I know I rag on compact flourescents all the time but Incadescent Lighting should be banned in the U.S. like it is in Australia.

Carol thought you would like to see this page from the Common Craft – Explanations In Plain English web site.

Message from Sender:

Doug, this is an awesome little video on CF light bulbs. Carol

Video: New Light Bulbs in Plain English
by leelefever

Switching the types of light bulbs we use at home is a small but
impactful way for nearly everyone to save money and help reduce
pollution. We made this video because compact fluorescent (CFL) bulbs make sense and we want people to make the switch.

Length: 3:00

Please feel free to share this video. You can email it to someone here, or grab the code for your website on You Tube and Blip.tv (where you can also download the original file.)

Click here to read more on our site

My buddy and Clean Energy Springfield member asked me to post this so I briefly interrupt the Presidential Candidates for this Public Service Announcement: 

On 10/4/07, Will Reynolds <willinois@gmail.com> wrote:

Who Killed the Electric Car?

Tuesday, October 16, 7pm

Capital City Bar & Grill
Capital City Shopping Center
3149 S Dirksen Pkwy
Springfield, IL 62703

This is your chance to see the film on a big movie screen with
friends, food and beverages.. Stay after the movie for information
about the Illinois Clean Car Bill and how to resurrect the electric
car.

Presented by Liberty Brew & View and the Sangamon Valley Group of the
Sierra Club.

SPRINGFIELDIANS BUILD ENVIRONMENTALLY  FRIENDLY HOME

Design, materials contribute to couple’s energy efficiency goal

By AMANDA REAVY

STAFF WRITER

As Sangamon State University students in the 1970s, Harv Koplo and his future wife, Annette, had a deep interest in eco-friendly design.

Some 30 years later, after their son gradu­ated from Northwestern University, the Ko-plos decided to put that interest into practice.

The couple chose sustainable materials and “green” design techniques to build a sprawling, ranch-style home on Spaulding Orchard Road near Chatham. After years of discussion and planning, the Koplos are now

settling into their new home.

According to Jim Johnston of Sustainable Springfield Inc., the Koplos’ house is one of the first locally to include building materials and practices that have been successfully used in other parts of the country.

It wasn’t an easy process, but Harv Koplo said that with research, a little creativity and determination, an efficient, environmentally friendly home is within reach of nearly any­one.

Koplo used a photo slideshow to describe the building process from start to finish Monday night during a presentation spon­sored by Sustainable Springfield Inc., a non­profit organization that promotes environ­mental advocacy and education. More than 30 people attended the event at the Dove Conference Center in the Prairie Heart Insti­tute.

“Plan in advance so you know what you want instead of realizing what you want later

on,” Koplo advised, noting that one of the couple’s biggest goals was energy efficiency.

“We wanted to create a tight envelope so we could control the environment (inside the house) instead of leaving it up to the ele­ments,” he said.

Besides insulating the home’s foundation with 2-inch-thick extruded polystyrene, they used 2-by-6-foot studs for the frame instead of the traditional 2-by-4s to accommodate thicker insulation.

And instead of using blown fiberglass — which air passes through, Koplo said — dense wet cellulose (recycled newspaper) was put into the walls and dry cellulose in the ceilings.

For heating and cooling, they chose a pas­sive solar design. Koplo recommended the book “The Solar House” by Daniel D. Chiras for tips.

The home is oriented with large windows on the southeast, south and southwest sides

to draw in heat from the morning and after­noon sun. To avoid overheating, Koplo said, he had a cement thermal mass wall built in­side the home that assumes the temperature of the air around it, soaking up the heat and giving it off when the surrounding air be­comes cool.

There also is an open floor plan to keep air circulating.

Koplo further explained how 2-kilowatt photovoltaic panels were installed on the roof to generate the home’s electricity.

A natural gas stove/convection oven bakes food in 80 percent of the time called for in recipes, while the Koplos opted for a high-ef­ficiency heat pump heating/cooling system, ceiling fans throughout the house and an air exchanger to refresh air inside the home, among other techniques.

For hot water, a recirculation pump on the line provides it in­stantly and saves on the amount used, Koplo said. A solar hot water heater was installed on the roof, and the home’s downspouts run water into special roof wash­ers, which filter the water and run it into a cistern that already exist­ed on the property.

Some of the building materials included Lyptus wood, which grows in about 15 years and is used to replant the rain forests, for the main floor. The porch decking is made out of a wood look-a-like composed of recycled plastic bags and soda bottles.

While the floor of Harv Koplo’s in-home computer shop is made of recycled tires, the couple found a countertop made of recycled cardboard known as ShetkaStone for their master bathroom.

