Okay, people. That "100 companies are responsible for 71% of emissions" thing that you keep sharing? That's so misleading that it might as well be a big lie. Those are *fossil fuel* companies. Coal and oil and natural gas companies. They're not producing the emissions, they're providing the fuel for *you* to produce the emissions. They're not ( Read more... )

Look at the red line.


( Read more... )

Privilege as difficulty level: straight white male is playing life in easy mode ( Read more... )

The Do The Math blog has been going through the numbers on various forms of alternative energy, mostly with an eye to how abundant they are, e.g. solar is abundant, wind is useful, tides are niche (locally useful, globally irrelevant.) I'd been planning on summarizing and linking at some point -- but he went and did it himself, with table and ( Read more... )

Do The Math looks at pumped hydro power. http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/11/pump-up-the-storage/

He has his math; I'll try mine.

( Mercy cut )

* SF geek: Animation of multiple-star systems. (From a Firefly thread.) How to show time-lagged STL comms on screen.
* Cute studies: Children of lesbian mothers less susceptible to mental illness. Take with as much salt as a single study deserves, but cute result anyway given the debates.
* Politics geek: Overseas departments of France. Unlike ( Read more... )

* That commie rag The Economist calls for higher taxes on the rich, suggests a financial-transactions tax, and various pragmatic and moral justifications. Actually it's a hosted debate, I'm not sure if the Economist is taking a stand, though "this house..." suggests that. Proposer is from CPER, a rare progressive think-tank; defender is a ( Read more... )

Assuming the same # of miles will be driven, is it better to spend $X to increase an individual vehicle's mileage from 10 to 20 miles per gallon, 20 to 30 mpg, 20 to 40, 20 to 50, 20 to 100, or 20 to 1000?

Space for you to ponder in...

( Answer! )

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080524/ap_on_bi_ge/money_in_the_tank_12

http://www.evworld.com/article.cfm?storyid=1436