Today's enviro blurb:
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V.ENVIRO As style consumers we can demand that our beauty, grooming and fashion products be eco-friendly, organic, sustainable and recycled. (SJMNC)
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I've got a better idea; How about we just BUY LESS? It's a much simpler solution, and easier to figure out. Sure, if you HAVE to buy something, buying the "greener" option is better, but it's the consuming drive that's actually burying us.
--Sent from my cell phone--
The ride will be this coming sunday March 30th (yeah, I know, I know, it's late notice. Hey, that's what the internet is good for right?) starting at 3:00pm. Meet in the parking lot in front of the Java Hut (across the street from the Iron Spring Brewery). There's a map of the route HERE.
I designed the route to be easy and fun and most of all pretty. You can do it on a tall bike, a road bike, a mountain bike, a unicycle, a recumbent, whatever. The ride will go past at least 3 LBS's, so mechanical issues shouldn't be a problem. Those who are fast are welcome to blaze ahead, but those of us riding 126lb Dutch City bikes (that includes the weight of my child) will be running a more sociable pace. When I started planning this ride, I stayed with the idea that this, while a memorial ride, should be festival and celebrate the quirky, prankster human and humane sides of SB. So the more goofy jerseys, one of a kind bikes, fun and funny accessories you bring to this ride the better. If you have a helmet, feel free to adorn it with an eagle, or whatever other totem road score you like (ala Sheldon). I appropriated one of my son's toys and turned it into a Sheldon Helmet memorial.. but come as you are. Don't feel obligated to don the Eagle on your helmet: show you own sense of flair! Also welcome are photos of you with Sheldon, photos of his life and best of all, stories and songs (some of you may not know, but Sheldon was quite fond of singing!)Children are welcome too, though they are the responsibility of their parents/legal guardians!
I will print some cue sheets for those who don't know the route. When I run out, follow those who have one, or print your own!
Some may ask "Why aren't you doing it on April 1st? That was Sheldon's day to make funny jokes about bikes!" Well... lots of folks have families and work and other things that get in the way of a evening ride, and weekends are usually better for a lot of people (me included), so we'll just PRETEND like it's the 1st, ok? If enough people come, we'll do it again on Sheldon's BIRTHDAY (July 14, Bastille Day).
One last thing: for those of you who enjoyed racing, local legend Jacquie Phelan told me she would come on the ride, so if you're feeling really saucy, ride up next to her and challenge her to race. It's been said she never turns one down.. but she rarely loses either.
Today's enviro news blurb sent to my phone:
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V.ENVIRO Japan aims to reduce the total amount of garbage - produced by both industries and individuals - by 60 percent by 2015. (AP)
Hmm... That sounds pretty awesome. Think the U.S can do as well? I have my doubts...
--Sent from my cell phone--
Today's news text message:
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V.USGOV Hillary Rodham Clinton "misspoke" when she asserted last week that as first lady she had landed in war-torn Bosnia under sniper fire.(NMN)
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So Hilary, what did you "mean" to say? How the hell could you make this kind of political no-no? This further proves my point that as long as their mouths are open, they're lying (politicians that is).
--Sent from my cell phone--
So I'm riding my son to his preschool this morning traveling down our normal route. Just before the intersection of Diablo and Novato Blvd (Northbound) in the left lane is the freshly strewn remains of a mallard duck. The vivid green/blue plumage of the neck and head contrasted rather starkly against the red and white of bone, flesh and entrails. It was pretty in an abstract kind of way, but it made me sad: Someone killed this little canard. Then I began to puzzle: ducks can fly: what happened that this guy didn't get out of the way? Did he decide to chill in the middle of the street during the night when there was little traffic? Did he not hear the car/truck?
Then I got to thinking further: why is is that we lament the loss of that that is beautiful over that of the mundane? Much of it seems to be in the eye of the beholder. My heart fell when I saw this ducky roadkill: most of the drivers were driving over it like it was a lump of dirt. Part of me wanted to scream at everyone of them "Hey assholes, don't you see the beautiful thing that died in front of your wheels?" Part of me wanted to stop traffic and carefully pull the remains off and bury them. Without a police car or ambulance running interference, this would have been a risky endeavor and I (and my son) might have ended up like the duck. So I rode on, hoping that the duck didn't leave behind a family of little ducks and a mate.
