Climate Change Forces Us To Move Animals – Noah’s ark comes to life

Already a group of scientists and volunteers moved a butterfly north because of the warming climate. Our zoos are being referred to as “lifeboats” for extinct “in the wild” animals. This is no longer funny. People should be going to jail for this but it turns out that jails are only for poor people and white collar criminals not the uber wealthy who control the literal power structure that is causing this.

http://www.livescience.com/17719-species-extinctions-climate-change.html

Extinctions from Climate Change Underestimated

Wynne Parry, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 04 January 2012 Time: 09:31 AM ET

As climate change progresses, the planet may lose more plant and animal species than predicted, a new modeling study suggests.

This is because current predictions overlook two important factors: the differences in how quickly species relocate and competition among species, according to the researchers, led by Mark Urban, an ecologist at the University of Connecticut.

Already evidence suggests that species have begun to migrate out of ranges made inhospitable by climate change and into newly hospitable territory.

“We have really sophisticated meteorological models for predicting climate change,” Urban said in a statement. “But in real life, animals move around, they compete, they parasitize each other and they eat each other. The majority of our predictions don’t include these important interactions.”

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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Hot Fun In The Summertime – Acting eco friendly is important

This is just a fun little site for kids. We are on summer vacation after all.

http://green.thefuntimesguide.com/2012/03/living-green.php

Americans Are Becoming More Environmentally Aware & Conscious Of Their Behaviors

A new national survey of more than 1,000 Americans found that ‘being green’ is becoming more mainstream and has less of a stigma tied to it than it once did.

According to the survey, getting caught littering is more embarrassing to Americans than getting caught cheating on taxes.

Other behaviors that people admit to being socially aware that they’re doing include:

  • not recycling plastic bottles
  • driving a vehicles that gets only a few miles per gallon
  • letting the water run while brushing teeth

It’s clear that it is no longer just a highly motivated ‘few’ who are conscious about their own environmentally friendly actions these days.

It’s The Little Things

For most, it’s important to start small in order to stay committed to living green.

In  my case, I set a few simple actions as my New Year’s Resolutions a few years ago.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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Energy Independence The Funny Way – A good time was had by all

Yes it is true. I am promoting a book I have never read. But you know what? I should have.

http://business-network-land.blogspot.com/2012/05/robert-danziger-funny-thing-happened-on.html

Robert Danziger: A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Energy Independence – Author Interview

Humorist and alternative energy pioneer Robert Danziger was kind enough to take the time to answer a few questions about his hilarious memoir about his life in the world of alternative energy, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Energy Independence.

The author finds the humor in such widely diverse places as Cal-Tech, the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL), and of course in his own business ventures in the alternative energy field. A true renaissance man, the author has enjoyed more careers, and indulged in more laughter, than many people would experience in two lifetimes.

Thanks to Robert Danziger for his comprehensive and informative answers.

What was the background to writing this book A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Energy Independence?

Robert Danziger: At the gym a couple of years ago a young mother was supervising her two kids, five and eight years old. We struck up a conversation and she told me that she doesn’t let her kids watch the news anymore because the energy and environmental stories had given them repeated nightmares. Partisanship and the escalation of catastrophic rhetoric threatened the sense of security and safety she wants for her children.

My career has been inventing and developing solutions. I am fundamentally optimistic about new technology and our ability to respond to crisis. Scaring people doesn’t work and breeds resentment. I don’t want to be part of scaring kids to accomplish something.

