Energy Citizens Rally Or Protest Was Not Just Surreal It Was Sad

I got into the rally because Roy Wehrle got stopped by Security. The lengths that they went to keep out “undesirables” was pretty amazing. Will Reynolds, of the Sierra Club went in and gave some materials to their Press Table. He was then barred from reentry by 2 Sangamon County Sheriff’s Deputies for distributing political literature. Apparently after that anyone seen talking to Will was a thoroughly dangerous man like in Alice’s Restaurant. When I went in the ballroom they pounced on mild mannered Economics professor Roy and turned him away.

Remember this is the compelling protest designed to defeat Cap and Trade WHICH is the INDUSTRIES proposal NOT the Environmentalists. I like a huge Carbon Tax myself. Most European countries pay 6 $$$ per gallon for their gasoline…and that tax money is invested directly into renewables and infrastructure. Why not do something like that in the US?  This is what the “protest” looked like:

catprotest1.JPG

Photos by Wes King

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This is what they stand for:

http://energycitizens.org/about/

About Energy Citizens

Energy Citizens is a nationwide alliance of organizations and individuals formed to bring together people across America to remind Congress that energy is the backbone of our nation’s economy and our way of life.

Energy Citizens are voicing their concerns about the impact climate legislation passed by the U.S. House of Representatives would have on American jobs, families and businesses. The alliance is urging the Senate to get it right and make sure that climate, energy and tax legislation would not take money out of Americans’ pocketbooks and cost millions of jobs.

See personal stories from people across the country, or take a look at the list of participating organizations that have joined Energy Citizens in support of American jobs and affordable energy

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This is who paid for it:

http://www.redcounty.com/illinois-business-groups-schedule-anti-cap-and-trade-rally-sept-1st

Illinois Business Groups Schedule Anti-Cap and Trade Rally, Sept. 1st

By Warner Todd Huston | 08/31/09 | 07:41 PM EDT

A group called Energy Citizens made up of 23 Illinois business associations have scheduled a September 1st rally in order to protest the seriously damaging policies of the Cap and Trade bill. The rally will be held near the State Capitol in Springfield.

The event will start a noon and will be held at Crowne Plaza Hotel, 3000 Dirksen Parkway, Springfield, Illinois.

A notice was posted at the Illinois Farm Bureau website.

A lunch will follow the roughly 45-minute event, one of 22 rallies nationwide sponsored by the group Energy Citizens to oppose House-approved legislation. IFB members are encouraged to attend, and may contact their county Farm Bureau for additional details.

The Illinois members of Energy Citizens includes the Southwestern Illinois Employers Association and Wayne-White Counties Electric Cooperative, the Illinois Association of Convenience Stores, Associated Builder and Contractors of Illinois (ABC), Illinois Petroleum Marketers Association, Grain & Feed Association of Illinois, Growmark, Home Builders Association of Illinois, Illinois Association of Aggregate Producers, Illinois Coal Associations, Illinois Energy Forum, Illinois Farm Bureau, Illinois manufacturers Association, Illinois Petroleum Council, Illinois Pork Producers, Illinois Retail Merchants Association, Illinois Trucking Association, MidAmerica Energy, Mid-West Truckers Association, Illinois Oil & Gas Association, National Federation of Independent Business, Rural Electric Convenience Cooperative and the Illinois Fertilizer & Chemical Association.

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The saddest part was  they used local “personality” Bob Murray as the MC. I hate to pick on anyone but there is a reason that Bob moved from TV to Radio and there are no pictures available of him below the waist…I mean he is huge. When I walked in he looked pretty normal but when I got off to the side I was stunned. Then he made a joke about it. “I am so big”, he said, “When I asked my mom when I was born she said July 4rth….July 5th and July 6th”

http://www.spoke.com/info/pF0Rf1m/BobMurray

I just wanted to cry. They were giving away bright yellow Tshirts that read, “I will pass on $4 gas”. I wish now I would have grabbed one. There was even a sign that read, “RVer’s Against Waxman-Markey” and another sign that read, “Crap and Trade”.  As I  walked out Murray said, “The great thing about this country is that you can hold a meeting like this and then there is no one waiting for you in the parking lot to shoot your ass”.  He then turned and launched into the Pledge of Allegiance.

WHAT a parking lot it was too. As I walked back to my car, past the hundreds of Lincoln Town cars, giant SUVs and the huge Chevys I noticed that they had filled up half of the parking lot with displays. There was   a huge 16 head combine that had a Rural America Needs Affordable Energy banner slung across it. A huge semi trailer display for Illinois Crude Oil and Natural Gas. To add insult to injury the last display I walked by was 2 bucket trucks with their buckets up holding a banner that said Stop Cap and Trade. The trucks were owned by the Rural Electric Convenience Coop in Auburn that just put up a 1.2 million $$$ wind turbine.

It may take me years to get the images out of my head…..yuck

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Oh and thanks to the college students who drove all the way from Chicago when we were thinking about disrupting this madness.

catprotest5.JPG

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Energy Citizens Protest Rally In Springfield Was The Most Surreal Event I Have Ever Attended

I could add sick, disgusting, phony and funny to that list but why bother? I can show you how it was by example. But on the 150 aniversery of the first oil well..it is just plain sad. Oil guys used to be such roughnecks now they are kinda wussy.

The 2 most surreal events I had ever been to before was an Alice Cooper concert in 1969 and the Opening of Ticket Sales at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for the English Opera Peter Grimes in Los Angeles in 1984. I know Alice doesn’t need any explanation (it does really), but the opening of ticket sales for an obscure opera?

But first a picture:

catprotest31.JPG

(thanks for the pictures Wes King)

It is in a BALLROOM. I have never been to a protest in one of the ritzyest ballrooms within a 100 miles of Springfield. This is the most senior citizens I have seen at a protest not sponsored by the AARP ever. There is no ethnic diversity in the room. I have been to plenty of protests, some where there were simultaneous counter protests and I have never seen this Caucasion of an audience since my last KKK rally. It is probably tough to see but the 2 black skinned men in the room are a waitstaff member at the bottom of the picture and way off in the distance there is a black camera man for the only news organization I saw that day, Channel 20 TV. Considering the cost of this rally that in itself was bizarre. But back to Alice Cooper.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LA-sjSkRM4M&feature=channel

This Alice Cooper concert was when I was 14, and it was my first rock concert ever. It was in Peoria in a place since torn down called the Cow Palace. Which it literally was. A barn like structure with a dirt  floor where they sold cows (and other live stock). It was my 3rd acid trip…my first in public and I was with my fiance’ Denise and some other San Jose (Illinois) crazies. All the lights were on so it was real bright, and all of the sudden the Wedding March starts playing, these flowers POP up on the stage and simultaneously a man in a tux (stage left), a women in a wedding dress (stage right) and a minister (center stage) all walk to the center of the stage. The audience was stunned. The minister performs the wedding complete with “is there anyone here who may object to this union”? Stunned silence. Towards the end of the ceremony Alice Cooper and his band in their full make up started peering through the flowers. At the “kiss the bride” part the room goes to BLACK, the stage lights come on low and giant trash cans come hurtling over the flowers, followed by Alice and the band…In that 2 second period my life changed for ever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUFO_04J1r4

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My second most surreal moment could take some set up but I will try to make it as quick as possible. But first another picture of the event:

catprotest4.JPG

I mean really do these people look angry? Do they look passionate about preventing “cap and trade” in the area of carbon production because it has already worked for sulfur? NO these people look like people at the Republican Convention in Minnesota last year.