I got to thinking further: Bicyclists don't kill animals with their bikes right? Well, I know there have been some close calls: Kent Peterson and several other who've ridden the Great Divide Race have had some pretty close calls. One of the Fatcyclist's friends (I think it might be Kenny) almost hit a deer. So who would have won/lost these collisions (if there can ever be said to be a winner and loser when a collision happens) if they'd actually happened? Neither is the likely answer. The fact that these "near misses" were just "near misses" might have something to do with the fact that the vehicles being piloted were bicycles. It could be that the riders were particularly adroit. If could be that average bicycle speeds are usually slower than cars (except in urban areas where they are often the same or higher). Just as I was thinking about all this, I turned into Miwok Park for my usual shortcut. I had to slam on the brakes and swerve b/c there was a clueless squirrel who started to dart in front of my tires. He had to have heard me coming, but the squirrels in that park have seen and heard it all so I don't think he took particular note of me. Either way, I almost had to eat my own words. I don't find squirrels particularly BEAUTIFUL, but they are pretty cute. It would have been a shame to crush the little guy.
Stay alert out there... it's a beautiful world and there's lots to see. You'll see more on a bike, I guarantee it.
Oh... and watch out for ducks & squirrels.
An update to the CFL / LED Conversation. THIS comment at Treehugger made me realize that I may end up burning out my new LED bulbs that are currently on a dimming circuit in my son's room. I was under the impression that when you turned down the dimmer switch you were applying less current to the bulbs which is what I *thought* they need in order to "dim". I guess turning on fewer of the bulbs in the array is the better option, but I know these bulbs weren't wired that way (they would have cost a lot more than they did!). I've seen some DC flashlights that had circuits that were designed this way (Princeton Tech) and I know that LRI (the folks who make the Photon Micro lights) uses Pulse Width Modulation in their Photon Freedom line of lights to "dim" the LED's. In a household application, I'm not sure if this would be distracting (or even possible) to walk around under (I have recessed ceiling cans in most of the rooms in my house). Any electrical engineer types want to chime in here?
So I get this text message every weekday morning on my cell phone giving me interesting tidbits of "environmental news" This was today's entry:
V.ENVIRO Locomotives, cargo ships, tugboats and passenger ferries will become much cleaner under new air pollution requirements announced by the EPA. (AP)
So the EPA says "you will become cleaner" and it just happens? I'm all for the increased efficiency of large vehicles and municial transportation but what I'm curious about is how this gets paid for... But you can't get all that from 160 characters of text.
--Sent from my cell phone--
Yeah, I'm slow. Slow on a bike, slow to post, slow to multi-task without losing my place... yeah, slow. Several folks have been talking about the deaths of Kristy Gough and Matt Peterson. Jacquie did it, and there's an AMAZING article HERE.
Last week Kristy Gough and Matt Peterson lost their lives to a car. They were riding their bicycles, Kristy was training for the Olympics. A sheriff's deputy fell asleep at the wheel (some are blaming bad scheduling plus the time change), went across the yellow and crushed both of them. Kristy's leg was severed. Matt was killed instantly. Another cyclist got hit as well, though he survived. Ugly ugly shite, and everyone's lives are ruined. I read the article in the SF Chronicle and was PISSED. Pissed that these folks lost their life and PISSED at the Chronicle for letting it create fear amongst the public. I quote "Riding a bicycle in the Bay Area is an increasingly deadly pastime". That's the first line of the "Safety" article that accompanied the photo of cyclists standing looking at the memorial on the front page. Great great... let's scare everyone into thinking that bicycling is inherently dangerous. Then call it a "pastime" and marginalize it as a valid transportation source. THEN go on to publish a study to show that bicycling crashes are down but deaths are up. Then DON'T publish a similar study that would show the number of car-car or car-stationary object crashes and deaths for the same period. NO.. let's just make cycling seem more scary. I'm NOT happy with the Chronicle, but then I rarely am. Listen, you are at least a HUNDRED times more likely to die or be seriously maimed in a car crash than you are in a bike crash. Sure, you could be the unlucky person who get's killed like Christy and Matt. More than likely, you'll live a lot longer. The more of us that are out there riding, the safer it gets, so don't submit to fear. As Paul Atreides recited when facing the Gom Jabbar:
"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain."
RIP Kristy Gough & Matt Peterson. May you live on in the minds of those who love you and let your memory serve to inspire us to make the world a safer place for bicyclists.
