In case you didn't know, most of the hydro-electric power along the Columbia has large draws and large reservoirs - so this statement is still true even in summer. As a matter of fact, it's late summer and early fall where the draws are lowest, as glaciers stop melting as much.
Again, more than 90 percent of electricity in the Puget Sound and in most of Washington and BC is from hydro. This is from official federal statistics.
I'm sure you can dig up an industry quote from a competing utility power source, but it doesn't change the reality of the power.
1. So we don't have to electroshock you and drag you to the bathroom to take a leak. 2. So you will listen to your mom/dad and eat your already cold dinner. 3. So you will finally go to bed instead of waiting until dawn. 4. So you can brag about how far you got (Level 30) instead of some other method (I went down that corridor...) 5. So we can rank how far you got for our online or in game rank listings (You are Mr. Purple!) 6. So we can sell you extra content at each level. 7. So we can tell how far you got and where people get hung up (remember when WoW plateaued around level 20 for most players?) 8. So when you do a bug report it is faster to fix (I was in this room and it was like red and...) 9. Because people like numbers.
Many people in California drive more than 1-2 hours each way for their commute. As I stated, it depends on the cost of energy where you live, the cost of gas or diesel where you live, and the cost of other alternatives (ethanol, bio-diesel, etc) all of which have different energy densities and storage requirements. Bio-diesel is not highly recommended in very cold regions, so using a higher grade non-bio diesel is a wiser choice (except in the summer months). However, the battery power can still be used for some or all of the commute, depending on the battery capacity of the vehicle, the power consumption, and the cost of electricity.
In general, as a rule of thumb, electricity in most regions of the US costs one-tenth as much as gasoline does to propel your car a similar distance. As distance increases, the increased battery capacity makes the use of electric-diesel hybrids a wiser choice, due to the storage density of fuel to battery and relative weight. As battery power discharges, the mass does not decrease (well, from a gross viewpoint), but the same is not true of liquid or solid fuel sources.
In general, for most Americans, a switch to plug-in electric bio-diesel engine systems gets significantly better mileage at lower cost - but it depends on the total cost of battery packs, fuel, electricity, and usage.
Most electricity is shaped. When I was a Power Engineer at Tek-Cominco in Trail, BC, we shaped the power from one of the hydro dams with additional power from other sources - hydro however does not need much shaping, as you can kick in additional generators as demand increases.
Most dams in the Pacific Northwest (hint, ever hear a song called Roll On Columbia) have very large drops. We have these things called Mountains here, specifically the Rocky Mountains. Even the dams that provide electricity for Seattle along our Coastal mountain chains have very large drops. It's not like the small teeny dams you have in the rest of the US. Most such dams have many turbines, with variable generation capabilities.
Please realize energy sources and shaping may differ depending where you live.
There is a Honda Civic plug-in hybrid available in the Japanese market.
It should be available by 2009 in the US market (recent coverage in the Wall Street Journal print edition).
Unlike the Japanese version which has a shorter range (most Japanese don't drive long distances to commute, only as far as the train or monorail), the US model is still choosing a specific battery technology.
But there are three firms in King County, Washington, that will retrofit Honda Civics into plug-ins right now. They charge more.
Unlike you, I understand these radical concepts called population density, market usage, and population distribution.
Repeat after me: large numbers of PEOPLE in the US have access to cheap hydro-electric and wind energy. And nuclear.
Much of the US has very low population density - I am not doing a comparison based on acreage, I am doing a comparison based on CONSUMERS - people.
People drive cars.
Not empty plots of land, yearning to be free.
As I stated, even places like New Mexico and Nevada have access to such sources.
Please wake up and realize that the population distribution of the US has changed since 1900, when most people lived along the Eastern seaboard. Now up to 40 percent of the US market is in just the Western states - California, Oregan, and Washington being the largest.
Mind you, slow charge is around 2 hours - which is longer than you need when parked at work or at home.
And when not running on charge, the motor kicks in.
What part of Commercially Available Worldwide don't you get? Just check the auto firms if you need power details... Honda Japan, Toyota Japan, VW, Lexus Japan, many more sources.
But, we can prove this assumption is incorrect just from your disclaimer.
