Save and Conserve

I'm sure a lot of Prius owners feel a lot like this owner:

One of the most fascinating parts of owning a Prius has been the ability to monitor how energy is used and distributed while it is in motion. It also displays the car's current fuel economy as well as the outside temperature. Touching the pad labeled "consumption" brings up a bar chart depicting gasoline mileage. It also shows how much energy has been delivered to the battery. The screens are endlessly informative. And as a new owner, I found my emotions rising and falling by how well I was doing on fuel economy. I felt victorious when the bar would zoom to 100 mpg, deflated to see it drop below 20 mpg.

That seems insightful. As soon as someone becomes aware of their behavior with respect to energy consumption, they want to optimize it (read: save energy). I think there is a market for home energy monitors, as well as monitors for the car too. But I really think it could help in the home. You can imagine programming a monitor to alert you when your consumption hits a certain level. That would be a really great way to keep your consumption capped & your costs down.

I have heard that owners who have a battery-backup solar system tend to watch their battery charge level like a hawk. I'm sure it's the same with grid-tied systems that employ net metering.

The notion to "do better" seems to be hard-wired in humans. I'm sure if we had more energy monitors showing us how much we are using, we'd use less.

Posted by tom c. at 1:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Realize that the energy crisis is fueled by a complete lack of long-term vision.

The average fuel economy of the automobile fleet in the US in 2008 has risen to 20.8 miles per gallon. In 1987, the average was 22.0 miles per gallon. source

Pretty much says it all ... grade: F

Posted by tom c. at 9:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's been pretty sickening watching the McCain - Palin ticket "go Rove" on us over the past few weeks. I mean, it's one thing to spread lies about your opponent (see Kerry in 2004), but it seems even worse to lie about your own record. I mean, come on! It's YOUR record & we can check it pretty easily.

The "Palin is the most knowledgeable person on energy" meme is particularly irksome, given that she can't even get the basic facts about how much energy Alaska produces relative to the entire US correct. Check out this post for the whole story, but suffice to say Palin is going around saying that Alaska produces almost 20% of the energy in the US. She is inflating this number rather dramatically. According to the Energy Information Administration, the actual number is more like 3.5%. Then she modified the claim, saying Alaska is producing 20% of the oil & natural gas in the US. Unfortunately, she is still way off. The actual number is 13%.

These seem like the type of mistakes "the most knowledgeable person on energy" in the US wouldn't make. Since Palin is largely basing her foreign policy credentials on the fact that Alaska is an important energy state, shouldn't the public be aware she is inflating Alaska's importance? Yet we hear nothing about this in the mainstream media.

Instead, we get the talk shows & the pundits. Usually there is one from each party & they argue & talk over one another for the entire "bit". Then the host thanks them for the enlightening discussion & the viewer has learned nothing. We really need to get a handle on the news media. It is not helping anyone figure out the truth. Since news should really be about facts, this seems perverse.

I'm not surprised that someone with some energy experience is on the national scene in this election. As I've written before, energy is probably one of the top 2 or 3 issues in this election ... for good reason. But it is surprising that someone can completely misrepresent the facts ... & not get called on it outside of the blogosphere.

Posted by tom c. at 5:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)