More on Fossil Fuels

[devoncloud]

Ok, in a prior rant, we all started to talk about getting off the fossil fuels in 15 years....

Some say we need the government to wean us off oil.  Some said we need to get away from the SUV gas guzzlers...  some said we need to write our congressman while others said we need to grow the non-"happy" strain of hemp...

OK, here is my rant:

Why are we talking about things that make almost no impact on energy conservation?  Even if all of us DIY'ers (I say us as if I am one, I guess I should be in a wannabe cattegory since my first wind generator is not even finished yet)got together and tried any of those "solutions" we would get nowhere.  It is one thing to sit here and pick our brains about things that would help if we lived in a perfect world, but let's not forget we don't!

The thing that bothered me the most is that EVERYONE that is attracted to this discussion board has something to offer the world that would actually help the energy conservation cause, and not one person in that last rant topic mentioned it:

WE ALL KNOW HOW TO BUILD (OR AT LEAST HAVE A MUTUAL INTEREST IN)LOW COST ALTERNATIVE ENERGY!!!

we cannot change the fact that the neighbor drives a ford excursion no matter how hard we try.  We can write the pres and his buddies a million times and nothing is going to change concerning his oil and other energy policies...  but we can get together as a group, put all of our knowledge together and come up with some very low cost ways for people to create their own energy!  

Everyone knows that money is what makes the world turn and what makes people listen.  When you are selling something, if you cannot show someone that your product is going to put money back in their pocket or at least show them they simply cannot live without it, you will be starving very quickly.  This same premise holds true for conservation.  If you can't show someone that conserving energy will make their pocket book fatter with no loss of their current comfort zone you are spinning your wheels.  

Can you think of one person who simply loves to get that electric bill and pay out their hard earned money to keep that electricity on?  I can't. If someone were to tell that same person that they could have some of that money back (if not all of it and then some)do you think you would have their attention?  

There are States that allow people to create their own energy and even sell the extra electricity back to the electric company.  If we could find someone in one of these areas that would love to have cheap alternative energy make them some money, we could help that person out!  If we help that person out and make others notice, we could start a REAL conservaton trend!  

Just imagine if we all networked our talents (and our garages) together.  There are some of us that have expertise on formulas.  Others have access to cheap steel and a great lathe in their garage.  Others our in big industrial areas and can get cheap magnet wire,rectifiers, resin etc...  The point is, we are located all around the globe.  I have emailed back and forth with hugh and he is in Scotland while I am in Texas for petes sake!  If someone in Oregon needs a solar panel and a wind generator, we got someone over there that can help out.  Florida?  their too.  Texas?  I am no pro at this yet, but trust me, I will be and will be glad to help anyone wishing to jump on the bandwagon.  Internet fred in Canada.  We reach all over the place, have a huge amount of knowledge, and have a product that works!  Why waste time talking about things that OTHER PEOPLE need to do in order to conserve energy and fossil fuels when we have something that could be HUGE as far as conservation right here at our fingertips?  Hey, the heck with a rant, Let's make this a reality!

Let's take that big old money-hungry grid and turn it into one big alternative energy battery.  To switch everyone to off-grid living we would need to utilize the grid system anyway because their is not enough lead in the world to make enough batteries for every household to go that route anyway.  Anyway, there are times you need more energy than you produce, so if you are on the grid it is there thus not lowering anyone's comfort levels (which is what we would need to accomplish for our conservation dreams to become a reality).  When you are at work or sleeping, you "store" the extra energy you are producing but not using on the grid.  You get the best of both worlds my friends, and we have the knowledge to make it happen.

If we pushed this, it could happen and relatively quickly, say, the 15 years we were just talking about a couple days ago!!!  If we got seriously motivated and organized, this could be a reality.  If we did get serious and organized, organizations like the Sierra Club (or other conservationists) would jump on the opportunity to spread the idea of turning the grid into a battery for environmentally healthy energy.  We could even make a buck or two while we are saving the planet.  We just need to be alot cheaper than these people making commercial units, and that is not that hard to do at all.

