Gas prices jump $1.50 before second hurricane THIS MONTH!!!

I'm just gonna go ahead and say, good. Good good good good. You skittery shifty cock-eyed consumerists can pay all the money in the world for your go-juice, and I'm loving it because it will get me that much closer to electric cars. I'm not loving it for the prices, but I'll sacrifice to reach my ideals, the American people don't seem to be much into that these days.

Every few minutes my wife comes in and tells me the latest news about runs on the gas station, prices up to $5. The gas stations are raping you in the back seat of your own car and you're lining up waiting for your turn.

Let me explain is this way. If your car gets 40 miles per gallon (I'm being real generous here because likely 3% of you reading this have a car that can do that,) you are spending about 35 cents to travel four miles at yesterday's gas prices. An average electric car gets somewhere around 4 miles per kWh, which means for that same 4 miles, they're not paying 35 cents, but more like 9-11 cents in this area. That means if you travel 400 miles, you're paying $35 in a gas car, while you're only paying $10 in an electric car. It adds up perty quick. Just think, if your car gets 20 mpg, you're paying $70 for 400 miles, and you're paying 18 cents per mile.

Electricity prices aren't going to rocket up like gas prices every time someone gets scared of a storm or terrorism or whatever. I can't make gasoline in my backyard, but I can make electricity, in fact, there's a little solar panel charging a battery in the shop as we speak on this bright sunny day before the hurricane ever even hits. I'd also like to mention that we just had a hurricane LAST WEEK and nobody panicked then. Electricity prices are very stable compared to oil because there are many diverse sources of electricity. In fact, when all else fails, we have backup generators. If one plant goes down, you can divert power from another one, and you may only just barely have a blink in your power, or you may not notice at all. There are 66 nuclear power plants many with more than one reactor, nearly 500 coal plants, 2000 hydroelectric plants and tons of natural gas plants. Oil pretty much only comes from one place, and once it's gone, it's gone. And let me be the one to tell you, it's almost gone. Prices will go up. Prices WILL go up.

One good note on the hurricane, Texas is going to reap a boatload of wind energy from this storm.
WiredForStereo

Wind farms Now and Future in Arkansas.

I was looking at the AWEA website at the wind energy characteristics of Arkansas. It has a neat little page here that shows the current and planned wind developments.

Guess how much Arkansas has.

0.1 Megawatts. One single small wind turbine in Prairie Grove. And I know that one can't do 100,000 watts, I just think that's the smallest number they had. I think it may be capable of 20,000w in a hurricane.

Here's a pic of that one lonely wind turbine.

The real sad part is that Arkansas ranks 27th in wind resources in the nation. That means we've got more wind resources than half the states. And all we have is a single puny wind turbine. And it's not even in a class 4 area. Arkansas has two good sized class 4 areas.

So, anyone in Arkansas, or anywhere else for that matter, push for wind power.
WiredForStereo

New Coal and Natural Gas Power Plants in Arkansas and the South.

I was out to visit a new natural gas power plant in Tontitown Arkansas yesterday. Looked up some info, you can find articles here and here. The first deals with the Tontitown plant and the second deals with the larger SWEPCO network over Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas.

I got to see some of the plans, and you can see the substation that has already been built next to it on Google Earth here. The plant will appear in that (now enlarged) dirt area to the left of the substation. The article states that there will be two gas turbines and one combined cycle steam turbine, but on the plan, I saw a fourth unit of the same size. I believe the turbines will be GE 7FA units but I could be wrong. I am definitely sure of the 7 though. Notice the Tyson chicken farm right next to the plant.

Now I am definitely more ok with the natural gas peaking plants than I am with the coal mainline plants because of reasons listed before. And, I am much happier about a natural gas plant being a few tens of miles from my home rather than a coal one. But, that ignores the availability of wind power close enough to here to be useful. Any US wind resources map you look at will show you class 3 wind resources in two separate areas, on both sides of the River Valley. And I know there are not alot of people that live on those areas because they are mountainous (for Arkansas that is.) Additionally, there is a huge portion of Texas that contains class 3 and 4 wind, not to mention Oklahoma.

It is refreshing however to hear of more wind turbines going up in Oklahoma and Texas though. And I'll tell ya, it was very enlightening to find out how much more efficient George W. Bush's house is than Al Gore's.

WiredForStereo

I'll give you a Hobbit hole.

One of my co-workers was looking at my screen whilst I was researching earth sheltered homes (as I often do) and made some comment about gopher homes and how he kinda liked some of them earth huts.

Earth huts and gopher homes.

Do I look like some moron who thinks the solution is to live in a whole in the ground? Do I seem like someone who is not always on the ball of renewable energy and sustainable technology? Do I look like someone who gets my vital information from TV?

This just goes to show the prevailing attitude regarding renewable energy and sustainable living. It is in vogue to drive an SUV, dress in the hottest stuff, and hire someone else to spray and manicure your perfectly green lawn where there is as much biodiversity as at the center of the earth, plus one variety of grass. Anyone aspiring to do the kinds of things I do is a hippie. Never mind that more solar panels are sold in Japan than the US. Never mind that solar water heaters are huge business in China. Never mind that Europe has always been miles ahead of the US in wind energy. I am a sustainable living person, so I get branded as a hippie.

People need to keep their fat yap shut about things they don't understand.
WiredForStereo