A good discussion on Grist about how climate change is affecting wine. Vinters are looking for ways to adapt by going to green energy and ground source heating/cooling. As far as the wine business. With the glut of grapes, quality has got to be the only way to survive in this industry. How do you get quality? Perfect soil obtained through perfect watering and organic fertilization. The organic fertilizer could be made specially to enhance the flavor, the natural constituents chosen for the soil contribution to the taste of the grapes. The watering designed to emulate the years with rainfall paterns that produced the finest vintages. This is a sophisticated type of farming when it's devoted to quality, vintners would be a good target market for biodigestion organic fertilizer and energy production systems and robotic ag equipment, specialized robots that sample soil and add just the right amount of water, fertilizer, soil ammendment, and mulch.   more »

How is it possible to lift all 7 billion boats without using the whole biosphere up? Economic activity brings the possibility of survival to the poorest and financial security to the middle class,but will it further devestate nature? I would say that an emphasis on quality of life, with the wealthier citizens of spaceship earth sacrififcing meaningless consumption and quantitiy of possesions, could be a way to lift everyone together on a different wave. Would financial security and reproductive (and all other) rights for women tend to reduce population? I think so. Quality over quantity, a whole new cultural ethic, could counter the old philosophy of eternal growth. If karma, heaven, or the magical effect of mirror neuron empathy are real, this kind of total commitment to spaceship earth and our fellow travelors should come as close as possible in this dimension. Hehey.   more »

The Tres Amiga superconducting interconnection link is a big step towards a supergrid that could smooth the intermittance of renewable energy. It might even hold the promise of superconduction and storage coast to coast. The question that comes to mind is why are they not using the superconducting bridge circuit for storage? And will the insistence on superconduction slow down the rollout of a national HVDC grid?   more »

Adam Sacks has another excellent piece on Grist, wondering once again why nearly the whole world, even experts are in denial about the severity of climate disaster. Maybe a thought experiment would be useful.. Could we imagine the mindset of people in Europe as the nazi invasion proceeded? Now how about contrasting that with the attitude of americans at the start of WW II? In Europe the blitz rolled, but that was far away for most americans. Experts must have realized that catching up to nazi war technology and production seemed nearly impossible at that point. The only course was to ignore the threat and hope the war would be confined to the continent. Back to our future: As seawater levels rise and glacial water supplies melt, the famine, disease, and war due to forced migration will produce hell-scape many orders of magnitude worse than Katrina, the recent US experience with disaster.   more »

The present centralized grid needs "baseload" power. It is based on baseload. Hehey. But a distributed generation and storage renewable smart grid with a national electron super highway would not. A gradual transition over the next 20 years will still use baseload power plants though. The fly in the ointment? Nuclear waste. It's there. everywhere a nuclear power plant exists. Here in the US in used nuclear fuel rod "swimming pools".   more »

Check this out, 0.2 liters per flush. The winner, at least in outside composting toilets that "flush" the waste. Actually a regular gravity feed composting toilet can be outside the home, but must be joined to the stool with a gravity transport pipe. Another low-flow toilet question on Grist inspired this, I'm hoping Umbra will video "test drive" the Envirolet? Hehey.   more »

Axion battery in play? It looks like it. This is a maker of high tech lead acid batteries in which carbon takes the place of some of the lead. Of course any company anywhere that finally breaks through to use carbon nanotubes to house the lead in the lead acid battery technology will make these other company's products obsolete overnight. I'm looking for that company. The OTC scammers have grabbed onto most of these ideas to tout companies that might only be hollow shells though. A booming market in green energy should emerge eventually that will make the internet technology bull look tame. Be careful, but not too careful and only bet your "gambling money".   more »

Big hoopla over more (in)famous climate change denier/delayer nonsense reviewed on Grist, these superfreaks want geoengineering via water spraying ships? The ocean water spraying "ships" better be wind/wave/ocean current powered energy platforms. Burning diesel fuel to spray the water isn't going to be a good idea. And of course this analysis leaves out the concept of increasing snow in winter over cold arctic regions, protecting ice caps and tundra from melting during the 24 hr sunlight of summer. Dark ocean water and tundra absorb solar energy, snow and ice reflect it. This scenario is more likely, let's say we decide we want geo-engineering? Throwing up particles into the upper atmosphere to block sunlight and produce cooling on the order of what happened in 1816 ("the year without a summer"). No need to employ a magical "garden hose" spraying sulfur into the atmosphere as the superfreaks tout. Volcanoes did that job in 1816 and are getting set to do it again. Land is rising due to magma pressure under Alaska. It was in check, pushed back by the gravity of glacial ice. As the ice melts the magma gets ready for a big blowout. Under Yellowstone the aquifer is drying up, drought and water wasting ag and cities are the culprits in this case.   more »

isaacschumann says: "...i profoundly disagree with your assertion that we have only a brief window to act before things spin out of control, there is absolutely no scientific basis for tipping points and the like." Since we know there actually is a scientific basis for human caused GHG climate disaster, and we realize individuals with your point of view can't be convinced by scientific evidence, we choose to stop trying to convince you. We will stick to convincing swing voters instead, people in the middle of the political spectrum. Extremists are being marginalized daily as their spokespersons rant. Feel free to further this cause. It helps get the majority to vote for a climate curing, job creating green energy and ag revolution. We will continue to emphasize economic stability and financial security by advocating independence from imported energy and chemical fertilizer (yes, that's right, ammonia fertilizer is now brought in on ocean going tankers from Russia).   more »

