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Daily Installment of Coffee Joe, By Jim O'Connor
texasjim.net MP3
Maybe this morning was just a bad morning, but with everything going the way it was, I couldn't help but to think of better times. I used to think nothing of walking down the street, smoking a cigarette. I never thought then, that I would have such fond memories of something so little.
I told the robot to get me some doughnuts for breakfast. The robot responded "Yes Sir, Good tasting, and Good for you food, coming right up." It fixed what looked like doughnuts, but tasted like shit. I told the robot and it responded with "I was not able to cross reference your input Sir. Can you please give me more data on shit?" I told the robot "good help is so hard to find." it answered, "good help, Sir, what is this?" "Forget it, you'll never understand." I think the bad taste of the doughnuts had something to do with all of the synthetic ingredients.
I think I better get out and do something today.
The search for employment was getting a little depressing. The doughnut was damn depressing. Even the news was depressing.
It was about eight in the morning when I walked outside to meet the day. It was warm and the sun was shining. I remembered many years ago, on nice days like this, we would start a grill and cook hamburgers outside. However, with beef being one of the things you can't buy anymore, it's just not the same. In addition, if your grill creates smoke, you could be sued. These days it seems like most people just cook imitation fish on their solar cooker. I guess this is the politically correct way to have a cook out.
I walked down the street to the local restaurant. I never really knew why this restaurant did so well. I never even gave it any thought until today. I walked in and I said "good morning Ahsu." She looked over and said "mornin' Joe, would you like the usual?" The usual for me was a cup of decaffeinated coffee and cinnamon roll with Sweet Stuff. Sweet Stuff is some thing that looks and tastes like sugar, but is actually an artificial sweetener with fluoride in it. I told her "yes please." Ahsu was probably one of the last true service oriented people I knew. I mean she really did a good job.
I went to sit at my table and put my card in the monitor. Ahsu then brought my stuff to me. She looked at me somewhat funny and asked, "Is there anything wrong?" I told her I was just having a bad day. For some reason though, I felt compelled to tell her what happened to my job. I told her all about it. She just smiled and said, "Don't worry Joe, things will work out." She certainly had more confidence in that statement than I did. Then for some strange reason she picked up the roll and coffee and said, "Sorry Hun, this one's for someone else, I'll be right back with yours." She didn't take it to another table. She took it back to the kitchen. I thought to myself "What's wrong with these people? Is everybody going crazy?"
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Our Daily Bit of the U. S. Constitution. Law Makers Turn Your Heads Like Always
texasjim.net MP3
Section 3. New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union; but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well as of the Congress.
The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to prejudice any claims of the United States, or of any particular state.
Section 4. The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.
Article V
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state , without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.
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More Energy-Efficient Ethanol
www.technologyreview.com MP3
A process used in wastewater treatment may increase efficiency in ethanol plants.
By Jennifer Chu
Making corn ethanol is an energy-intensive process, requiring fossil fuels to grow and harvest corn and to power the production plant. To make the process more energy efficient, researchers at Washington University are proposing to borrow a process used in breweries and wastewater treatment facilities: oxygen-less vats of bacteria that naturally feed on organic waste produced from the fermentation process.
As bacteria break down waste, it releases methane, which can be funneled back through the system to help power a plant. The process requires little additional energy to run, and can further cut down on energy costs by producing its own power. Largus Angenent, a professor of chemical engineering, and his team at Washington University have tested anaerobic digestion on waste from ethanol plants and found that the process could cut down an ethanol facility's use of natural gas by 50 percent. The team has published the results in the recent issue of the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
Angenent says that the process would serve as a short-term solution until more-efficient biofuel, such as cellulosic ethanol, is commercially viable. "Rather than have hope for new technology that comes to fruition in 10 or 20 years, we need technology we can implement now," says Angenent, who recently became an assistant professor of biological and environmental engineering at Cornell University. "This is an interim process, and it's off the shelf."
Nearly all ethanol biofuel in the United States is made from corn. Typically, the ethanol production yields organic waste that is then consolidated into two parts: a dry, cake-like substance and a syrupy solution, called thin stillage, that's layered on top. The concoction is used as animal feed. Angenent says that a large portion of this feed, particularly thin stillage, which is laden with salts, provides low nutritional value but may have high energy potential for powering a plant when broken down via anaerobic digestion.