Anyway in 1984 I lived in Las Vegas with a woman who celebrated her 30 birthday. I had patiently gone to the Lyric Opera in Chicago for 2 seasons with her. Then I said enough! I am not going to another Opera unless it is in English and I was off the hook for a couple of years. BUT someone (probably her sister) told her that Peter Grimes was playing at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in LA.  Yes the same place where the Academy  Awards are occasionally given out. So we got a room in a South Central L.A., yes the place that burned down in the riots which was surreal enough as it was. We went for a driving tour of the LA area (Hollywood, Venice Beach, Malibu) and then we had Oriental Food downtown someplace. The next day we had to go pick up our tickets at the Pavilion. Yes I know that seems quaint now but you had to physically pick up your tickets. While we were waiting in this 500 person line we were subjected to a surprise Japanese Performance Art piece.

http://www.musiccenter.org/

http://www.asianinfo.org/asianinfo/japan/pro-performing_arts.htm

http://outwestarts.blogspot.com/2008/03/attend-tale-of-peter-grimes.html

Nobody was looking up so I have no idea how it started, but suddenly you hear a huge horn sound…like a foghorn or something real deep and loud. I looked up and there on top of the Pavilion (4 stories maybe) was a long robed Japanese figure in an elongated paper masked, flanked on each side by 2 naked guys in diapers. He blew on this big horn again. It was about 8 ft. long and rested on the ground like an Alp Horn:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070905040636AAXDrTt

Then these 4 nearly naked Japanese guys rappelled down the front of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion Australian style to some really weird Japanese music played through the Pavilion’s very small very tinny outdoor speakers:

swatman6.tripod.com/srt1.html

This rapel took forever. When they landed in front of us they did some short welcoming ritual (I am guessing). The guy on the roof blew the horn again. These naked guys jumped up and down once, turned and ran to the entrance way. They threw open the doors and ran inside the building and the guy on the roof was gone. People were so stunned nobody actually went through the door. Then people started clapping and several brave soldiers advanced into the que.

So there you have it. What I witnessed at the Energy Citizens protest rally yesterday was somewhere between an Alice Cooper Concert and a Japanese Performance Art piece on my surreal scale. WHOA

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He Was Shootin At Some Food And Up Came Some Bubbling Crude

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkOGM6gHvao

Oil that is, Texas Gold….Hmmm maybe like population bustin, human cancer makin, pollutin the atmosphere…dead plants and animals from the past black gunk.

http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/26/after-150-years-whither-oil/

2009-08-27 T00:52:03-04:00″ Updated: 12:52 am

After 150 Years, Whither Oil?

Drake Well

The Associated Press A replica of the well and tower stand over the site in Titusville, Pa., where Edwin L. Drake drilled the first oil well in 1859.

This week marks the 150th anniversary of the first oil well drilled in Titusville, Pennsylvania by “Colonel” Edwin Drake. The commodity would prove essential to the development of modern societies, enabling communications, travel and trade on a global scale.

But its central role is now facing unprecedented challenges.

Governments are concerned about the need for energy security and reliable supplies. The threat of climate change requires shifting away from fossil fuels that currently dominate the world’s energy mix. And fears of “peak oil” — the notion that half the world’s reserves have been pumped and that global production is now on a slow path of decline — have gained followers as prices have soared.

How much longer will the “Oil Age” last?

In our own opinion page on Monday, Michael Lynch, an oil consultant, suggested that the notion of peak oil amounted to uninformed fear-mongering, and that it ignored the realities of the modern oil industry. The bottom line, Mr. Lynch argued, is that the world is not about to run out of oil and that new exploration and drilling technologies continue to expand the pool of global reserves

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http://www.energypublisher.com/article.asp?id=20230

 

Insights:  Energy and Environment

150 Years of Commercial Petroleum

One hundred and fifty years since the discovery of oil at Titusville, Pennsylvania, it is time to reflect on what are the next steps towards energy independence.

 

 

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

by Gal Luft

One hundred and fifty years ago, give or take a few days, in the sleepy lumber town of Titusville, Pa., “Colonel” Edwin Drake was persistently hammering a pipe into the ground in search of a replacement for depleting whale oil as a fuel for lamps. At a depth of 69 feet below ground he finally struck oil, and the world changed forever. Over a century and a half his 25 barrels per day well would give rise to a global industry of 85 million barrels per day, making oil the world’s most strategic commodity, one that supplies 40 percent of the world’s energy.

Just like in Drake’s own life — he died two decades later penniless — oil has been both a curse and a blessing for humanity. It has been a driver of seminal events and a backdrop behind great powers’ foreign policy. During World War I, “the Allies had floated to victory upon a wave of oil,” as the British statesman Lord Curzon noted. The post-war contention between Turkey and Britain in the early 1920s over Iraq’s oil-rich Mosul, Imperial Japan’s expansionist policy of the 1930s that led to a four-year war in the Pacific, Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Russia, America’s repeated military interventions in the Middle East and the “New Great Game” currently taking place in Central Asia have all been tied to oil dependence.

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http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052970203706604574370511700484236.html

Why Oil Still Has a Future

( :} This is an excerpt from a much longer piece…the first paragraph was …titusville blah blah)

Why this debate about the single most important source of energy—and a very convenient one—that provides 40% of the world’s total energy? There are the traditional concerns—energy security, diversification, political risk, and the potential for conflict among nations over resources. The huge shifts in global income flows raise anxieties about the possible impact on the global balance of power. Some worry that physical supply will run out, although examination of the world’s resource base—including a new analysis of over 800 oil fields—shows ample physical resources below ground. The politics above ground is a separate question.

But two new factors are now fueling the debate. One is the way in which oil has taken on a second identity. It is no longer only a physical commodity. It has also become a financial asset, along with stocks, bonds, currencies and the rest of the world’s financial portfolio. The resulting price volatility—from less than $40 in 2004, to as high as $147.27 in July 2008, back down to $32.40 in December 2008, and now back over $70—has enormous consequences, and not only at the gas station and in terms of public anger. It makes it much more difficult to plan future energy investments, whether in oil and gas or in renewable and alternative fuels. And it can have enormous economic impact; Detroit was sent reeling by what happened at the gas pump in 2007 and 2008 even before the credit crisis. Such volatility can fuel future recessions and inflation

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Yahoo Attacks The Illinois State Fair – Well not really but my Yahoo account was attacked

The reason this Post is so late in the day is because I opened my web browser today and it showed that I had 35 messages waiting for me. Someone had unleashed a worm on my address book and it was busy sending all my friends spam. Some of it dangerous spam. I was mortified. I spent over 2 hours checking to make sure it was originating on my computer. People sent some of it back to me so I could see what the heck was spewing out of my account. Then in consultation with my computer expert Afredo I determined that just changing my email password could halt the attack…So I did and it ended. I had to blow off lunch with David Lasley, Dave Fuchs and the Sangamon County Democrats just to get to here…Damnit.

There were some things that I saw at the Illinois State Fair that I did not really care for. One of those things was the prominence of Biofuel in both of  Governor Pat Quinn’s tents. We all know that biofuel, especially ones made from foods, distract people from getting rid of the internal combustion engine. It also drives up food prices so this:

fairs4.jpg

and this:

fairs81.jpg

were NOT appreciated.

