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As I spoke about in my previous post, I’ve been working on improving my mileage in my Subaru Forester by employing some hypermiling tips.Well, the results are in on the first tank, so I thought I’d share them with you:

• Miles driven = 282.0 mi
• Gallons of gas = 11.57 gal
• Mileage = 24.4 mpg!

Going from 20.0 to 24.4 mpg is an increase of 22%. I am going to keep up the good work, and like others have suggested, I’ll take out the golf clubs, and any extraneous weight, make sure my tires are pumped up fully, and change my air filter (it was sold out the last time I went to Autozone).   I am also due for an oil change and service.  I hope I can get above 25 mpg!

UPS – which already has the largest private alternative fuel fleet in the transportation industry – today announced it has ordered 200 hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) – the largest commercial order of delivery trucks by any company – and 300 Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) vehicles for its U.S. fleet. The HEVs will save 176,000 gallons of fuel annually, and the CNG vehicles will yield a 20 percent reduction in emissions.

Since 2000, UPS’s existing “green fleet” has delivered packages over 144 million miles, and the purchase of the 500 additional vehicles means the UPS alternative fuel fleet will grow 30 percent from 1,718 to 2,218 low-carbon vehicles.

I like hearing about companies that are embracing technology to reduce their emissions and still keep their business moving. With the way fuel costs are going if they want to stay in business they’ll need to step up these changes just to keep the trucks on the road.

If we lived in a world where women wore their bras over their clothes, the makers of this solar-powered bra might just be onto something. However, as the inventor himself admits, “people usually can not go outside without wearing clothes over it.” So close, yet so far away.

The solar powered bra, which comes from Japanese lingerie maker Triumph International, features a solar panel worn around the stomach. Stand outside for a few hours — much to the delight of those all around you — and you’ll be able to fire up that iPod or cell phone in no time! Triumph has no plans at this time to introduce this product to the masses (it should be noted that they advise not washing or sunning on a rainy day to avoid damaging it!) — but it does reveal an interest and future integration of photovoltaics in our everyday clothing.

For now, I’ll just stick with a solar backpack. At least until they make something for boxers.

via reuters

There is no mistaken it, Google is my most frequented web service company, I use gmail, reader and search every day. Google’s merchandise store is going green, everything from a mouse made from recycled plastic to a organic cotton Blogger beanie and even a hemp travel organizer.

The Google Store is going green. We only have one Earth and we want to do our best to take care of her, so we’ve worked hard to make our store more eco-friendly. From organic cotton T-shirts to pencils made of recycled blue jeans, you’ll find that most (though not all) Google products are now made of recycled material or other stuff that goes easy on our planet. We are also using more environmentally sound, recycled polybags, to individually package your items and to protect your items during transit.

Now you can show your Google fanboy/girl love by sporting some of their green goods.

Well the price of gas has hit the magic $4/gal mark for regular in Syracuse, well, $3.999 to be exact. After the last fill up, I decided that I was sick of getting about 20 mpg or about 260 miles per fill up out of my old Subaru (a 2000 Forester). I decided to start trying out some basic techniques - I wouldn’t let the engine rev above 2000 rpm if I could help it. I would maintain a speed of no more than 3 miles over the speed limit, and no more than 60 mph. I wouldn’t accelerate into red lights, and would not idle the engine (except at traffic lights).I’ve traveled 245 miles since my last fill up, and the results so far are promising. I still have a 1/4 tank to go! Normally about 250 I had to seriously consider which gas station I was headed towards. I’d say that the techniques that I described above have increased my mpg (city + hwy) from ~20 to up around 24. This means that I am getting about 20% better gas mileage! I’ll know for sure, if I can squeeze the (13 gal x 24 mpg) 312 miles out of this tank. Pretty amazing results, if you think about it. 20% fuel economy improvement equals a free tank of gas out of every 5 regularly scheduled fill ups. This week I have some maintenance scheduled that should help boost the mpg even further, as there is a problem with the vacuum line in the fuel system (Damn “Check Engine” light!).To recap, here Balogh’s rules of the (expensive) road:

• Don’t let the engine rev above 2000 rpm, if you can help it. (You can pick your own number depending on make and model.)
• Maintain the speed limit, or no more than 3 mph above. Top speed of 60 mph. (This is tougher than it seems…)
• Do not accelerate into red lights or stop signs. (I do a lot of coasting now.)
• Do not allow car to idle (except at stop lights).