Devon

[franknbuger]

   Devon,  You have some good ideas.The most important of all: THE WANT TO DO SOME GOOD IN THIS WORLD,DONT LOSE IT. I dont mean to assign blame but,after World War II,

the Japanese flodded of market place with cheap trinkets and trade goods.They especialy started with toys and transistor radios, then motorcycles, then small cars.

 This was one of the contributing factors that started our throw away society.

Our own auto makers, kept making the very large gas guzzlers for many years after being shone that,a small car would work.In the 1970's THE GOVERMENT STARTED MAKING AUTO MAKERS PUT POLUTION DEVICES ON CARS.This happened because people got together and put pressure on law makers....PEOPLE HAVE TO BE MADE DO THE RIGHT THING, BY OUR LEADERS WHO MAKE THE LAWS....Mr. GEO B--H is now and has been involved with big oil companys all his life.He does not want to conserve anything.He put us in Iraq to steal their oil. He wants to keep on drilling.... more money for him and his cronies... that should be plain to see.He has to be made to do the right

thing....VOTE HIM OUT.      "Some people build a small fire and stand close to it...some people build a big fire and stand way back away from it".

                                             Frankenbuger.

[TomW]

devoncloud;

Well, first, these kind of rants belong in the diary section. But nobody seems to be following the rules lately so im not going to force the issue.

Second. Personally I am pretty sure that not one thing is going to happen to further renewables on a large scale until the oil runs out so what we need to do is burn it up fast and now. I honestly feel this way it is not some joke i am making.

Pretty radical but humans have a long history of ignoring the obvious. By the time we burn up all the oil the planet will be unsuited to human survival so like any good virus we will seek a new host planet to poison.

Cheers.

TomW

[KHB1]

Supply and demand, when fossil fuels realy get low the prices will get so high people will find alternatives.

KHB1

[Gary D]

I love your excitement! The reality as I see it is that this board has helped me thru talking and giving options.

  To name just a few: Tom W. just shared his way of using his inverter. I wired my new room with a breaker for each wall, and one separate for lighting. This gives me new thoughts of how to reconfigure as I get new power up.

  Old F. had a link back a few on ground cooling that I might use.

  I posted an article on haterheater losses and got many good options, some I have already implimented.

 So it is already paying off for me! Generating is only one part of the big picture, how to best use it is another. Hopefully soon I will be able to share my project on mycrohydro (altho it keeps getting pushed back by other pressing things )

and hopefully someone will get an idea from it. Thats the way this board works for me. Good ranting! Gary D.

[finnsawyer]

OK, I'm going to wade in.  I've noticed that the advice on this board is not to connect to the grid.  That's wrong, if you want to show people that alternate energy is the way to go.  Even at three cents a kilowatt hour.  The problem is that you need larger wind turbines than 5 foot or ten foot diameters.  Twenty foot is more like it.  Not much work going on here in that area.  One needs a good low cost way of manufacturing the blades.  This is probably the greatest bottleneck.  Alternators and transmissions are not the problem.  Why are synchronous inverters so expensive?  How about noise problems?  Well, maybe the ten foot range is the place to start.  And don't wait until fossil fuels run out.  Get the bugs out of the system now.  Also, explore some new ideas.  I've dropped a few hints here and there, but nobody has picked up on them.  I don't believe that the last chapter on wind power has been written.

[RogerAS]

Hello all,

First of all I'm not directing this toward any person here, second of all please forgive me of what follows, but I did not open this Pandoras Box.

Here's my spin on things.

The grid cannot become a "battery" for everyone to tap, there is no storage capability in a distribution grid. Just like a gen set for us off grid folks if we don't use the power from the gernerator there is seriuos waste. Putting all of our excess power back into the grid could overload the system if we made enough excess. Not likely but possible. The electricity has to go somewhere and be used. During peak demand times the power generation companies crank up extra tubines, and cut back production when the demand drops. This balancing act is the result of the fact that there is no storage capability within the grid and that's a good thing. If the grid stored power every time the load dropped the rest of those using power would see massive voltage spikes.

I would beg to differ that there is not enough lead (metal) in the world to make all the batteries required for everyone. There are deposits of lead so vast we could mine and refine it for hundreds of years before exhausting them. We can and do recycle millions of lead-acid batteries annually. Also there are other types of batteries which don't have any lead at all, ie nickle iron, NI-Cad, etc. New energy storage systems are under development as we converse, such as super flywheels, and these MAY replace our batteries someday. Large holding resivoirs of water work great.