Why do we need a new coast to coast supergrid? One estimate I remember reading claimed that with renewable smart grid technology and using distributed generation and storage and energy conservation, existing cables and transmission equipment already has 5 times the capacity which would eventually be needed.   more »

I see the goal of an HVDC national supergrid would be similar to the goal behind national railroads, interstate highways, and the TVA-type WW II power projects. National economic growth and financial security. The foundation upon which modern nation/states stand. The crumbling of that foundation, signals the fall. The path to unsubsidized, inflation fighting, foreign fuel free, renewable energy is a nationwide electricty super highway system. Then let the free market work, a project that restores free market competition will be palatable to government-phobic politicos. Solar, wind, biogas, efficiency/cogeneration, and energy storage will be competitive.    more »

Another barely noticed milestone! I have written about this project several times, mainly as an alternative to problematic NIMBY plagued offshore installations like Cape Wind. Floating wind resides further offshore out of sight of residents and isn't mounted on sensitive protected seafloor areas. And look at the capital behind this, mass production could make these cost competitive. We have four shorelines these could be mounted off of here in the US, including the Great Lakes.   more »

This german project features home based distributed cogeneration, excellent! It replaces a home furnace and hot water heater with a generator burning natural gas. The waste heat from the engine does the home heating. Electricty is generated in each home and sent onto the grid. Honda has developed a system like this as well.   more »

But it boils down to a few simple principles in terms of this current debate: ....healthy youngsters (and in fact everyone who is uninsured) who do not purchase health insurance and use the emergency room or walkin clinic, leaving taxpayers with the bill, are getting a free ride. that free ride is not free. It costs 500 bucks for a sniffle. A visit that would cost 100 dollars for an insured patient   more »

So now Grist is reporting that geo-engineering is actually being seriously considered as remediation for GHG indsuced global climate change. Does the rejuvenation of soil as a carbon sequestration mechanism constitute geo-engineering? If it were acomplished globally with a wholesale shift from chemical ag to organic fertilizer from waste stream biomass it could be, and actually would remove enough GHG to equal other geo-engineering schemes. Consider the elimination of nitrous oxide (300x the GHG effect of cO2) from chemical fertilizer and the reduction of methane (20x the GHG effect of CO2) emissions from chemical fertilizer run off bio-reacting with cellulosic biomass in soil and wetlands.   more »

Fire, precursor to desertification. The feedback loops of GHG released by fire and less carbon capture due to the loss of greenery and increased solar heat absorption by blackened landscape; all point in that direction, deserification. But the article hits on a much more immediate bottomline consideration: namely, the sheer cost of not only fighting fires, but the loss of all those homes and comminuities. It devestates the local economy.   more »

Excellent Grist article! The focus on cost and capacity factor is really on the mark. Adding solar furnace molten salt storage and/or geothermal heating to the CAES system might eliminate most of the natural gas use. Then maybe waste stream biogas could make up most of the extra power needed. Especially if the waste stream biogas were first used to generate electric power in a solid oxide fuel cell. The 800 degree waste heat from the 50% efficient fuel cell would then be used to heat the CAES compressed air before it enters the turbine generator.   more »

This short story will bring a tear, here's the link. The ineffable sadness and beauty of mortality.   more »

Energy industry organized rallies to fight climate change legislation and renewable energy are right on track according to this article on Grist. The healthcare townhall here with our congressman was packed, all the front rows, with wing nuts and insurance and hospital corporation employees repeating "death panel" talking points. Most were tourists from other districts and even other states. Expect the same on every other issue, some wing nuts even went off into anti-GHG climate change talking point delayer/denier rants. Congressmen will not even hold meetings on climate legislation, they were scared off by talking point attacks on healthcare.   more »

A great video on Grist from Umbra. She's very utube-genic in her bee suit. Plus an article all about colony collapse disorder (CCD), it's probable causes and possible cures. Here's my prescription:   more »

I have blogged about this strange theoretical invention before. Here is another more detailed view of exactly how a device would work that uses a tacyon stream to send internet signals into the past. Actually how this would work is that the moment the first of these devices that accelerate tacyons beyond the speed of light is activated, the operator would start to receive signals from his future self. Google the future? Well yes, a google search would be initiated, then the scientist, in the future time targeted by the search would send the search results into the time machine on the tacyon stream. The result, gathered in the future, would immediately appear in present time.   more »

