Pete C. wrote:

Exactly my point about solar not being viable for utility scale
application. If however you get a cheap PV material that can be applied
to every single roof in the country in low maintenance batteryless
grid-tie configurations then you could have a huge impact on RE
production without much of any new environmental impact, unlike attempts
at utility scale production covering square miles with collectors.
Distributed generation is the only way solar will likely be viable in
our lifetimes.

Yes, agreed. Didn't mean to come across like these new
developments are the answer for utility scale projects.
However, in some areas those large scale facilities make sense.

Distributed PV generation on everyone's roof and utility scale tidal
generation. Free electricity for anyone who is able to use an electric
or plug-in hybrid vehicle. Improved public transit systems. Greatly
reduced demand for liquid transportation fuels i.e. gas and diesel,
making bio-fuel replacements for those more viable.

I'm looking into an electric truck and solar panels for
charging. I work from home, generally make a max of 2 trips
to town a day, for maybe 25-30 miles. At least during spring
and summer, I can drive nearly for free. And in winter, just
plug into the wall.

A great many homes are now using
mostly CF lighting (I use mostly CF) as well.

Me too, but I'm really waiting for prices to come down on
white LED's, that will really start to make a difference.

Side note, I live in Grass Valley, up in the foothills, and
used to work for a guy that flew to the SF bay area
frequently for business. I got to go along several times,
and twice we flew back at night. I was amazed seeing from
the air, all the huge but empty parking lots in the
industrial area, fully lit.... whata waste.



lighter
vehicles,


Only where legitimately viable. Mindlessly insisting that everybody
should be driving tiny little econoboxes only serves to turn the public
off to the idea of smaller vehicles as a whole. A great many people have
regular need for a larger vehicle and they aren't going to give them up,
period.

I'm not in the category that says EVERYONE must have a
lighter vehicle. I'd love to have a Dodge diesel and a
companion heavy duty trailer, but as you note, the costs of
the second vehicle are significant.

Some things can be done to improve efficiencies in that process, but as
a percentage of our total energy usage, it is insignificant. We should
however, *not* be importing produce from other countries while the same
items are in season in this country.

Maybe in the overall scheme of things it's a small factor,
but all these small factors add up...


Do you think lessons will ever be learned? Look at thousands of years of
history and the same problems occurring over and over and over again.
Lessons are never learned for any appreciable length of time, they may
be learned in the short term but are rapidly lost on successive
generations.

I have hope. In the past, few people really had any
education or access to records. Today, nearly anyone can
access an avalanche of data.

But then, I lose hope when I see people driving around town
constantly in huge massive 4x4 trucks that are obviously
just a testament to someone's ego and pocketbook. The bling
on most of these trucks would easily pay for a small
economical vehicle. Still, despite the overall lack of long
term learning from our mistakes, it would be a big mistake
to say "we're all gonna be screwed by our inability to learn
from the past, so fuggit, I'm going to grab every luxury I can"

For myself, I drive at the bottom end. Half of my vehicles
go to the scrapyard when I've used them up. Nicest car I've
ever owned in my current '94 Ford Escort which returns a
respectable 32mpg up in the foothills, an '84 Toyota truck
for those tasks I can't do with the wagon, and an '81 Honda
XL185 trail bike which gets me around 70mpg given I like to
wind it out. It'll do close to 90mpg if I want to just putt...

Overall, nobody gives a **** what I think or do, all I can
do is try to minimize my consumption of resources, and
quietly laugh to myself when I hear monster SUV owners
crying about what it just cost them to fill their tank.

Jon