Archive for December 2009
A broken low energy bulb got cleaned up with a broom. How can we clean the broom from mercury dust?
December 28, 2009
We had a low energy light bulb break in our kitchen on a hard flloor and it got unknowingly cleaned up with a broom. (Luckily the break happened right next to an out side door).How can we clean up the broom from any mercury that probably has gotten on it? Thanks
Wash it off with a hose.
The dust you see is actually phosphor dust, harmless stuff. The bulb likely contained only 3-4 milligrams of mercury, not enough that you’d ever actually see it. 3mg is a mass of mercury about the size of the bb ball in the end of a typical ball point pen!
Astrobuf
Astrobuf
Causes Of Land Pollution
December 27, 2009
Imagine the next time you join a discussion about the causes of land pollution. When you start sharing the fascinating the land pollution facts below, your friends will be absolutely amazed.
Pollution is one of the signs that humans have exceeded those limits. Pollution is a big problem for plants. For example, Pesticides are designed to allow farmers to increase their yields (and gardeners to keep out weeds), but their misuse and over-application can adversely affect any wild plants in the area. Water pollution events like oil spills or the accidental release of raw sewage can harm the environment. These events can kill fish and other water life and can threaten human health.
Pollution became a popular issue after WW2, when the aftermath of atomic warfare and testing made evident the perils of radioactive fallout. Then a conventional catastrophic event The Great Smog of 1952 in London killed at least 8000 people. Pollution is the contamination of water, air, and soil by substances harmful to life. It can occur naturally such as gases from volcanic eruptions that pollute the air. Pollution is caused by various industrial and agricultural processes, population growth and movement, and transportation. For thousands of years, people lived off the land without permanently harming it.
So far, we’ve uncovered some interesting facts about the causes of land pollution. You may decide that the following information is even more interesting.
Groundwater’s quantity is far from the only concern, however; its quality is also under constant assault from a variety of sources. Natural poisoning of groundwater has long been known to occur around the world, as underground deposits of arsenic, heavy metals or even radon can seep into an aquifer and contaminate its contents. Groundwater contamination has happened in some places, ruining wells and even blowing up whole houses. It sounds like technological improvements are on the way but even then there are likely to be complications.
Environmental agencies already cite concerns about poor air quality and pollution in terms of the effects on the health of children or the elderly. In particular, people who have respiratory health conditions are highly susceptible to the effects of poor air quality and pollution. Environmentalists’ fears about the depletion of resources in countries with weak institutions will always be present. Although there is indeed some evidence supporting the fears about pollution havens through delocalisation of activities for regional pollutants like SO2, their relative magnitude is rather small, and it is likely that international trade has not had a major negative impact on the environment.
Locally the emission of nitrogen oxides, sulphur and carbon particulates (soot) can be very detrimental to health. We draw the distinction between local and global effects because all fuels have different pollution profiles and an individual, for example such as a mayor, may be only interested in curbing local pollutants. Local exhaust ventilation (LEV) ensures pollution is removed at its point of generation.
Knowing enough about water and land pollution to make solid, informed choices reduces the fear factor. If you apply what you’ve just learned about the causes of land pollution, you should have nothing to worry about.
About the writer: EnergySavingSite.info discusses the causes of land pollution and offers free resources on land pollution. You have full permission to reprint this article provided this paragraph and hyperlinks are kept unchanged.
Solutions From Renewable Energy
December 27, 2009
You will no longer have to be worried about how costly the price of natural gas or electricity will be after reading this article. All of us can benefit from the power of solar energy and wind power too. Just like that of PV solar panels, homemade windmills can be made from basic hardware store products. If your not quite sure what solar panels and windmills do, think of them as oversized batteries that can produce energy or power for anything that uses electricity in your home. However, opposed to solar panels, these windmills can be made for less than a hundred bucks using novice building techniques.
With your house running on both solar and wind power a back up to your solar system on cloudy days or in the winter time. Having more than a single backup is good, you can always backup to the localized electric company. You no longer need to worry about the expensive natural gas or electricity within a few months.
It is hard to believe that Earth 4 Energy program works really wonderful, and produces renewable energy by solar system or any natural resource. But it is true that it works remarkable well.
Other similar program don’t work as well as Earth 4 Energy’s methods, because it covered everything in detail with pictures and diagrams. Plus it’s written so an 8th grader could understand it. So it’s rather easy to follow inside the instruction manual. It also includes step-by-step videos which show you how to do it perfectly without any confusion.
Using this system you can make your own solar powered device as well as a wind mill that will help generate energy for you. All that you need can be instantly downloaded off the website. The e-book can be opened through Adobe Reader, and contains 73 pages that will really help you out. There are 16 pages of pictures and diagrams that will guide you through the process.
One of my favorite spots is where it gives tips on how to get a free solar panel at no cost, it’s sort of exciting on how you are able to obtain them at no cost. The pieces can be bought at a local store or on eBay. The manual tells you how you can get the pieces at below market value.
