Energy reform is a good thing :)
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- Are you interested in becoming an organizer in your area?
- Yes
- Tell us about your experience with alternative energy:
- Not enough experience! I wish it were an everyday thing already, however, as most us are, I am still trying to make changes in my life to get the ball rolling in a more positive and CLEAN direction. I have driven through southern CA and have seen the sprawl of windmills just churning away. As a child when I lived in Texas I saw the sprawl of oil derricks and pumps churning away. I think even though we will continue to need oil, if we can diversify our energy resources we would not be too dependent on any one thing and would be able to use the resources more efficiently for what they work best for. Most of my experience is reading and listening, there is so much going on that excites me about the potential and possibilities. I only throw myself behind projects I think I can believe in and every time I see a wind mill generator or solar panel I get a little flutter in my heart :) We have gotten this country a long way and now it is time to take it to the next step!
- What excites you about this campaign?
- The potential to be independent from oil, the new sources of energy like solar and wind being more affordable for every household to use or even the idea of our electricity that comes from the power plant being created from wind or nuclear. The knowledge that better technology will mean considerably less impact... I hope that one day it starts blending with and maybe even benefitting the environment instead of affecting it and eroding the overall health of our land.
- What do you want to do to help?
- spread the word, volunteer for events, get solar energy, learn learn learn
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VIDEO of the very first design prototype:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmUZJYYT2n0
An article recently published:
http://www.biztimes.com/news/2009/2/6/innovations-racine-inventor-creates-a-better-windmill
Shea,
If you would like to take a trip to the coast we are having a Solar and sustainability event in San Clemente, Southern California.
800 S. El Camino Real, Saturday 2.7.09 10am to 4pm.
Here is the event:
http://www.livinggreensc.com/
Michael
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27FEB09
Honorable Speaker of the House Congresswoman Pelosi,
I am an Electronic Technician Chief in the US Navy with 27 years service stationed overseas. I’m outlying an idea to assist and work with current plans for achieving energy independence. I urge you, as speaker of the house and the driving force to form the select committee on energy independence and global warming, consider for discussion and introduction into the house US Treasury Savings Bonds for Energy Independance.
In WWII America sold war bonds supporting the war effort. When young, my mother told me her primary school raised enough money through bonds to build a tank to support troops. I am impressed with the patriotism and purpose of our greatest generation that accomplished so much.
Selling energy bonds for RE (Renewable Energy) development would lower foreign oil imports and assist with the complex problem of funding. Bonds sold as “Energy S” could support new solar trough plants, “Energy W” to support wind farms, Energy “H” to support hydroelectric plants, Energy “T” to support RE transportation such as electric bullet train routes powered by RE, Energy "C" COOPS for small communities only needing a small quantity of turbines, and Energy “I” for needed infrastructure high voltage power lines to the RE site. Bonds will have the project name and include an artist’s perspective of the project and an American flag. President Obama had great success with the internet during his campaign. In a similar manner, using the internet, energy bonds could have a website listing current projects and an “electronic checkout” could purchase a bond $25 or higher. Simpler methods of payment such as “PAYPAL” and credit cards would be available and after an electronic purchase is complete a color print out of the bond is available with a follow up of the bond in the mail. The website would limit quantity of projects for each category until funding is complete. After a project becomes funded, a new project will be available. A tab on the site will show history and status of previous projects. Purchasers may take great pride in “collecting” and displaying bonds of various RE projects and participating at different levels of financial support. Solar trough plants in the multi-hundred MW size capacity with molten salt energy storage in California, Arizona, and West Texas can provide a major portion of electric needs. North Dakota has potential to support 1/3 of our nations electric needs in it’s class 4 wind zone areas. There are plenty of suitable proposed wind turbine farms now around the nation to significantly increase our RE if funded. Mid sized hydro-electric has not been used in America to it’s full potential. Following the example of our neighbor, Canada, it would provide a significant increase in percentage of electric production. Developing all three we could provide the majority of our electric and heating needs through renewable energy in a "New New Deal" fashion allowing natural gas for transportation as T. Boone Pickens is working for. Bullet train routes have proven a viable alternative to commercial domestic air service and when powered by electricity provided by RE suppliers America would be in the forefront of world technology. Example, I heard of discussion for a commuter train from Denver to Colorado Springs. Such a route built as a renewable energy project with charter requirement legally requiring to only purchase electricity from available renewable energy sources would be a model example. There are many train routes, city bus systems, and government vehicles that can be converted to run from alternative energy sources and fuels. Jobs created would bolster the economy, lower trade deficit, and strengthen national security. I would take great pride in print outs of bonds with graphics of each project I supported and many other Americans would also. The energy bonds could have tax breaks. BLM lands may be a viable place to start for some projects.
