Global warming--solutions.

MountainDon · May 02, 2007, 04:16:17 PM

Peter, I recall you saying you'd found someone who could do some things to a Saturn and make the milegae appreciably better. I didn't realize you'd gone and done it. Just what sort of things were done, what was the approach to what seems like wizardry?

fourx · May 02, 2007, 04:39:16 PM

Just a comment on the mention earlier that cars have 20% less power on propane- living 40 k's from the nearest petrol station which sells propane I find the gas running low occasionaly and switch to the back-up unleaded. I have never noticed any( this is in a 4.2 litre Ford with a factory fitted LPG system) difference in performance at all. In fact it seems to have more grunt on propane.

glenn-k · May 02, 2007, 07:11:49 PM

Interesting BTU facts -- you would think we would be industrious enough to get our own. :-/

Now I know why a piece of dry bark or two kicks up the heat from the old Round Oak stove quite nicely.

MountainDon · May 02, 2007, 07:34:52 PM

QuoteInteresting BTU facts -- you would think we would be industrious enough to get our own. :-/

LOL

glenn kangiser · May 19, 2007, 11:05:50 AM

Newsletter - Fuel cell info

His windmill book is great - I have it - linked at the word windmill in the newsletter.

http://www.poormansguides.com/news-April-07.htm

Leo · May 19, 2007, 12:32:40 PM

work from home if possible then work toward it.Ups comes almost anywhere.Cottage industry has much going for it no commute,listen to music or not.eat when hungry etc.the Internet has helped greatly..in order for Me to do it again 911 killed the Mr haney of wood and metal furniture.theres a three day festival here in September live music and artist from all over the east..i waited till they had no customers then asked how its been since 911 half said it had picked up some the others not to pre 911.then with 10 carefully picked photos of what i build asked them what they thought would sell half pointed to one item all wood.,building lap stake canoes.odd thing its what id rather do?steel weighs 490?lbs per cubic foot,western red cedar 22lbs..the finished one person 12' canoe weighed 27lbs.way back when i got 2000 for the one here some where found a 1992 used one for sale for 3000.on a per pound basis,the next step will be to set up shop where the only thing in the room is a cd player chair or two , the essential materials and tools .no clutter makes for more efficient work time. Do youre home work where to market .pricing.,and start it as a hobby part timejob etc in a year one can reach a good momentum.for now Im in the great rust belt.that goes from chicago toledo,detroit,all the way to the east coast.where people are under getting laid off cloud.Cottage industry will become a bigger piece of the economic pie

benevolance · May 19, 2007, 04:50:13 PM

Well there is one big problem with the cottage industry returning to mainstream....Used to be people owned their own land and homes...Today everyone either rents or are mortaged to their limit and are looking at 30 year loans...

Which means you cannot afford to be wrong or to struggle for very long while starting up a cottage industry.

But as gasoline and other fuels get retardedly expensive you will see people look for transportation alternatives...

Working out of the home is one thing that will be looked at by a lot of people.

Land values are going to see a shift....There has been a long urban sprawl problem in America...People wanting to get out of the cities out into the country for their own little piece of paradise....

When it costs a fortune to commute to work...One thing that will change is people will once again focus on living closer to cities and their jobs cutting down their commuter costs.

Another thing is simply getting rid of the SUV and choosing to drive smaller cars with slightly less power for better fuel mileage.

Car pooling and mass transit will see some growth as well...

But the passing of Peak Oil has definately started a change in the way we live our lives...For me it was improving my car to get 60 miles per gallon....So I could afford to drive the damned thing...

We are going to see a whole new wave of cars that are not hybrids but give more than 50 miles to the gallon... Gasoline prices may go down a little...But the says of fuel for $1.50 a gallon are over....

The average price in America is well over $3.00 a gallon and it will soar to over $3.50 a gallon in the near future... This is without a hurricane or castastrophe....Just the cost of fuel...

We may see some relief at the pumps in the fall...Expect something like $2.50 a gallon... Which is almost a dollar more than it was last winter.

So people will have to start looking for ways to lower their transportation costs...

I hope that long haul trucking gets cut in half and we start to make use of things like rail and ships....Which are much greener methods of transporting goods and people

May 19, 2007, 05:28:03 PM

Good points, Leo. If you do a search for ""downsizing"" you will find a host of dissusion groups and web sites based very much on the concept Leo is describing. If you have done yours sums right and are prepared to live simply and grow much of your own food- and can do those things such as simple plumbing and housing repairs etc which most folk hire someone else to do for them- you can live cheaply and very well indeed.
I live on 12 hours work per week, for example.

benevolance · May 20, 2007, 01:55:46 AM

Fourx

Not many people can grow anywhere near enough food to feed themselves...You can get creative and have plants inside the house in all the windows...Growing multiple crops of things like carrots or potatoes...But you cannot feed your family unless you have a decent amount of land

For people in colder climates it is even tougher.

Leo · May 20, 2007, 12:16:36 PM

My theory on what is wrong with Man?for umteen generations man the animal life was very hard (the number one cause of suicide in the good old days was abscess tooth.they were in pain for years,they focussed on day to day survival. then in just a couple of generations good shoes,central heat?all the goodies great grandpa didnt. How many generations did it take to turn a wolf into a english setter bird dog.Put simply the changes in recent years creates day to day stress the species hasnt adapted to.,we dash from here to there then to the next thing on the cell phone.his life is too complicated .stress is not good for the body down size and simplify.take time to smell the roses,i can live without the rat race..just 30 or 40 years ago people had more free time,now we have a host of time saving Conviences and no time..

glenn kangiser · May 20, 2007, 11:27:43 PM

Hardly a spare minute.