I remember when I took Power Mechanics in grade 10 and Electricity 11 12 that in fact, gasoline engines are not 100 percent efficient. Even were we to assume you have a tuned engine (not normally true of most cars on the road, and especially not for SUVs), the reality is that the average electric motor - especially a souped up real electric motor like those used in industrial applications as most of these retrofits use - will almost always have a much higher efficiency engine than any gasoline engine unless constantly maintained at peak performance.
Down in Eugene Oregon there are a group of electric cars that can outdrag all the other drag racers. They use high-performance electric motors with souped up batteries, get around 100 mpg, and can even outdrag gasoline dragsters while they are going backwards using reverse - an electric motor doesn't really care which direction it spins if designed correctly.
Been doing this for a few years now.
You could easily mod a Prius to outdrag almost any car on the road without even trying. Heck, you could take an econo box and still out drag a gas engine.
Some models have (e.g. Japan) a 5 kilometer range - this is 3 miles for the one country in the world not using metric.
Some models have (e.g. Europe) a 50 kilometer range - this is 30 miles.
Some models have up to a 250 mile range (US conversion usually around this much).
Depends on battery type, car/truck model, and who does it.
Cost depends on factors such as - in factory (Japan/Europe) - usually a lot lower in price, sometimes as simple as the new "switch" added to the dash of Honda hybrids that turns off the A/C unless you turn it on and runs on battery until down to 1/5th charge - which gives you an effective mpg around 60 mpg with no real change to on-board batteries. Or after market - where someone goes in, rips out the engine, replaces it with a decent stepped up electric motor that can go 0-60 in 6.0 and a bio-diesel engine with all the tubes and add ons you need for this, plus putting decent batteries in locations that are more crash-resistant - this can run usually $10,000 to $50,000 depending on how extensive and what the target mpg and usage is.
It depends where you live. In large portions of the US, we use this new-fangled thing called hydro-electric power, and we supplement it with wind power. So, our basic cost is less than 7 cents per KWh. Other areas of the US use different energy supplies - Vermont is mostly Hydro with nuclear (used to own Green Mountain Power), and much of the Northeast uses imported hydro power with nuclear and some coal.
Some places generate and sell their own power from home or farm based wind turbines and solar cells - especially in the West.
So the cost of the energy ranges from $3 a gallon (cheap in the West) for gas to $0.30 gallon equivalent for electricity in coal states to $0.04 gallon equivalent for electricity in the Northwest.
At that point, the cost of retrofitting - which is less than $5000 if done by Honda or Toyota (which sell plug-in hybrids in Japan even if not in the US yet) or Lexus, or $15,000 if you use say one of the three conversion businesses in my county alone (King County in Washington state) - is price compatible if you commute to work nearby.
Of course, you could do what Willie Nelson is doing and go plug-in bio-diesel with your truck, or even convert a classic Cadillac to get more than 80 mpg using an efficient bio-diesel engine with plug-in hybrid electric power tuned to the make and model.
Some people talk.
Other people do.
P.S.: If you're on facebook and use the I Am Green app, there's a We Are Green Seattle group you can join now. Let's beat out Vancouver BC and San Francisco CA!
1. For Net users in the Americas and Europe, it would be fairly easy to establish bridge portals to not include Africa and Asia and solve the whole problem.
2. For Net users beyond the Americas and Europe, going to IPv6 would solve this problem - and installing throttle content managers to bridge the gap.
3. Just because you can link all devices to the Net, doesn't mean you have to.
And regard off-kilter research like this as flawed not just in its basic design, but unproveable by any statistically sound method, using self-selected groups of college students who tend to like to flame more than the general population, and to whom trash-talking is an art, not a crime.
I said "not much cleaner than many other less risky choices".
Coal is only one of many choices. Wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, hydro - all other choices that are less risky than coal.
And it depends on what coal (caveat - at one point I owned 500 Peabody IPO shares) actually - some is high in sulfur, some is hard to mine, some is low in sulfur and easy to mine.
Repeat after me - all advocates tend to ignore the downsides of their chosen energy source.
Wind advocates ignore their own downsides, solar too, nuclear fission too.
You are not alone in thinking your choice is the best thing since sliced bread and has no problems. It's a common problem in energy research, this blinkered focus one has that one's choice is totally wonderful and has no faults. Believe it or not, oil and coal people are just like you.
We look at game console markets as if what exists today will be the case in the future.
We know this is not true, however.
