impression that RIM's servers are in Canada. It wouldn't shock me if the US government had access, but I didn't think that they did.
I picked that one because the numbers were easy (250w x 4hours/day = 1 kWh) - my point is that "plug-in grid-tie solar panels" can't be found "very cheaply these days". The implication was that it would be along the lines of shutting doors and filtering water, easy and low cost. I have looked for these things before - they're not easy to find, and they're expensive. Just a plain 175w solar panel is going to run you $750 or so, and that's without the plug in grid tie.
I didn't see a way to purchase the domes, so I assumed... They are cool.
The L-Vs are a little pricey, but I think they're not unreasonable for what you end up with, and you could keep costs down by doing a lot of stuff yourself. I think a realistic range would be $175-200k, with nice finishes. I like the idea of the calearth domes too, but that's a much harder sell for the wife. Maybe if we end up in the boonies one day.
I agree that there is some impact from the laborer, but it's not nearly so linear as it is with the raw materials. If I get a $1000 load of concrete, the cost is a fair approximation of the energy put into it. If I get a carpenter to make me a $1000 bookshelf, the energy input is not nearly as great, and if I hire a painter to do a $1000 faux marble finish on a wall it's even less.
The only thing that ever matters in these kinds of projects, the only thing WORTH measuring, is how long until it starts to pay for itself. Not the electrical system, or the "money saved" on your normal use, but the time until you're actually in profit on the venture as a whole.
It's a crass and crude measure but the money invested into getting something like photovoltaics, underfloor heating, etc. is directly related to the difficulty of manipulating the raw materials, the cost of extraction, the rarity, the difficulty of transporting them, installing them, the environmental impact they have (via taxes, subsidies, etc.).
I agree that you should try to make a profit on your green projects - it's the most straightforward way we have of measuring impact. It seems to me that the raw material costs should reflect their environmental impact fairly closely; if something requires a lot of energy to extract & produce, that will be reflected in its cost. I wouldn't include the costs of installation, however; paying a skilled worker a good chunk of cash doesn't represent a direct environmental impact. You might still debate whether it's worth doing, but if you're looking at just the environmental payback I don't think you should include the labor costs.
How much did subsidies kick in for that? It seems like here in MD a 4,000kW system would be about $12k after subsidies; at prices like you're talking about it might make sense.
My favorite modular homes are the L-Vs from http://www.rocioromero.com/ - unlike most of the designs you see out there (including, as far as I can tell, that domehouse) you can actually order one, and a decent number have been built. I've been in one, and it's a nice design. Maybe someday I'll get to build one...
4) Always-on electrical loads? You can buy a plug-in grid-tie solar panel very cheaply these days. Just plug it in where you have your PC plugged in, or whatever.
The first one I could find was $1800 for a 250w system; that's going to make 1 kWh per day (ie, $0.15 per day, tops). Every time I do the numbers, PV systems are the last possible thing you want to do. Almost every passive measure you take is going to have greater results, for way less cost.
In the middle of winter, the geothermal heating unit can't keep up and the electric furnace which is kept as backup kicks in to keep the house warm (albeit only in -40 type weather).
That's a lot better than a conventional heat pump; mine will kick on backup heat when it's not much below freezing. Fortunately we have relatively mild winters compared to you guys, and can supplement with gas when it's really cold, so overall the heat pump is ok for us.
One reason more people don't use them is that they are hard (I was told that in my area, impossible) to add to existing homes. It's something I'd do if I ever built a house, but I guess that the slightly higher upfront cost puts a lot of people off.
I agree that induction cooktops are the way to go - we just got one and it's great. All the power & control of gas, with ~90% efficiency. LED lights, however, I don't think are there yet. I try them every so often just to see if they are improving, but I have yet to find one that has a decent spectrum. Modern CFLs are almost as efficient and their light has a good WAF, so that's what I'm sticking to for now.
If the base signal is identical but you remove a source of mains hum by breaking a ground loop you can have a very audible improvement.
But that mains hum would have to enter *after* the digital->analog conversion, no? So the cable still wouldn't matter, unless you're saying that the cable itself is transferring hum from the dvd player to the analog amp.
My thought was that it would be cool to get a portrait done next time I'm in NYC. Then I went to his website & saw that it's $1800... too rich for my blood. It's still neat stuff he's doing there, though.
I once had to poke holes in my firewall to get at internal machines on nonstandard ports when away from home. Now that they are IPV6 enabled,, I can address them directly.
Couldn't you have done this before by getting rid of the firewall? (OK, maybe you didn't get enough IPs for all your machines.) I don't want all the ports on all my home machines exposed, which is why I suspect there will be a lot of people clinging to their known NAT routers as long as possible. Once I get comfortable with IPv6 firewalls, I'll switch, but I don't want to have everything opened up until then.