Earth 4 Energy provides the proper measurement and diagrams. The wire directions is displayed so that you won’t have any technical problems. Additionally, the map includes information about the entire system and how it works.
All the technical details regarding the wind mill power, diagrams with maps are also given. With such accurate information given and proven testimonials it’s impossible to think that anyone could call this some sort of scam. The Earth 4 Energy guide provides a method which creates a solar system within $200 very easily. For more info please visit homemade-renewable-energy.com
Renewable energy professional Tony Jallit has been researching different types of renewable energy, including solar power, for a long time and his guidance has helped hundreds if not thousands of people defeat the high cost of electrical energy. To discover how to build your own wind and solar energy systems go to homemade-renewable-energy.com
Ethos gives up to 25% more gas mileage on NBC news.
December 27, 2009
Two thumbs up! Ethos comes out strong as the new thrill seeker performance product giving you better gas mileage and car performance. Expect Ethos to become the next household name.
Duration : 0:2:34
Alternative Energy Systems
December 27, 2009
Global Energy Solutions
These are some global solutions to the problems of energy independence, peak oil, climate change, global warming, an inconvenient truth, resource conflict.
They include hydrogen, electric, fuel cell, hybrid, solar and wind technology, including vertical and horizontal axis turbines.
Renewable energy effectively uses natural resources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides and geothermal heat, which may be naturally replenished. Renewable energy technologies range from solar power, wind power, hydroelectricity/micro hydro, biomass and biofuels for transportation.
In 2006, about 18 percent of global final energy consumption came from renewables, with 13% coming from traditional biomass, like wood-burning. Hydropower was the next largest renewable source, providing 3%, followed by hot water/heating which contributed 1.3%. Modern technologies, such as geothermal, wind, solar, and ocean energy together provided some 0.8% of final energy consumption. The technical potential for their use is very large, exceeding all other readily available sources.
Renewable energy technologies are sometimes criticised for being intermittent or unsightly, yet the market is growing for many forms of renewable energy. Wind power has a worldwide installed capacity of over 100 GW and is widely used in several European countries and the USA. The manufacturing output of the photovoltaics industry reached more than 2,000 MW per year in 2006, and PV power plants are particularly popular in Germany. Solar thermal power stations operate in the USA and Spain, and the largest of these is the 354 MW SEGS power plant in the Mojave Desert. The world’s largest geothermal power installation is The Geysers in California, with a rated capacity of 750 MW. Brazil has one of the largest renewable energy programs in the world, involving production of ethanol fuel from sugar cane, and ethanol now provides 18 percent of the country’s automotive fuel. Ethanol fuel is also widely available in the USA.
While there are many large-scale renewable energy projects, renewable technologies are also suited to small off-grid applications, sometimes in rural and remote areas, where energy is often crucial in human development. Kenya has the world’s highest household solar ownership rate with roughly 30,000 small (20–100 watt) solar power systems sold per year.
Climate change concerns coupled with high oil prices, peak oil and increasing government support are driving increasing renewable energy legislation, incentives and commercialization. European Union leaders reached an agreement in principle in March 2007 that 20 percent of their nations’ energy should be produced from renewable fuels by 2020, as part of its drive to cut emissions of carbon dioxide, blamed in part for global warming. Investment capital flowing into renewable energy climbed from $80 billion in 2005 to a record $100 billion in 2006. This level of investment combined with continuing double digit percentage increases each year has moved what once was considered alternative energy to mainstream. Wind was the first to provide 1% of electricity, but solar is not far behind. Some very large corporations such as BP, General Electric, Sharp, and Royal Dutch Shell are investing in the renewable energy sector.
Please feel free to rate, comment, subscribe and post a video response.
Duration : 0:3:35
Why not to use alternative fuels?
December 26, 2009
I have to do some work on alternative fuels and i have to answer the questions: Why we should research and use alternative fuels, and why we shouldn’t research and use alternative fuels? Can anyone give me some help?
I have to do some work on alternative fuels and i have to answer the questions: Why we should research and use alternative fuels, and why we shouldn’t research and use alternative fuels? These questions have been asked because of the scenario that fossil fuels are running out, so can anyone give me some help?
They are too exspencive is the main reason.
Ethanol is only viable in tropical places that can grow sugar cane. Everywhere else you end up burning oil or gas to grow the crops and distill it. There is research being done to make it using bacteria and enzymes from less than ideal plants so it might be viable in the future. Plus most cars in North America would need a lot of parts replaced to make them run on it without falling apart.
Bio-diesel is ok if you can find it. If it went into large scale production they would start using virgin food crops instead of old deep fryer waste oil. Burning food that people need to live driving the price up is not a good idea. There are machine capable of turning just about any organic material into somethingthat could run in a deisel engine, if someone put up the money they could be up and running on a large scale in a few years.
Electric vehicles are really not an better for the enviroment. They have tons of bateries that are made of toxic materials. And most of the worlds electricity comes from burning coal. A modern coal fired power plants might power a electric car cleaner than a gas car but it is not a great alternative.