In the future, we will have more HDTV, games will adapt to feed the growing casual gamer market, MMO games will figure how to be console-based, the interface of portable game devices will increase in game connections, and a more mobile population will be served somehow.
Even the Wii itself is just a placeholder for the future game consoles that Nintendo will make. Dominance by sports games will likely not go away, due to the growing availability of HDTV sets among sports game players, and that market will be larger. But casual gamers will start expecting connectivity and games you can start, put down, and come back to - possibly with new, fresh, different content.
Light saber and fencing games will increase, due to the Wii influence.
Fun multi-player party games will increase, as HDTV sets get used at parties - let's invite everyone over to play Doctor Mario: Galactic Surgeon and DJ Dance Instructor! Pause features where you shift who is playing what will be more typical.
The question is not which console. The question is what will the next consoles be able to do.
Just think of it, 9.3 million possible guild members to deposit gold for my Squirrelly Wrath guild bank!
But, the big question is, if I need 1000 gold to buy 96 slots for the guild bank, how many of those 9.3 million accounts are on my server and aren't gold farmers who will try to join so they can siphon gold out of the guild?
And how many will be online when I am?
And will they all help me in my mythical quest for coffee, nuts, and Foamy the Squirrel?
Slashdot Mirror
When you've worked in power generation for a few years and invested in utilities for three decades, I'll listen to your advice on this matter.
Please re-read my post.
In case you didn't know, most of the hydro-electric power along the Columbia has large draws and large reservoirs - so this statement is still true even in summer. As a matter of fact, it's late summer and early fall where the draws are lowest, as glaciers stop melting as much.
Again, more than 90 percent of electricity in the Puget Sound and in most of Washington and BC is from hydro. This is from official federal statistics.
I'm sure you can dig up an industry quote from a competing utility power source, but it doesn't change the reality of the power.
The reasons that games have levels are many.
...) ...)
Basically, in rank order, they are:
1. So we don't have to electroshock you and drag you to the bathroom to take a leak.
2. So you will listen to your mom/dad and eat your already cold dinner.
3. So you will finally go to bed instead of waiting until dawn.
4. So you can brag about how far you got (Level 30) instead of some other method (I went down that corridor
5. So we can rank how far you got for our online or in game rank listings (You are Mr. Purple!)
6. So we can sell you extra content at each level.
7. So we can tell how far you got and where people get hung up (remember when WoW plateaued around level 20 for most players?)
8. So when you do a bug report it is faster to fix (I was in this room and it was like red and
9. Because people like numbers.
What is with you and the hostility?
...
Heck, I just did a Slashdot search and found a link from an article on Slashdot.
One of many.
Stop asking others to do searches when the info is already on slashdot and you just haven't been paying attention
I'm sorry, it is an established fact that all electric vehicles can and do outdrag gasoline engine racers of the same class.
For more information, do a Google search on Racing Eugene Oregon Electric and other keywords.
Many people in California drive more than 1-2 hours each way for their commute. As I stated, it depends on the cost of energy where you live, the cost of gas or diesel where you live, and the cost of other alternatives (ethanol, bio-diesel, etc) all of which have different energy densities and storage requirements. Bio-diesel is not highly recommended in very cold regions, so using a higher grade non-bio diesel is a wiser choice (except in the summer months). However, the battery power can still be used for some or all of the commute, depending on the battery capacity of the vehicle, the power consumption, and the cost of electricity.
In general, as a rule of thumb, electricity in most regions of the US costs one-tenth as much as gasoline does to propel your car a similar distance. As distance increases, the increased battery capacity makes the use of electric-diesel hybrids a wiser choice, due to the storage density of fuel to battery and relative weight. As battery power discharges, the mass does not decrease (well, from a gross viewpoint), but the same is not true of liquid or solid fuel sources.
In general, for most Americans, a switch to plug-in electric bio-diesel engine systems gets significantly better mileage at lower cost - but it depends on the total cost of battery packs, fuel, electricity, and usage.
Very funny.
Most electricity is shaped. When I was a Power Engineer at Tek-Cominco in Trail, BC, we shaped the power from one of the hydro dams with additional power from other sources - hydro however does not need much shaping, as you can kick in additional generators as demand increases.