I would have to disagree. The only person I know with one is a writer, and he has started using it in preference to his laptop for writing his articles. He has a bluetooth keyboard which he hasn't even tried to use with it yet, because he's perfectly happy typing onscreen. They're not for everyone, but they can be used as a real computer in a lot of cases.
I got the Skylink SC-1000 from Amazon for ~$140. It has wireless sensors (2, you can add more), a wireless motion sensor, a main control pad & a wireless module that can call a list of numbers & play a recording if the alarm goes off. The siren is pretty darn loud, and you can buy an external one to go with it too. All in all, it's about as good as I had hoped for the price, and about all that I'm willing to spend on an alarm system. I really only set it if we're going to be away for a few days or more, I also have a Zoneminder system with two cameras. If I get a call from the alarm I can either try to check the cameras (if I have internet access) or just call a neighbor to go have a look. So it's DIY in that I installed it, but otherwise there was little thought required.
You should check out this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joMK1WZjP7g It's a crash test of a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air vs. a 2009 Chevrolet Malibu, done by the IIHS for their 50th anniversary. It's pretty amazing to see how little all that metal does for you... and yes, I realize it's a joke, but this video is too good to miss.
Currently, the worst drivers tend to remove themselves from the gene pool, or at least have the possibility of death place some sort of upper bound on how moronically one can drive.
Or not, like the guy around here the other day that rear ended (at a high rate of speed) a person sitting at a light. Was he texting? Had a stroke? Who knows, but the driver who was properly stopped was killed, the driver who caused the accident was injured but may well survive. The kinds of systems described in the article would go a long way towards preventing such accidents.
Maybe it's dumb for transporting people, but it may prove to be perfect for holding cameras over Afghanistan for 21 days at a time. Time will tell, but it's an interesting idea and something different. Let's see how it plays out. Lots of people take cruises, it's not too far fetched to see people paying to float around, say, the Grand Canyon area for a few days.
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If I remember correctly USA has access to every single blackberry email.
Is this actually the case? I was under the impression that RIM's servers are in Canada. It wouldn't shock me if the US government had access, but I didn't think that they did.
Maybe the Archos 5 & 7?
I picked that one because the numbers were easy (250w x 4hours/day = 1 kWh) - my point is that "plug-in grid-tie solar panels" can't be found "very cheaply these days". The implication was that it would be along the lines of shutting doors and filtering water, easy and low cost. I have looked for these things before - they're not easy to find, and they're expensive. Just a plain 175w solar panel is going to run you $750 or so, and that's without the plug in grid tie.
I didn't see a way to purchase the domes, so I assumed... They are cool.
The L-Vs are a little pricey, but I think they're not unreasonable for what you end up with, and you could keep costs down by doing a lot of stuff yourself. I think a realistic range would be $175-200k, with nice finishes. I like the idea of the calearth domes too, but that's a much harder sell for the wife. Maybe if we end up in the boonies one day.
I agree that there is some impact from the laborer, but it's not nearly so linear as it is with the raw materials. If I get a $1000 load of concrete, the cost is a fair approximation of the energy put into it. If I get a carpenter to make me a $1000 bookshelf, the energy input is not nearly as great, and if I hire a painter to do a $1000 faux marble finish on a wall it's even less.
The only thing that ever matters in these kinds of projects, the only thing WORTH measuring, is how long until it starts to pay for itself. Not the electrical system, or the "money saved" on your normal use, but the time until you're actually in profit on the venture as a whole.
It's a crass and crude measure but the money invested into getting something like photovoltaics, underfloor heating, etc. is directly related to the difficulty of manipulating the raw materials, the cost of extraction, the rarity, the difficulty of transporting them, installing them, the environmental impact they have (via taxes, subsidies, etc.).
I agree that you should try to make a profit on your green projects - it's the most straightforward way we have of measuring impact. It seems to me that the raw material costs should reflect their environmental impact fairly closely; if something requires a lot of energy to extract & produce, that will be reflected in its cost. I wouldn't include the costs of installation, however; paying a skilled worker a good chunk of cash doesn't represent a direct environmental impact. You might still debate whether it's worth doing, but if you're looking at just the environmental payback I don't think you should include the labor costs.
How much did subsidies kick in for that? It seems like here in MD a 4,000kW system would be about $12k after subsidies; at prices like you're talking about it might make sense.
+1 for the Toto Drake!
My favorite modular homes are the L-Vs from http://www.rocioromero.com/ - unlike most of the designs you see out there (including, as far as I can tell, that domehouse) you can actually order one, and a decent number have been built. I've been in one, and it's a nice design. Maybe someday I'll get to build one...