As the SI article cited in it's own litany against bike accidents: START SEEING BICYCLES!
Many people are touting CFL's (Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs) as being a small but good way to start "going green". What they usually DON'T tell you is that CFL's usually have significant amounts (5 mg on average) of MERCURY in them. In case you've been living under a rock, Mercury (Hg) is toxic to the human body. So, how is this helping us "go green"? CFL's use less electricity than standard bulbs, and that's good. The average lightbulb buyer won't keep the ubiquitous non-recyclable blister-pac PLASTIC packaging after they install the bulb, and therefore they'll miss the TINY print on it that says "Do not throw this product in the trash, take it to a Hazardous Waste Recycling Facility for disposal". I REPEAT, THE HAZARDOUS WASTE RECYCLING CENTER. Plastic = petroleum by the way, which of course greatly diminishes the "greeness" of the bulb. When the consumer tosses the bulb in the trash instead of recycling it, the mercury often ends up in the groundwater or in the ocean, which in turn ends up in our bodies. SO, Every time you buy a CFL, you are bringing Mercury (Hg), a hazardous and potential lethal chemical into your home or business. You wouldn't bring a rabid snarling dog into your home would you? You wouldn't bring a pestilent dead rat into your home and rub it like a dishrag over the kitchen counters, would you? Though that might be fun, most of us are smart enough not to do it. Can you tell I'm not a fan of CFL's? I have one minor exception in my rant against the CFL manufacturers: The folks at EarthMate Lighting. They package in post consumer cardboard and their mini-CFL's(and only the mini-CFL's) have 75% less mercury than standard CFL's. Why couldn't ALL their bulbs be low Mercury? I'm guessing it has something to do with the dimming ability in some of the bulbs, and for the full spectrum bulbs, something to do with the extra phosphors needed to produce full spectrum light. Hey, they're far from perfect, but they're better than a lot of their competitors. EarthMate's biggest downside? They appear to only be distributing to the east coast of the U.S. DOH! Oh well...
"Ok smart guy, what's the alternative?" I'm glad you asked. There's NOT a lot of good alternatives. Currently, using lower wattage incandescents is an option, though they don't last as long as CFL's are "claimed" to last. Subjectively speaking, my CFL's seem to burn out (and I've been writing the date I install them on the bulb) at about the same frequency that the incandescents did. This could be because of faulty wiring or old fixtures, but I digress. CFL's cost more initially and they cost more to clean up (Mercury is expensive to deal with). They use less a lot less energy during their life, which should give them a slight overall environmental edge. Durability of CFL's may have a lot to do with how often they are cycled on & off. The inital "lighting" of a bulb (just like a car) is the part of the cycle that's the hardest on it. If you turn your lights on & off a lot (like I do: to save ENERGY!), then you cycle the light a lot. My impression is that if you turn a light on and leave it on for the duration of the time you would have used it, it will last longer. I have no evidence to back this up, though the data is surely out there. The ballast required for the CFL's is likely what wears out first, and since most (if not all) of the CFL bulbs being sold in the U.S today are made in China (who has notoriously poor environmental controls), there's no guarantee of bulb quality or diligence to environmentally cautious manufacturing.
One of the few good alternatives to incandescents are LED Bulbs. Many people still assume that LED's are at best used in weak penlight flashlights or more commonly for indicator lights on stereos, computers, and power supplies. In the past 10 years, household LED's have increased exponentially in output while experiencing only modest increases in electricity required to power them. I recently bought a couple of PAR 30 LED bulbs from The Green Fusion center in San Anselmo, CA. Green Fusion gets them from C.Crane company. About 4-5 years ago, I got an early version of C.Crane's LED bulb. It's not NEARLY as bright as the new ones, but it's still going strong, and I expect it will be when my son turns 25 (he's nearly 4 now). LED's contain no mercury and they are solid state, so they only break if you hit them hard and direct with a big hammer or other similar object. Drop one and you'll find it unscathed as long as it's potted in place correctly. The bulbs I've bought from C.Crane are high quality and it's one of the few companies I have a lot of confidence in. If it's not right, they make it right.