The conversation with that young mother convinced me to take a year or so to listen to people from a broad range of ages, politics, and beliefs to try to find out what people agreed on, if anything. I found three things all of them, at least in these groups, agreed on without exception: people like to laugh; like music; and want energy independence and a clean environment when they are coupled with prosperity.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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This Piece Just Blew Me Away – Small unit nuclear power is just so wrong on so many levels

This is the Republican Corporate dreamland. Proclaiming that you are the energy source of  the future doesn’t make it so. But mix in a fair number of under educated farm people who will believe anything and Westinghouse who has everything to gain and you have a Missouri wet dream. Unfortunately this is just that, only it is a bad dream. I mean really, if we make it small and spread it around it will work better? Get out.

http://www.moenergyfuture.org/blog/breaking-news-exciting-investment-opportunity-for-missouri-announced-today/

Breaking news: Exciting investment opportunity for Missouri announced today

Posted on April 19, 2012

On Thursday, April 19, Missouri’s energy future took a giant leap forward as investor-owned, cooperative and municipal utilities announced that they are partnering with Westinghouse Electric Company to apply to the Department of Energy’s Small Modular Reactors (SMR) investment fund for up to $452 million. The funding will support engineering, design certification and licensing for SMRs in Missouri.

This historic partnership could make Missouri a world leader in the energy sector economy.  Gov. Jay Nixon, Sen. Mike Kehoe, Rep. Jeanie Riddle, Chairman Pollock and the overwhelming majority of members of the General Assembly who support nuclear power and helped make this amazing opportunity a reality, should be applauded for their hard work and commitment to Missouri’s energy and economic future.

Over the last four years, MBEF’s supporters across the state educated the public to show that cleaner, alternative energy sources like nuclear are a path forward for Missouri. Today, we are another step closer to creating jobs, boosting our economy and securing our energy future.

This announcement could make Missouri home to an SMR component manufacturing center, engineering and design center, and training facility for engineers—establishing Missouri as a world leader and exporter in energy technology and manufacturing.  In addition to the construction of new SMRs, thousands of Missourians will be put to work because of this project.

An economic impact study about the SMR project is in process and will be made available later this spring.

For more information about SMRs, please visit the below websites.

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Go there and laugh. More tomorrow.

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The Big Fix Gets It Right – Thus gets no attention

The American sheeple have grown tired of Reality TV that is not manufactured. If you show the American people the truth they stampede in the opposite direction because they have been taught that the truth entertains not that the truth shall set you free. First I give you the movie site and then the best review I could find. I know this has been out for awhile and I apologize for my tardiness. Part of the problem is I have spent a fair amount of time on the Gulf Coast, living in Tampa and New Orleans. As a result I have been frequent visitor to St. George Island. So I many times do not trust my emotional response to events there. Still this is important.

http://www.thebigfixmovie.com/

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/big-fix-cannes-2011-review-189062

The Big Fix: Cannes 2011 Review

8:39 AM PDT 5/17/2011 by Kirk Honeycutt

The Bottom Line

A gloomy but perhaps realistic depiction of the forces of corruption and deceit that produce environmental catastrophes.

CANNES — The Big Fix from Josh Tickell (Fuel) and his wife and co-director Rebecca Tickell is the latest doom-and-gloom environmental documentary although this one takes alarming leaps from a single environmental catastrophe into fantastic realms of worldwide conspiracies, corporate malfeasance and political corruption. Which is not to say the filmmakers got anything wrong. Anyone with an open mind and some attention paid to events of the past few years will have little trouble seeing that the fix was in when the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig blew up in the Gulf of Mexico last year — and this fix will still be in when the next catastrophe happens.

The problems with The Big Fix though are threefold: One, judging by the poor attendance of journalists and film critics at the film’s Palais press screening, few people other than fellow activists are seeing to these doom-and-gloom movies anymore. Two, little here is really new as much of the Tickells’ findings have been reported elsewhere, even by some of those they interview, especially Jeff Goodell, who spent months in the Gulf for his well-researched Rolling Stone article.

