Geek Habitat

Being lazy and scrounging for content by copying my response to a well-written bog post on GreenAndCleanMom.org entitled: “Hybrid Concerns: How green?” –

“I’ve driven our Ford Escape Hybrid since early March 2006. Love it and would have a very hard time going back to a 100% gasoline (or diesel)-powered vehicle. I’ve had absolutely no maintenance issues, save tire patches due to excessive construction where I live and one recall that affected the drive shaft (not a hybrid component).

First responders are always having to be trained on new technology that ends up in vehicles. Higher powered engines, bigger fuel tanks, sun/moonroofs, side curtain airbags (which may or may not deploy in an accident). Lots of “stuff” that they need to look out for. Hybrids have been on the roads 10 years now and the fact that we haven’t heard of a catastrophe is, as they say, no news is good news. Just like gasoline and diesel vehicles have auto fuel shutoffs, hybrids have that and auto kill features to disengage/disarm the hybrid battery in certain collisions/wrecks. I don’t blame folks for being wary of something new, but they’re (hybrids) not as new as folks think. Japan’s had hybrids since (if I recall correctly) 1997, and they’ve been available in the USA since 1999 or so.

PS: Many hybrid owners change their own oil, etc. after the vehicle’s out of warranty.

The batteries are recycled/reclaimed at the end of their useful life (and the mfgr warranty covers them for a minimum of 8 years, 100k miles; 10 years, 150k miles in CA and a few select areas). And that’s just the warranty. There are hybrid taxis with over 300k miles on them.

We bought a domestic (Ford) hybrid so we got the full tax credit of $2,600 (single year). Late adopters of foreign make hybrids got reduced or no tax credit due to the tiered tax credit based on sales of each mfgr’s hybrids (after 60,000 sold the tax credit reduced greatly.)

At some point, I read that gasoline engines (I don’t know about diesels) produce the most pollution when they’re at idle, which is when a hybrid electric vehicle’s internal combustion engine is OFF and the vehicle is running on stored power and an electric generator (powered by the hybrid battery).

For all the reasons folks have every right to want to avoid hybrids, there are those of us who are thrilled to be owning and driving ours. My hybrid will be 3 years old in March. When it comes time to replace our F-150 pickup? It’ll either be replaced with a hybrid electric vehicle or a plug-in hybrid, and my Escape Hybrid will take on the role the F-150 has served. (hauling camping gear, bicycles, etc.) On the rare occasions we need extra carrying capacity, we’ll rent a diesel van/truck. My husband also bicycle commutes 2 or 3 times a week (23 miles total!) and leaves the F-150 at home when I need the Escape Hybrid, so we too believe there’s no single answer to lowering fuel costs, reducing emissions, etc. It takes multiple effects among multiple people, and it takes cities becoming more aware of the mass transit needs of their populations, for example.

My Ford Escape Hybrid will be 3 years old in March and I would buy it again in a heartbeat. There’s something that tickles me to drive a small SUV that gets even better fuel economy than my economical Toyota Corolla (which the Escape Hybrid replaced) did.

Can we do better (higher fuel economy, less emissions in ALL vehicles regardless of powertrain?) You bet. Hybrids are just one facet, one step, in that direction. I’m happy to be part of the “early” adopter crowd as well, and “beta test” them for others without the means and/or desire to do so.”

Realize not everyone has the same agendas as I do but thought I’d share these since they’re among some of the resources available to see where candidates stand on various issues.