Organizations such as the Serria Club do not seem to care enough about the current (grin) situation to take action now, so I seriously doubt our efforts would sway them. Worth a try? Sure, but don't hold your breath. I feel that without their membership dues and contributions they wouldn't exist at all. Very few people can afford to work for nothing in return. I sure can't.

I aslo doubt that our efforts can be done cheaper than the big boys. The government built a series of damns on the Columbia and Snake rivers in the northwestern United States several decades ago, and these produce several megawatts of hydro electric power. Of course we, or our forefathers, paid for these projects. The trouble is the cost per watt was and is WAY cheaper than we can privately or collectively reach and the northwest still enjoys fairly cheap electrical rates. For us DIY'ers to produce 1 megawatt would be monumental, and being spread across the globe the losses in transmission add up. Then there is the problem of connecting our excess to the grid without major hurtles both physical, political and economical (your watts worth less than theirs).

I say *#C( the grid and the multitude of problems associated with it. When I moved onto my remote land the power company wanted $18,500 to run power lines to my property, which I would even then not own those lines, and others could then connect without paying their share. When we have our yearly ice storms and the grid goes down we're the only ones for miles that has reliable sustainable power (why all lines are not burried stumps me). If they try to bring those lines to someone else in the future I will not allow them across my proprty without a fight, and I don't mean a litigation battle either! I will take my Stil chainsaw to the poles. Our Public Utility Commission (Arkansas) seems to have never heard of the Rural Electrification Act, or more likely the giant power company has the dollars and lawyers to assure their interests are the prime consideration. That's why, even with federal laws already on the books, they only pay a fraction of what they charge watt for watt. Now pass a law that makes the playing field level and you'll get somewhere, but that will never happen.

People (as a whole) are just plain too lazy in body and spirit to do anything and our government(s) know it. Until this changes nothing else will, so again, don't hold your breath. I say the crap they've fed us about humans being a social creatures is tripe of the highest order. Ever notice how those "primitive" peoples in the Amazon and elsewhere seem so happy until they are shown how pitiful (by someone elses standards) their existance is? (always by some do-good social reformist or missionary). Just take a look at the history of the American west and how we destroyed both a pristine wilderness and several nations of native americans, all in the name of "progress". Manifest Destiny?

The whole point is to control us and govern all aspects of our lives, lots of taxpaying folks equal more and more power in the hands of a few. Don't expect to change it without being labeled as a kook or worse yet a threat to national security. Think I'm a kook? fine I can deal with that, but the US supreme court had no constitutional power or prior precident to settle the 2000 presidental election, yet they did. 9 people picked our current president.

RogerAS

[bkrahmer]

I have a few comments to add to this discussion...

1. We CANNOT afford to burn up all the oil to force alternative energy or even energy conservation!  Did you read the report yesterday that said the entire Greenland ice shelf may melt in the next 1000 years and put the worlds oceans up 23 feet?  That would cost the world trillions to relocate people or build rediculous Venice-like dikes, etc.  I think we should all write our congresspeople and ask them to ratify the Kyoto Protocol.
   
2. Personally, I dislike the idea of everybody having a windmill in their backyard, unless they are less than the height of the average house.  Solar panel shingles on the other hand...
   
3. I like the idea of distributed generation.  If we took all the money we're dumping into building new power plants, and instead put up distributed solar installations, we'd never need another power plant built.  Transportation and many factories use power 24/7.  However, most households use power for a couple hours in the morning, and from 5-10pm.  Because every timezone has those peaks at different times, if you had a worldwide grid utilitizing solar and wind power, you effectively would have storage.  The power generated from the homes during the day, from solar, would be used in another timezone, and vice versa.  You wouldn't actually have storage, but you could reach an extremely efficient equilibrium.
   
4. America claims to be the leader of the free world.  And like any great leader, it completely ignores everybody beneath him.  Denmark is moving towards 100% renewable energy by 2010!  That means no coal, no gas-fired plants, 0 CO2!  Does our media even remark at that?  Do we have discussions about how we could achieve such a goal?  Hardly.
   