Though the latest craze in biofuels is watermellons that are farm waste:

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/08/26/watermelon-fuel.html

Watermelon Juice: The New Fuel?

Michael Reilly, Discovery News

Fill 'er Up

Fill ‘er Up | Discovery News Video

Aug. 26, 2009 — A staple of backyard barbecues and summer time snacks, watermelon is also a promising new source of renewable energy.

According to a new study, leftover watermelons from farms’ harvests could be converted into up to 9.4 million liters (2.5 million gallons) of clean, renewable ethanol fuel every year destined for your car, truck, or airplane’s gas tank.

Agriculturally, watermelon is a peculiar fruit — each year farmers across the country leave between 20 and 40 percent of their crop to rot on the ground. These are the ugly ducklings of the lot; though perfectly fine on the inside, the misshapen or blemished melons simply won’t sell at the grocery store.

“If a crow lands on a melon, takes two pecks at the rind, and then flies away, it’s no good,” Wayne Fish of the United States Department of Agriculture in Lane, Oklahoma said. “I had farmers telling me, ‘I’m leaving one-fifth of my melons on the land. Is there anything I can do with them?'”

Across the United States, he estimated that 360,000 tons of watermelons spoil in fields every year.

Some local growers wondered whether the waste melons could be turned into ethanol, the clean-burning fuel derived from plant sugars. In a series of new experiments published yesterday in the journal Biotechnology for Biofuels, Fish and a team of researchers showed that they can.

What’s more, watermelon juice may turn out to be the perfect way to optimize industrial-scale production of ethanol from corn, molasses and sugar cane.

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Then there was this. What the hell. This causes Earth Quakes in Texas yet it makes it to the State Fair?

fairs2.jpg

Fracking is Coming to Decatur. People better get ready for it:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,526233,00.html

Drilling Eyed as Possible Culprit Behind Texas Earthquakes

Sunday, June 14, 2009

CLEBURNE, Texas  —  The earth moved here on June 2. It was the first recorded earthquake in this Texas town’s 140-year history — but not the last.

There have been four small earthquakes since, none with a magnitude greater than 2.8. The most recent ones came Tuesday night, just as the City Council was meeting in an emergency session to discuss what to do about the ground moving.

The council’s solution was to hire a geology consultant to try to answer the question on everyone’s mind: Is natural gas drilling — which began in earnest here in 2001 and has brought great prosperity to Cleburne and other towns across North Texas — causing the quakes?

“I think John Q. Public thinks there is a correlation with drilling,” Mayor Ted Reynolds said. “We haven’t had a quake in recorded history, and all the sudden you drill and there are earthquakes.”

At issue is a drilling practice called “fracking,” in which water is injected into the ground at high pressure to fracture the layers of shale and release natural gas trapped in the rock.

There is no consensus among scientists about whether the practice is contributing to the quakes. But such seismic activity was once rare in Texas and seems to be increasing lately, lending support to the theory that drilling is having a destabilizing effect.

On May 16, three small quakes shook Bedford, a suburb of Dallas and Fort Worth. Two small earthquakes hit nearby Grand Prairie and Irving on Oct. 31, and again on Nov. 1.

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Lighting Things On Fire Fascinates Humans – Burning things is stupid

(it’s jam band friday and i saw eva hunter last night so – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2i8vaWoIVN4 – )

Everyone who is human has started a fire. It is primal, but now it is deadly. The “off gases” of combustion are changing the planet Earth’s composition to the point that much of the animal world will not be able to live in it.

http://redyak.com/video/BurningThings/BurningThings.htm

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(speaking of hot – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOx6QGJaNFA&feature=related -)

While we are hooked on burning things the rest of the world moves on:

http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2248232/china-poised-seize-clean-tech

China poised to seize clean tech crown

Report from The Climate Group argues China is set to dominate the global market for low-carbon technologies

James Murray, BusinessGreen, 21 Aug 2009

China flag

China’s position as one of the world’s pre-eminent clean tech hubs was underlined yesterday, with the release of a major new report from The Climate Group arguing that the country has already secured a lead over many of its global rivals in the race to develop and implement low-carbon technologies.

The report, which updates a similar study from last year, concluded that despite the onset of the global recession, Chinese clean tech firms are continuing to record impressive growth, aided in no small part by the government’s decision to focus much of its $585bn (£354bn) stimulus package on low-carbon projects.

The study found that while the Chinese government is resisting international calls to set carbon emission targets, it is delivering good progress against domestic targets to improve energy efficiency, having cut the energy intensity of the economy 60 per cent since 1980.

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(did i mention seriously talented – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6PJUoNp0tY&feature=related -)

Yet still we must send smoke into the very air we breath and without which we can not survive.

http://www.dgate.org/~brg/death/index2.html

We like to burn things!

So one fine Saturday, recently, (to be exact it was the third of February, 1996), we were kinda bored, and we were messing around with some hard drives, trying to get them to work. One of ’em was completely dead — no spin-up, no blinking light, no nothing. The computer said it was a Micropolis but couldn’t tell us more than that. So we figured, the thing’s toast, right? And we figured, we’re on the third floor, right? Cool. Open da window. (Remember, it was -6 degrees F out that night!) ;-> Well, enough of my ranting, why dontcha look at the pictures! (If you are using a text-only browser, you might as well quit now. We took 87 pictures for this thing, and they *ARE* the good part, OK???)

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(did I say beautiful – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQ7KDVtxcXA&feature=related -)

We throw so much up in the air,  SOX, NOX, Natural gases like methane, butane, and propane, and dangerous particulates like mercury. Yet everyone wants to worry about carbon. I guess that is as good a place as any to start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

List of countries by carbon dioxide emissions per capita

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

CO2 emission per capita per year per country

This is a list of countries by carbon dioxide emissions per capita from 1990 through 2006. All data were calculated by the US Department of Energy’s Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC), mostly based on data collected from country agencies by the United Nations Statistics Division.

Countries are ranked by their metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions per capita in 2006.

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(great band too – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBnfxOovUVA&feature=related )
They even have a FaceBook page dedicated to it. You too can make your own Flamethrower!

Burning Things

Burning Things

Homemade Flamethrower

haha i encourage you all to try this… pam + water gun = pure entertainment!

Length:0:09

June 12 at 12:07am · Share

like this.

Steven Kmiec

Steven Kmiec

wait, so all that is, is pam and water… nothing else?
i gotta try that!

July 24 at 10:20am · Report

Lauren Ashley Bowden

Lauren Ashley Bowden

this is so cool!!!!

August 15 at 2:50pm · Report

Ian Montgomery

Ian Montgomery

ax and lighter also works

August 17 at 9:22pm · Report

Burning Things

Burning Things

Burnt things

11 new photos

April 29 at 5:46pm · Share

RECENT ACTIVITY

Burning Things discussed I am a pyromaniac. I burn these things: on the Burning Things discussion board.

Burning Things edited their Founded and Company Overview.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4InbNOJqqy8&feature=related

I like her very much.