To test this theory, the researchers cultivated thermophilic bacteria from a wastewater treatment plant in two small, five-liter anaerobic digesters. Angenent and his colleagues then slowly began feeding waste samples into the digesters, which were kept at 55 °C to maximize the bacteria's activity. As the digesters ran, the team measured the amount of methane released.
However, initial tests found that the process produced very little methane. Angenent guessed that the system might be missing an essential ingredient but was unsure as to what that might be. So the team dug into the scientific literature and found that methane-producing bacteria require certain trace elements to jump-start the process--particularly cobalt.
When Angenent added cobalt to the mix, he recalls, "it was unbelievable. Overnight, the process was recovered." In lab tests, the average output yielded a quarter of a liter of methane per gram of waste fed into the digester. Angenent calculates that this number, scaled up to industrial production rates, would decrease the amount of natural gas needed to power an ethanol plant by 50 percent.
In a 2006 study, researchers at the University of Minnesota calculated the total amount of energy used in the production of ethanol, from how much it costs to build and run tractors to how much it costs to power a biofuel plant. They found that ethanol provides a scant 26 percent more energy than is used to produce it.
When Angenent plugged results of his process into the Minnesota model, he found that energy output was bumped up to 70 percent, meaning that anaerobic digestion significantly boosts the energy value of ethanol biofuel. Angenent says that percentage may change slightly in a real-life scenario if ethanol plants choose to install anaerobic digesters.
"If you put in a digester, you have a lot of liquid that needs to be recycled back into the system, and that would create changes throughout a plant," says Angenent. "So someone will have to do a study to find out what that net energy balance really is."
Douglas Tiffany, a research fellow at the University of Minnesota and a coauthor on the 2006 study, says that operating anaerobic digesters in ethanol plants may be a challenge, since it requires expertise to maintain a stable bacterial community at high temperatures and avoid system crashes. However, if these problems are sorted out, Tiffany says, the process may improve ethanol's energy and environmental potential.
"We can improve these existing corn-ethanol plants dramatically and reduce greenhouse gases far more than they do today," says Tiffany. "This process is attractive because it's a low-energy, low-capital approach. It will take some [ethanol producers] to stick their necks out to try it, but once it's happening in a number of plants, it should work out pretty well."
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Electric Bikes Provide Greener Commute
cnn technology MP3
NEW YORK (AP) -- When Honora Wolfe and her husband moved to the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado, she wanted an environmentally friendly way to commute to her job as a bookshop owner in the city.
Wolfe, 60, found her solution about a month ago: an electric bicycle. It gets her to work quickly, is easy on her arthritis and is better for the environment than a car.
"I'm not out to win any races," she said. "I want to get a little fresh air and exercise, and cut my carbon footprint, and spend less money on gas. And where I live, I can ride my bike seven months out of the year."
The surging cost of gasoline and a desire for a greener commute are turning more people to electric bikes as an unconventional form of transportation. They function like a typical two-wheeler but with a battery-powered assist, and bike dealers, riders and experts say they are flying off the racks.
Official sales figures are hard to pin down, but the Gluskin-Townley Group, which does market research for the National Bicycle Dealers Association, estimates 10,000 electric bikes were sold in the U.S. in 2007, up from 6,000 in 2006.
Bert Cebular, who owns the electric bike and scooter dealership NYCeWheels in New York, said his sales are up about 50 percent so far this year over last. Amazon.com Inc. says sales of electric bikes surged more than 6,000 percent in July from a year earlier, in part because of its expanded offerings.
"The electric bikes are the next big thing," said Frank Jamerson, a former General Motors Corp. executive turned electric vehicle guru.
They're even more popular in Europe, where Sophie Nenner, who opened a Paris bike store in 2005, says motorists boxed in by traffic jams are looking for an alternative for short journeys that doesn't involve navigating overcrowded transport systems.
Industry associations estimate 89,000 electric bikes were sold in the Netherlands last year, while 60,000 power-assisted bikes were sold in Germany.
The principle behind electric bikes is akin to that behind hybrid cars: Combine the conventional technology -- in this case, old-fashioned pedaling -- with a battery-powered motor.