I challenge our readers to go out and give it a shot. Let me know how you do. For those who do not have a fancy onboard computer that figures out mileage, here’s how you do it:

Mark down miles on odometer upon fill up. You have to fill tank the entire way for this to work. The next time you get gas, fill the tank up completely again and note the new number on your odometer. Save your receipt from the gas station. Now you’re ready to compute mpg:(newest odometer reading [minus] old odometer reading) e.g. 109,635 - 109,392 = 243 miles.Divide this by the number of gallons on the last fill up, e.g. 243 miles [divided by] 12.2 gal = 19.9 mpg.   

UPDATE:  This site - cleanmpg.com linked to this article.  Seems like a great place for people interested in improving their mileage to start.  (I don’t condone any of the illegal techniques though…)UPDATE #2:  Results posted here. 

Look out Chevy Volt. Nissan is planning on stealing a bit of your thunder.

The automaker has announced plans to introduce an all-electric vehicle in both Japan and the United States by 2010. Sources are saying that the “Renault-Nissan alliance” will invest between $500 million to $1 billion dollars in electric cars; with an emphasis on swappable battery technology. Lithium ion battery packs (apparently from A123 Systems) will give the vehicles a range of between 160 to 200 km before a recharge or swap is needed. From the article,

But Nissan is being more aggressive about its electric-car efforts. Mr. Ghosn declined to say how much an electric vehicle would cost, but stressed that they would be affordable and comparable with other vehicles in the marketplace.

“We are not interested in some ‘Stars Wars’ prototype,” he said, “but in really bringing a mass market product that everybody can buy. It’s really a new chapter in the life of this industry.”

He said that as many as 10 million of the 69 million vehicles produced each year worldwide could ultimately be electric-powered, with a concentration in urban areas. “We think that cars sold in cities are the obvious first starting point,” he said.

Really interesting news — and I think it’s wise to explore the addition of swappable batteries for owners planning on taking long trips. New advances in battery weight and size would make such backups akin to keeping a spare tire in your trunk.

Could the next decade of transportation be the one that really shakes up the industry? I’m hopeful such a time is right around the corner.

via reuters and the ny times

There’s nothing like seeing a wild animal in real life. Nature shows are great, and the footage available is impressive (see the Planet Earth series for example). However, I prefer the rarer “close encounters” with animals off the screen.

This spring, I’ve have the luck of being in the right place at the right time, right outside my front door. Several weeks ago, just after midnight, I ran out to my car to get something. As I stepped out the door, I noticed a deer out of the corner of my eye, slowly walking towards the road. At the same time I heard a car coming up the street (don’t worry, this story has a happy ending…) Instead of the car barreling down the street and reducing the deer population by one, it saw the deer and slowed down. The deer froze in my front yard. The driver made a few noises like he was calling his cat, and the deer nonchalantly walked away from the car - and right towards me. I stood motionless, thinking “I can’t believe how big this animal really is.” The deer passed right on the other side of the bush in front of me - stopping when it caught my scent. I was less than five feet away. Time slowed to a stand still, and my heart was racing. I was eye to eye with a glorious looking doe. After one hour 15 seconds - the jig was up. The deer saw me and did its best imitation of a cartoon character, spinning its legs in place before barreling out of there.

A week or so after that while locking up, I noticed another doe walking up from the side of my house. I stepped out and watched one deer after another come around the side of the house and head for the woods across the street. Six does passed by - this time at a stones throw. Funny thing was each one stopped - and looked both ways(!) - before crossing the road. The big mommas and the little babies all knew to check both ways before venturing over the blacktop. Pretty incredible to see adaptation in action.

The last little encounter might not be much to write home about, but it was still a wonderful break in my day. Around dusk, I headed out side and heard a little commotion on the side of the house. I saw a plump little brown body scurry under the garage. I waited and watched as a beady little head popped up out of the hole - a woodchuck. He and I entered a staring contest of sorts. He trying to figure out if I were there to do him harm, and myself thinking “I can’t believe that that little bugger lives under my garage!”