Most dams in the Pacific Northwest (hint, ever hear a song called Roll On Columbia) have very large drops. We have these things called Mountains here, specifically the Rocky Mountains. Even the dams that provide electricity for Seattle along our Coastal mountain chains have very large drops. It's not like the small teeny dams you have in the rest of the US. Most such dams have many turbines, with variable generation capabilities.
Please realize energy sources and shaping may differ depending where you live.
There is a Honda Civic plug-in hybrid available in the Japanese market.
It should be available by 2009 in the US market (recent coverage in the Wall Street Journal print edition).
Unlike the Japanese version which has a shorter range (most Japanese don't drive long distances to commute, only as far as the train or monorail), the US model is still choosing a specific battery technology.
But there are three firms in King County, Washington, that will retrofit Honda Civics into plug-ins right now. They charge more.
Unlike you, I understand these radical concepts called population density, market usage, and population distribution.
Repeat after me: large numbers of PEOPLE in the US have access to cheap hydro-electric and wind energy. And nuclear.
Much of the US has very low population density - I am not doing a comparison based on acreage, I am doing a comparison based on CONSUMERS - people.
People drive cars.
Not empty plots of land, yearning to be free.
As I stated, even places like New Mexico and Nevada have access to such sources.
Please wake up and realize that the population distribution of the US has changed since 1900, when most people lived along the Eastern seaboard. Now up to 40 percent of the US market is in just the Western states - California, Oregan, and Washington being the largest.
And much of the Northeast uses Hydro from Quebec.
Reality is something that changes over time.
Most plug-in bio-diesel hybrids use slow charge.
... Honda Japan, Toyota Japan, VW, Lexus Japan, many more sources.
Mind you, slow charge is around 2 hours - which is longer than you need when parked at work or at home.
And when not running on charge, the motor kicks in.
What part of Commercially Available Worldwide don't you get? Just check the auto firms if you need power details
But, we can prove this assumption is incorrect just from your disclaimer.
I remember when I took Power Mechanics in grade 10 and Electricity 11 12 that in fact, gasoline engines are not 100 percent efficient. Even were we to assume you have a tuned engine (not normally true of most cars on the road, and especially not for SUVs), the reality is that the average electric motor - especially a souped up real electric motor like those used in industrial applications as most of these retrofits use - will almost always have a much higher efficiency engine than any gasoline engine unless constantly maintained at peak performance.
I'm going electric bio-diesel hybrid.
Besides, since electric motors can outdrag gasoline motors, I'll be spinning out so fast the cops won't even see me coming.
Down in Eugene Oregon there are a group of electric cars that can outdrag all the other drag racers. They use high-performance electric motors with souped up batteries, get around 100 mpg, and can even outdrag gasoline dragsters while they are going backwards using reverse - an electric motor doesn't really care which direction it spins if designed correctly.
Been doing this for a few years now.
You could easily mod a Prius to outdrag almost any car on the road without even trying. Heck, you could take an econo box and still out drag a gas engine.
Batteries depend on the conversion.
Some models have (e.g. Japan) a 5 kilometer range - this is 3 miles for the one country in the world not using metric.
Some models have (e.g. Europe) a 50 kilometer range - this is 30 miles.
Some models have up to a 250 mile range (US conversion usually around this much).
Depends on battery type, car/truck model, and who does it.
Cost depends on factors such as - in factory (Japan/Europe) - usually a lot lower in price, sometimes as simple as the new "switch" added to the dash of Honda hybrids that turns off the A/C unless you turn it on and runs on battery until down to 1/5th charge - which gives you an effective mpg around 60 mpg with no real change to on-board batteries. Or after market - where someone goes in, rips out the engine, replaces it with a decent stepped up electric motor that can go 0-60 in 6.0 and a bio-diesel engine with all the tubes and add ons you need for this, plus putting decent batteries in locations that are more crash-resistant - this can run usually $10,000 to $50,000 depending on how extensive and what the target mpg and usage is.
Amusingly, it seems like there is a car or van on fire in my county probably every day - some days there are up to 10 car fires.
You can live in Fear.
Or you can be a proud patriotic American and refuse to live in Fear.
Those are the choices.
It depends where you live. In large portions of the US, we use this new-fangled thing called hydro-electric power, and we supplement it with wind power. So, our basic cost is less than 7 cents per KWh. Other areas of the US use different energy supplies - Vermont is mostly Hydro with nuclear (used to own Green Mountain Power), and much of the Northeast uses imported hydro power with nuclear and some coal.