The net result is a vehicle that rides a bit like a scooter, with some legwork required. Most models have a motorcycle-like throttle that gives a boost while going up hills or accelerating from a stop. On some models, the motor kicks in automatically and adjusts its torque based on how hard the rider pedals.
Although regulations vary by state, federal law classifies electric bikes as bicycles, and no license or registration is required as long as they don't go faster than 20 mph and their power doesn't exceed 750 watts.
Price largely determines weight, quality and battery type. A few hundred dollars gets you an IZIP mountain bike from Amazon with a heavy lead-acid battery. For $1,400, you can buy a 250-watt folding bike powered by a more-powerful, longer-lasting nickel-metal hydride battery like those in a camera or a Toyota Prius. At the high end, $2,525 buys an extra-light 350-watt model sporting a lightweight lithium-ion battery similar to a laptop's. Most models can go at least 20 miles before plugging in to recharge.
Joe Conforti, a commercial film director from New York, uses a four-year-old model designed by former auto titan Lee Iacocca in the 1990s for running errands or getting to social occasions.
"It's really nice," said Conforti, who is eagerly looking to upgrade to a newer, more powerful ride. "If you've got a date, you go to meet friends -- you go out on a (conventional) bike, you're gonna sweat up. You go out in an electric bike, it's great it's terrific, you're not gonna sweat up and you ride home fine."
Bike dealers said the growing demand goes beyond just the uptick in gas prices, but also because of word of mouth. Cebular said business at his store and on his Web site has been booming.
"Fifty percent of that increase is probably because of gas prices, and the rest is that there's just more bikes out there," said Cebular, who has run his shop on Manhattan's Upper East Side for seven years.
Improved technology also has made electric bikes more popular, Cebular said.
"When I started, there was only one bike that had a nickel-metal hydride battery -- everything else was lead-acid and was 80 or 90 pounds," he said. "That's a huge improvement."
Jay Townley, a partner at Gluskin-Townley, said the latest electric bikes are sleeker, better looking and hide their often-clunky batteries better than ever. That goes a long way to attract baby boomers and other mainstream customers.
"The new designs that we've seen in the marketplace are going to inure to the benefit of the electric bike companies," he said.
Ultra Motor, an England-based electric bike and scooter company, is betting big that it can capitalize on what it seems as a growing market for attractive-looking two-wheelers designed specifically for U.S. commuters. The company on Tuesday unveiled its "A2B" model, a slick, low-riding electric bike.
Ultra Motor took a conventional bicycle and redesigned it with fatter wheels, a lower center of gravity and a thick shaft designed to hide the lithium-ion battery inside, U.S. Chief Executive Chris Deyo said. The result is a cross between a motorcycle and a mountain bike.
The company already has signed up 75 dealers nationwide to sell the $2,500 bike starting next month.
"A year ago, when you mentioned the word electric bike, people looked at you and they really weren't sure what it was," Deyo said. "Today, what we're finding is we're actually having dealers call us seeking an electric bike to meet the demand."
Jamerson, the former GM executive who has become a staunch advocate for electric transportation, believes this is only the beginning for electric bikes. He retired from GM in 1993 after helping develop the company's EV1 electric car, and he's been an avid follower of alternative transportation ever since.
The EV1 project, though widely seen as a spectacular failure, helped convince Jamerson of the value of electric transportation. Given soaring fuel prices and thinning patience with foreign dependence on oil, Americans are ready to embrace electric vehicles, he said.
"Did you know there are 70 million electric bikes on the road today in China, and they are selling at the rate of 2.6 million electric bikes a year?" he said. "The public at large needs to understand that it is the right thing to do to move to electric transportation, and electric bikes and electric scooters will allow you to do that, to get that familiarity."
As for Wolfe, she could not be happier with her bike, a 48-pound mountain bike with a lithium-ion-powered assist made by California-based IZIP. A self-described "tree-hugger for decades," she drives her Honda Insight hybrid car or rides the bus when she's not using her bike to get to work.
It's part of her own personal campaign to reduce her carbon footprint. She also powers her home with help from a set of rooftop solar panels, and a geothermal furnace heats and cools it.
The furnace, she adds, even heats her water. Just one more way to reduce emissions, she said.
"Even my 92-year-old mother has a Prius," she said. "So I come by my green credentials genetically."
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