Koplo noted that while some techniques and materials are more expensive initially, they should pay for themselves in time.

“(Both) sustainable and afford­able can be hard to find” when se­lecting certain building materials, he admitted, adding that most contractors and subcontractors favor more traditional building methods as opposed to the less-utilized green techniques.

“Many will tell you there are a lot of things they don’t do. If they don’t, find someone else who will,” he said.

Amanda Reavy can be reached at 788-1525 or amanda. reavy @s/-r. com.

The film deals with the history of the electric car, its development and commercialization, mostly focusing on the General Motors EV1, which was made available for lease in Southern California, after the California Air Resources Board passed the ZEV mandate in 1990, as well as the implications of the events depicted for air pollution, environmentalism, Middle East politics, and global warming.

The film details the California Air Resources Board‘s reversal of the mandate after suits from automobile manufacturers, the oil industry, and the George W. Bush administration. It points out that Bush’s chief influences, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, and Andrew Card, are all former executives and board members of oil and auto companies.

EV1s crushed by General Motors shortly after production

A large part of the film accounts for GM’s efforts to demonstrate to California that there was no demand for their product, and then to take back every EV1 and dispose of them. A few were disabled and given to museums and universities, but almost all were found to have been crushed; GM never responded to the EV drivers’ offer to pay the residual lease value ($1.9 million was offered for the remaining 78 cars in Burbank before they were crushed). Several activists are shown being arrested in the protest that attempted to block the GM car carriers taking the remaining EV1s off to be crushed.

The film explores some of the reasons that the auto and oil industries worked to kill off the electric car. Wally Rippel is shown explaining that the oil companies were afraid of losing out on trillions in potential profit from their transportation fuel monopoly over the coming decades, while the auto companies were afraid of losses over the next six months of EV production. Others explained the killing differently. GM spokesman Dave Barthmuss argued it was lack of consumer interest due to the maximum range of 80–100 miles per charge, and the relatively high price.

The film also explores the future of automobile technologies including a deeply critical look at hydrogen vehicles and an upbeat discussion of plug-in hybrid electric vehicle technologies. Similarly to and in conjunction with films such as An Inconvenient Truth, the cinematic value of the film is rapidly becoming eclipsed by its motivational effect on a diverse group of newly activist, environmentally minded supporters.

[edit] Interviews

The film features interviews with celebrities who drove the electric car, such as Mel Gibson, Tom Hanks, Alexandra Paul, Peter Horton, Phyllis Diller, and Ed Begley, Jr., a bi-partisan selection of prominent political figures including Ralph Nader, Frank Gaffney, Alan Lloyd, Jim Boyd, Alan Lowenthal, S. David Freeman, and ex-CIA head James Woolsey, as well as news footage from the development, launch and marketing of EV’s.

The film also features interviews with some of the engineers and technicians who led the development of modern electric vehicles and related technologies such as Wally Rippel, Chelsea Sexton, Alan Cocconi and Stan and Iris Ovshinsky and other experts, such as Joseph J. Romm (author of Hell and High Water and The Hype about Hydrogen). Romm gives a presentation intended to show that the government’s “hydrogen car initiative” is a bad policy choice and a distraction that is delaying the exploitation of more promising technologies, like electric and hybrid cars that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase America’s energy security. Also featured in the film are spokesmen for the automakers, such as GM’s Dave Barthmuss, a vocal opponent of the film and the EV1, and Bill Reinert from Toyota.

[edit] Production

The film was written and directed by Chris Paine, and produced by Jessie Deeter, and executive produced by Tavin Marin Titus, Richard D. Titus of Plinyminor and Dean Devlin, Kearie Peak, Mark Roskin, and Rachel Olshan of Electric Entertainment. The documentary was featured at the Sundance, San Francisco, Tribeca, Los Angeles, Berlin, Deauville, and Wild and Scenic Environmental Film Festivals and was released in theaters worldwide in June of 2006. The film features a score composed by Michael Brook and also features music by Joe Walsh, DJ Harry and Meeky Rosie. Jeff Steele, Kathy Weiss, Natalie Artin and Alex Gibney were also part of the producing team.

So this Blog at least documents that another Electric Car could be forthcoming. We can’t let them Kill Electric Cars AGAIN!

Think about it. What if all the Coal Miners around the world just stopped mining coal and demanded to be retrained for jobs that did not contribute to the Warming of the Globe. Wouldn’t we immediately have to start doing things differently? Initially the 10 producing areas would send in their military troops to fill the void, and as a by product, providing a break from combat on the planet. How long could that last? What a breath of FRESH AIR that would be.