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Why Rightwing Fundamentalism Is So Environmentally Destructive

Why are Conservatives so stupid. Usually right away I get accused of name calling and class warfare. I usually respond that I am not questioning their intelligence so much as I am questioning their larger view of the world. I point out there is a class war going on and most of us are losing it. In much the same way that the VERY Rich slave holders perpetuated the fighting and hatred of the less wealthy poor whites and blacks, the world destroyers and the mega wealthy must have the lower classes fighting and bickering over “tree huggers” and Cap and Trade. This is what the fundamentalists miss. For lofty ideals that do not exist like “personal freedom” they are watching the only world that we have slip away for the enrichment of the very few.

Further more as I have said for 30 years it is not the “little guy” that is to blame for things like destabilizing the climate and acidifying the oceans. It is in this order, The militaries of the world, the Airline Industry, the Big Smoke Stack users (mainly megawatt coal fired electrical plants), and the Shipping industry. That is it. The little guy can ride his stinky garden tractor, fire up his stinky grill and drive his F150 to work everyday if he wants to. THINK about it for a moment. The aforementioned Earth wreckers want the burdened pushed off on the public. It means they get to keep on polluting because we STOP.

http://www.usnews.com/articles/business/economy/2007/11/14/the-10-biggest-carbon-dioxide-polluters.html

The 10 Biggest Carbon Dioxide Polluters

By Marianne Lavelle

Posted November 14, 2007

Ten large companies generate more than one third of the 2.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide emitted each year by U.S. electric power

generators, according to figures in a first-of-its-kind database unveiled Wednesday.

American Electric Power, based in Columbus, Ohio, and Southern Co. of Atlanta, which run the largest coal power plants in the country, top the list of U.S. companies responsible for greenhouse gas emissions from electricity, according to data compiled by the Center for Global Development, a global economic development think tank in Washington, D.C.

The database, called CARMA or Carbon Monitoring for Action, culls for the first time data both from government regulators around the world and commercial databases to provide an up-to-date look at the state of CO2 from power production—which accounts for one quarter of all carbon emissions. (The database doesn’t look at other large sources, like transportation and manufacturing.) Here are the top sources of greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation in the United States:

The 10 Biggest Carbon Dioxide Polluters

COMPANY TONS OF CO2 PER YEAR
1. American Electric Power 174 million
With 5 million customers in 11 states from Ohio to Texas, its biggest carbon emissions come from its Gavin coal plant in Cheshire, Ohio.
2. SOUTHERN 172 million
Has 4.3 million customers in the Southeast and owns the top three carbon-emitting power plants in the country: Scherer, in Juliet, Ga.; Miller in Quinton, Ala.; and Bowen in Cartersville, Ga.
3. (tie) AES CORP. 108 million
Has power plants from New York to California, with the worst emissions from its Petersburg, Ind., plant.
3. (tie) DUKE ENERGY 108 million
Serves 4 million customers in the Carolinas, Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana. Its Gibson plant in Owensville, Ind., is the nation’s fourth-largest carbon emissions source in the power sector.
5. TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY 101 million
The nation’s largest public power company serves the 8.7 million residents of the Tennessee Valley. Its Cumberland City, Tenn., plant ranks eighth in the nation in CO2 emissions.
6. NRG ENERGY 82.7 million
A wholesale power producer that operates in deregulated electricity markets throughout the country, its W.A. Parish plant in Thompsons, Texas, is the nation’s No. 5 carbon emissions source.
7. XCEL ENERGY 76.1 million
With 3.3 million customers in the West and Midwest, its largest carbon generator is its Sherburne County plant in Becker, Minn.
8. MIDAMERICAN ENERGY HOLDINGS 70.9 million
A Warren Buffett Berkshire Hathaway company, MidAmerican serves customers in Iowa, Illinois, and South Dakota, with its largest CO2 emissions from the Jim Bridger plant in Point Of Rocks, Wyo.
9. PROGRESS ENERGY 68.1 million
Based in Raleigh, N.C., its plant in Roxoboro, N.C., is its biggest emissions source.
10. DOMINION RESOURCES 66.6 million
Dominion is based in Virginia, with operations stretching into the Northeast and Midwest. Its biggest carbon emissions source is its Mount Storm, W.Va., plant.

……

Strikingly, three Chinese power companies, South Africa’s giant Eskom, and India’s NTPC all generate more CO2 emissions than any single U.S. firm—underscoring the shared challenge posed by global climate change. The largest, Huaneng Power International of China, has emissions 68 percent higher than American Electric Power’s.

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I am quoting extensively from the article because it makes the point rather well. It is well researched and Lavelle is a good writer. In a startling 2 paragraphs she cuts through all the smoke and the fog to the heart of this story.

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One of the most striking findings in the data, says David Wheeler, a Center for Global Development senior fellow who led the research, is how concentrated the problem is among a relatively few large power generators. He said the top 100 companies worldwide produce 57 percent of CO2 emissions coming from the power sector. The top 30 companies produce 30 percent of the total. “On the one hand, it’s sobering,” he says. “But it might be hopeful. You could actually assemble the CEOs of those firms, and there might be many channels through which they can organize and address this as a group themselves. I think that’ll be critical to a solution.”

Wheeler was a former lead economist in the World Bank’s Development Research Group, where his team used public disclosure as a strategy to generate pressure from lenders and communities for pollution reduction in China, Indonesia, and the Philippines. Wheeler says his team similarly hopes the CARMA data will be used not only by environmental groups but by institutional and private investors and insurers, to encourage power companies to use less coal and oil and shift to renewable resources

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If you want to check the data here is the CARMA site:

http://carma.org/

About CARMA

Posted by Christopher Frazier on March 25, 2006

Frequently Asked Questions
CARMA’s Partners
All About Icons
Plant-Specific Information
Citation Policy
CARMA Version Tracker

At its core, Carbon Monitoring for Action (CARMA) is a massive database containing information on the carbon emissions of over 50,000 power plants and 4,000 power companies worldwide. Power generation accounts for 40% of all carbon emissions in the United States and about one-quarter of global emissions. CARMA is the first global inventory of a major, emissions-producing sector of the economy.

CARMA is produced and financed by the Confronting Climate Change Initiative at the Center for Global Development, an independent and non-partisan think tank located in Washington, DC.

The objective of CARMA.org is to equip individuals with the information they need to forge a cleaner, low-carbon future. By providing complete information for both clean and dirty power producers, CARMA hopes to influence the opinions and decisions of consumers, investors, shareholders, managers, workers, activists, and policymakers. CARMA builds on experience with public information disclosure techniques that have proven successful in reducing traditional pollutants.

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Yet yet at least one of the social values issues also comes into play and that is abortion. Now I could go on and on about a woman’s right to control her body and how god does not play an active role in the world so birth is not a “miracle”. But the fact is that the main hatred of abortion by the various world’s religions is based on their desire for world domination. The idea being that once the world is “totally” christian for instance then NIRVANA will arrive. But what this ignores is the Over Population that this has caused. The world population stands at 9 billion people. The Earth has a carrying capacity of about a billion people soooooo at some point there is going to be a huge die off. Probably when my niece Taylor is in her 30s or 40s. I just want to say to my mother and others like her…don’t you realize that you are killing Taylor off?

http://www.overpopulation.org/cgi-bin/cgiwrap/popaware/article.pl?display_subsection%%%NewsDigest_NewsItem%%1

If we don’t halt population growth with justice and compassion, it will be done for us by nature,
brutally and without pity – and will leave a ravaged world.”