With the advent of Luxeon Star emitters and just recently, the new CREE bulbs, LED Bulbs have gotten SIGNIFICANTLY brighter than they used to be. I recently purchased a flashlight for my bicycle that features the new CREE Q5 XR-E bulb, and I'm damn impressed with the power of this bulb. I got my Fenix L2D Premium Q5 Cree XR-E LED Flashlight from the guys at EliteLED. I'm using it as a helmet mounted light and much of the time I run it in it's low mode. In darker areas, I'll run it in medium or for high speed descents in the dark, I'll use the Turbo mode. It's a little like wearing a search light on your head, though it weighs a fraction of the weight. EliteLED offers the CREE LED's in household bulbs as well. I haven't tried any yet b/c of budgetary restrictions, but I look forward to trying some of THESE for lighting my entire living room. With a 20,000 hour life, I'm guessing... that's about 8 hours a day, 365 days a year for 6.85 years, or 5 hours a day, 365 days a year for 10.96 years or 5 hours a day, 200 days a year for 20 years. It's a lot of light (300 lumens) for only using 7W! By the way, most LED manufacturers are rating their bulbs to their HALF-LIFE (when driven to spec), which means the bulbs dim to half their original brightness. LED's can last functionally forever, though their brightness does diminish at some point to negligible levels.
I figure if I replaced the 13 PAR 38 bulbs in the ceiling canisters (10 of which are on dimmer circuits and all are 60 watt bulbs) with THESE ones from C.Crane, I'd spend $662.48 up front. If I had every single LED PAR 38 running full tilt, I'd be using just slightly more (48.75W) than just ONE of the ones I'm using now (at full blast)(45W). So.. the energy savings would be $326.44 / bulb over the course of 60,000 hours (listed life of the bulb). For 13 bulbs (the number of PAR 38's in my house), that adds up to a savings of $4243.72. Wow. It also amounts to 32,175 kWh of energy saved. WHOA. According to the math done by C.Crane,
"If every U.S. household replaced just one standard 60 watt bulb with a CC Vivid LED bulb, we could save 24,184,400,000 watts or 24,184.4 mega (million) watts per day.
National savings information based on 103,000,000 households with an average use of 4 hrs per day per house. Based on gross watts.
One of the largest power plants in the U.S. could be eliminated as a result of each U.S. household replacing just one standard 60 watt bulb with a CC Vivid LED Light bulb."
C.Crane is just one company selling LED Bulbs: here are 4 more (with varying prices for similar products):
EliteLED
SuperBrightLEDs
The LED Light
EternaLEDS
I guess I know where that cash rebate the government is talking about giving every american is going...
Finally, the way to properly recycle your CFL's when they break is to take them to a proper recycler. You can FIND ONE HERE.
While looking through the most recent entries at Fake Plastic Fish, I stumbled upon a link to AfriGadget. There's an article up there about Bamboo Bikes, and none other than Craig Calfee of NAHBS fame was behind it.
I saw Craig's creations last week at NAHBS, and as usual, he doesn't disspoint. I would put a link here to my pictures, but since the hard drive on my Mac G4 iBook is apparently roasted, my photo uploading abilities are somewhat... limited. Anyway, check out the article.
If you haven't read THIS article written by David Sylvester, you should. David "Just a man" Sylvester is an inspiration to me, and no doubt a lot of others. Though he'd likely eschew it, he gets the H.O.T.M (Hero of the Month) award from me. I hope I get to meet him someday, and maybe ride a few miles with him. His article put tears in my eyes and though that's not that hard to do (yeah, I'm a softie), those tears honor a beautiful life and a life lived beautifully.
Thanks Kent for the link.
I found out this evening while looking through the iBOB Digest (Vol 62, Issue 43) that Sheldon Brown passed away from a heart attack on Feb 3rd. It's a heavy blow and it took the wind right out of my sails. I'm headed for the NAHMBS tomorrow afternoon, and I'm sure there will be those there who knew Sheldon, at least I hope there'll be. I'm hoping I get to hear some tales of Sheldon from those who knew him. I attribute much of my "bike knowhow" to Sheldon and his loss is a loss to everyone who rides a bike. Yeah, Sheldon's one of my bike hero's. My thoughts go out to his family.
Grant Peterson of Rivendell Bicycle Works wrote a very nice article about sheldon and summed it up better than I could. So did Todd at Clevercycles. I just wanted to acknowledge Sheldon and how much he contributed to my own love and involvement with that 2 wheeled conveyance we so loving call "the bicycle".
Sheldon Brown, RIP
1944-2008
Well, I've decided (after a LONG look at the Fake Plastic Fish blog) that I have 2 goals for 2008.
