My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on February 8, 2006

Now just because it was printed in Business Week doesn’t make it ‘fact,’ but the January 31st article, “The Top Ten Hybrid Myths” by Brad Berman gives a pretty good primer on what hybrid technology is and isn’t. For those interested in cars and paying attention to automobiles, most of this isn’t new, but a good reminder as to the differences between makers and models in how they intergrate the technology in their vehicles. Just because the word “Hybrid” is stuck on the back of the vehicle doesn’t automatically make it a green, hyper-miler anymore. (nor has it necessarily been true even for those marketed that way — see USAToday article.)

Berman’s Top Ten Hybrid Myths:
1. You need to plug in a hybrid car.
2. Hybrid batteries need to be replaced.
3. Hybrids are a new phenomenon.
4. People buy hybrids only to save money on gas.
5. Hybrids are expensive.
6. Hybrids are small and underpowered.
7. Only liberals buy hybrids.
7. Only liberals buy hybrids.
8. Hybrids pose a threat to first responders.
9. Hybrids will solve all our transportation, energy, and environmental problems.
10. Hybrid technology is only a fad.

As a proponent of clean, renewable, American produced biofuels, I’ve often stated that biodiesel and ethanol are solutions that we can implement today. I am hopeful that technology and innovation will continue to solve the problems related to dependency on fossil fuels … I believe that the hydrogen fuel cells are in our future, but a long way off?

I also see hybrids playing a role too. Biofuels and hybrid techology will carry us a long way while improving our emissions and reducing our dependance on foriegn oil. I believe hybrids might also be part of the final solution and be intergrated into hydrogen powered vehicles … anyway you look at it, they help our vehicles improve how they use energy. Regenerative braking and engine cycling offer definite improvements and most likely will be in future vehicles. Consider that the International Energy Agency (IEA) concluded that even under the most favorable conditions, hydrogen vehicles will most likely represent only 30% of the global fleet by 2050, future of automotive technology will most likely refine and continue to use hybrid/gas/diesel/biofuel/electric vehicles for a long time. Jim Press, president of Toyota Motor Sales USA is quoted in the article, and his comment parallels my conclusion: “I think everything will be a hybrid, eventually. It will either be a gas hybrid, a diesel hybrid, or a fuel-cell hybrid.”

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Posted By RichC on February 7, 2006

Yes, discovered –a red faced, wattled honeyeater — its a bird.
🙂
An area high in the rainforest of New Guinea is being described as the “lost world.” I read through an article published yesterday in “The Independent” that details the unknown and rare animals that have been discovered by a team of international scientists. Bruce Beehler, of the American group Conservative International, led the expedition that recorded several new species of birds, frogs, butterflies and palms. The expedition explored this “Garden of Eden” in November and December of 2005 in this area untouched by man.

The teams jungle camp site was surrounded by giant flowers and unknown plants. The scientists watched rare birds, strange mammals, tree kangaroos and spiny anteaters. Interestingly these animals “appeared totally unafraid, suggesting no previous contact with humans.”

Bruce Beehler explained that “We found dozens, if not hundreds, of new species in what is probably the most pristine ecosystem in the whole Asian-Pacific region. There were so many new things it was almost overwhelming. And we have only scratched the surface of what is there.”

According to the interesting article, the scientists hope to return this year.

Category: Nature | No Comments »
Tags: animals, birds, birdwatching, New Guinea

Posted By RichC on February 6, 2006

I’m at a quandary as to comment on the actual game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Seattle Seahawks? Do I opine on the performances, or lack there of, from either team — or just focus on the individual achievements? I suppose I could eulogize about Seattle or reflect on the mediocre performance of the superstar status players? Maybe neither team really has superstar players? Seeing the emotional Bill Cowher with his family and their exuberance was perhaps a highlight of this game, but in my opinion the 21 – 10 Steeler victory was less than stellar. The game wasn’t a standout Superbowl and the slow pace wasn’t helped by the several required referee booth reviews. At time I even felt that the ABC announcers Al Michaels and John Madden were stumbling for call analysis as close decisions were decided at a painfully slow pace. (Congratulation to John Madden; he was just voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame) All in all, it was a tepid end to a long NFL season.

Although the game is why most of us watch the Superbowl, the halftime show and commercials are becoming as important for some as the game itself. (they are a marketer’s delight) I found myself checking out each commercial, wondering which would capture the conversation around the watercooler on Monday morning?

Early results suggest that the winner might have been the “pre-hysterical” (as Professor Bill Ward states) FedEx spot featuring a caveman crushed by a dinosaur.

FedEx Caveman should have used FedExAnheuser-Busch who generally spends the most on Superbowl ads came close with its “secret” spinning wall refrigerator and the Bud Light spot with men on their roofs excaping their wive’s was also near the top. Since I was watching with a couple of teenagers, the Clydesdale football game with a “streaking” sheep seemed to rate pretty high as well.