Nobel Laureate Dr. Henry W. Kendall 023934

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Tough Decision – My mom is stupid or burning is stupid

OK so Mom wins but let me very quickly qualify that I love my Mother and I mean that unconditionally. My Mom is a rightwing fundamentalist Christian. So really what I am saying is that I hate the ideology more than my mother. I am not talking about the social agenda either or most of it anyway. I am pro abortion. I think everyone should have one. I am pro civil rights which means I am for samesex sexuality. I think everyone has tried just one. I am for universal health care.

I am more talking about her pro corporate business, pro rich, pro military, deregulation, anti union and anti evolution stances. Mom things that rich people and powerful people are the best. She got this from Eureka College where Ronald Reagan was big man on campus:

http://www.hindu.com/2009/07/07/stories/2009070750300200.htm

Budget pro-rich, says TDP Special Correspondent

‘No solution shown for unemployment and agricultural crisis’

Budget failed to specify how 1.20 crore jobs would be generated’

‘Promoting disinvestment in PSUs amounts to encouraging privatisation’

KADAPA: The Union budget is pro-rich and not oriented towards poverty alleviation and ignored the cause of the middle classes, Telugu Desam Party leaders alleged.

The budget failed to specify how 1.20 crore jobs would be generated, TDP State Secretary V.S. Ameer Babu, TNTUC president S.A. Sattar and party leaders S. Goverdhan Reddy and J. Rayappa Raju said in a statement. They deplored the government’s contention that it would attract foreign direct investment when there was global economic recession and did not specify how it would clear the foreign debt and interest.

The budget did not show any solution to unemployment, agricultural crisis and suicides. There was no mention of unearthing the black money of Rs. 1 lakh crore, they alleged. Inflation grew from 2.8 per cent last year to 6.7 per cent this year. The Bill passed for unorganised workers was confined to paper.

Promoting disinvestment in public sector units amounts to encouraging privatisation, the TDP leaders alleged.

Steps were not taken to curtail the increase in petrol and diesel prices. The budget made no mention of the lakhs of workers who lost jobs in IT industry, they said.

The TDP is opposing the budget, they asserted

‘Highly disappointing’ Tirupati Correspondent adds: Federation of the Farmers’ Association and various other farmers organisations have termed the general budget introduced today as highly disappointing from the farmers point of view.

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Which I think should clash with her Christian values. Lets face it, the rich just want more money at the expense of not just the poor but the environment. As long as they believe that their money can buy them clean water and clean air – even if it has to come in a bottle – well then the heck with the rest of us.

http://a4a.mahost.org/fakes.html

DON’T BE FOOLED!

Only after the last tree has been cut down,
only after the last river has been poisoned,
only after the last fish has been caught,
only then will you realize that money cannot be eaten.
–The Cree People


Big Business is terrified of the environmental movement, which remains the single most popular left-wing movement in the US. The dirty secret of Big Business is that it is principally responsible for pollution and environmental degradation around the world. The majority of Americans want a safer, cleaner environment. They know that, and have taken extensive countermeasures to protect themselves from the people at large, including pouring money into bogus environmental groups designed to further industry causes while appearing to be environmentally conscious. They also launch massive PR campaigns to paint themselves green.These anti-environmental initiatives are, in essence, efforts to thwart democracy.It’s important to note that the only green behind these efforts is money, not concern for the environment. These groups are very well-financed, backed, as they are, by corporations and other capitalist interests. What they lack in public support, they make up for in resources and powerful connections.Going over the list, you can see the copious use of buzzwords by the anti-environmental movement, as they strive to create the appearance of a broad mandate and public support. However, these groups are funded and controlled by economic and political elites, with a vested (financial) interest in thwarting and reversing environmental reforms.The following is excerpted from The Greenpeace Guide to Anti-Environmental Organizations, put out by the excellent Odonian Press, Box 32375, Tucson, AZ 85751, and is part of their Real Story series

TACTICS

  • Greenwashing: When a company adopts marketing strategies whereby the company appears to be adopting a more environmentally-conscious stance, when really it’s simply doing its usual routine.
      Examples:
    1. Mobil Chemical added a small amount of starch to the plastic in Hefty trash bags and called them “biodegradable” (however, the bags would not degrade if buried in landfills, but only if left out in the sun; moreover, the bags didn’t degrade, but rather broke up into smaller plastic pieces — not the same thing!) A Mobil Chemical pitch man said, “degradability is just a marketing tool. We’re talking out of both sides of our mouth because we want to sell our bags.”
    2. Coors Brewing sponsors a greenwashing campaign called Pure Water 2000 that funds “grassroots organizations [engaged in] river cleanups, water habitat improvements, water quality monitoring, wetland protection, and pollution prevention.” In 1992, however, Coors pleaded guilty to charges that it had dumped carcinogenic chemicals into a local waterway for 18 years!
  • Astroturf organizing: These are industry-funded organizations meant to function like environment grassroots groups, except that they are heavily financed by industry and seek to manipulate public opinion by distorting facts. They seek to put environmentalists in an unfavorable light by launching personal attacks against them, charging that activists are “anti-family,” “anti-American,” and pitting jobs and the economy against environmental reform. They are termed “astroturf” because they are designed to look like they are genuine grassroots movements.
  • Physical violence: Activists are routinely harassed by the FBI, which considers any progressive movements “terrorist” in nature, justifying surveillance, break-ins, arrests, and worse. Activists find themselves the victims of assaults, sabotage, death threats, and worse.
      Examples:
    1. 1990: Earth First! activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney were nearly killed by a car bomb — incredibly, the authorities arrested them and accused them of transporting a bomb, which was later thrown out for lack of evidence. The actual perpetrators were never apprehended.
    2. 1992: Activist Stephanie McGuire of Florida was assaulted by three men for opposing a Procter & Gamble pulp mill’s practice of dumping toxins into the Fenholloway River (this mill still does this, btw). They beat her, burned her with a lit cigar, and cut her with a straight razor, while saying “now you have something to sue us over.” No one was arrested in this crime.
    3. The Center for Investigative Reporting noted 104 violent attacks on environmentalists from January 1989 to January 1993, averaging one every two weeks.
  • Government involvement: Through official government channels, whether Congress or the courts or the Executive Branch, government has been shown to regularly side with Big Business where environmental issues are concerned. The conservative 104th Congress recently showed this in its efforts to weaken endangered species laws, open up wetlands and parklands for economic exploitation, and lessening clean air, food, and water legislation. They also cut the funding for the EPA to the bone, all of which pleased industry greatly!

SIX TYPES OF ANTI-ENVIRONMENTAL GROUPS

Most industries will rely on a combination of the following to undermine and roll back environmental reforms, lavishly spending money on campaigns to secure their financial gain at our expense!

  • Public relations firms
  • Corporate front groups
  • Think tanks
  • Legal foundations
  • Endowments and charities
  • Wise Use and Share groups

Of these, the misnamed “Wise Use” and “Share” groups need the most explanation. This anti-environmental movement is mostly a western phenomenon where timber, mining, ranching, chemical, and recreation companies banded together to fight the environmental movement. Ron Arnold, the movement’s founder, is a self-described reformed environmentalist, one who has “seen the light”. As he puts it: “We want to be able to exploit the environment for private gain, absolutely.”

Makes you wonder what kind of environmentalist he must have been, with an attitude like that!