I contacted the US treasury department and was told that the marketing department for savings bonds closed several years ago. I was told there would be problems because savings bonds are at the federal level while the projects will be at the state and local level. I disagree and believe that these can easily be figured out in the way of grants to the state and local level using money from the bonds for those specific projects. I was told to check out auctions on the www.treasurydirect.gov website and found them to not apply to citizens wanting to buy savings bonds to support a cause such as energy independance. I was told by the treasury department to look into CREB (Clean Renewable Energy Bonds). I found CREB to be large scale funding that a citizen would not be able to participate in as a US Treasury Energy Independance Bond would provide. If given the tools to participate directly, the power of the citizens of the United States to help achieve energy independance could not be denied. Americans mean well and the Energy Independance Savings bond program will give citizens the power at their level to make it happen. If marketed through a web page, commercials, and to federal employees the word would get out and participation would spread like wildfire.
Mr. Paul Gipe, a resident of Bakersfield CA, an author of several books about wind energy, and recipient of multiple awards as a pioneer in the industry since the 1970's has put a letter I wrote to Senator Dorgan on this subject as well as an older letter I wrote on wind COOP in JAN07. These websites are:
http://www.wind-works.org/coopwind/RenewableEnergyBondsforEnergyIndependence.html
and
http://www.wind-works.org/articles/AmericanEnergyIndependencethroughCooperativeInvestmentinWindEnergy.html
Sincerely and very respectfully,
ETC(SW/AW) Mike Kendall USN
Mailing address: PSC 476, Box 879, FPO AP, 96322 USA
Telephone (803) 265-4756, Email: ke6cvh@yahoo.com
The clock is ticking. Both Thomas Freidman and The Gang of 20 have told us (see DAILY PICKENS) the only way to change America's energy policy is to build this historical, grass roots effort to un-ignorable heights. There are less than 75 days until Inauguration Day. We must concentrate on the job at hand. CAN YOU GET 10 signed pledges faxed in asap? Many hands make light work.
PLEASE,
Kim
I began following a chain of links way back on a page in AR and now here I am on your page. You are refreshing! You are intelligent, you can communicate well with the written word and you are young! That gives me both hope and encourgement.
While I am visiting Shea I want to invite you to come and take a look at the elephant. The elephant is in the room. You'll see...
http://push.pickensplan.com/profiles/blog/show?id=2187034%3ABlogPost%3A1366404
May we always desire to play a better game and create abetter tomorrow (for everyone!).
Monte
We need your help with the Pledge Push! We can only get this plan done with HUGE numbers. Please download some pledges, get them signed and fax them back to the 888# at the bottom of the page. We eat the apple one bite at a time. Collect a few every day, and in no time you will have 100. We would be thrilled to have you in the 100CLUB. ARE YOU IN?
Please get your elected leaders to sign, as well. A two pronged offense can not fail!
Best
Kim
Also, please congratulate Karen Nardella and Craig Savage for completing the task! You should read how they did it on the 100CLUB GROUP page - http://push.pickensplan.com/group/100pledgeclub
We have petitions! "THE PLEDGE" is on the main page.
I think this is the very best tool we could ask for. It is so much easier to get someone to sign a petition than to go online and join the plan as a member.
I have been test driving it for a few days and got 200 signatures rather eaasily. Most folks had seen the ads or seen Boone on the news. Most were eager to sign it and strongly support it. A few wanted to get more info- I handed them a business card with the website. Very few said no (2 or 3).
I hope you can ask all your "friends" to download a bunch of PLEDGES and fax them back to the office ASAP. THIS IS HOW WE BUILD AN ARMY much faster. Millions of signatures.
Thank you for all your efforts. We have a very strong team. Many ants can take the Hill!
Best
Kim
I don't think i thank you for joining my group, or adding me as your friend, so I'm doing it now. Your a very beautiful woman, and you have a good goal in front of you. So did you get to spend time with Mr. Pickens, and talk to him? I work for a company that installs wind, and solar for residential, and commercial applications. Looking forward to talking with you soon,
Have a great week,
Kraig
Enter the New American Dream House
This Oregon couple's home hits a standard few others have achieved: It's completely energy self-sufficient.
Here's how:
Four years ago, Linda Rose and her husband, Eldon Haines, realized it might soon be time to consolidate -- and reinvent -- their family living arrangements. The retired couple lives in Eugene, Ore., where they have to negotiate 46 stairs from curb to doorstep every time they venture out. So the couple decided to build their own version of a dream retirement home in Rose's daughter's backyard in Portland, Ore.
The two life-long environmentalists didn't want just another house, however. The pair already burned old newspapers and cardboard in their wood stove and recycled or reused all plastic. They're proud to boast that they have generated two garbage cans of waste a year for the past 20 years.