[stop4stuff]

I just gotta have my say...

Over the last 4 months, I have come to realise that the World's fossil energy resources are being depleted very quickly, oil will become as rare as rocking horse droppings within my childrens' lifetimes...

(10 years or so of denial and now... i woke up

I found fieldlines because i was trying to figure out mangets and electromagnets for a robot made of Lego...

everyone who's contributed to the discussions here has OPENED MY EYES... and i have gone on further to find out what renewable energy resources are/will be available.

In the UK we have very little in the way of mainstream advertising for renewable energy products... in fact i can't remember ever seeing a tv advert for any product that involves renewable energy.

I'm not religeous, but I have a lady who visits and delivers the Jehovah's Witness publication 'Awake', the magazine has some interesting articles, complete with a bible solution.

Exerpt from Awake, November 8 2003

"Happily, the future of oil - and, indeed, of all sources of energy - is not in the hands of the nations. Ultimately, it is in the hands of earth's Creator and Caretaker, Jehovah God, who has promised that soon every environmental and social problem related to the use and abuse of the earth's resources will disappear (Revelation 4:11) As the Bible states, the time is near when God will 'bring to ruin those ruling the earth.' Righteous rulership by god will result in 'a new heaven and a new earth.' a world without selfish exploitation and injustice, where the resources of the earth will be used alturistically for the benefit of all obedient humankind. - Revelation 11:18; 21:1-4."

The above is something I read, and disbelieve as I cannot find any evidence to support the claim... however the claim could be interpreted as 'Power to the People'

And power to the people has consequences too, the bottanist David Bellamy has a few word to say about windfarms... mostly negative.

http://www.davidbellamyconservation.org.uk/advice/windfarms.htm

I believe, thanks to everyone that generously passes on their knowledge via internet, that there will be no serious challenges for anyone with a half an ounce of savvy... no matter what their energy needs are.

Devoncloud...

How about an Amway style 'Renewable energy' network marketing scheme...

money ppl always go for MLM if they can get in at the top

Find an architect capable of designing a decent passive solar house...

...Uni-solar produce 'Solar Shingles', 17w, 12" x 86" roof shingle style PV panels

http://www.kingsolar.com/catalog/mfg/uni-solar/shr17.html ($158 ea.!!)

...south facing roof surfaces covered in solar shingles.

...incorporate a roof mounted wind generator, and heliostat water heating...

water supply/waste would be the only thing needed in a suburbian dwelling. (buired water treatment plant collecting methane???)

Construction crew, plumbers, electricians etc...

You get the model renewable energy home... MLM every step and watch ppl try to make money )

neways,

upshot goes like this...

ppl will emulate their favourites,

ppl will believe what they're told,

ppl don't like change

ppl DO like adventure

ppl like their comfort zones

ppl need to be lead

ppl need to be educated

the only way to educated ppl is to lead and steer them in the right direction...

...& b4 ne1 has a go at me for preaching...

i'm interested in MY childrens' future,

i'm educating them and steering them in the right direction...

most MLM starts with family and friends...

the way forward???

paul

[devoncloud]

ok, now that people have weighed in on the subject,  let me tell you how I feel about the subject now.

First, those of you who say that the grid cannot be used as a battery are scientifically correct but you are missing the big point in thinking in those terms.  Unless every household on the grid starts producing enough energy to power themselves, then the more energy created by households using alternative energy does indeed make the grid act like a battery.  If your systems pump more electricity than you are using, the next house down the line will use your electricity before it uses electricity that was created by a power plant across state. The more electricity that is pumped into the grid via our methods the less energy is needed from nuclear, coal, and other plants that are hurting our planet.  Unless households produce more electricity than the total amount of electricity used, then the grid will use every bit of that energy created just as your off-grid systems that store your energy in batteries at home do.

Does the electric company give you a fare rate when buying your energy back?  No.  But on the same tolken, the more you spin your meter to your advantage, you have then succeeded in getting your electricity at YOUR RATES instead of theirs (the cost it took you to build your units devided by the amount of output it gives you in it's life).  For every watt you put on the grid, you get that watt back for free if you use it later or get paid for it at the end of the month.  Actually, if you use the same amount of energy that you produce, the grid saves you money!  Say you produced 10,000 watts and used 10,000 watts.  You get a bill from the electric company of 0 dollars.  You just saved yourself four hundred dollars or so every seven years because you did not have to buy any batteries for your system.