Finally, the Tickells describe a “fix” is so vast and powerful, the film can only throws its hands up over any realistic solution other than to install solar panels to heat up your toxic household water.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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Car Gets Over 2000 MPG – Well it is not really street legal but it is still amazing

If we could all get this kinda performance out of a 50cc engine we would be…well geniuses like the ones at Cal Poly. It is a little cramped and probablely hot but 2000 miles is a long trip at 30 miles per hour. So while the headline is deceptive, this is an amazing accomplishment.

http://inhabitat.com/students-build-black-widow-supercar-that-gets-2752-3-mpg/

Students Build Black Widow Supercar that Gets 2752.3 MPG

by Ariel Schwartz, 02/19/10
Think claims of electric vehicles that get over 200 MPG are impressive? Try this on for size: a group of mechanical engineering students at Cal Poly have developed a vehicle that can get up to 2752.3 MPG — and it doesn’t even use batteries.
The Cal Poly Supermileage Team‘s wondercar, dubbed the Black Widow, has been under construction since 2005. The 96 pound car has three wheels, a drag coefficient of 0.12, a top speed of 30 MPH, and a modified 3 horsepower Honda 50cc four-stroke engine. It originally clocked in at 861 MPG and has been continuously tweaked to achieve the mileage we see today.Want to see the Black Widow in action? The car is being entered for a fourth time in the Shell Eco-marathon along with a new three-wheeled Urban Concept vehicle. Who knows? Maybe this one will break the 3,000 MPG barrier.

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Go there and read. Especially look at the pretty pictures. More tomorrow.

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The Military Sheds Its Dependence On OIL – Shouldn’t we be doing the same thing

I know this week and next week, maybe all summer, may look like a chaotic mish mash of subjects but to rejuvenate my sense of purpose I am only blogging about stuff that I find interesting today. I find the military’s attitude towards peak oil to be much more pragmatic then the capitalists they serve.

http://grist.org/renewable-energy/u-s-military-kicks-more-ass-by-using-less-fossil-fuel-energy/?fb_ref=.T7uRMi_E9bl.like&fb_source=home_multiline

 

David Roberts

Energy, politics, and more

 

U.S. military kicks more ass by using less fossil-fuel energy

By David Roberts

This is my contribution to a dialogue on the military and clean energy being hosted by National Journal.

To understand the promise of renewable energy for the U.S. military, it helps to start as far from Washington, D.C., as possible. (This is true for most forms of understanding.) Start far from the politicians, even from the military brass, far from the rooms where big-money decisions are made, far out on the leading edge of the conflict, with a small company of Marines in Afghanistan’s Sangin River Valley

Not long ago, for a three-day mission out of a forward operating base in Afghanistan, each Marine would have humped between 20 and 35 pounds of batteries. One of the reasons Marines are so lethal in such small numbers today is that they are constantly connected by radios and computers. But radios and computers require a constant supply of batteries, brought by convoy over some of the deadliest roads on earth and then piled on the backs of Marines in highly kinetic environments.

In late 2010, India Company, from the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, tried something new. They packed Solar Portable Alternative Communications Energy Systems, or SPACES — flexible solar panels, 64 square inches, that weigh about 2.5 pounds each. One 1st Lieutenant from India 3/5 later boasted that his patrol shed 700 pounds.

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Go there and read. This guy writes well. More tomorrow.

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Fine Kettle Of Fish They Have Got Us IN – or actually out of I guess

Whatever. It is real rare that I do a Purely environmental post. Yes it is true if there is no food to eat, then there is no private housing market, thus no residential energy market. But man that is a stretch. Still fishing vessels use huge amounts of energy, at least the large commercial ones do, so they pollute the water as well as strip it bare.

The end of fish, in one chart

Posted by at 08:00 AM ET, 05/20/2012

Want to see how severely we humans are scouring the oceans for fish? Check out this striking map from the World Wildlife Fund’s 2012 “Living Planet Report.” The red areas are the most intensively fished (and, in many cases, overfished) parts of the ocean — and they’ve expanded dramatically since 1950:

Between 1950 and 2006, the WWF report notes, the world’s annual fishing haul more than quadrupled, from 19 million tons to 87 million tons. New technology — from deep-sea trawling to long-lining — has helped the fishing industry harvest areas that were once inaccessible. But the growth of intensive fishing also means that larger and larger swaths of the ocean are in danger of being depleted.

Daniel Pauly, a professor of fisheries at the University of British Columbia, has dubbed this situation “The End of Fish.” He points out that in the past 50 years, the populations of many large commercial fish such as bluefin tuna and cod have utterly collapsed, in some cases shrinking more than 90 percent (see the chart to the right).