EARTHLY PURSUIT. Haines, a nuclear physicist, has worked for decades as a consultant to NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, most recently on the Mars Odyssey unmanned spacecraft. But he's also known nationwide as the inventor of the copper cricket, a solar water heater. "My real-life interest is the environment, not planet Mars," he likes to point out.
So it was only natural that the couple set out to build a home that generates all the energy it needs to run appliances, heating, and cooling. It's a pioneering effort in Oregon and one of the first in the nation.
These so-called net-energy homes go a step beyond the "zero-energy homes" promoted by the federal government, explains Charlie Stephens, residential energy specialist at the Oregon Energy Dept. in Salem. To qualify as zero-energy, a home need only generate enough electricity for 70% to 80% of its needs. The Rose House (that's what the owners like to call it), completed this summer, is energy self-sufficient, period.
MORE AFFORDABLE Such homes are at the cutting edge of alternative energy. Fewer than 500 zero-energy homes exist in the U.S. today, and net-energy homes are even rarer. One being constructed in the oceanfront community of Canon Beach, Ore., will store hot water in wells drilled through basalt several hundred feet down. The idea is to store heat in the stone to be siphoned into the house later. Clever as this system is, it costs several thousand dollars extra. You won't find one in the aisles of Home Depot (HD ) or Lowes (LOW ).
The Rose House takes a different design path. It's plainer and more affordable than most such experiments. In fact, this one-story, green-colored home with a steepled roof looks deceptively normal. Set in a quiet residential neighborhood, it's surrounded by tall sunflowers and beds of tomatoes and squash. It only has 800 square feet of living space: two bedrooms and one bathroom.
The Rose House's owners received $27,750 worth of government grants from the likes of the Energy Trust of Oregon for the construction. With the grants figured in, they estimate they spent about $146 per square foot to build the home. That's 22% more than Portland's going price of $120 per square foot for a standard home. But because Rose and Haines will have no energy bills to pay, they'll save hundreds of dollars each year.
HIGHER RESALE VALUES. The economics might turn out to be even more favorable as utilities start to pay for electricity that residential customers generate. In Tennessee solar-home owners receive 15 cents per kilowatt hour produced (an average solar home produces 6,000 kilowatt hours a year). They pay only 6 cents per kilowatt hour that they buy from the utility. That's one of the more generous deals in the nation.
Builders in California have found that energy-efficient homes have a higher resale value than traditional homes, says John Suppes, president of Clarum Homes, which expects to have built 277 zero-energy homes in California by yearend.
A June survey of 600 Californians conducted for Environment California Research & Policy Center indicated that 63% of respondents said they would pay more for a solar home.
In Oregon, the Rose House doubles as a research lab, monitored by scientists from Oregon Institute of Technology, among others, and some of its features could show up in new housing developments to be built in the state capital of Salem in 2006. Sensors dispersed throughout the home measure temperature of the exterior and interior walls and on the roof. Energy generation and consumption is constantly monitored. For the next two years this data will be fed to researchers and builders throughout the state -– and soon onto the Web for anyone to see.
HOT AIR AT WORK. The reason for the study, in part, is to motivate more builders to construct energy-efficient homes. The Rose House was recently featured on a local "Build It Green!" tour, showcasing 20 Portland homes incorporating innovative environmental ideas. "My hope is that anyone would be able to see themselves in it," says Clark Brockman, project manager at SERA Architects in Portland, who designed the house. "That they don't think of a net-energy house as something out of a sci-fi movie."
Space-age technology is certainly at the core of the experiment. Part of the house's south-facing roof is covered with 300 square feet of solar panels that should produce 6,000 kilowatt hours a year (a typical American household spends 2,000 kilowatt hours a year on lighting alone). A special system sucks in hot air from underneath the solar panels -- it's typically heated to more than 100 degrees -- and uses it to heat water and air inside the house.
In addition, Haines's invention, the copper cricket, uses the sun's energy during the summer to heat water. Together these contraptions should produce enough hot water for a hot shower.
"MORE ALIVE." A special energy-recovery ventilator -- a file-cabinet-size box -- recaptures heat leaving the house and recycles it. A big part of creating an energy-efficient home is an air-tight design. In a typical older home the whole volume of air escapes through cracks and crannies in less than an hour. In an energy-efficient home, walls, roof, and foundation are designed to reduce this air exchange to once every three hours or even longer.
The Rose House features so-called staggered-stud walls, which prevent heat from leaving the house and the cold from entering it. And its special air-exchange system prevents the house from becoming too stuffy. "You can almost feel the house breathing in the night," says Haines. "It feels more alive."
Haines hopes that as more people see his house, they'll feel it, too, and follow his lead.
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