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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

When you ponder the future of transportation, can you imagine most of it taking place above the ground?  These folks say that passenger cars will soon be replaced by passenger drones, each flown by someone without so much as a pilot’s license.

If that makes sense to you, the company is raising investment capital.  By all means, go for it.

You may be concerned, however, that 228 million licensed auto drivers may not be able to safely navigate our skies, that they will be constantly running into one another and colliding with the 115,000 daily commercial flights.  You may worry that our FAA has a 0.000000000% chance of allowing this to occur, and thus, that these people are not really entrepreneurs, but rather, criminal frauds.

In that case, you’d be well advised to keep you money in your wallet.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

A reader notes: Sarah Palin was the gateway drug to the crazy GOP. Here we go again!

Now that’s funny!  “The gateway drug.” Wish I’d thought of that.

Think of what a different world we’ve have now had Sarah Palin not been on the scene.  Obama would have lost, that’s almost a certainty.  A McCain presidency wouldn’t have been an incubator for people mean (and stupid) enough to vote for Trump.

Hard to imagine.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Here are some interesting words from one Ralph Marston, and they echo what Abe Lincoln said, “We’re just about as happy as we make up our minds to be.”

Yet this has never seemed true to me.  From where I sit, we don’t decide to be happy; in fact, we don’t really even think about it at all.  I would say that happiness is a natural byproduct of honesty and good work, of taking good care of oneself and others.

Here’s an experiment that you can  conduct to test this.  Next time you’re out on the road, look for a few cars or trucks with stickers that read: MAGA, Trump 2024, Liberal Tears, Vaccinations Kill, or what have you, and look at the faces of the drivers.  You’re likely to see some scowls, or other indications of some sort of “friction” in life.  Then find a few electric vehicles, or cars with stickers that say things like “Co-Exist” or “I Support Science,” and notice faces of contentment and even conviviality.

This is why my reaction to the Trump supporters is just as much pity as anything.  By and large, people who buy into all the hate and the lies are simply nasty, miserable human beings.

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Here’s a product for sale that is completely illegal, in most if not all of our 50 states, it both blocks the driver’s vision and distracts him from his task.

I would hope that it’s illegal to sell a product that is illegal to use. If it isn’t, it should be.

In any case, there is a moral side of this story as well.  You’re selling products that are bound to reduce the life expectancies of everyone riding in the cars in which they are installed.  I’m not sure how impressed Saint Peter is going to be with your life’s work when you meet him at the Pearly Gates.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

It certainly is remarkable that the bravery of Ukrainians of all ages isn’t inspiring us Americans to do a better job in defending our democracy.

Both in congress and in the electorate as a whole, there are far too many people who look at the  January 6th insurrection as a non-event, i.e., “legitimate political discourse,” and see it as something that our nation simply needs to put behind us and forget.  Many of them still believe that Trump won the election, and that the evidence of this has somehow not yet come forth.

It’s said that “you don’t know what you got till it’s gone.”  Let’s hope that’s not the case here.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

From this:

Happy Birthday to the incomparable Dr. Jane Goodall! Today, we celebrate the 88th birthday of a changemaker who has inspired millions of people around the world to take action on behalf of the planet we share.

Dr. Goodall is indeed an inspiration, if only for her reason-guided and full-throated optimism.  She is absolutely convinced that the commitment of young people, the pace of technology development, and the resilience of nature will team together to reverse the ecological damage we see all around us.

As an example of the last of these three ingredients, she points to the River Thames, which for decades was a toxic waste dump, but now is teeming with fish and other life forms.  What did the British government do to make this happen?  Nothing.  They simply stopped releasing poisons into it.

This reversal really can happen.

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

We actually do have a few senators and representatives who seem to measure up to what Dr. King is looking for here, but they stand among a slim minority.  American elections are driven by enormous sums of money that are donated to the campaigns of fundamentally dishonest people, who return political favors in exchange.

Unless we’re able to change this, we would be very foolish to expect any shift in the basic character of our lawmakers.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Here’s something from a local woman.

I had forgotten that this ever existed.  Which seems like a better idea: a) install a high-end water filter under your kitchen sink for a few hundred dollars, or b) eat up part of your kitchen with a water dispenser, hire a service in which a company processes tap water, insert it into five-gallon jugs in such a way that doesn’t introduce bacteria, put it onto a truck that gets perhaps 10 MPH, then have some guy come into your house once a week to change out the 40-pound bottles, and occasionally disposing of old bottles in favor of new ones.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Thought I’d share the cartoon here, because it certainly does seem that this is what’s happening.

Sadly, the process is moving forward at a pace thousands of times slower than an ocean wave gathers steam and ultimately breaks, but it’s becoming more clear with each passing day that Trump led an attack on the U.S. government.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles
A reader answers the question above, followed by my comments in italics:
This is a function of your utility’s grid mix. There will likely be a lot of gas, possibly some coal, hydro is common, nukes, and of course solar and wind.

(more…)

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