I would also like to address the fact that our alternative energy would somehow foul up the grid.  This is false.  First, anyone hooked up and delivering energy to the grid are required to deliver that energy via a synchronius inverter in order to make your electricity the same frequency (or wavelength or however you are suppose to refer to it).  As long as this is done, the alternative energy poses no more threat to the system as the energy created by the plant.  And as for how the grid works, there is not someone at the plant waiting to turn more turbines on as needed for the rush energy use during peak times.  This is all done by computer.  When the turbines online come close to peaking out, the computer tells the next one to go online.  If energy on the grid has been created by alternative sources, the computers simply do not turn extra turbines on.

Also, another good thing about connecting our sytems to the grid is that when someone gets a check from the electric company rather than giving them one, that is the kind of thing that makes news.  the more the news covers what we are doing, the more people come on board with our way of thinking.

One last thing.  Someone mentioned that groups (actually the Sierra Club was specifically mentioned) would not be interested in this idea.  This is false.  I know this is false because I am a very active member of the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club, I handle their audio and video needs for meetings, videos that are produced, and soundtracks for those videos.  If a group of people got together that were organized, focussed, and knew what they were doing showed them that this was not only a possibility but easy to accomplish, and cheaper than if you went and bought a whisper unit (or other commercial alternative energy unit)they would jump on the idea in a heartbeat.  I am not saying they would put money into it, that is not what I believe they should do.  What they would do is put information about the plan in their magazines, news letters, and offer to have speakers at their meetings.  They would also lobby state polititians in states that do not allow people to create their own energy and sell it to the grid so that the idea can be utilized throughout the country.  Why is this good?  

There are well over 700,000 members of the Sierra Club.  These are like-minded people who would all be interested in creating alternative energy, and we can show them how.  If we felt like making a little money at this, we could even design and build the systems for them and install them. I am not posting this so the people on this site can "see the light" as I see it and give their time and money for the cause.  We could actually make some income doing something that we all feel pretty pasionate about (at least I think most here have a love for energy since this site is what we do in our spare time).

We have a very large amount of brain power on this site.  We also have alot of people who have a great machine shop in their garage.  We have people all over the country (world actually)that could utilize these things to create alternative energy for people out there that do not have the knowhow but do have the sense to see the good it possesses.  We may not have a big building to place a company under, but in my opinion, this is not a disadvantage, it is an advantage.  We can reach anyplace in the country with our DIY energy because we ARE all over the country.  We can utilize the person with a good machine shop to make our magnet rotors, we can utileze the person next to the industry city to get cheap supplies like magnet wire and rectifiers, by our magnets from you know who, and then we have plenty of the real big braines out there for formulas and whatnot.... we got everything we need to make this work, we just have to do it.  What is the worst thing that could happen?

Devon

[devoncloud]

I have always believe "simple" is the best way stop4stuff.  I do not think that starting a energy ammway is a good idea because someone is "on top".  This is simple stuff here.  Let's say one of is DIY'ers finds someone that wishes to have alternative energy incorporated into their house.  That person does some research suchas wind speed, good sunlight for solar, how much energy the person wishes his system to produce, etc.. and then introduces the plan to the website.  For the plan to be implimented, several things need to happen.

1. someone needs to find matterials
   
2. someone needs to machine matterials.
   
3. somoeone needs to know formulas to figure out designs of alternators, rotors, magnets configurations, coils and whatnot....
   
4. someone needs to know either how to build an inverter cheaply or where to purchase ones cheap....
   
   

I am sure you all get the picture.  Whoever can offer these services, offers them at a price and the DIY'er that has the customer picks his helpers and gets the system built.  No one is in charge, noone is getting taken advantage of, and alternative energy is getting created.  We do the best job possible every time.  After it is all said and done, we do our best to have our deeds noticed.

Pretty soon, people are comming to the website in order to get someone to help them build an alternative energy source and depending on where they live, they can be directed to the  nearest DIY'er to them.  It is not rocket science, it is a simple plan that works as long as there are people willing to work at it.