“Wise Use” and “Share” (Canadian version of “Wise Use”) act basically as stormtroopers for industry, because, according to Arnold, the “Wise Use” movement can “do things the industry can’t. It can stress the sanctity of the family, the virtue of the close-knit community. And it can turn the public against your enemies.”

Wiseguys are recruited from the ranks of workers at company meetings (typically compulsory meetings, by the way), and through door-to-door canvassers claiming environmentalists are responsible for unemployment.

Here you see a classic tactic of capitalists, turning the working class against itself when they should be fighting their common enemies, the capitalists themselves! News flash, folks — capitalists cause unemployment, environmentalists don’t!

What the wiseguys want was hammered out in their 1988 conference in Reno, Nevada, where they created a 25 point platform cementing their goal to destroy the environmental movement. Below are eight of their “lofty” goals:

  • “immediate development of the petroleum resources of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska”
  • opening “all public lands, including wilderness areas and national parks” to mineral and energy exploitation and to recreational vehicles
  • exempting from the Endangered Species Act any species whose protection would interfere with resource exploitation (buzzword for “capitalist profit”, I’d say)
  • opening 70 million acres of wilderness that is currently protected by the Wilderness Act to commercial exploitation
  • logging 3.4 million acres of the Tongass National Forest in Alaska
  • making enviromentalists pay industry back if they lose cases in court, as well as to pay for lost industry profits (this is the classic “big guy” versus “little guy” tactic, where the industry hopes to scare off potential suits because they know that while they have the money to fight a successful court battle, environmentalists don’t — it’s not unlike a wealthy incumbent’s campaign war chest scaring off would-be challengers)
  • giving anti-environmental groups the right to sue environmentalists on behalf of the industry (this is a real gem, where industry uses these goons as dupes to do their dirty work, while the industry keeps its nose clean — ever the capitalist way!)
  • implementing free-trade agreements (e.g., NAFTA and GATT) that will grant US industry access to natural resources (e.g., raw materials) globally

Looking at these, one wonders where the “Wise Use” comes in! Far from being populists, these wiseguys are snugly in the vest pockets of their capitalist employers. They are what you’d call “ruling class heroes,” I suppose, making the world safe for wealth, power, and privilege — and they even get paid for their effort!

ANTI-ENVIRONMENTAL GROUPS

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More on this later but suffice it to say that couching all of the above in a religious certainty and finding proof of that in the Bible is just plain wrong. In fact it is what all the polluters want to happen. Ready made stooges.

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While I Was Gone Many Energy and Environmental Things Happened

I was so tempted to post them but I swore that for the first time in 2 years I would take a break. Tomorrow I may even post some vacation photos (shock) and we will be going to the State Fair so there will be pictures of that too (awe). Maybe if you are lucky a picture of the Butter Cow. Anyway in a nutshell here are some of the things I missed:

http://www.sj-r.com/homepage/x772302426/Dozens-show-up-for-jobs-at-former-Monterey-coal-mine

Dozens show up for jobs at former Monterey coal mine

By DEB LANDIS

THE STATE JOURNAL-REGISTER

Posted Aug 14, 2009 @ 08:51 PM

Last update Aug 14, 2009 @ 11:24 PM

WILLIAMSVILLE — Ron Semplowski of Gillespie has been laid off three times in the last four years.

Friday, Semplowski and three members of his extended family who also are unemployed drove an hour to Williamsville for a jobs fair for the Shay No. 1 coal mine that will operate out of the former Monterey coal mine facilities in Macoupin County between Carlinville and Gillespie.More than 50 applicants showed up by 9 a.m., according to the company.

“We drove 65 miles, and the mine is probably two miles from my house,” Semplowski said.  Rodney Rosentreter, who is also from Gillespie, said: “None of us has experience in coal mining, but we have other job experiences.”  Such jobs, said the Semplowski and Rosentreter family members, have included work with automotive, insulation and pork-producing companies.

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http://www.sj-r.com/entertainment/x1528792918/A-E-Notebook-A-new-Lincoln-musical-and-a-documentary-on-coal
Check out ‘Coal Country’ at Brew &View

Liberty Brew & View film series will host a screening of the documentary “Coal Country” at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Capital City Bar & Grill, 3149 S. Dirksen Parkway. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Admission is free.

The film is about modern coal mining and tells the stories of miners, activists who are battling coal companies in Appalachia, coal company officials and others involved in the industry. The film addresses questions related to the nation’s energy needs and the environmental impact of coal mining.

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I have it on good authority that the cinematographer will be there to discuss his work

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http://www.sj-r.com/homepage/x1528792006/Ameren-to-lay-off-80-at-Illinois-power-plants

Ameren to lay off 80 at Illinois power plants

THE STATE JOURNAL-REGISTER

Posted Aug 12, 2009 @ 03:08 PM

Last update Aug 12, 2009 @ 11:17 PM


More than 80 jobs at Ameren Corp. power plants in Illinois will be eliminated by the spring of next year as the poor economy continues to drive down demand for electricity, the company announced Wednesday.The cuts include 47 jobs at the Meredosia power plant, approximately 60 miles northwest of Springfield. Wednesday’s announcement came three weeks after the company announced it would cut 55 jobs in its Illinois energy marketing operations.Laid-off workers will be offered transfers, if possible, or severance packages and job-search assistance, according to the company.

“While we regret having to take this action, the challenges we face demand a new model for our merchant generation business. We must build a leaner, more streamlined organization that can more effectively compete in today’s difficult economy where we see much lower prices for our power,” said a statement from Chuck Naslund, president and CEO of Ameren Energy Resources Co.

Naslund said the company also has cut about $1 billion worth of construction projects that had been planned from 2010 to 2013.

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http://www.sj-r.com/homepage/x1558733451/Wind-farm-neighbors-to-petition-for-greater-distance

Wind farm neighbors to petition for greater distance

By TIM LANDIS (tim.landis@sj-r.com)

THE STATE JOURNAL-REGISTER

Posted Aug 11, 2009 @ 11:30 PM


A group of Sangamon County residents plans to file petitions this week asking that developers of a commercial wind farm be required to put greater distance between turbines and non-participating property owners.Approximately 450 signatures have been collected for submission to the county board and a county zoning appeals board, Cathy Bomke of Sangamon County Citizens for Wind Rights said Monday.The petitions ask that the current 1,200-foot setback requirement from the property of non-participating landowners be increased to a mile, although Bomke said the mile figure is open to discussion.

“One mile is where we started based on research on health, safety and property values. It’s not cut in stone. It’s a starting point for us,” Bomke said.

Bomke said a few petitions still must counted, but that the group hopes to file the request as early as Wednesday.

“What we’re asking for is a simple review of the setbacks. We’re not trying to stop anything here,” Bomke said.

American Wind Energy Management Corp. continues signing up property owns and conducting tests for the Meridian Wind Farm, a utility-scale project that in the first phase would have as many as 200 turbines in an area roughly between New Berlin and Pleasant Plains.

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 http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/partner/renewable-energy-world-north-america/news/article/2009/08/renewable-energy-world-conference-expo-exceeded-growth-and-attendance-expectations?cmpid=rss

August 13, 2009

Renewable Energy World Conference & Expo Exceeded Growth and Attendance Expectations;

Continued Strong Growth in 2010 Is Expected

March 30, 2009/Tulsa, OK

More than 4,000 renewable energy professionals from 75 different countries gathered in Las Vegas, Nevada for the sixth annual Renewable Energy World North America conference and expo March 10-12. With more than 225 companies exhibiting, both the exhibit and attendance numbers reflected significant increases over a year ago. Next year’s numbers are again expected to increase. A total of over 5,000 attendees and 300 exhibitors are expected at the Renewable Energy World North America conference and expo in Austin, Texas, February 23-25, 2010.