Bud Light and the ‘Magic Fridge’
Husbands excape to the Rooftop for a Beer
Budweiser’s Clydesdales and the streaking sheep
My wife appreciated Unilever’s Dove ad, where young girls struggle with self-image issues, but her favorite product Diet Pespi, IMHO had a couple of the ‘loser’ ads as did Burger King. I’m not too convince the marketing for Ameriquest was poignant as I kept trying to figure out what there ads had to do with their business, but I did get a charge out of the mother and daughter in a hospital room visiting dear old dad as the buzzing fly was zapped.
Ameriquest Bug Zapper Ad
Dotcom’s still bought a few ads — I think most liked the Careerbuilder.com chimp ads. GoDaddy.com probably did the most ‘risque’ ad of the bunch when it produced a spoof on the Janet Jackson Superbowl fiasco. I’m not sure what it has to do with their product, the oxygen mask for an aging executive was a great touch.
GoDaddy.com – Aging board member needs oxygen
Gillette could have done something more creative to introduce their new five-bladed razor; it is basically a rework of a two, three and four bladed razor ads of the past — whoopee. Motorola stumbled as well in my opinion in marketing their PEBL phone … what’s with the meteor becoming a pebble? Celebrities were used in a few ads, including one for the nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug Aleve which used Star Trek’s Leonard Nimoy. It was so-so.
Aleve with Star Trek’s Leonard Nimoy
The motor city did their part as the Detroit, auto companies, General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Corp., had pretty good ads. Ford promoted their ‘green’ ad with “Kermit thee Frog,”while GM went creative with a baby Hummer H3. Honda and Toyota were there, but were lukewarm as I know they had ads but can’t hardly recall them. (Ridgeline and Civic I think???)
But the winner is … according to me 🙂 … drumroll please …. the Sprint ad demostrating the crime deterrent of its phones. I thought it was hilarious.
Sprint/Nextel crime deterrent
All in all … Superbowl XL could have been better … but then that would have required the Bengals to have won a couple of more big games. Congratulations Pittsburgh.

Category: Misc, Sports, Video-TV | No Comments »
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Posted By RichC on February 6, 2006

I know … this internet video encoding is getting old, but there is a reason for my tinkering. I’m getting ready to publish a VW TDI Intake Manifold Cleaning “How To” clip and trying to decide if there is a way to offer Google Video downloads and still not damage the DVD donations. I’m embedding a Cat Herding clip that is kind of funny as a test of this ‘Google Video’ method.

Cat Herding Commercial

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Posted By RichC on February 5, 2006

I’m guessing that across the pond there don’t worry about political correctness in their advertising? This Ford Sportka ad is rather disturbing. “Here kitty – kitty – kitty.” 😉

Category: Automotive, Humor, Video | No Comments »
Tags: birds, cars, cats, Humor, mp4, video

Posted By RichC on February 4, 2006

PBS’s Motorweek celebrated 25 years of reporting on the auto world this past weekend and after taking a look back, also looked ahead to what is in our automotive future. Since I’ve been tinkering with video and encoding this weekend, I’ll include the tail end clip that mentions of diesel making a comeback and visions of diesel hybrids in our future; they even look under the hood clip of a VW TDI.

Take a look.

Category: Automotive, Tidbits, Video-TV | No Comments »
Tags: anniversary, motorweek, mp4, tv, video

Posted By RichC on February 4, 2006

I’ve been wanting to be able to incorporate a series of short video clips in my blog. Some clips have most likely been spotted on the internet before, others might be new and a few I’ve recently encoded. Instead of ‘forwarding’ to friends I thought I would share them here.

Without further ado I’ll put up a 20 second clip showing a couple geniuses ‘across the pond’ jury-rigging their car in order to do some tubing. (I would have used a term that Jeff Foxworthy coined for this situation — but it might be thought of as offensive … although I would have meant it in the most ‘creative country boy sort of way’) Unfortunately the beta plug-in that a handful of us WordPress guys are testing does not support H.264/mp4 AVC. (I prefer this kind of high quality/small size video file)
For the automotive types reading … “Name that Car!” 🙂 (maybe for the next GTG???)

Category: Humor, Video | No Comments »
Tags: jerry-rig, jury-rig, redneck, video

Posted By RichC on February 3, 2006

As we move forward with alternative energy and ways to displace petroleum as a primary fuel, I believe it is important to encourage industry and the country to explore a variety of option. The old adage of “placing all your eggs in one basket” apply to the predicament of what energy source we should consider. Personally, I believe we’ll eventually move towards hydrogen as a portable energy source, but see the road long and complicated. Even if we eventually adopt hydrogen fuel cells, I believe there will be combinations of petroleum and biofuels for many years to come. On my blog, I try not to overly focus on politics, but since the last two posts detail politicians (President Bush, Majority Leader Rep. John Boehner) who both are supportive of farm based renewable fuels … and are regularly promoting biofuels as a way to overcome our “petroleum addiction,” I wanted to stress a few key points because unlike hydrogen … it is something we can do today.