All of these little glimpses of nature have stuck with me. They made me feel alive.

Appreciating the scope and diversity of the animal life on this planet is important. I’ll be sure that my children have access to nature videos, books, and the like. However, just as importantly, I’ll take them out in the yard, and show them how wonderful our local “critters” are.

[photo via Wikipedia]

At my house keeping bread fresh and not moldy is a constant battle. I make our bread, so there aren’t any of those preservatives in it, which I like, but it also means that the bread doesn’t last as long as it might otherwise. I’ve composted many a partial loaf as it was moldy before we could eat it. After I make a loaf I try to make a mental note to check it in 4-5 days and see where it is on the freshness scale. If I don’t think we can use it all I make it into other things.

Bread pudding is obviously a big favorite, but it’s not something that should be eaten on a regular basis. I also have an egg casserole recipe that uses bread slices, but it too shouldn’t be eaten on a regular basis. Lately I’ve been tackling this challenge by making croutons.

It’s salad season in my neck of the woods, which makes croutons an in demand item. Also, by having croutons around I have a ready supply of bread to smash up into bread crumbs if I need them. No more need to buy containers of bread crumbs. Croutons are ridiculously easy to make. I brush olive oil (or you could use melted butter) on slices of bread. Sprinkle on garlic, salt, onion powder and dried parsley (the parsley seems to be very important to the overall flavor). Slice the slices into small cubes and put them on a cookie sheet at 275 degrees for about 45-60 minutes. It’s that easy.

A great time to make these and reduce your energy use is to make these up to slide in the oven after it’s already been used to cook a meal or something. Reduce the temp for 15 minutes or so and then turn the oven off and the residual heat should dry them out well enough. If you have an earth oven you can use the low temperature times to do this as well.

After they are done (and I’ve fought off all the people trying to eat them) I put them in a plastic Ziploc bag and toss them in the freezer. The next time we have a salad I pull out the bag for each person to add to their own salad.

Check out the video below from About.com. Read more »

NPR aired the last episodes this week in their year long series titled Climate Connections by focusing on the new “zero-emissions” city being built outside of Abu Dhabi called Masdar City. With an expected population of 50,000 people, the “experiment” in green technologies and sustainable design will be the largest effort ever to create a carbon-neutral urban center. The project is the crown jewel in the Abu Dhabi’s amibtious plans to become the ’silicon valley’ of the renewable energy world. The Middle East certainly isn’t naive when it comes to looking past oil for the future security of their economies.

One of the more interesting technologies being put into action in Masdar is the PRT — or Rapid Transit System. Designed to hold six people, these pods will travel to more than 1,500 stations distributed throughout the city. From the NPR clip,

“‘Really, all it is is a car,’ says Scott McGuigan of CH2M Hill, the construction firm that’s building Masdar City. ‘It’s a simple vehicle [for] six passengers. It’s designed like a car, but obviously it’s powered by solar energy with batteries.’”

Unlike other PRT systems in development, this one will be completely underground. In fact, don’t expect Masdar City to go looking like something out of Blade Runner. The architects are sticking to a purely traditional Arab theme — not only because it makes people feel more “at home”, but also because narrow streets and shaded walks keep things cooler; reducing the need for air conditioning.

But back to the PRT — they will basically take you anywhere you want to go. No fixed routes like a Subway. Once again, from the radio segment,

“‘You program what station you want to go to, and [the vehicle] will directly take you to that station,’ he says. ‘If you look at things like Blade Runner, etc., that we had 15 years ago, it’s really bringing that to the fore now.’”

Hmm…then again, perhaps we will get a little Blade Runner in the mix. Construction on Masdar City starts this summer.