“According to Amanda Levy at the Springfieldbase newspaper the State Journal Register: You can help stop the BURNING in Darfur and save lives too”…(http://www.sj-r.com/News/stories/14658.asp)

Among other steps, he said, people can check whether their mutual funds support the Sudanese government and they can chip in to buy solar cookers for refugees.

The Springfield Jewish Community Relations Council and the Never Again! Save Darfur Coalition hosted the event, which was designed to promote the sale of such cookers for refugees in Darfur and Chad.

At least 3.5 million people have been displaced since the genocide broke out in Darfur in 2003.

Solar cookers were on display Monday and information was provided on how to purchase them as part of the Solar Cooker Project, which is sponsored by Jewish World Watch. The initiative aims to give the cookers to refugees in the Iridimi and Touloum camps in Chad.

Lindy Seltzer, founder of the Never Again! Save Darfur Coalition, said most refugees are female, because most boys and men have been killed in village attacks.

Seltzer described the cookers as ingenious and simple to use. Though she didn’t have exact figures, Seltzer said many of those attending Monday night wrote checks to provide cookers. 

What they don’t say is when the woman go out to look for wood for a fire they are raped and maimed…yikes!

“As a companion piece::

How to donate solar cookers

To purchase solar cookers for Darfuri women in refugee camps. download a donation form at

www.jewishworldwatch.org/donate/solarcookerproject.html.

Area contributors are asked to put “Springfield Solar Cooker Project” in the memo of their checks so the funds raised locally may be calculated.

According to Jewish World Watch, solar cookers offer many benefits to refugees:

“On another note even Nicholas Kristof is willing to admit that Dick Cheney and the BURNING crowd are full of crap.”

Conservation a technology deal, not a sacrifice deal

Conservation a technology deal, not a sacrifice deal

By NICHOLAS KRISTOF

Published Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Saving energy doesn’t have to mean shivering in the dark. Dick Cheney once scoffed that energy conservation can be a “personal virtue” but is no basis for an energy policy.Growing evidence suggests he had it exactly wrong.

Concern about greenhouse gases and reliance on imported oil usually leads to a focus on the supply side of the energy equation, particularly exotic sources such as wind, solar, waves and hydrogen. The coolest car in history is a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle I once drove on a GM test track: It could go 100 miles per hour and nothing came out the exhaust but water vapor.

Cheney’s image seems to be of a dour stoic shivering in a cardigan in a frigid home, squinting under a dim light bulb, showering under a tiny trickle of (barely) solar-heated water, and then bicycling to work in the rain. If that’s the alternative, then many of us might be willing to see the oceans rise, whatever happens to Florida.

“Of course what we can do is BURN LESS” 

But new research has shown that improvements in energy efficiency often pay for themselves, actually leaving us better off.

“This is not a sacrifice deal,” Daniel Yergin, head of Cambridge Energy Research Associates, says of conservation. “This is a technology deal. After all, we’re twice as energy efficient now as we were in the 1970s, and at the same time our economy has more than doubled.”

James Woolsey, an energy expert and former director of the CIA, puts it this way: “People have radically overestimated the sacrifice and dramatically underestimated the opportunity.”

McKinsey & Co., the business consulting company, suggests embracing energy-saving measures that pay for themselves with at least a 10 percent rate of return. McKinsey says that if this approach – at no cost to economic growth – were put into effect worldwide, by 2020 the annual savings would be 1.5 times the current U.S. annual energy consumption.

McKinsey Global Institute put out a 290-page book in May detailing the steps necessary. These include better insulation and high-efficiency heating in new homes; low-energy light bulbs; high-efficiency appliances; and higher fuel economy standards for vehicles. To drive a mile in the U.S. typically takes 37 percent more gas than in Europe.

“The sheer waste of it all, when other countries have shown another path, is incredible,” notes Diana Farrell of McKinsey Global Institute. “The opportunities here are tremendous.”

Besides the Ruling Elite who else does he blame? 

I can’t help feeling that we in the news media are part of the reason that steps to battle climate change aren’t on top of the national agenda. We’re good at covering things that happen on any one day – like a tornado or hurricane – but weak at covering complex trends, like climate change. And we tend to cover disputes by having a dutiful quote from each side, without always explaining where the scientific consensus lies.

Climate skeptics say that we don’t know how serious climate change will be, and they’re right. But isn’t it prudent to address threats even when we’re unsure of them? We don’t expect to be caught in a fire, but we still believe in fire escapes and fire departments.

Suppose we had political leaders who snorted that fires are nothing new, that the science of firefighting is unclear, and that we can’t impose a burden on business by establishing fire departments – while brightly adding that citizens can extinguish fires on their own out of “personal virtue.”