I guess that is the question here folks.  We talk a mean talk, but just how serious are we about our energy ideas after all?  Talking about conservation is obviously easy.  We have a chance to actually do it and make money at the same time.  Why not try?

devon

[windstuffnow]

  The problem with solar panels... it takes as much energy to make them as they produce in their lifetime.   Your only pre-paying your electric bill.  Still using fossil fuels to make them... where is the gain?

Windstuff Ed

[kirk]

www.journeytoforever.org is a tremendous resource in alternative fuels and food and other stuff

[ve6aym]

Hi,

I have been reading this forum for several months now and am totally amazed at the calibre of knowledge displayed by members.

You have all seemed to miss an important point. The mere fact that you all are using the power of the web and contributing to this forum can do nothing but further the cause of alternate power. The movement will build and improve as time goes on regardless of politics and/or roadblocks.

I only wish I was 20 years younger so that I could embrace the enthusiasm and passion about alternate energy that is demonstrated here.

Please continue to contribute and get a small spark of enthusiasm started in this old guy.

[RatOmeter]

I recognize the point about spreading the word and have been promoting fieldlines whenever I get the chance, including via my sig and posts on Slashdot.  

http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=103479&cid=8817261

I've worried a little that if I steer too many people who are less DIY over here, it might change the tone or focus of the forum; I hope not, I just want to share this great resource and spur some interest in RE.

I'd encourage anyone to share their RE projects here and on the net at large.  I'd like to see a whole lot more variety of hits come up when folks search on google.

-RatOmeter

[hvirtane]

My 2 cents.

There are big resources around the world

to build renewable energy systems.

Especially in developing countries.

In many developing countries people are

in general more skillful

using their hands than people

in industrial countries.

This is the case, because in industrial

countries people are already used

to buy most of the things ready made

instead of making them.

On the other hand many people

from industrial countries have learned

much valuable technologies,

because all kinds of technology exists

everywhere in industrial countries.

What people have learned by using and fixing

their cars can often be applied to other technologies such as wind turbines.

I think that if different existing knowledges

and possibilities are combined together

we can create renewable energy enough for

this world.

In industrial countries we have

got the difficulty

how to make re technology

cheap enough to beat oil and

nuclear technologies.

But in some other places re technology

maybe could be made much cheaper?

For example many developing countries

are located in areas, where there is

much sunshine available.

Solar technologies become cheaper there,

because you don't need to care

so much about the efficiency.  

Also some technologies like wind turbines

might become cheap if they would be produced

by handicrafts people from developing countries?

Instead of buying oil from the Middle East we

could buy wind turbines made in China, in Indonesia and in India?

And of course we could make these things ourselves, too after learning how to apply

our knowledge learned from other technologies

effectively on these things?

Let's say that a big car manufacturer

like GM would start a series production

of 20 kW wind turbines...

I think that the product would be

quite cheap if they would make

a 20 million series of it.

If we could make energy systems based wind turbines, which are capable to make cheaper electricity than existing grid electricity

all the people would buy those I think.

My friend from Tinytechindia just visited me here

to see some self made wind turbines in this area.

- Hannu

[bkrahmer]

BTW, wind turbines are already mass produced by GE, more or less.  If you called GE today and said you wanted to order 10,000 of them, I'm sure they'd fill the order.  The issue that you bring up regarding the cost of alternative energy comes down to supply and demand.  You can easily compare HDTV to alternative energy.  HDTVs a couple years ago cost 20k.  Now you can get them for 2k.  Why?  Because for every one bought, the price came down.  For every dollar the cost came down, 100 more people bought one.  

I saw an interesting survey on CNBC today.  If gas goes to 2.75 per gallon, 3 per cent of people would consider buying a more efficient car.  If it goes to 3.75 per gallon, 35% will consider buying a more efficient car, and 33% would buy hybrids.  

Eventually (50 years?), AE will be cheap enough so that it will be common for the mass producers to utilize it almost exclusively.  I only ask one question: Why not accelerate the curve?  In the long term, we would save an immense amount of dollars and the earth.