1. Ride my first century, in one day. In all the years I've been bicycling, I've never ridden a century. I've never owned a "road" bike, though all my bicycles are of course capable of riding on the road. I'm told it's foolish to think I can ride a century on my Azor Oma, and the naysayers are probably right, though I may try it once I've done a century on a "go fast" bike. To this end, I've borrowed a "fast" bike from my uncle, a Kestrel 200SC. It's not set up TOO racy: a high rise stem brings the handlebars to within a reasonable facsimile of level with the seat. The bars slope more than I like, but I may be able to turn them up slightly without screwing up the cables.
2. Reduce the amount of plastic I throw away by 50% this year. After reading THIS article, I can no longer in good conscious blindly use plastic the way I have in the past. Recycling is NOT enough, reduce reduce reduce is the key. This morning when I first broached the goal with my wife she was amicable, but the realities of the loss of "convenience" may cause her and my son to balk. We (our family, and likely yours too!) have become completely blind to the "convenience" factor that plastic provides. Even at places like Whole Foods & Trader Joes, plastic is EVERYWHERE. Prepackaged foods are the worst culprits, and their lure is similar to crack cocaine to the addict. Cutting the cord won't be easy: it's harder to find things that AREN'T packaged in plastic than things that are because EVERYTHING gets packed in plastic now. Read the ARTICLE (mentioned once already) and you'll begin to understand my sense of urgency.
Oh dear, she's done it again. "What's that?" you say? IMPRESS THE HELL OUT OF ME.
I wrote about Jacquie the FIRST TIME way back in December of 2005, not long after I started writing this blog. She's been impressing the hell out of me for a long time.
In 2007 I met jacquie's husband Charlie for the first time when he came to my house with a mutual acquaintance to check out my human electric hybrid bicycle, SuperVato. To say I was honored to have Charlie in my garage would be a gross and unjust understatement. The fact that he rode my bike and declared it a "true cyclists electric bike" made all the waiting and sweating over the details worth the trouble. To quote my former sister in law Charity, I did the "yippy skippy" inside my head when he said that.
Fast forward to December 2007 when I discovered Jacquie's Weblog and started commenting. We started corresponding shortly thereafter. We still haven't met for "tea", though I intend to change that this month if possible. Shortly after our email conversation started, Jacquie told me she was under the gun trying to finish an article for the Pacific Sun. She tried to send me a draft to preview it, but due to some technical (formatting) issues, I wasn't able to read it. I went out of town shortly thereafter (watch the blog for a entry about my trip to London and Stockholm coming up) and this evening I was catching up on the blogs I usually read. Kent Peterson's Blog is usually where I start and one of the recent entries is about Jacquie and her article in the Pacific Sun. It caused me to once again reassess my lifestyle and the daily choices I make. Her article makes a fine companion piece to the Story of Stuff, but that's hardly a surprise: Jacquie's always been ahead of her time. Her lifestyle predates the Story of Stuff by years and years and like I said in 2005, she's a continuing source of inspiration. Thanks to Kent & Jacquie!
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Originally uploaded by Nollij.
Well here it is, the Matchless. I've been meaning to write something for and about my dad for months now, but I guess I'll start with this and let the stream of consciousness flow from there.
As long as I can remember, my dad talked about the Matchless he owned before I was born. In all my years, I never saw one. Not on TV, not in a book, not on the Internet. I came to think they were like the Pegasus: a mythical creature. Add in a touch of wistful longing in his eyes and voice every time he talked about his bike, and you've got an instant legend. It probably explains my love of motorcycles to this day (well, DUH!).
