Save and Conserve

Quick disclaimer ... since I now live in Salt Lake City, when I write about local stuff, it's probably going to relate to the western region.

The governor of Utah has just announced that state workers will switch from a 5 day/8 hour schedule to a 4 day/10 hour week - largely in order to reduce energy consumption (both personal & business). This is set to begin in August ... and it has not been done by any other state. Who knew Utah would be the leading edge of lifestyle changes designed to address the energy crisis? I'm happily surprised.

Obviously, I think this is great news. Getting thousands of state workers off the road every Friday will reduce gas consumption & limit CO2 emissions. It will eliminate 1 full round-trip commute per week for thousands of employees.

This will also get other states looking at similar proposals. It might get some private businesses doing the same thing. All good.

This makes a lot of sense & it shows good judgment on the part of the governor, Jon Huntsman. Will there be some issues with the change? Certainly. Can they be dealt with? Sure. Everyone needs to have an open mind as we begin to rethink the way we commute to work in light of soaring gas prices. Times change & effective leaders change with the times.

Posted by tom c. at 3:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

No? Well, how about this ... can you say 7 billion?

The world's population surpassed 6 billion in 1999, meaning it will take only 13 years to add a billion people.

By comparison, the number of people didn't reach 1 billion until 1800, said Carl Haub, a demographer at the Population Reference Bureau. It didn't reach 2 billion until 130 years later.

1 billion in 13 years. That's how you get a hockey stick graph ...

This is a demand-driven energy crisis we are experiencing. Interesting times indeed.

Posted by tom c. at 1:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's official. China is now pumping more CO2 into the air than we in the US are.

This is an enormous problem. Even if the people & government of the US got religion on global warming & started to cap and/or reduce carbon emissions, it wouldn't matter. China is now the 500 pound guerilla pounding the Earth like it's an American Tourister suitcase.

And we can't really ask China to stop, either:

The world's carbon dioxide emissions increased 3% in 2007, and China was responsible for fully two thirds of that increase, according to the report. It now emits 14% more than the United States every year, and that figure is expected to grow as the country continues to burn coal, clear forests and make cement to fuel its own economic boom, while manufacturing the world's disposable goods.

The more you learn about the climate crisis, the more you realize it's more about economic growth & population than anything else. You can't expect to radically reduce the CO2 emissions if you still want people to drive, to be mobile, to eat, to go to school, to live. Plus, it becomes even harder if the number of those people who want to do those things keeps increasing. It's like trying to plug the ever-lengthening cracks in a failing dam.

The scale of the problem exceeds any one country's ability to cope effectively with it. This is a global shitstorm ... one without any simple or quick fix that has been made much more difficult to deal with now that Chinese economic growth has "gone plaid".

Posted by tom c. at 5:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

After nearly a month between posts, I'm happy to be back blogging from a new location. My wife & I just moved ourselves to Salt Lake City & thus far, we are really liking the city, the mountains, the sun, the views & the friendly people!

With a new location comes a new job, right? Well, no actually. My company was kind enough to offer a telecommute situation, so I am now working from home.

I mention this because it means I'll be driving a LOT less than I had been in Albany. I will be flying quite a bit more than I had been, so I'm not sure what his change means for my net energy use, but I plan to do some research on that front. Look for something in a future post on that topic.

The telecommuting has been going well thus far. Since I work "on the web", the work is the same. Obviously the physical isolation is the big change ... that is - no doubt - an adjustment.

Here are some interesting numbers that detail energy savings from teleworking reported by Sun Microsystems on Web Worker Daily:

* The average worker only used 64 watts per hour at home, compared to 130 watts per hour in a Sun office.
* Commuting was responsible for 98% of each employee's carbon footprint.
* Working from home two and a half days per week saves two and a half weeks of commuting time per year.
* The same amount of work at home saves 5400 kilowatt hours of energy per year.

Posted by tom c. at 12:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)