The future is bright for science and super capacitors too

| May 23, 2013

I love reading stories about bright young inventors exploring the world of science and remember with fondness the days of science fair projects. One that recently caught my eye was a scholarship winner from California who worked with super capacitors and is finding ways to improve electrical energy storage devices (as well as charging and [...]

Motley Fool Stock Advisor: The death of diesel …

| May 15, 2013

A Motley Fool financial advisory email arrived in my email box this week which caught my eye with a subject line reading “The death of diesel.” While this seems to predict dire news for those of use who are advocates for compression ignition engines, I’ll paraphrase Mark Twain and say that announcement of diesels death [...]

ExxonMobil see growth, but big changes the energy picture

| March 12, 2013

Seven years ago, it was challenging to find automotive diesel at a car friendly "gas" station here in the U.S., but according to ExxonMobil research, in the next seven years we’ll see diesel use surpass gasoline as the petroleum fuel of choice. (The Outlook For Energy: A View To 2040 – PDF) The efficiency of [...]

Diesel fuel prices: Cracking, Fracking and Biodiesel Brewing

| December 8, 2012

My kids roll their eyes when I strike up offhanded conversations with strangers in parking lots, gas stations, etc. Take Friday for instance, I saw a guy get out of his new Passat TDI and glanced over to ask how he liked his new diesel. He grinned and exclaimed, “I’m getting 47 mpg!” which I [...]

Converting to natural gas–what’s taking so long?

| August 22, 2012

Since our nation’s oil and gas industry has expanded its capacity to produce natural gas in recent years, it only makes sense that we take advantage of this plentiful, clean, and low cost energy resource. It sure sounds like a sensible way to keep the United States an economically competitive place to build and expand [...]

Are we closer to electric current inducing solar windows?

| June 23, 2012

Yes, according to a news release from Colombia, Maryland’s New Energy Technologies, Inc. Unfortunately I still think we are faced with the “it is a drop in the bucket” producer of electricity in comparison to what we Americans use … not to mention the cost of windows. Still, it is interesting to explore the advancements [...]

No Government loan guarantees, but better ideas

| April 21, 2012

Solar3D, Inc. (solar3d.com) is developing a breakthrough 3-dimensional solar cell technology to maximize the conversion of sunlight into electricity. Up to 30% of incident sunlight is currently reflected off the surface of conventional solar cells, and more is lost inside the solar cell materials. Inspired by light management techniques used in fiber optic devices, our [...]

Politician from both sides doing little to move us forward

| March 22, 2012

It’s easy for someone like me with a fiscally and socially conservative ideology to disagree with President Obama and his expansion of government. I disagree with his irresponsible deficit spending, his liberal social philosophies and adding new entitlements. As he approaches re-election he has also returned to blaming someone else for problems, even after 3+ [...]

Controlling solar power onboard Encore

| January 9, 2012

Although I’m not at all disappointed with my current single 135W Kyocera solar panel, I don’t want to be wasting amps and not returning them to my battery bank. I was reading an article debating the different controllers regulating charging and began doing some of my own research since I’m thinking about adding an additional [...]

Crony Capitalism & How do you know a politician is lying

| November 16, 2011

How do you know a politician is lying? Well we’ve all heard the old “lips are moving” answer … it is even more true today than in the past. As someone who really wanted to believe that people – voters – could make a change … I’m becoming more and more disheartened. (Disclosure: I didn’t [...]

Should fuel efficient diesel get equal tax incentive credits?

| November 12, 2011

After reading a recent article in the WSJ discussing the tens of thousands of high paying energy sector and supporting jobs that would be immediately available if the Keystone XL pipeline project would be approved, its clear that politics are more important to President Obama that U.S. jobs. He must have decided that the votes [...]

Desultory - des-uhl-tawr-ee, -tohr-ee

  1. lacking in consistency, constancy, or visible order, disconnected; fitful: desultory conversation.
  2. digressing from or unconnected with the main subject; random: a desultory remark.