In a few months, Milton at night will be half as bright as it used to be.
The town this week began shutting off half of its 3,000 streetlights, going down each street and flipping the switch for every other fixture
via Milton will shut off lights to save money – Milton, MA – Wicked Local Milton.
Photo: CC/Kathy Mackey
The NSF-funded National Center for Atmospheric Research is now in the business of providing wind forecasts to utilities operating wind farms.
I expect we’ll all soon be looking for wind and sunlight forecasts as property owners plant small turbines and solar panels to power their homes.
via NCAR Forecasts Will Help Xcel Energy Harness Wind – News Release.
“Wind can be elusive, and even very small changes in the atmosphere can make a difference in wind speed and direction,” Mahoney says. “But we believe our experience in developing increasingly sophisticated forecasting systems will enable us to produce the accurate forecasts that Xcel Energy needs to provide reliable wind energy to its customers.”
Photo: CC/Phillip Sumner
U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar “was extremely well received” at a recent getting-t0-know you session, says an insider at the department.
“Respect for the scientific process” will mean trouble for natural gas companies hoping to exploit privately-owned ranchlands.(Interior manages the mineral rights to millions of acres of privately owned lands in the Western United States.
The new guy at Interior. Photo: CC/Jeffrey Beall
One reason: The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration this week announced that it found dangerously high levels of ozone over existing natural gas fields in Wyoming.
Just wanted to let you guys know that there was an all-hands meeting with the new Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, at 11am today.
The bullet points are:
- Ethical misconduct and criminal acts by Bush political appoints spoiled image of department.
- We want to be held to the highest standards of ethics and accountability.
- We will respect the scientific process
- There is the possibility that we will form a basketball team and take on the White House. Though Sec. Salazar noted that he has to be careful, as he “serves at the pleasure of the president.”
Converted: This tank, in the trunk of a converted green grease car, holds waste vegetable oil. (Photo: Ben Falk, from the Green Grease Monkey website.)
by Mark Baard
As gas prices pass four bucks per gallon, green grease has never looked so good.
And with more entrepreneurs entering the Boston biodiesel and waste vegetable oil market, prices for the stuff are plummeting.
“The grease wars have begun in earnest,” Green Grease Monkey Patrick Keaney told me in an email this week.
The Boston Globe’s Robert Gavin today reports that premium is already way over four bucks, “while diesel hit a whopping $4.72 a gallon in Massachusetts.”
But if you own a car converted to run on waste vegetable oil (WVO), you can fill your tank (the plastic one in your trunk, that is), for as little as ten cents per gallon.
“I can’t keep the stuff on site,” Keaney said of his own, filtered, WVO product. “It’s crazy.”
Keaney is selling WVO, which he gathers from local restaurant kitchens, for $1.50 per gallon.
Now New Hampshire companies are coming to Boston, “offering $0.10/gal. for
grease!” said Keaney. “And some guy on Craigslist is offering $0.20.”
If you already drive a diesel, the Green Greasemonkeys and Boston Biofuels are offering B100 (100 percent biodiesel) at a very reasonable $4.00 per gallon.
You can pour biodiesel straight into the tank of your diesel car — no conversion necessary.
Spring is a good time to take a chance on WVO or biodiesel. The warm weather means you won’t have too warm up your tank in the morning. (WVO and biodiesel can gel at low temperatures, one reason WVO cars have a switch that toggles between the veggie oil and diesel tanks. Continue reading