Renewable Energy World North America is owned and managed by PennWell Corporation and is the largest all-renewable conference and exhibition in the world. Conference sessions covered issues related to wind, solar, biomass, hydroelectricity, geothermal and hydrogen technologies, projects and finance.

 

“Renewable Energy World North America has shown exceptional growth in recent years and 2009 was no exception,” said Richard Baker, senior vice president of power for PennWell. “Our association partners, corporate sponsors and growing number of exhibitors are instrumental in making this the premiere all-renewable event in the world. Our host utility, NV Energy, exceeded expectations when it came to their support and involvement.”

 

Exhibitors also reported results that exceeded expectations. “Following our successful launch to the utility industry at DistribuTech, we were excited to keep the momentum going with our debut presence at Renewable Energy World 2009 in Las Vegas,” said Therese Wells, Director of Marketing for Ice Energy. “The visibility and exposure we generated there among key influencers has been invaluable for us as we establish the importance of energy storage as a key enabling technology for the renewable industry. We are excited to be back again in 2010. From DistribuTech to PowerGen to Renewable Energy World, PennWell’s global energy conferences

are a fundamental cornerstone of our event strategy.”

 

“Renewable Energy World and Power-Gen are the premier power industry trade shows in the United States,” said Chris Huntington, Vice President of Business Development for SkyFuel. “For SkyFuel, these are the crucial venues in which to meet the customers, suppliers and developers with whom we hope to create a new paradigm in the power industry; one in which utility scale solar power is no longer a marginal alternative but a mainstream option.”

 

The Keynote Session on March 10 featured Roberto Denis, Senior Vice President of Energy Supply for NV Energy. Following his remarks he was joined on stage by the executive directors of each of the leading renewable industry trade associations for a lively roundtable discussion on the economic stimulus, federal and state policy initiatives and technological breakthroughs. Roundtable participants included Denise Bode, CEO of the American Wind Energy Association; Douglas Durante, Executive Director of the Clean Fuels Development Coalition; Karl Gawell, Executive Director if the Geothermal Energy Association; Linda Church-Ciocci, Executive

Director of the National Hydropower Association; Julia Hamm, Executive Director of the Solar Electric Power Association; and Rhone Resch, President & CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association. Edwin F. Feo, Partner in the law firm Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy LLP also took part.

 

Archived video coverage of the event is available by visiting Renewable Energy World.com, the event’s flagship media sponsor.

 

The 2010 event is scheduled for February 23-25 in Austin, Texas. For more information, visit the Renewable Energy World North America web site at www.renewableenergyworld-events.com.

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This is what we have to look forward to:

http://www.conferencealerts.com/energy.htm

August 2009

17 Preparing for a NERC Audit Chicago IL
18 United We Stand / Building A Sustainable Economy – Conference & Trade show Washington DC
18 National Renewable Energy Summit 2009 Kuching Malaysia
21 Beyond the Brain VIII: Self and Death – What Survives? Canterbury United Kingdom
24 High Voltage Transmission Conductors Conference – (?69 kV) Chicago IL
24 Oil and Gas Boot Camp™ Houston Texas
25 Utility Scale CSP–Breaking Barriers and Lowering Cost Denver CO
26 ICESE 2009 – International Conference on Electrical Systems Engineering London Other
26 CESSE 2009 – International Conference on Computer, Electrical, and Systems Science, and Engineering London Other
26 CESSE 2009 – International Conference on Computer, Electrical, and Systems Science, and Engineering Singapore Singapore
26 ICEE 2009 – International Conference on Energy and Environment Singapore Singapore
26 The 3rd International Conference on Fermentation Technology for Value Added Agricultural Products Khon Kaen Thailand
27 Australian Institute of Hotel Engineers Gold Coast Australia
28 International Workshop on Empirical Methods in Energy Economics (EMEE09) Jasper Canada
30 SYNERGY AND TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENT in Agricultural Engineering Gödöllõ Hungary
31 The Indian Sugar Summit New Delhi India
31 Sustainable Energy Technology (SET) 2009 Aachen Germany
SET 2009 conference brings together leadingacademics and industrial partners and provides thelatest developments in sustainable technologies inthe energy, built environment, transport, waste &industry to stimulate new collaboration.

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Why The Automobile Is Stupid – It had to be invented in America

America is the home of instant gratification. There IS nothing more instant than the automobile and capitalism and nothing more American than the car. At no time in the history of humans have people been able to go some place distant at a whim. The Odyssey remains a famous work precisely because it takes Odysseus 10 years to get home and he never got out of the eastern Mediterranean. For a historical perspective it took mankind 50,000 years to get around the world. Yet I can just get in my car and for a few hundred dollars drive to California. How dumb is that…better yet how irresponsible? For that priviledge 32,000 people (roughly) a year die. That figure has not changed since 1962.

That is again roughly 1,536,000 people. That is more casualities then most major wars. Driving put the casual in casualities. Staggering numbers when compared to Vietnam, or Korea and especially compared to the various  incursions in the Arab or Persian Gulf (Iraq, Kuwait, and I include Afghanistan). So let me be clear, I hate the internal combustion engine and not just the one under your hood. But cars do not make any sense no matter what powers its drive train, whether its bio-diesel, electricity or water. It is a bad use of resources. If you need to cover long distances…take the damn bus. If you have to get to the store RIGHT NOW…take your bike. You want to go really really long distances…take the freakin train… But every last one of us having a 2000 lb. car (many weigh much more) that carries 50 lbs. of fuel (usually much more) and transports one 300 lb. human (usually much less) is just stupid. There really is no other way to characterize it dumb dumb dumb.

Please also do not misunderstand me. As long as people have traveled they have died in transit. Think the Titanic here, sometimes in spectacular numbers:

http://www.titanic-facts.com/

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But:

A traffic collision is when a road vehicle collides with another vehicle, pedestrian, animal, or geographical or architectural obstacle. Traffic collisions can result in injury, property damage, and death.

Terminology

Phrases commonly used to describe collisions include: auto accident, car accident, car crash, car smash, car wreck, motor vehicle accident (MVA), motor vehicle collision (MVC), personal injury collision (PIC), road accident, road traffic accident (RTA), road traffic collision (RTC), road traffic incident (RTI), smash-up and fender bender.

As the factors involved in collisions have become better understood, some organizations have begun to avoid the term “accident,” as the word suggests an unpreventable, unpredictable event and disregards the opportunity for the driver(s) involved to avoid the crash. Although auto collisions are rare in terms of the number of vehicles on the road and the distance they travel, addressing the contributing factors can reduce their likelihood. For example, proper signage can decrease driver error and thereby reduce crash frequency by a third or more.[1] That is why these organizations prefer the term “collision” rather than “accident”.