• League of Conservation Voters - grades serving politicians by how they vote regarding environmental issues/energy issues/etc:
  http://www.lcv.org/scorecard/
  (Search by state; not surprisingly, most everyone running in Texas has a very LOW environmental score, but some are good)
• Wikipedia section on Future election candidates – will have to search page for names from our ballot but useful for high level overview of each candidate
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Future_election_candidates
• League of Women Voters – grades serving politicians on a BROAD range of issues (not just women’s health issues, equal pay, etc. ALL issues incl. immigration, energy, etc.)
  http://www.lwv.org/Election2008/index.html
• Sportsmen & Animal Owner’s Voting Alliance (SAOVA) – Their site design sucks so you will have to scroll to below their left nav to see any of their content. Anyway, I look at who these people support not to see who I will vote for but who these folks are just in love with. The organization feels it necessary to oppose animal rights issues across the board, calling it the “AR Threat” and lumping the ASPCA and Humane Society of the USA with PETA (whom I loathe, just in case this isn’t clear) as the same type of “animal rightist group”.
  Not surprisingly, they endorse McCain/Palin (surprise — her type of hunting includes “hunting” wolves by helicopter. Not my type of sportsmanlike behavior. Shiver in a blind like a real hunter, or learn to track animals.)
  http://saova.org/2008endorse.html — you can see where TX elections fall as well. Remember, to them, “animal rightist” means you even support the ASPCA and Humane Society.
• NRA traditionally always supports Republican candidates and this year’s no different. It’s Texas. We all love our guns. Seriously don’t think we’ve EVER had a candidate in U.S. Presidency that wants to ban all guns. We should figure out what’s up with all the school shootings, though, no? Or do teenagers have gun rights, too?
  http://www.nraila.org/
• T. Boone Pickens?
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._Boone_Pickens
  He was a huge supporter of G.W. Bush & the Republican party so I pay special attention when he talks because if he’s swung away from Bush & Co. I find that notable. Unfortunately, he’s opted out of endorsing anyone this election cycle and is instead calling on WHOMEVER wins to get their a** in gear regarding U.S. energy dependence/usage/supply. I wish he at least had a PAC that endorsed candidates as it would be telling, given he’s actually putting his money where their mouths are — “We need to harness ALL types of energy, not just oil, and do so now.” It’s what even the staunchest Republicans are saying (hence, “drill, baby, drill” in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, etc.) but I suspect he’d disagree with many. For one thing, he thinks as I do, that we cannot “drill our way out” of our dependence on foreign oil.

One last thing — depending on your position on the $700 billion bailout/rescue bill (remember, they went through two rounds on it so there were 2 votes) — you might also want to do a Google search to see who voted for and against the bill(s). I haven’t gotten around to that yet and I’m on the fence on what that would really tell me. We should have left the voting on that up to the astronauts & cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station because it seems like one needs *that* high level of a view of our economy to really determine what good, or ill, that bill will actually have. Obviously, short-term, it seems better than worse but it’s a hell of a lot of money at a time when a lot of other things (our infrastructure, healthcare, Social Security, the military and, not the least of which, the American people) need a hell of a lot of money, too.

I urge everyone to watch at least a couple of the U.S. Presidential (and the only Vice Presidential) debates leading up to the election. CSPAN’s Debate Hub and CSPAN’s YouTube channel are terrific sources.

CSPAN’s Debate Hub is especially handy, providing videos broken out by question and full information on the dates and locations of each debate as well as carrying the debates LIVE as they occur. The next and final U.S. Presidential Debate for this election is at 9 PM ET on October 15, 2008, in Hempstead, New York, and you can watch it live on CSPAN’s Debate Hub at this URL (bookmark it for viewing on debate night): http://debatehub.c-span.org/index.php/debate-4/

Haven’t downloaded the pics of the former, yet, but wanted to thank both Ford Motor Co. (via a Flickr/Twitter contact) and Google Lunar X-Prize (via @glxp on Twitter) for the free swag I’ve received in the past month. I rarely pick up swag anymore, not attending conferences and the like, so it’s noteworthy enough for a blog mention.

The Google Lunar X-Prize swag’s a comfy, soft black (of course, for geeks!) t-shirt. To learn more about the Google Lunar X-Prize, visit TheLaunchpad.xprize.org!

The Ford swag is primarily Ford Escape Hybrid related, due to my hybrid-related tweets on my previous (now retired) Twitter account. My hybrid-related tweets now originate from @hybrid411 as I’ve spun off my personal (and higher frequency) tweets to @ageekmom. I’ll post a pic of the Ford swag soon… somehow my camera, USB cable, laptop and I can’t seem to share the same Time-Space Continuum lately.

This is a stream-of-consciousness post so pardon any egregious spelling and grammatical errors, if you can.

