In my experience, this is sad but true. There is a core of vegcar (and other alternative fueled vehicle) owners who are willing to pay a little more to help reduce their carbon footprint. Putting green (energy) ahead of green (backs), if you will. Most people, however, are motivated by price. This is why I believe that we are only going to see significant change in energy consumption in this country, when one of the following happens:

• Gasoline is back above $4 per gallon
• Alternative fuels become cheaper than gas/diesel at the pump
• The air is no longer breathable

Hybrid Technologies, Inc. boasts of a lithium battery system that will allow drivers to travel 150 miles after charging the batteries for 6 hours.

Here is a story from CNN on vegcars.

Here is a slideshow from the delivery of 1,000 gallons of SVO we received in May from Sphere Energy out of San Luis Obispo, CA.
Can’t post Picasa Slideshow on Wordpress at presnet.

I received the following comment on my April 29th post. She wrote:

What happens to your mileage (miles per gallon) and net emissions when you figure in the energy expended (fossil fuel or otherwise) to deliver the filtered WVO to your door?

It is a great question. I don’t have an exact answer as far as net emissions and my mileage, adjusted for the delivery. But how many Americans really know their true efficiency or pollution for any fuel? How much energy is consumed extracting the oil, delivering it half-way around the world, refining it, delivering it to the stations etc. And how many deaths and injustices are committed in the process of bringing petroleum to our gas tank?

In my case, the guy who delivers the oil, runs his truck on biodiesel. He trades filtered wvo to the biodiesel makers for the fuel. Ian drove approximately 350 miles round-trip in his Powerstroke Diesel. I’m guessing (conservatively) that he got an average of 10 miles per gallon on the trip. That means that he used 35 gallons to deliver 1,000 gallons to us.

It is difficult to calculate exactly how much energy and emissions are attributable to producing and burning one gallon of diesel fuel or vegetable oil. The information that I have read, indicates that it isn’t even close. The process of growing plants removes carbon from the air. Some of that carbon goes back into the air when it is burned in a vegcar. Petroleum takes 100 of the carbon out of the ground where it is sequestered. Then, when it is burned, a good deal of carbon is released into the air. The net effect is that vegetable oil has a much smaller impact on the airborne carbon.

I read something else recently that was very interesting. The energy required to build a new car is tremendous. This guy’s assertion was that to save the energy that went into producing a new Prius, one would have to drive that prius several hundred thousand miles compared to buying a used car that had mileage in the mid 20’s. I love Prius’s and am not knocking them. I am just pointing out that the whole story is a big and complicated one.

If anyone has seen any data on this, please send it along.

Here in California an amazing thing happened on election day. The people voted out 7-term incumbent Republican Richard Pombo. Pombo had been a staunch supporter of Bush and his failed policies.

The people voted in Jerry McNerney. Jerry is an engineer who works on wind power and is committed to ending our dependence on petroleum. His daughter’s name is Windy.

You can see his energy policy statement here.

Living here in a gerrymandered, Republican congressional district in central California, I feel compelled each election cycle to go to a “swing” district and campaign there. This year there are around 60 such districts. So tomorrow morning, I am flying to Philadelphia where I will meet up with a couple of old friends and head to PA-07. We are going to campaign for the Democratic candidate, retired Vice Admiral Joe Sestak. Imagine a vice-admiral calling for the U.S. to get out of Iraq! You can see Joe’s site here.

Joe is running against 10-term incumbent, right-wing-nut, Republican Curt Weldon. Curt is another one of the dozens of Republicans currently being investigated for wrongdoing. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer:

… the FBI was investigating whether the Delaware County congressman used his influence to help his daughter, a registered lobbyist, win consulting contracts.

Please do something this weekend to end one-party rule of our country. Volunteer for a campaign, make phone calls for moveon.org and by all means, vote (on Tuesday).

I’m cautiously optimistic that the Democrats will retake the House and hopeful that they will retake the Senate as well. The corrupt Republican machine is finally imploding on itself and it is about time!

This ad by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee pretty much sums it up. Please vote on Tuesday and let’s make sure that one party doesn’t control all branches of government.

In an interview with a conservative talk radio host, Vice President Dick Cheney admitted that the U.S. has used water-boarding and doesn’t consider it torture. The graphic illustrates what water-boarding is. It was good enough for the Spanish Inquisition so it is good enough for Bush/Cheney.

Impeachment is far to good for these two war criminals.

Watch this video of Bush imitating a weasel…

UPDATE 1-17-08: This video was removed for use violation. This is scary folks. videos like this, of the president of the US speaking to the public, are and should be in the public domain.