Discovery has a really interesting article on the fate of the dinosaurs — that may have been sealed by a meteorite striking an oil field in the Gulf of Mexico 65 million years ago. Apparently, smoke-related particles found in sediment are eerily similar to those found in today’s as a result of oil and coal burning. The good news is, if another one does a couple hundred years from now, its doubtful there will be much oil left to ignite. [Read more…]

We’re said to be saying goodbye to Nau — the organic, giving, fashion-retailer that was in business for about a year. They’re shutting their doors — but you can still grab 50% off their entire line right, um, nau. [Read more…]

Oil at $200/barrel? We’ll see — but even conservatives are estimating it could hit $150/barrel this summer. If so, expect to dish out between $4.50-$4.75 at the pump. [Read more…]

Could you get by with only one car? That’s what a new MSN article is asking — while underlining the fact that there are more cars in the U.S. than drivers. Even worse, the number of people driving alone to work inched up to 77% in 2005 from a previous 75.7% in 2000. No wonder oil companies are swimming in profits. [Read more…]

At my house we have a problem with rabbits, squirrels and also chipmunks. While I can keep them out of the garden space for the most part with chicken wire, sometimes it’s easier to use containers to grow certain food items, and then move the container around as necessary.

This is a picture of two large planter boxes I acquired at a garage sale. I like to use this planter box to grow lettuce. The rabbits enjoy eating my lettuce and by using this planter box I am able to put the lettuce up on a table or other platform that the rabbits can’t get at. Which means more lettuce for me, and less effort to keep them out.

Other things you could grow in here would be radishes, small carrots, possibly garlic or onions. Probably anything that would have a shallow root.

I like to reuse items in my garden when possible to grow food. Below I have a picture of an old plastic tote that someone (who shall remain nameless) broke when he tossed it down the stairs even though he constantly gets rebuked for doing that and breaking clothes baskets. I drilled some holes in the bottom for drainage, layered in some compost, put in a couple potato eyes and covered it with leaves. Already the taters are poking through as they grow. When it’s time to harvest I can simply pull off the leaves or just tip it over and pick up the potatoes. This is a great way to make use of containers that would otherwise go to the landfill.

Another way I am growing potatoes is in an old tractor tire. My neighbor has this tractor tire planter in the back portion of her house that is currently not used. She agreed to let me plant some potatoes there for the time being. They are simple to plant. Place the eyes around the tire, add compost if you wish, cover with leaves. Yet another container put to use in the garden and less yard work for my neighbor.

How do you use containers in your garden?

Shopping For Porcupine is an interesting book. It’s hard to put my thoughts about it into words really. The author, Seth Kantner, obviously loves his homeland, Alaska, and all it’s wildness. He loves the traditional way that people made a living there. He also seems to like a lot of the conveniences of today’s world, but he also hates them.

This conflict he feels comes across in his writing. He talks in the book about his childhood growing up, and how he learned to hunt from his father using old traditional techniques. Now in today’s world he hunts using these techniques, but also new methods like snowmobiles, binoculars and high powered rifles. And it eats him up. It’s obvious from his essays that he struggles with these decisions every day of his life. This management of old and new. This struggle to take only what he needs even though he can use our technology to take as much as he wants to take.

There are startling examples in the book of how our use of technology has harmed the wildlife in Alaska. Transportation is easier now, so more people can hunt the animals, especially the wolves, for just their furs, not just the meat. This transportation has allowed us to travel further, faster and more tirelessly in our pursuit of game, which is beneficial, but also in the pursuit of trophies. Seth’s struggle to deal with this comes through very clearly. It’s obvious he values and treasures all the natural bounty that he has been provided.

Shopping for Porcupine is really an interesting tale of how quickly our world can change. When Seth was growing up his family was mostly self sufficient and made a living by hunting and foraging for food, trapping animals to sell the furs and perhaps selling some odds and ends. In his life span (which I believe is around 40 years) that traditional life has given way to a mish mash life where they do a lot of those things for food, but still shop, they buy clothing and live in both traditional and non-traditional types of housing. I imagine in another 40 years things will be quite different (unless Peak Oil pushes things back down back to the traditional ways). In a span of 80 years this knowledge of living traditionally could be completely lost within his family, and truth be told, in most of Alaska. Seth spends a lot of time talking about the elders around him that have helped educate him, and it seems to me that he wishes more of the current youth would make use of this resource.

Shopping For Porcupine is an interesting book about the conflict people can feel between the traditional way to do things and the modern way of doing things. Very interesting book.