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If you haven't heard of this, check it out. EcoFont is a printer font designed to use less ink but still look good. My friend Drew passed this along and it's pretty cool. It may not make a huge difference if you are like me and rarely print, but imagine institutions that print volumes?
Dave
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Ecofont
According to Paul
Every once in a while my friend Paul Scott, founding member of Plug In America, EV advocate and Solar guru, sends me an email about something going on in the world of solar or EVs. I will be posting them here under the heading According To Paul pretty much as in the same state he sends them to me. Also, over the next week or so i will be bringing stuff form the other site over here so my apologies if there are a lot of posts.
Dave
Mitsubishi iMiEV Test Drive
According To Paul
Darell is one of the more active members of Plug In America and has the best EV site anywhere (www.evnut.com).
He was allowed to put a new Mitsubishi iMiEV (pronounced "imeev") through its paces and wrote a great report on his experience. I copied part of it below, but for all the photos and more info, go to http://evnut.com/iMiEV.html.
My only comment was his note about coasting. This is something all EV makers will want to incorporate in their cars. If you've never driven an EV, you might not know about the "freewheeling" aspect of coasting without the regenerative braking. This allows for superior efficiency if used properly. Both the Nissan of yesterday's post, and this iMiEV from Mitsubishi do not allow this option. I told the Nissan folks they should definitely build it in as it's easy to do and will be a competitive advantage over those who don't have it.
Check out Darell's site, lots of good info and funny in places.
Paul
*******
Howdy EVerybody -
Last week (Thursday) I had the pleasure of taking the Mitsubishi iMiEV for a test drive. I love this little car! I made a page, and there is a short video embedded at the bottom (sorry for the quality - I had "issues.")
http://evnut.com/iMiEV.html
-= Darell =-
http://EVnut.com
Mitsubishi iMiEV
March 19, 2009. Vacaville, CA.
Today I got to drive a Japan-spec Mitsubishi iMiEV. And while this thing may look like a low-speed NEV, it most definitely is not. This car has a governed top speed of 81 mph, and a range of 76 miles. It seats four full-size adult males comfortably, and accelerates and handles smartly with that load on board. There is precious little cargo space - but as a people mover, I just can't see doing it any more efficiently. This is the ultimate commute vehicle. With the wheels placed at the extreme outboard edges of the vehicle, the passenger compartment is maximized (as well as handling and road feel). And what looks like a diminutive car on the outside suddenly becomes a comfortable pod for four adults on the inside. I had tons of headroom left over, and plenty of leg/hip/shoulder room all around. The car has all the normal amenities of power windows/mirrors/steering/brakes along with HVAC and stereo. The throttle and braking regeneration is seamlessly blended. This is a REAL car, folks, once you get over the outside dimensions. It has enough power to do anything that you need a freeway-capable car to do. With four large guys onboard, I was somewhat astonished at the acceleration. This is no Tesla Roadster, but it pulls away with every bit as much authority as the Rav4EV. When I think about carpooling in a vehicle like this, I almost get giddy. Shuttling a few guys to work in this instead of a solo driver in a Prius? Just no contest.
The faults I can find include a charge rate (from 120 V or 240 V) of just 9A. I see little reason for this low limit. The other issue I have is that there is no way to "coast." There is always some regen to mimic a gasoline car in compression. You can add a bit more regen with the shift lever, but there is no way to defeat it. To me this is an easy-to-rectify omission. The reasoning I was given is that they want the car to feel just like any other car. And that's fine! Just allow those of us who wish to have no regen a way to turn it off. A little button on the shift lever comes to mind!
Specs:
Battery: Li-Ion, 330 V, 16 kWh
Motor: 47 kW, 180 n*m, permanent magnet
Weight: 1,080 kg
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Dean Kamen and L.E.D.'s
Dean Kamen is one of the cooler guys out there. The inventor of the Segway (and the wheelchair that walks up stairs that preceded it), he's one of the good guys who is working on fixing the problems the world has. So an article about Kamen, his island home, and his experiment to turn it 100% L.E.D. has got to be cool. Check it out!
Dave
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Leftovers (or making the abnormal, normal)
From a piece I wrote for Care2.
I was interviewed on the radio last Friday about my 365 Days of Trash and an interesting thing happened. I was talking about some of the things that I started doing last year (and still do) in order to waste less and the subject came around to eating out at restaurants. I mentioned the simple ones–try to stay away from fast food, tell them you don’t need the straw, don’t order more than you think you’ll eat, and then I mentioned doggie bags.
My wife and I have two young kids, so more often than not we are left with food on the table. So, assuming we knew we were planning to eat out, one of us will usually bring along a small Tupperware type container and put it in there. As I explained to the gentleman interviewing me, this allows me to save the food that would otherwise get trashed, but negates my need for a Styrofoam take out container.
Now I’ve been bringing my own for a while now, so it pretty much seems like second nature, but the radio host saw it a different way. “Really?” he said, “Isn’t that sort of embarrassing?”
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard that kind of reaction and I’m sure it won’t be the last so I wasn’t taken aback, but it did get me thinking. Why is the idea of standing out, of being so different, so scary?
Now I know that there’s human nature, the desire to not be seen outside of the herd and all. My guess is this comes from not wanting to be eaten first by predators or some such subconscious remnant from our pre-wheel, spear-throwing times (as an aside, it fascinates me then that loud Hawaiian shirts are so popular). But no one at Bo’s Bar and Grill is looking for any human flesh these days so it seems like Tupperware shouldn’t be that scary?
I know I’m rambling a bit here, but bear with me for a second. It seems that my generation has sort of woken up over night and discovered that something is very wrong. We were brought up in this pre-packaged, single-serving, don’t-sweat-the-ramifications-of-what-you-are-doing-because-someone-else-will-take-care-of-it society and suddenly (well it started 20 years or so ago) we are beginning to realize that it doesn’t work so well. We are beginning to wake up and recognize that we need change and we need it fast.
So maybe what we need now is for more people to act differently, to make some noise, to risk being embarrassed. And maybe by doing so, enough people will see what we are doing, follow our model, and then we won’t risk being embarrassed anymore, but will once again be able to disappear into the herd as we pull out our take home containers and pay our checks.
And while we, the “adults” struggle to change our ways and try to do what’s best while still fitting in, maybe we’ll realize that this is a short term problem. Because as we start to make a stand and change our ways, our children will be watching. And if we show them that what we are doing is “normal”–that Tupperware take-home is “normal,” that steel water bottles are “normal,” that turning the lights off and walking to the store are “normal,” maybe that’s just what they will eventually become, normal. And then we’ll have done something.
So what am I getting at? Don’t try to hide your Tupperware, or your water bottles, your reusable bags, or your travel coffee mugs. Walk to work and let your co-workers know you did it and why. Challenge the status quo and throw it out there that what you are doing is not embarrassing, but empowering. And let your children know that being different isn’t something you should be embarrassed about, but something you should be proud of, because you are doing it for them.
Trust me, as the father of two girls who think that scrap paper should be given to the worms in their composter, I can assure you that when abnormal becomes normal, it’s pretty cool.
Amazing Earth Hour Pics
Check out these amazing Earth Hour pics from last Saturday night. You can click on each one and it will toggle between before and after. Pretty cool.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Excellent Recycling Process Animation
Excellent animated video in several parts that explains the whole recycling process of many different materials.
You can also watch the first one on youtube and the rest will play automatically.
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