Key facts about biodiesel and ethanol

*There are more than 4 million FFVs (Flexable Fuel Vehicles) that can run E85 (85% ethanol) currently on America’s roadways.

* Biodiesel works in any diesel engine and is much cleaner burning than petroleum diesel. It can be blended with petroleum at any percentage and can be made from any fat or vegetable oil. About 90 percent of U.S. biodiesel is made from soybean oil. It takes roughly 7 pounds (about 3.2 kg) of soybean oil to make one gallon (about 3.8 liters) of diesel.

* Ethanol, an alcohol most often made from grains and sugar cane, is blended with gasoline to reduce tailpipe emissions in cars and trucks. One acre of corn can produce 300 gallons of ethanol — enough to fuel four cars for one year with a 10% ethanol-blend.

* Biodiesel production capacity in Europe, mainly in Germany and France, has risen sharply as countries try to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and cut the bloc’s dependence on fuel imports. The EU in 2004 set a target that fuels should contain 5.75 percent of biofuels in 2010.

* Brazil is the world’s leading producer and exporter of ethanol, derived from the country’s huge sugarcane crop. It already blends its domestic gasoline with 25 percent ethanol and is looking to U.S., Japanese and Indian markets to boost exports.

* In the United States, the second largest biofuel producer after Brazil, hundreds of major truck fleets use biodiesel including all branches of the U.S. military, NASA, several state departments of transportation and public utility fleets.

* China, the world’s second largest energy consumer, is also the third largest ethanol producer. The Philippines encourages use of coconut oil for biodiesel.

* The International Energy Agency estimates that under the most optimistic scenario ethanol could make up 10 percent of world gasoline by 2025.

Source: Reuters and International Energy Agency.

Testing the Google Video link:

GM’s Go Yellow Commercial’http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?videoUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fvp.video.google.com%2Fvideodownload%3Fversion%3D0%26secureurl%3DkQAAALrZ7Kw2hIp3Hfa6LvCDeXltLMar4l8Hk4zVvcQPRo4HO9_t2xv5D_VxAzcgsQbpsg33PGmYPGX9lpnfCwVZke0M1J2i9EMkcVk3UHaDrnagx6GFFDwntmCl2agGcaYcrCYTp8CQxBEnu0A_bq_FqV07UNev_lkoaoItIYexNuJWVYlRi_7odGxQNxhaRKUBdOX8Bsk4kVKeo55wKvxU3ps%26sigh%3DUH5yee1PE0bJSByZOmRlrl1iQ8w%26begin%3D0%26len%3D30496%26docid%3D8631642079881718613&thumbnailUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fvideo.google.com%2FThumbnailServer%3Fcontentid%3D2eb1c3050c6c266a%26second%3D5%26itag%3Dw320%26urlcreated%3D1139244985%26sigh%3D65JXFJcQhyofgUqcQwulA5RcP0I&playerId=8631642079881718613&playerMode=embedded
Ford Hybrid and Kermit Commercial

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Posted By RichC on February 2, 2006

U.S. Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, the underdog to acting leader Rep. Roy Blunt becomes the new majority leader today in a 122 to 109 vote. He will replace the Texan Tom DeLay in hopes to clean up the scandal-rocked house.

Blunt will remain in the House Republican leadership, holding onto his job as majority whip, the person responsible for making sure Republican-backed bills pass the House. Blunt became acting majority leader in September after DeLay was forced under House Republican rules to step down when he was indicted in Texas on campaign-related felony charges.

In January, DeLay, under pressure from members, announced he would not seek to reclaim the job after lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a close associate, pleaded guilty in a mushrooming influence-peddling investigation that threatens the Republicans hold on Congress.

Additional info added — Feb. 3, 2005

Boehner was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, attended Moeller High School and received a bachelor’s degree in business from Xavier University in Cincinnati in 1977 and worked as a businessman.

In 1981 Boehner served on the board of trustees of Union Township, Butler County, Ohio. In 1984, he served as president of the township board of trustees.

He is a Roman Catholic and lives in the Wetherington section of West Chester Township, Butler County, Ohio. He has a wife Debbie and two daughters, Lindsay and Tricia.

Boehner served as an Ohio state representative from 1985 to 1990. In 1990, when U.S. Rep. Donald “Buz” Lukens (R-Ohio) was caught in a sex scandal involving a minor, Boehner challenged Lukens in the Republican primary and defeated the incumbent, while also upsetting the district’s former representative, Tom Kindness. Boehner went on to victory in the 1990 general election and began serving in the U.S. House of Representatives the 102nd Congress. He was a member of the Gang of Seven, comprised of young, idealistic conservatives with a mission to clean up congressional corruption, many of whom, including, Boehner, have been criticized for their ties to Jack Abramoff.