The day after my dad died, I was coming out of Woodlands Market and crossing the parking lot when I spied this immaculate Matchless. I was… thunderstruck. I stopped dead in the middle of the lane when I realized what I was looking at. All the hairs on my body were standing at attention and my nerves started jangling so hard I had a dull roar in my ears. (No, it wasn't the Matchless; he hadn't started the engine yet.) My spine felt all… fuzzy. I somehow managed to get my feet moving towards the bike and stammer something to the rider. For the life of me, I can't remember exactly what I said. I know there was a compliment, a mention of my dad riding one, a question of year, and possible something about a unicorn or pegasus… it's all a bit muddled now, like the echo of a dream. I don't remember the riders name, but he had a huge and very bright white smile against his dark skin. I don't remember his face, but his smile I'll never forget. He let me take a picture (damn cheap shit cameraphone!) and he told me it was a '68 (or did he say '69? Ah yes… jangled nerves speaking…)
I watched him for a few minutes as he suited up, started the bike and rode it away. A profound sadness crept up behind me and ripped something out of my gut as he disappeared down the road. The taste of red wine drunk with a penny under the tongue was lingering in my throat and I had to swallow hard to push down the lump of grief that was threatening to choke me. Unbidden, tears stained my cheeks and for some reason, I let them stay there, as my face suddenly felt like I'd been standing in front of a blast furnace with the door open. It was one of the few times I've ever let the tears just chill there: it felt like a silent salute to Steve. I would never again talk to him about motorcycles, the adventures he'd had on his Lambretta while riding around Europe in the 60's, never more hear the stories of the Sunday Morning Ride, never hear the stories of his adventures with Crazy Mac. It HURT and that was new. It was real pain I felt in my chest… I was more raw and more alive than I'd ever remembered feeling before.
Just then a crow alighted on top of the Woodlands Market sign. Now, crows are not an uncommon sight in Marin. They are everywhere, but they are rarely alone, at least in my observations. This was a lone crow, It was just above my line of sight and it's timing was uncanny. Crows (and Ravens) are often associated with death. They are carrion eaters AND they're all black. That's enough for most people. Crows to me though are fascinating birds, and they are evidently connected spiritually with my family. Without going into a pedantic level of detail, suffice to say that my late uncle Jimmy had the crow as his spirit animal, and he's visited his children, myself and my brother in crow form since his death in 2006. The arrival of the crow was like the point below the exclamation. Unlikely as it seems, another layer of gooseflesh rose up under the first: I was starting to feel like a frightened porcupine. I got in my truck and wept for a few minutes and after that… after that I really don't remember much of the rest of that day. I made it home without further incident, and life went on.
I've yet to see another Matchless since that day, or even the same one. Was it a ghost? Are shitty low res cameraphones capable of picking up ghosts? Maybe…
Steven English Hopper, RIP
9.20.1942 - 8.06.2007 (64 yrs, 10 mo, 17 days)
Gone, but never forgotten.
After watching "The Story of Stuff", I've been thinking a lot about it. Some synaptic bridge suddenly connected in my brain the other day, and I remembered reading about the former owner of Esprit moving to Chile, buying up 700,000 acres of rainforest land and turning it into a sanctuary. While I was trying to find the article on-line (please do read it, it's well written and will make you want to go there!), I stumbled on THIS article about the hidden dangers of electronic-recycling. As the Story of Stuff mentions, consumerism is creating the problem. If manufacturers designed their products to be upgraded (think about computers, cell phones, ipods to start) instead of being tossed out or recycled, it would start to attack the problem. Then make them responsible for properly dealing with the e-waste on the back end, and you can be sure they'd be designing products that were far more robust and durable (not to mention a lot "greener"). The "hidden cost" of our consumerist behavior is not being transmitted to us in those insanely cheap prices we're used to a the register, and it fosters an environment where the impulse buy is king. In the meantime, writing to the companies themselves and asking for the change is a good idea. Apple, IBM, Intel, Dell, HP would be good places to start. I have been guilty of wanting the "new thing", which is currently the iPhone. I've managed to retain my 3rd Gen iPod and I've already changed out the battery on it myself. It would be great to have the same software that the newest generation iPods have, but that's not an option that Apple made possible: poor thinking IMO. I'm kind of disgusted by the fact that I'm always confronted by the "new thing" and that I somehow unconsciously developed a predication towards viewing the "old thing" as inferior; according to the Story of Stuff, that's exactly the mindset that the consumer chain wants me to have. I have to actively fight that mindset, and I'm getting better at it, but it's still a daily struggle.
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Originally uploaded by xtracycleinc.
Ho ho ho... do I detect a prototype Surly / Xtracycle centerstand here in Red? That's something to celebrate if it's true!
Ok.. so this entry is slightly random, but I'm just freaking out, because it's something that's new to me, but not to the scientific community. Where the hell have I been?