Indeed, there’s some evidence that we’ve already hit “peak fish.” World fish production seems to have reached its zenith back in the 1980s, when the global catch was higher than it is today. And, according to one recent study in the journal Science, commercial fish stocks are on pace for total “collapse” by 2048 — meaning that they’ll produce less than 10 percent of their peak catch. On the other hand, many of those fish-depleted areas will be overrun by jellyfish, which is good news for anyone who enjoys a good blob sandwich.

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Go there to see the graphs and maps and read. More tomorrow.

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Littlest Greenest Car – But it is way too much money

I love things like the Smart Car, the Coopers and all the little electric cars I have reported on over the years so of course I like this one too. The thing that amazes me is how much money they cost. I mean you can argue that you are front loading your costs…yada yada blah. But noway I am paying that kinda money for a car period.

http://jalopnik.com/5910190/the-worlds-smallest-cars-are-back-on-sale-for-insane-money

The World’s Smallest Cars Are Back On Sale, For Insane Money

Contact Jason Torchinsky: jason@jalopnik.com

May 17, 2012 4:00 PM

Like an adorable, tiny zombie popping out of its tiny, adorable window-box grave, the Peel P50 and Peel Trident are back from the dead. Neither of the tiny, tiny cars has been built since 1966, but a new company, with funding from the BBC’s show Dragon’s Den, is starting production up once again, as announced earlier this year. They’re street legal in the UK and US, and you can buy them for an absurd price £10,000 ($16,000).

The Peel P50 is the World’s Smallest Car, most famously enjoyed (indoors and outdoors) by Jeremy Clarkson. The Trident is a sort of sportier-looking model, with the same mechanicals (original: 49cc, 4.2 HP) but swaps the cyclopian porta-potty look for a very 50s-modern bubble-topped futuristic fiberglass body. The Trident also can hold two, instead of the solitary seat of the P50.

The modernized P50 and Trident swap the old (reverseless) three-cog transmission for a CVT unit, and use a 3.35 HP motor (one of the few times the hundredths decimal place is important), which is enough to push the 198 lb Trident or 240 lb P50 to 28 mph (electronically limited— maybe you could go a bit faster?). There’s electric versions as well, with roughly the same specs, except instead of an amazing 118 mpg, you have a meager 15 miles between charges. Dead dinosaurs sure hold a lot of energy.

At 118 MPG, Peel advertises…

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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War Over Oil – Heh it even sounds sexy

Right now we are involved in the largest war games ever held in the middle east in Jordan with 20 or so other nations participating. Isn’t that grand? And to top it off the President of Israel thinks the plan is worked out. This is so wrong in so many ways I lost count at 100. What a pitiful waste for so much promise in Obama.

http://www.infowars.com/u-s-ambassador-to-israel-plan-to-attack-iran-ready/

U.S. Ambassador to Israel: Plan to Attack Iran “Ready”

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
May 16, 2012

The U.S. ambassador to Israel, Daniel Shaprio, told a closed conference in Tel Aviv that the United States has completed preparations for a military strike on Iran. His comments were recorded by a reporter and aired on Israel’s Channel 2 TV on Wednesday night.

It would be preferable to resolve this diplomatically, and through the use of pressure, than to use military force,” Shapiro said. “But that does not mean that option isn’t available. Not just available, it’s ready. The necessary planning has been done to ensure that it’s ready.”

Shaprio’s comments were not intended for public consumption, the Times of Israel reports.

The finalized attack plan arrives as Israel and the United States prepare for joint military exercises in the United States. “The exercises, to be held in the coming months, will strengthen the relationship between the IAF and the US Air Force as they practice carrying out joint operations,” the Jerusalem-based online newspaper reported. “Israeli and US air defense forces are also to take part in a major joint drill later this summer in Israel to simulate a massive attack. Thousands of US soldiers are expected to arrive in Israel for the drills.”

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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