From 1995 to 1999, Boehner served as the Republican Conference Chairman in the U.S. House of Representatives. He is now entering his final term as the Chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce.

Boehner is widely credited with championing the Contract With America, the 1996 Freedom to Farm Act, and the passage of “No Child Left Behind Act.” He was also one of the key figures in the failed 1998 coup to replace House Speaker Newt Gingrich with Buffalo, New York congressman Bill Paxon. In 1995, Boehner raised eyebrows by distributing campaign checks from tobacco industry lobbyists on the House floor. His PAC has raised $31,500 from four Indian tribes associated with lobbyist Jack Abramoff[1], who is currently the central figure in an unfolding lobbying scandal.

Boehner was elected House Majority Leader on February 2, 2006, after previous leader Tom DeLay stepped down after being indicted of criminal charges of conspiracy to violate election laws. Boehner campaigned as a reform candidate who could help the House Republicans cleanse and recover from the political damage caused by charges of ethics violations, corruption and money laundering leveled against prominent conservatives such as DeLay and disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, in spite of his own ties to Abramoff. He bested fellow candidates Rep. Roy Blunt of Missouri and Rep. John Shadegg of Arizona, even though he was considered the underdog candidate. It was the most contested election among House Republicans since 1998. Boehner received 122 votes compared to 109 by Blunt in a run-off vote. Rep. Shadegg dropped out of the race after a loss in the first round of voting. Blunt was re-elected to his previous position as Majority Whip, the No. 3 leadership position in the House.

Click Wikipedia Link for Source info.

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Posted By RichC on January 30, 2006

President Bush will use his State of the Union address this week to stress a package of energy proposals. He will continue to talk about our nation’s development and implementation of fuel-saving technologies. Front most in the President’s vision is hydrogen. He believes that eventually Americans will be filling their fuel-cell cars at hydrogen stations and eventually it will replace petroleum providing us near limitless supplies of clean burning fuel. (hmm … probably not in my lifetime?)

In the short term, President Bush will promote biofuels as a way to use our existing vehicles. Many vehicles already run on fuels processed from farm produce or even trash called biodiesel and ethanol. The president remarked regularly about these alternatives in his first term and notably referenced them in his stump speeches, like the one in West Chester, OH in 2004. (click for short mp3 audio)

The President’s proposals will be aimed at spreading the use of biodiesel, ethanol, hydrogen and renewable fuels — some were part of the energy bill that he signed into law in August of 2005. The addition of subsidised alternatives like biodiesel and ethanol have largely gone unnoticed by most Americans and so far are only seen as a drop in the bucket. According to a Pew Research poll, 9 out of 10 Americans worry about high fuel prices and US citizens are feeling pinched as high energy costs are reflected in nearly everything they purchase. We’re all are seeing higher heating and utility bills and who hasn’t noticed the cost of filling up their car? Even though the economy has shown some encouraging signs, energy and fuel prices continue to dampen that mood.

No doubt the biggest concern Americans face as we ponder energy, is the unrest in the middle east. President Bush expressed this in a comment to CBS, “I agree with Americans who understand being hooked on foreign oil as an economic problem and a national security problem.” He told CBS that he is looking for tax breaks that encourage new technologies, which is popular with farmers, with industry and with consumers of those products. “We have got to wean ourselves off hydrocarbons, oil. And the best way, in my judgment, to do it is to promote and actively advance new technologies so that we can drive – have different driving habits.”

Bush stresses that the federal government needs to push harder toward a more widespread use of corn-based ethanol, although non-corn ethanol from sources like grasses, wood chips and even garbage could prove practical and cost-effective. (although most in this industry suggest we are still years away from using raw products other than corn for ethanol)

Most likely the President will point out that we already have vehicle capable of using these alternative fuels. For example, 4.6 million cars on the road in the United States can run on ethanol. The fuel works in more than 30 models, however, almost all drivers of those vehicles outside the corn belt fill up with gasoline — as do many ‘even’ in the corn belt. (See E85 ready vehicles)

Although the automakers and most environmentalists are excited about the prospect of fuel cells and hydrogen, developing and adopting this technology is going to be extremely expensive. The production of hydrogen is energy intensive and we as a country lack the infrastructure and specialized fueling stations to make it viable in the short term. (unlike biodiesel and ethanol) The date most government officials place on hydrogen fuel cell vehicles is 2020.

As for electricity, fuel oil and natural gas that Americans used to power their homes, we are well behind the curve in supplantting these with renewables. Very little U.S. electricity now comes from renewables such as wind, solar, geothermal, wood and waste; it will be interesting to see what options are presented.

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