objections to constant cost overruns

Dotson and Youngs voted AGAINST the new gym, Billy, Best, and Garcia voted FOR it. There is no real objection to a new bathroom, or even to enclose the CC. The objection is to paying 3,4 , 5 and more times what it SHOULD cost! Billy is the Mayor, just as Borgemann is the City Manager-the buck stops THERE! They are quick to take credit when something occasionally goes right.

Consistency not always a good thing

Billy led the charge to bury the Pistorino option to the gym. HE decided it wasnt a viable alternative altho the report said that renovation was very possible at 1.6-1.8 million- a far cry from the current 6.8 million we are at now. Billy was in charge and approved payments of $600+ a square foot for the CC enclosure, and TRIPLE what the bathrooms should have cost! He is consistent alright! Consistently throwing away TRUCKLOADS of our tax monies! He stopped listening to the majority of residents a LONG time ago, and now only listens ans caters to those handful of local contractors that make exorbitant profits on EACH and EVERY construction project we undertake! Shameful! He should be embarrassed.

Louisiana Biofuels

Governor Bobby Jindal has signed into law the Advanced Biofuel Industry Development Initiative, the most comprehensive and far-reaching state legislation in the nation enacted to develop a statewide advanced biofuel industry. Louisiana is the first state to enact alternative transportation fuel legislation that includes a variable blending pump pilot program and a hydrous ethanol pilot program.

Field-to-Pump
The legislature found that the proper development of an advanced biofuel industry in Louisiana requires implementation of the following comprehensive “field-to-pump” strategy developed by Renergie, Inc.:

(1) Feedstock other than corn;
(2) Decentralized network of small advanced biofuel manufacturing facilities;
(3) Variable blending pumps in lieu of splash blending; and
(4) Hydrous ethanol.

Renergie looks forward to working closely with the Obama-Biden administration to:
(a) reduce U.S. dependency on imported oil;
(b) repeal the ethanol import tariff;
(c) maximize the environmental benefits of ethanol-blended transportation fuels; and
(d) create jobs in rural areas of the United States by growing ethanol demand, specifically hydrous ethanol demand, beyond the 10% blend market.

Please feel free to visit Renergie’s weblog (www.renergie.wordpress.com) for more information.

heat for cold places

JC Fairbanks: I believe there are small scale geo thermal systems that work something like this..you have an area of heat absorbing material that heats up in the summer months and the stored heat is then used in winter. There is a place in Okotoks Alberta that has 52 homes heated this way. (Drake Landing) Here is a quote...

" 800 solar panels attached to garage roofs.

The black panels transfer solar heat to an antifreeze solution that is relayed by underground pipe to a central heat exchanger.

There, the antifreeze passes its heat to storage tanks full of water. During warmer months, the hot water is stored in boreholes sunk 37 metres beneath a town park. The water warms up the surrounding soil to temperatures as high as 80C. During winter, the heated soil acts as a kind of subterranean furnace, warming up water that is then circulated to homes. "

http://www.dlsc.ca/news/july_07/13_07_07_green.htm Thomas Ashby, Calgary (Sent Friday, January 30, 2009 12:38 AM

commentary

There's a problem with geothermal that no one mentions. Ie. heat only moves through the ground via conduction, not by convection or radiation. So once you pull the heat out of, say, the walls of a drilled shaft (thereby cooling them) it takes a long time for it to be replaced, since conduction is a very slow process. So there is a limit, set by conduction rates, to how much energy you can pull from a given "heat pump", no matter what you use the power for.

In reality geothermal energy is only viable on a large scale where there is geothermal activity (like Iceland, Alaska . . .). Even then, geo-heat is NOT an infinite source as people seem to think (funny how often people make that mistaken assumption). Need proof? Here are some geo-projects that extinguished popular fields of geysers around the world when they tapped their heat sources:
http://snras.blogspot.com/2008/10/geothermal-energy-development-geyser.html
At the same time, their power output has dropped steadily over the years.

Wind, 'bio-mass', ethanol and solar all have their potential pitfalls as well, if done badly. And "Clean coal" is a total misname; THERE IS NO SUCH THING! The term comes from those who stand to profit from it. Like when Eric the Red named a chuck of uninhabitable rock and ice "Greenland", "clean coal" advocates are trying to sell people a bill of goods. And how about ethanol; doesn't it seem odd to anyone that all the loudest deniers of ethanol's multiple problems as a fuel have profit motives?
My point is that all of the alternative-energy options need to be carefully considered *before* they are implemented, not built with a gold-rush mentality. Thus, while profits for innovators have to be part of the equation, they should NEVER, EVER trump sober consideration of possible down-sides. JC, Fairbanks, AK (Sent Thursday, January 29, 2009 10:38 PM

Green tech

Interesting comments on your site about what our government is doing and yes many people are looking for a change that will save our resources and yet provide us with a safer and more environmentally safe home and businesses.

I found on the internet one company which appears to be doing just that and they are making things happen. I found them at this web page: www.greentechbuildingsystems.com

They seem to be the only business which truly offers what everyone and the government has been looking for and they are doing it alone without any help. John, Phoenix AZ (Sent Thursday, January 29, 2009 5:45 PM

clean coal ?

This does sound promising. Companies like URS & TMEN should benefit.

TMEN has a promising clean coal technology. They have a MOU with Babcock Power for TIPS. I think this should be huge. MIT and others have worked on it. Also CANMET backs up the TIPS process by ThermoEnergy.

Check them out.
http://www.babcockpower.com/index.php?option=news&coid=9&task=viewnews&sid=115&Itemid=56

Harris Stevens Short Hills, NJ (Sent Thursday, January 29, 2009 12:25 PM)