However, treating collisions as anything other than “accidents” has been criticized for holding back safety improvements, because a culture of blame may discourage the involved parties from fully disclosing the facts, and thus frustrate attempts to address the real root causes.[2]

Background

Road crashes causing death, injury, and damage have always happened since animals were domesticated. History tells people who were the victim of such incidents. Louis IV of France died in 954 after falling from his horse, as did at least two kings of England: William I (William the Conqueror) in 1087 and William III in 1702. Handel was seriously injured in a carriage crash in 1752.[3]

The British road engineer J. J. Leeming, compared the statistics for fatality rates in Great Britain, for transport-related incidents both before and after the introduction of the motor vehicle, for journeys, including those by water, which would now be undertaken by motor vehicle:[4] For the period 1863–1870 there were: 470 fatalities per million of population (76 on railways, 143 on roads, 251 on water); for the period 1891–1900 the corresponding figures were: 348 (63, 107, 178); for the period 1931–1938: 403 (22, 311, 70) and for the year 1963: 325 (10, 278, 37).[4] Leeming concluded that the data showed that “travel accidents may even have been more frequent a century ago than they are now, at least for men“.[4]

Irish scientist Mary Ward died on 31 August 1869 when she fell out of her cousins’ steam car and was run over. She is believed to have been the world’s first motor vehicle accident victim.

 

 

A truck crash.

In the United States the calculable costs of motor-vehicle crashes are wage and productivity losses, medical expenses, motor vehicle damage, employers’ uninsured costs, and administrative expenses. (See the definitions for a description of what is included in each component.) The costs of all these items for each death (not each fatal crash), injury (not each injury crash), and property damage crash was: Average Economic Cost per Death, Injury, or Crash, 2006: Nonfatal; Disabling Injury; $55,000; Property Damage Crash (including nondisabling injuries) $8,200; Death; $1,210,000; Expressed on a per death basis, the cost of all motor vehicle crashes—i.e. fatal, nonfatal injury, and property damage—was $5,800,000. This includes the cost of one death, 197 property damage crashes (including minor injuries, 54 nonfatal disabling injuries). This average may be used to estimate the motor vehicle crash costs for a state provided that there are at least 10 deaths and only one or two occurred in each fatal crash. If fewer than 10 deaths, estimate the costs of deaths, nonfatal disabling injuries, and property damage crashes separately.

Defined in sections 2.3.4 through 2.3.6 of the Manual on Classification of Motor Vehicle Traffic Accidents (7th Edition) ANSI Standard D16.1-2007 are defined by severity motor vehicle injuries Estimates are given here of the costs by severity of injuries. http://www2.nsc.org/lrs/statinfo/estcost.htm

Road incidents result in the deaths of an estimated 1.2 million people worldwide each year, and injure about forty times this number (WHO, 2004).

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OR:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divorce_your_Car!

Divorce your Car! Ending the Love Affair with the Automobile (New Society Publishers, ISBN 0-86571-408-8), written by Katie Alvord and with a foreword by Stephanie Mills, proposes that automobiles have lost their value as a convenience and have become a hindrance, even an addiction. “Today’s relationship with the automobile inflicts upon us pollution, noise, congestion, sprawl, big expenses, injury, and even death. Yet we continue to live with cars at a growing cost to ourselves and the environment.” [1] There are several arguments for her thesis presented throughout the text as well as some suggestions for how to wean one’s self from automobiles.[2]

Reception

The book was well received by critics and has been hailed by environmentalists as a realistic description of the current situation in which we live. Alvord cites many sources throughout the text to back up her claims, however there have been complaints that some of them are biased, originating from sources with an apparent agenda, such as Asphalt Nation. Jay Walljasper of Utne Reader claims the book is “A clear-headed approach to reducing or even eliminating our dependence on cars, Divorce Your Car! [is] full of common sense and fresh insight.”

About the Author

Katie Alvord, born in northern California, is a freelance writer, environmentalist, and avid bicyclist. A graduate of the University of California at Davis and with a Master’s degree from the University of California at Berkeley, Alvord has worked with many non-profit agencies focused on environmental issues. She has had articles printed in such publications as E Magazine, Wild Earth, and The Urban Ecologist. In 1992 she received several awards, including the Clean Air Champion award, for her self documented experience of divorcing her car while living in a rural part of Sonoma County, California.[4]

[edit] Main Points

[edit] Supporting Arguments

In the book, Alvord states that air pollution from cars is damaging to the health of humans directly because of contaminants in pollution and indirectly through the destruction of the environment and contribution to global warming.[5] Oil spills, acid rain, and dirty rivers are some of the results of widespread use of cars, according to Alvord. The destruction from oil spills can wreak havoc on entire ecosystems.[6] In addition to the cost of the car, an owner can expect to pay much more in repairs and upkeep throughout the car’s life.[7] Additionally, tens of thousands of people die every year from car crashes, and hundreds of thousands are injured.[8]

[edit] Solutions

Alvord proposes that there are benefits to walking, cycling and using mass transit beyond saving the Earth, such as exercise, money conservation, and self reliance.[9] By modifying land use, financial policies, and urban infrastructure, efficiency can be increased world wide and society can learn to function without a car in every household.[10] With the advent of the Internet and decreasing phone prices, it is more efficient to work from home or video conference online in many circumstances, and just as effective. This not only reduces pollution but can save money for businesses.[

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Making Drugs Illegal Is Not Just Stupid It Is A Serious Mistake

I like to make a distinction between naturally occurring mind altering substances and man made drugs. Naturally occurring substances should be totally legal and drugs should be regulated. But for the purposes of this discussion, think for a minute how quickly our world would be transformed if we took all of the money we spend on the “war on drugs” and spent it on alternative energy and environmental issues. If we took all of the money spent on:

eradication

criminal and military foreign drug assistance

border patrol

law enforcement

criminal prosecution

department of corrections

state and federal bureaucracies

We would save Billions of $$$ every year to spend on getting off the carbon economy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegal_drug_trade

Not to mention the  taxes we could raise:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQlk01sxO_E

How many marginalized lives could be restored:

http://drugwarfacts.org/cms/?q=node/62

How much suffering could be reduced:

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/debate/myths/myths8.htm

http://www.amazon.com/Illegal-Drugs-Complete-History-Chemistry/dp/0452285054

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http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2009/04/30/drugs-elephants-and-american-prisons/

The Great Debate

 

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07:38 April 30th, 2009

Drugs, elephants and American prisons

By: Bernd Debusmann

Tags: General, , , , , , , , ,

Bernd Debusmann - Great Debate–Bernd Debusmann is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own–

Are the 305 million people living in the United States the most evil in the world? Is this the reason why the U.S., with 5 percent of the world’s population, has 25 percent of the world’s prisoners and an incarceration rate five times as high as the rest of the world?

Or is it a matter of a criminal justice system that has gone dramatically wrong, swamping the prison system with drug offenders?

That rhetorical question, asked on the floor of the U.S. Senate by Virginia Senator Jim Webb, fits into what looks like an accelerating shift in public sentiment on the way that a long parade of administrations has been dealing with illegal drugs.

Advocates of drug reform sensed a change in the public mood even before Webb, a Democrat who served as secretary of the Navy under Republican Ronald Reagan, introduced a bill last month to set up a blue-ribbon commission of “the greatest minds” in the country to review the criminal justice system and recommend reforms within 18 months.

No aspect of the system, according to Webb, should escape scrutiny, least of all “the elephant in the bedroom in many discussions … the sharp increase in drug incarceration over the past three decades. In 1980, we had 41,000 drug offenders in prison; today we have more than 500,000, an increase of 1,200 percent.”

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