This year I decided to take a few more breaks. Exploring the local history.

I just drove my truck a hundred miles to pan gold at a dude ranch. That ought to help combat global warming.

MountainDon · May 20, 2007, 11:39:00 PM

Hey Dude!

It was probably well worth the time, relaxation wise.

We spent the day clearing away some more fallen timber and then exploring a few back roads in our mtn neighborhood today. Time well spent.

May 21, 2007, 12:09:36 AM

Growing up we always had an old 4x4 just for driving down the forestry roads...Fishing exploring...Looking for easy timber to fall on the logging roads...

Try to find logs that were leaning the right way....And fall them to the road...Cut off the top and hook a chain to the log and drag it onto the road with the 4 wheel drive....And then cut the log lengths and block the rest...Throw it on the truck...

good times...

glenn kangiser · May 21, 2007, 01:47:13 AM

It was fun and the Gem and Mineral group I went with are a great bunch of people, but I think the dude ranch put gold in the pile for the city dudes to find. That is the only place I found any. I think they sort it out and concentrate it a bit as we didn't find it where we thought we would. The rest of us will go after the rough adventurous places.

Most important is making contacts for future deals- trips- exploring, etc -- you meet a lot of people who know a lot of things you don't this way and usually they are willing to share if you share with them.

benevolance · May 21, 2007, 02:02:46 AM

Correct me if I am wrong...But isn't there a revival to the cottage industry gold mining? Where people have no overhead they just find a place to pan and they can make a good living...

Places where commercial mining or panning is not viable are perfect for the individual now that the price of gold is outrageously high...

I wonder if high commodity prices will combine with cottage industry in other areas...Such as people in the southwest buying land in AZ and New Mexico...That used to be a dollar an acre....And install solar panels and make hydrogen from Solar...To power their homes and then sell off the surplus power to the city and the surplus hydrogen to whomever...

glenn kangiser · May 21, 2007, 09:20:14 AM

I know there are still some serious mines going here and I know a few who do it quietly and survive.

I know of one guy - friend of a friend who struck it pretty rich - lots of new stuff - house - boat - etc, I heard -- all the sudden the tax man showed up and started asking questions -- he sold all his mining stuff I heard but don't think they quite caught up to him completely. I don't think he talks about it much.

Power Co's make it pretty rough for small guys to get in the energy business. Co-generation plants here do get in but they are multi-million dollar affairs and some of them don't succeed.

benevolance · May 21, 2007, 04:19:48 PM

Glenn

I was mostly talking about smaller scale powerplants that would produce roughly 3-4 times the electricity you would need...

Or I know that for fuel you can get permits and sell fuel...Biodeisel makers have to get proper permits...Something under 100,000 gallon a year or whatever...

If you installed the solar panels on your land and used the electricity to produce hydrogen....Shouldn't there be plenty of people that would buy the clean cheap energy source...

maybe it would be like dairy farmers of yesteryear....They all had smallish farms and the milk truck came and picked up their milk every couple of days...They had storage tanks...

why couldn't people have the same type of system...Where there would be a commodity price for hydrogen and companies would be established to buy it and distribute it....Like Milk...

The southwest would be prime land for such an endeavor....

glenn kangiser · May 21, 2007, 06:52:38 PM

At this time the political/corporate partnership between our state and big business has it set up so that you are a fool if you build something like that. You only benefit if you can net meter and trade exact value of your power for theirs annually. If you make extra the power company gets to buy it from you at avoided cost - about 1.5 -4 cents per KWH. Way less than it costs you or them. They will not let you make a living off of the energy industry -- don't want to encourage others to cut into the profit margin. Wonder how many politicians got paid off to help set that up? :-?

http://www.crest.org/repp_pubs/pdf/issuebr2.pdf

May 21, 2007, 09:50:14 PM

Glenn

Duly Noted...Follow the money as per usual... I imagine that this is something that will change as the technology makes this even easier to do...

You have stated what happens with electricity...Maybe the Hydrogen Economy is a way to break the power companies control...

What I mean to say is that if people started producing hydrogen and had it stored for sale to distributors...The electric companies are not the ones buying it from the local population.

As more green laws get passed that mandate electricity be generated cleaner...And mandated zero emission vehicles...The demand for things like solar generated hydrogen will soar through the roof.

What is it that they say about necessity...The creator of all genius? A paradigm shift could occur simply because of the raw demand there will be for hydrogen.

benevolance · May 21, 2007, 09:50:40 PM

BTW...

What does a KWH cost you out there in the mountains Glenn?

MountainDon · May 22, 2007, 12:24:15 AM

Fortunately we do have true net metering; one meter that turns forward or backward. Period. No adjustments. No if's or but's. Unfortunately, I love my A/C in the summer so the power company gets paid more than they pay us. But that's cool!

KwH is about 9 cents

glenn kangiser · May 22, 2007, 12:33:26 AM

We have a couple scales in the valley - around 10 to 15 cents. All free here in the mountains so I don't know --- the real cost -- for me --- I don't want to figure. Don is the one who likes all those numbers.

There is really not much way you are going to beat the system to make money -- maybe to use yourself, but then they will figure out a way to tax the sun.

Illinois is suing a old couple for using bio-diesel and not paying tax on it. It's used french fry grease - fer cryin out loud. B*stards.

MountainDon · May 22, 2007, 12:41:10 AM

Quote--- the real cost -- for me --- I don't want to figure. Don is the one who likes all those numbers.

I don't even want to crunch those numbers! Although I did once and all I recall is that I was thinking "I should live so long!"

Global warming--solutions.

MountainDon

fourx

MountainDon

glenn-k

MountainDon

benevolance