I'm all for the 'underground' approach.  I encourage everybody to experiment with alternative energy.  I'm thinking of building a house next year, and I'm planning to make it entirely self-sufficient (save for some LP as backup.)  I also want to build a hybrid-electric car that will get more than 60mpg.  It's only 15 more than my TDI, but it would be fun.

The problem with underground is that it's under the radar.  What I think is more important is to spread the word, and teach people about the possibilities...  If we'd get rid of religious fanatics like Tom DeLay which keep us involved in places like Israel, and stopped buying middle-eastern oil, I think the world would be a lot better place.

[devoncloud]

I am happy to see that people are at least happy about the knowledge here in the forum.  I am deffinitely one of those people....  I am a conservationist and it has opened my eyes to a whole new aproach to conservation... and tons of other things as well.  I am learning the ins and outs of electricity, storage, aerodynamics, resistance in copper wire, magnet technologies, turbines, and even getting introduced to some cool future type stuff like unity machines.  This is all fun and extremely educational.  

I started this whole rant because this site has brought people from all sorts of different backrounds, places, education levels, and so on.  Everyone is so different yet we all have a common interest and it has brought us all here to this site. alternative do-it-yourself energy has shown us that even in the times we live in we still can live the way we choose instead of the way our government chooses for us to live.

This to me is a whole new and exciting approach to conservation.  One that does not need government sponsorship or a large sum of money to get it started.  We can go to a junkyard and pick up just about everything that is needed to build energy.  Conservationists over the years has failed to get the attention of the world governments.  It is clear to me that we never will.  As long as their lives are full and their stomachs are full, they do not care what life is like for the rest of us.

Conservation techniques of the past have failed because of this, but this idea is different. Rather than having to "Fight the Powers that Be", conservationists can now simply "MAKE THEIR OWN POWER!!!"  We can simply forget their ways, and start living our ways.  This message is too strong not to unite under and do what it takes to spread the message.  This site is deffinitely one way that helps tremendously.  There are other things that could be done to further the cause though, and that has been what this rant was all about.  We could find a place that is on the grid and allows energy to be produced and sold back to the grid, and load that spot up with alternative energy.  We could then get the attention of groups, news, or whoever will listen and show them what we are capable of.  We have the knowledge, the tools, and the product(junk)!

I for one cannot let this idea simply go away due to complacency.  All this idea needs to become a reality is a little organization, some people with the knowledge, a a few good people to get it started.  I am one of those people.  I need help though.  Anyone interested in continuing with me on this idea can email me at devoncloud@sbcglobal.net or keep writting on this post.

devon

devoncloud@sbcglobal.net

[bkrahmer]

I just have to point out something in relation to a statement that you made.  You said:

> Conservationists over the years has failed to get the attention of the world governments.

This is not true at all.  Take Germany for example...  I'm not sure if the government pushed the agenda, or if the people asked for it first, but they are huge conservationists over there.  You have to trip over three recycling bins to get to a trash can.  They have the green dot so consumers can easily see that the product has been packaged in the most ecologically friendly way.  You think they use paper towels?  throw-away dust cloths?  single-use food containers?  No, no, no.  You have to pay for grocery sacks.  I believe most of Europe is the same way.  (I've only travelled in Germany and The Netherlands).  In Japan, computer manufacturers are compelled to collect and recycle old computers.

Conservationists over the years has failed to get the attention of the United States government.

cheers

[ibedonc]

I am already off fossil fuels Both my Car and Truck are Diesel and both of them run off 100% Biodiesel

[devoncloud]

point made sir.  Being that this is where I live, you I tend to think it is the same everywhwere. But even with the steps taken so far in Europe, it can get better.

devon

[devoncloud]

Sir, you are just the type of person that I would love to have on the "brain" side of this idea.  People who have actually come up with alternative energy ideas and put them to work.  I would love to see your ideas.  Please email me with more info!

Devon

devoncloud@sbcglobal.net

[ibedonc]

I did not come up with this , Just doing what a lot of people are doing

http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_make.html

And not be lazy about it

[troy]

That's a myth Ed.  A monocrystaline panel pays for it embodied energy in four years.  An amorphous panel pays for it's embodied energy in two years.  It's been studied pretty carefully.  The latest issue of Homepower (download free at www.homepower.com) has a whole article debunking several renewable energy myths, including this one.

Best regards,

troy