Some places generate and sell their own power from home or farm based wind turbines and solar cells - especially in the West.
So the cost of the energy ranges from $3 a gallon (cheap in the West) for gas to $0.30 gallon equivalent for electricity in coal states to $0.04 gallon equivalent for electricity in the Northwest.
At that point, the cost of retrofitting - which is less than $5000 if done by Honda or Toyota (which sell plug-in hybrids in Japan even if not in the US yet) or Lexus, or $15,000 if you use say one of the three conversion businesses in my county alone (King County in Washington state) - is price compatible if you commute to work nearby.
Of course, you could do what Willie Nelson is doing and go plug-in bio-diesel with your truck, or even convert a classic Cadillac to get more than 80 mpg using an efficient bio-diesel engine with plug-in hybrid electric power tuned to the make and model.
Some people talk.
Other people do.
P.S.: If you're on facebook and use the I Am Green app, there's a We Are Green Seattle group you can join now. Let's beat out Vancouver BC and San Francisco CA!
1. For Net users in the Americas and Europe, it would be fairly easy to establish bridge portals to not include Africa and Asia and solve the whole problem.
2. For Net users beyond the Americas and Europe, going to IPv6 would solve this problem - and installing throttle content managers to bridge the gap.
3. Just because you can link all devices to the Net, doesn't mean you have to.
And regard off-kilter research like this as flawed not just in its basic design, but unproveable by any statistically sound method, using self-selected groups of college students who tend to like to flame more than the general population, and to whom trash-talking is an art, not a crime.
But that's the real world viewpoint.
Everyone there recommended she not get Vista but consider getting a Linux or Mac box.
Not a good sign.
We know Microsoft has some patents involving anti-aliasing and other font rendering stuff.
We also know that UCLA has recently sued over the non-licensed usage of it's patents by a number of software technology firms, including Microsoft.
All your stolen Microsoft patents are belong to Cali!
I distinctly recall Microsoft stealing tons of things before.
Does that count?
By the way, how is my patent for the lightbulb coming?
I said "not much cleaner than many other less risky choices".
Coal is only one of many choices. Wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, hydro - all other choices that are less risky than coal.
And it depends on what coal (caveat - at one point I owned 500 Peabody IPO shares) actually - some is high in sulfur, some is hard to mine, some is low in sulfur and easy to mine.
Repeat after me - all advocates tend to ignore the downsides of their chosen energy source.
Wind advocates ignore their own downsides, solar too, nuclear fission too.
You are not alone in thinking your choice is the best thing since sliced bread and has no problems. It's a common problem in energy research, this blinkered focus one has that one's choice is totally wonderful and has no faults. Believe it or not, oil and coal people are just like you.
We look at game console markets as if what exists today will be the case in the future.
We know this is not true, however.
In the future, we will have more HDTV, games will adapt to feed the growing casual gamer market, MMO games will figure how to be console-based, the interface of portable game devices will increase in game connections, and a more mobile population will be served somehow.
Even the Wii itself is just a placeholder for the future game consoles that Nintendo will make. Dominance by sports games will likely not go away, due to the growing availability of HDTV sets among sports game players, and that market will be larger. But casual gamers will start expecting connectivity and games you can start, put down, and come back to - possibly with new, fresh, different content.
Light saber and fencing games will increase, due to the Wii influence.
Fun multi-player party games will increase, as HDTV sets get used at parties - let's invite everyone over to play Doctor Mario: Galactic Surgeon and DJ Dance Instructor! Pause features where you shift who is playing what will be more typical.
The question is not which console. The question is what will the next consoles be able to do.
Just think of it, 9.3 million possible guild members to deposit gold for my Squirrelly Wrath guild bank!
But, the big question is, if I need 1000 gold to buy 96 slots for the guild bank, how many of those 9.3 million accounts are on my server and aren't gold farmers who will try to join so they can siphon gold out of the guild?
And how many will be online when I am?
And will they all help me in my mythical quest for coffee, nuts, and Foamy the Squirrel?
But what if we use our Bio Block Building Set to create a paper-eating organism?
Than it would be based on a rapidly consumed mythical piece of paper and your currency would truly devalue in a very organic kind of way.
Have to engineer something so it can handle those little metallic strips, tho.