Hydrogen fuel cell cars are in use in Iceland becasue they have nearly unlimited geothermal power to sperate hydrogen from water. Therefore it was worth setting up the filling station infostructure. Everywhere else they need to extract hydrogen with exspencive electricy mostly from coal power plants and there is not really much incentive to set up the infostructure. The other source of hydrogen is extracting it from fosil fuels and alcohols in the vehicle, fewer emition but still using fosil fuels one way or another.
What is the most accurate way to determine gas mileage in my car?
December 26, 2009
I know my fuel tank holds 17.2 gallons. I fill my car up….then figure my gas mileage based on how much gas I purchased.
example:
My last fill up I purchased 10.772 gallons of gas. So I drove 318.9 miles on that 10.772 gallons of gas.
318.9 / 10.772 = 29.60 MPG
Is this the most accurate way of doing things? Or am I assuming wrong that my gas tank holds exactly 17.2 gallons of gas (which is what the manual says it holds)
That is the best way to calculate actual mileage. Even though your gas tank technically holds 17.2 gallons, due to the shape and configuration of the tank, you may only have 15 or 16 gallons of useable volume.
Which countries are leaders in alternative energy source research and utilization?
December 26, 2009
Why are these countries so interested in alternative energy?
yaay we are! (sings; rule britannia, brittania rules the waves!)
we have a working tidal stream turbine
http://www.marineturbines.com/
working wave generator farms;
http://www.pelamiswave.com/
two off shore wave power research facilities for new prototypes, one in devon and one in scotland.
come on usa! do keep up!
actually, in terms of per capita generation, the danes, closely followed by the swedes.
edit;
tde, i’m not sure you can count nuclear as ‘alternative’ lol!
Because investing in clean energy will eventually cut jobs do republicans think I’m unAmerican for doing so?
December 26, 2009
I bet some do.
It’s kind of the same when they think I’m unAmerican for supporting withdrawel from Iraq.
How on all the gods’ green earth did you come up with the idea that investing in clean energy will cut jobs? It won’t, it will simply change the job descriptions. I know several former oil-rig monkeys that now work for wind companies climbing and maintaining their equipment. Dismantling and cleaning up the old technology will keep thousands of folks employed for years, and building the new infrastructure and adapting the old infrastructure will literally take generations (remember, it took generations to build the cities we have — and remodeling and retrofitting typically takes longer, costs more, and is even more labor intensive than ground-up construction). These are the only solid jobs on the horizon: as we outsource so much of the rest of our economy, these are the only ones that simply can’t be done elsewhere. Of course, there could be an issue with in-sourcing, but it hasn’t happened…yet…
How Many 2010 Jeep Models Get Over 20 MPG?
December 26, 2009
Having a Jeep is like being in a club. Did you ever notice that when Jeep drivers see other Jeep drivers on the road they give them a little honk? Well, it happens, sometimes. Okay, it used to happen more, but it doesn’t matter.
Some people could careless if they are in the club, they like the versatility of these American classics. They became a big part of the military during WWII and became a huge favorite of the G.I.s when they came home. 70 years later, Chrysler is still pumping the Jeep brand and they are popular as ever. Here is a look at the 2010 models:
The 2010 Jeep Commander
The Commander with the big V8 engine is going to come in at 13 city and 19 on the highway. The more efficient V6 gets a respectable 15/20.
The 2010 Jeep Compass
5 speed MT rates 23 city and 28 on the freeway 5 speed AT gets 21 in the city and 25 on the highway
The 2010 Chrysler Jeep Grand Cherokee
The V6 comes in a 16/21 with an automatic. The Grand Cherokee features two V8 models: one with the Multi-Displacement System gets 13/19 and the regular HEMI gets 11/14.
The 2010 Chrysler Jeep Liberty
16 miles in the city and 22 on the highway is what the EPA is rating Chrysler’s Jeep Liberty at for 2010.
2010 Jeep Patriot
You actually get three different engine options for 2010: a small 2 Liter version gets you 23/27/; a 5 speed manual will get you 23/28 and the 5 speed automatic gets an EPA rating of 21 in the city and 25 on the highway.
The 2010 Chrysler Jeep Wrangler
This vehicle comes in a 6 cylinder only. Whether you get the automatic or manual transmission, the EPA rates this vehicles at 15/19.
The 2010 Chrysler Jeep Wrangler Unlimited
V6 automatic and manual both rate 15/20.
I want the best gas mileage from my Jeep. Any tips?
a) Drive in 2 wheel drive as much as possible. Driving in 4 wheel drive when you don’t have too will kill your mileage rating.
b) Less cylinders is usually much better on fuel. Choose the smaller option, if you can, to be most efficient.
c) Don’t run the air conditioning if you can help it
Listen, Jeeps are cool and fun to drive, but they can have a bit of a rough rid and are really not that great in the fuel efficiency department. If you are looking for massive gas mileage you may want to consider a hybrid or maybe even a sedan. Keep your Jeep as a second car.
Bill has a lot more awesome information at the Car Reviews and Ratings website. What is cool is that the it is all awesome and talks about topics like the best hybrid cars.