I’ll further preface this by saying I haven’t read the complete article — I’m trying to wind down and go to sleep — but my comments relate to the discussion on Instapundit about Obama’s plan to see 1 million plug-in hybrid vehicles on U.S. roadways by 2015

Often, when plug-in hybrids are mentioned, one of the first things naysayers latch on to is “How is our electrical grid going to be able to handle charging all those vehicles? So much for being GREEN–we’ll need more coal/oil/nuclear power generation stations to run your “tiny plug-in hybrid.” They usually throw in “tiny” just to further bolster their point, so they think, when in reality it proves just how little research they’ve done…beyond listening to talk radio and regurgitating what they’re told to believe.

I don’t get it..

Yes, anything that needs to be powered or recharged with house/mains current is going to require power generated from somewhere–and the vast majority of power generated for residential and business use in the US is not derived from clean, “green” sources like wind and solar power. I understand and don’t dispute these facts.

What I don’t understand is why 1 million vehicles (by 2015) sends shivers of fear up anyone’s spine regarding our electrical grid’s capability to meet that demand. That’s 1 million vehicles out of an estimated 250,851,833 registered passenger vehicles in the United States (2006 data, per Wikipedia.) That’s less than .4% of all the passenger vehicles on the roads in 2006; with 2008 numbers that percentage is, if anything, even more miniscule.

Now, how many personal computers do you think are in active use in the United States? It’s easier to arrive at that number by thinking globally, in this case. According to Wikipedia: “As of June 2008, the number of personal computers in use worldwide hit one billion, while another billion is expected to be reached by 2014.” (Source: Wikipedia) Did you get that? I’ll wait while you read it again. We’re currently at one billion computers in use worldwide, and that number is expected to DOUBLE by 2014. And every single one of those computers has to be plugged into an electrical outlet; indeed, most desktop computers are connected full-time! Again according to Wikipedia, “The United States, Western Europe and Japan accounted for 58 percent of the worldwide installed PCs,” so that means our three countries, along, account for 580 million computers total.

Why are there not cries of an impending energy shortfall as the number of computers in active use is projected to double in the same timeframe that Obama is committing to putting a paltry 1 million (.4% of existing vehicles) on the road?

It just doesn’t make sense. The plug-in hybrids, and full-electric vehicles like the Tesla Roadster, are a drop in the ocean and they wouldn’t even be connected to the grid for very long per vehicle, compared to most computers which are–we’ve already established–plugged in full-time. Even with the EPA’s Energy Star program and “green computing,” the sheer number of computers, far in excess of the total existing number of vehicles of ALL types on the roads, tells me they’re using a considerable amount of power.

BAN COMPUTERS. WE’RE RUNNING OUT OF POWER.

Absurd, right?

So why the stick-in-the-mud, the sky is falling, “incremental progress at weaning ourselves from foreign oil is no progress at all”, malarkey?

I just don’t get it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it isn’t worth discussing. A large number of 100% electric and plug-in electric hybrids will be purchased (just as their hybrid brethren have) in markets where the power grid is definitely taxed more than in other areas of the country. Thus, I definitely believe it’s worth planning for all contingencies. I just hate to see an idea die on the vine because of a knee-jerk reaction based on little more than FUD (Fear, Uncertainty & Dread).

I promise, I’m still alive. I keep coming down with the same sinus infection or plague or whatever it is and taking weeks to get over it. I’ve been catching up on my reading, on my Kindle no less (which has been enjoyable!), as well as other assorted “low impact” things. Generally not much to blog about. Sara’s doing well, and yes we need to take some new photos of her that aren’t blurry, informal cameraphone pics. Message heard loud and clear.

Every day I’m more and more happy we bought our hybrid when we did (March 2006). This “Cathy” cartoon, for example, is probably far more true than it should be –
http://www.gocomics.com/features/35/feature_items/373065

In related news, I just learned Lexus has another hybrid on the market but it STARTS at $104,900 -> http://www.lexus.com/models/LSh/features/pricing.html
Oh.my.goodness! That’s almost $40k more than the non-hybrid version of the Lexus LS!

Several grand more and you could get a Tesla Roadster (100% electric sports car) ->
http://www.teslamotors.com/

Insanity!