A list of the blue dog dems on the energy and commerce comittee holding up our healthcare. Call them and tell them how you feel about their campaign "contributions" from mega-corporate healthcare industry lobbyists. The key 8: Congressman Charlie Wilson (OH-6) http://www.charliewilson.house.gov/ Mike Ross (D-AR)202 225-3772, 870 881-0681 http://ross.house.gov/index.html Rep. Charlie Melancon of Louisiana 202 225-4031 http://www.melancon.house.gov/ Bart Stupak (MI) - 202 225-4735 http://www.house.gov/stupak/ Baron Hill (IN) - 202 225-5315 http://baronhill.house.gov/ Zack Space (OH) - 202 225-6265 http://space.house.gov/index.html Bart Gordon (TN) - 202 225-4231 http://gordon.house.gov/ Jim Matherson (UT) - 202 225-3011 http://matheson.house.gov/   more »

Just what I think about every time I get poison ivy lately, this time I consulted google. And lo & behold there it is. I had considered that the ability of poison ivy oil to activate the immune system might make it a very good treatment for cancer. A microscopic glass bead soaked in the oil, then coated with a time release gel, inserted in a tumor could be used to emit levels of the oil on a homeopathic scale into the tumor. Then the immune system could possibly begin to target the cells infused with the oil.   more »

Is a new generation of leadership evolving as this article states? William Strauss and Neil Howe, coauthors of Generations, posit that each generation makes a unique bequest to those that follow and generally seeks to correct the excesses of the previous generation. They argue that the Boomer excess is ideology and that the Generation X reaction to that excess involves an emphasis on pragmatism and effectiveness. I would argue that this effecct is impelling a hybrid organizing principle. Pragmatic idealism. Obama's organizing principle? I think so.   more »

Here's a great video explaining the mechanism of how cannabinoids (THC & others), the compounds in maijuana, prevent cancer growth and cause cancer cells to eat themselves. In this video series, started off with Dr. Robert Melamede, Professor of Biology at the University of Colorado, the effect is detailed.   more »

Check this out, a 50s rockabilly song that is featured in "Kill Bill" in the opening scene, with a short snippet played on the radio in Sherrif Earl McGraw's (Michael Parks) car, as he pulls up to the wedding chappel massacre scene. Note the natural inspiration for this music. Carl Feathers..."that Certain Female"   more »

Here is an awesome new perspective on global climate disaster. From Jeff Goldstein in huffpost: Every Geologic Day, Earth will write in her diary the comings and goings for that day. Here's the next important point: Every one of the 27,394 pages in Earth's diary -- each Geologic Day -- is 365,000 years long enough time for 14,600 human generations. How come? Easy: 10 billion years divided by 27,394.   more »

Rainbow cinnamon gumdrop, Lemon and purple people are a plastic mystery, Radio bubblegum porkchop, Lilac lady will go down in history. (Chorus) Climb inside my world, Climb inside my belly button bean-bag plastic world!   more »

A fascinating topic, treating oneself for whatever ails, rather than relying on the healthcare system. Check this cancer self-care prevention and treatment article. Really interesting. Mentioned in the article are heat based treatment. Recent studies of heat treatment that raises the temperature of only the tumor to 104 degrees have been effective . Microscopic metal pellets that act as heating elements are inserted into the tumor, then an external radio wave heat source maintains the heat. It would be like a battery powered heating pad.   more »

Here is John Prine alone singing his magnificent song. Here is Bonnie Raitt. No reason to choose, but an interesting contrast. Now if I could only find a reliable link to the duet, try this one, it might work   more »

It looks bad for the greens in Iran, silent sitdown strikes that were really working have now turned to rock throwing and fires. Are violent factions in the protest movement being encouraged by government provacateurs? That is my guess, anger is taking over. Government thug handlers are sending them out to act like angry protestors giving police and militia the excuse they desire to attack en masse and then murder innocent nonviolent protestors in the crowd with rooftop gunfire. When nonviolent protestors are murdered in this cowardly, psychotic fashion, already angry, rock-throwing, fire starting protestors become enraged.    more »

Mind enhancement drugs or merely speed for students? As steroids are for athletes, Ritalin and other ADD drugs are becoming the extra edge that students use to compete in academia. But what about the familiar drawbacks of speed, brain chemical and neural receptor destruction? Wouldn't it be a lot better to actually enhance natural brain biochemistry with exersize, rest, and meditation? Like a program of endurance training with running or biking and yoga? This restores dopamine and dopamine receptors, that provide the reward for intellectual acomplishment.   more »

"Those who learn from history are doomed to watch others repeat it" (drx). So maybe looking at the history of FDR's guidance out of the great depression might just provide some kind of heads up this time around? FDR was heckled into curtailing stimulus, in favor of budget concerns, in the late 30's. The economy did another dip, then war production finally ended the depression. Should we heed the duplicitous warnings of neocons and bush era leaders on debt, and stop the stimulus a few months into it's initiation? After only wall street has been stimulated? And after none of the regulation imposed by FDR on wall street scamming is repeated under Obama's watch?   more »

Here's a very effective twitter search category to identify scambots, automated tweet generating bots designed to look like real tweople. Once I ID one, I unfollow them. Simple plan to clear your personal portion of the twitter hive mind of useless con game chatter.   more »