4) Always-on electrical loads? You can buy a plug-in grid-tie solar panel very cheaply these days. Just plug it in where you have your PC plugged in, or whatever.
The first one I could find was $1800 for a 250w system; that's going to make 1 kWh per day (ie, $0.15 per day, tops). Every time I do the numbers, PV systems are the last possible thing you want to do. Almost every passive measure you take is going to have greater results, for way less cost.
In the middle of winter, the geothermal heating unit can't keep up and the electric furnace which is kept as backup kicks in to keep the house warm (albeit only in -40 type weather).
That's a lot better than a conventional heat pump; mine will kick on backup heat when it's not much below freezing. Fortunately we have relatively mild winters compared to you guys, and can supplement with gas when it's really cold, so overall the heat pump is ok for us.
One reason more people don't use them is that they are hard (I was told that in my area, impossible) to add to existing homes. It's something I'd do if I ever built a house, but I guess that the slightly higher upfront cost puts a lot of people off.
LED lights are excellent. induction cookers as well.
I agree that induction cooktops are the way to go - we just got one and it's great. All the power & control of gas, with ~90% efficiency. LED lights, however, I don't think are there yet. I try them every so often just to see if they are improving, but I have yet to find one that has a decent spectrum. Modern CFLs are almost as efficient and their light has a good WAF, so that's what I'm sticking to for now.
If the base signal is identical but you remove a source of mains hum by breaking a ground loop you can have a very audible improvement.
But that mains hum would have to enter *after* the digital->analog conversion, no? So the cable still wouldn't matter, unless you're saying that the cable itself is transferring hum from the dvd player to the analog amp.
My thought was that it would be cool to get a portrait done next time I'm in NYC. Then I went to his website & saw that it's $1800... too rich for my blood. It's still neat stuff he's doing there, though.
I once had to poke holes in my firewall to get at internal machines on nonstandard ports when away from home. Now that they are IPV6 enabled,, I can address them directly.
Couldn't you have done this before by getting rid of the firewall? (OK, maybe you didn't get enough IPs for all your machines.) I don't want all the ports on all my home machines exposed, which is why I suspect there will be a lot of people clinging to their known NAT routers as long as possible. Once I get comfortable with IPv6 firewalls, I'll switch, but I don't want to have everything opened up until then.
They should just get Disney to subsidize them & build a bunch of these:
http://atlasobscura.com/place/mickey-pylon
You could also use WASTE or similar darknet software if you're just looking to communicate & share things with your friends.
its not oriented to create things
I would have to disagree. The only person I know with one is a writer, and he has started using it in preference to his laptop for writing his articles. He has a bluetooth keyboard which he hasn't even tried to use with it yet, because he's perfectly happy typing onscreen. They're not for everyone, but they can be used as a real computer in a lot of cases.
If someone intercepted my ftp uploads, they wouldn't know or care what the heck it was.
But they might be happy to use your ftp server as a warez repository or something...
I got the Skylink SC-1000 from Amazon for ~$140. It has wireless sensors (2, you can add more), a wireless motion sensor, a main control pad & a wireless module that can call a list of numbers & play a recording if the alarm goes off. The siren is pretty darn loud, and you can buy an external one to go with it too. All in all, it's about as good as I had hoped for the price, and about all that I'm willing to spend on an alarm system. I really only set it if we're going to be away for a few days or more, I also have a Zoneminder system with two cameras. If I get a call from the alarm I can either try to check the cameras (if I have internet access) or just call a neighbor to go have a look. So it's DIY in that I installed it, but otherwise there was little thought required.
You should check out this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joMK1WZjP7g
It's a crash test of a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air vs. a 2009 Chevrolet Malibu, done by the IIHS for their 50th anniversary. It's pretty amazing to see how little all that metal does for you... and yes, I realize it's a joke, but this video is too good to miss.
Currently, the worst drivers tend to remove themselves from the gene pool, or at least have the possibility of death place some sort of upper bound on how moronically one can drive.
Or not, like the guy around here the other day that rear ended (at a high rate of speed) a person sitting at a light. Was he texting? Had a stroke? Who knows, but the driver who was properly stopped was killed, the driver who caused the accident was injured but may well survive. The kinds of systems described in the article would go a long way towards preventing such accidents.
As the AC above pointed out, they are claiming that with their hybrid design, they actually get an airfoil lift from the shape of the balloon.
Maybe it's dumb for transporting people, but it may prove to be perfect for holding cameras over Afghanistan for 21 days at a time. Time will tell, but it's an interesting idea and something different. Let's see how it plays out. Lots of people take cruises, it's not too far fetched to see people paying to float around, say, the Grand Canyon area for a few days.