Electroechanical Batteries have been in development at Lawrence Livermore Laboratories for over 20 years. According to THIS paper, they hold amazing potential for energy storage. The thing I think they're missing is the potential for vehicles that are much lighter than a car. Anyone who reads this blog knows what's coming next: electric bicycle power. If you could build a electromechanical battery using something like this Halbach array (or maybe something a little smaller) and keep the weight of the other components to a minimum, you could smash the weight/power problem that I have on my human electric hybrid SuperVato. Consider this: my current battery weighs about 26 lbs including the enclosure. The Gaussboys Halbach array weighs 32 oz. Two of em spinning in opposite directions would cancel the gyroscopic effect of the bike, and assuming they were mounted on limited excursion gimbals they could resist the braking and acceleration forces created by the bicycle. I'm guessing you could build a high capacity system for less than 10 pounds. I'm planning on going back to school in the fall for engineering, and now I think I know why: I want to build a Human/Electromechanical Battery Powered Bicycle. Maybe I've just figured out my dissertation thesis… wouldn't that be convenient?
Critics mock the electric bicycle because the products are often poorly made and poorly thought out. Electrical storage has been the Achilles heel of the electrical bicycle, but the Electromechanical Battery would have huge advantages over even the newest Lithium Ion and Lithium Polymer batteries because of the longevity and capacity. The weight differential between Electromechanical & Lithium Ion/Polymer appears to be fairly close. Electromechanical batteries would obviously cost more in the prototype phase, but because they appear to be pretty simple, I think the costs could come down significantly if production could be increased. I'd like to see a product like this made as "greenly" and equitably as possible, i.e living wages for the production crew, non toxic assembly techniques performed in energy efficient production facilities.
I can't be the first person to think of this…can I??? The designers and engineers want to make money from this by putting it in hybrid cars and in municipal systems. Most of the money for the project at Lawrence Livermore has come from corporate sponsors, so that's no surprise. That's nice for the car manufacturers, but cars still don't make a lot of sense a lot of the time, even if they DID use less fossil fuel. I'm all for putting this in municipal systems. It can't be any more dangerous than Nuclear power right?
CURRENT MUSIC: Revolting Cocks, Cocked and Loaded
-----UPDATE 7/6/08-----
I'm an idiot. Officially. Up until today I had the words "electromechanical" and "electromagnetic" used interchangeably in this article. Not ok, since they are completely different ideas! My apologies: publishing blog entries after you've been up late writing them isn't always a good idea. ESPECIALLY when you have proofread them at least twice. *Forehead Slap*
My friends Nikki & Merritt are putting on another Prepare For the Playa event, this time in celebration of the holidays. I told them I'd flog their event on my blog, so take a minute to check it out. If you're a bay area resident and are so inclined, check out the event this Sunday (TOMORROW!) in SF. Here's the spiel…
Prepare for the Playa -
Holi-Daze Event!
Don't get distracted by the sugar plums dancing in your head - The holidays are upon us and the quest for creative and unusual gifts has begun!
Need a special gift for that friend, campmate or significant other? Is a watch, sweater or set of encyclopedias just too boring, normal and mundane for your Burner friends?
Looking for an unusual, creative and furry gifts for those folks on your holiday shopping list???
Then look no further! Prepare for the Playa returns for the Holi-Daze with an eclectic mix of vendors with unique gift items that are sure to please every character on your holiday shopping list!
Live Music, Free Entrance and Free Parking!
ALL AGES WELCOME!
Cafe Cocomo
(same location as BM Decompression 2007)
650 Indiana Street, San Francisco
Lots of FREE parking and we never charge an entrance fee!
Sunday - December 16th, 2007
11am-6pm
Buy Local this Holiday season!
God dammit. I just watched The Story of Stuff and I started crying. I had to stifle my sobs actually, because my son is sleeping, and it would suck to have to put him back to sleep all the while trying to explain to a toddler that my generation and the several preceding it have done a horrendously bad job of taking care of our planet and our country. Do I weep for what is lost to everyone or just what *I* might never experience? Selfish or Selfless? Maybe a little of both. As a revelatory slap-in-the-face, The Story of Stuff made me feel pretty bad about the world my son has to inherit at the moment. I hope to be able say someday that I played some small part in making some changes for the better. Rationally, I know I didn't cause the problem by myself, but I know I've been a part of the problem more than once. This little 20 minute video is kind of like taking the red pill, if you'll excuse the pop-culture reference.
"What does that mean?" "It means fasten your seat belt Dorothy, 'cause Kansas is going bye-bye."
The Wachowski Brothers
A Matter of Scale by Keith Farnishwww.flickr.com
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