Why, we would think those leaders were nuts.

And its not just Energy Policy that Cheney lies about!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BEsZMvrq-I

Friday, August 10, 2007

Energy Tough Love Learning how you burn things up and when is the key to stopping burning things up. Learning how much it costs to burn is also incentive not to burn. Say gasoline prices rise to $4.00 per gallon. You might not necessarily sell your car but you would be very careful about when you buy gasoline, say in the morning when its cooler and where you bought it, like anywhere that sells it below $4.00. If you thought gas prices would come down you might postpone that trip to Denver or Miami until then…Oddly (very sarcastic here) in the place where you burn a bunch of stuff, your home, you do not have this basic information. You can change that according to the the New York Times.. www.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E00E4DA1530F93BA35752C0A9619C8B63 “Ten times last year, Judi Kinch, a geologist, got e-mail messages telling her that the next afternoon any electricity used at her Chicago apartment would be particularly expensive because hot, steamy weather was increasing demand for power. Each time, she and her husband would turn down the air-conditioners — sometimes shutting one of them off — and let the dinner dishes sit in the washer until prices fell back late at night. Most people are not aware that electricity prices fluctuate widely throughout the day, let alone exactly how much they pay at the moment they flip a switch.” You can change all of that by purchasing a digital meter for your house. They cost $100-200 a meter with memory and a wifi card and the local utility company should install it for free. Now I know the energy conservation purist out there will scream that the utility companies should do this and some are, like PGE. www.pge.com But why wait and you can scare the living beejeezus out of your utility company at the same time. They may not even have time of day rates yet and they probably will think that a future that was far off is here today.

Wednesday, August 08, 2007

Energy Tough Love New Homes Partner Results in All States Printable: Results 1 – 50 | All Results ENERGY STAR mortgages are designed to help home buyers purchase an ENERGY STAR qualified new home by allowing the home buyer to qualify for a larger loan, reduce closing costs, and/or offset the cost of a home energy rating. The following is a list of ENERGY STAR lender partners and basic information about their ENERGY STAR mortgage programs. Please contact lenders directly for details and current information. All Available Incentives Select another partner type:Site-Built Home Builders and Developers Manufactured Home Builders Home Energy Raters Utilities/Sponsors Lenders Select another location:All States Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut D.C. Delaware Florida Georgia Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming Results 1 – 50 of 69 Next   All A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z Special Financing Hoosier Mortgage Anderson, IN 765-622-1620 2006 Illini Bank Springfield, IL 217-547-9671 2007 This is a partial listing of banks that will offer Environmental Mortgages  at the Energy Star website. Illini Bank is currently offering them in Springfield, IL! I hope that someday this is universal for both the current housing stock and new builds. Just think what a change in mentality it would be if every housing lender in the country said to all their customers, “That house could use an energy upgrade and here is the deal I can put together for you”. The next time you buy or build a house, please ask about this program.

August 7th, 2007

Stopping burning stuff to be happy is easy once you get the hang of it. For instance lighting is a very simple way to at least cut down. I was asked by a Mayor of a pretty good sized town what was the greenest thing I thought he could do. My answer was ban incandescent lightbulbs tomorrow! When you think about electrical lighting its kinda like burning the candle on both ends. You are burning coal (or someother major source) at a power plant and then burning something to make light at the other end. This might have been acceptable 100 years ago but NOT NOW. At least not the way Thomas Edison wanted it done. Incandescents simply burn a wire inside a glass case until the wire breaks.

There are several ways to minimize this. If everyone switched to compact flourescent light bulbs right now, We could shut down almost all of the 100+ nuclear power plants or the equivalent of the “dirtier” coal fired power plants immediately. Compact flourescent light bulbs still burn things, in this case a electric modulating balast that interacts with a gas to produce light, but they are at least 5 times more efficient than a lightbulb and last 5 times as long. While this is an extreme example, I currently have a compact in my basement that i bought in 1990 and it is still going strong!!! It cost me $15 then, but that is now less than a $1 a year. How many of you can say that you spent $1 on bulbs last year? And they have gotten a lot cheaper. You can get them now on sale for $3.

2 to 200 Watt Compact Fluorescent Bulbs

you can find out more at www.lightbulbsdirect.com, www.bulbs.com, or www.1000bulbs.com, and wikepedia has a listing on them as well

But there so much more out there. There is LCD lighting that is again, 5 to 10 times more efficient than compact florescent light bulbs. For day time lighting there are light tunnels to bring daylight into the house. My ultimate dream is to have biological lighting that is totally renewable but that is another blog. Today get rid of your incandescent bulbs.