STUFF

US has been rated Aaa since 1917.

Greek GDP going down @ 4%/y. IMF thinks their debt/GDP will reach 172% next yr. Well, Japan has been doing 200% for how long? Greek unemployment @ 40%. Ow.

um- while i watch the MetLife blimp flying around in the sky out my window. Kid you not. And thought of the captain of the Goodyear blimp. And have i told you about my MSFT blimp design? Shaped and colored in the MSFT symbol, which we see below, but powered by solar on top. Never got it to Bill.

Anyway, Italy is at 120% debt/GDP. GDP of $2.1T. Greece is at $330B.

Our glorious House passed an Energy bill $6B below admin's request of $31B for DOE and Corps of Engineers. Environmental cuts and the $11B for hi-speed rail (wouldn't that be DOT?) diverted to midwest flood relief. And why is Corps of Engineers in E bill? God Congress is screwed up. Please help them get unscrewed Lord.

The House also voted Friday to withhold funding to enforce the new light bulb standards in '12. Well, they sure made their statement. You ain't making me do a dam thing i don't wanna, u dam guvmint. Even tho it saves me money long run, saves energy and saves GHG emissions. God please love our politicians better. They really deserve it. And bless all those companies and their people who have made all these better lighting bulbs since '07 and continually work to make them cheaper.

Previously mentioned our oceans absorb 1/3 of CO2 emmissions. New study says world forests absorb another 1/3. But forests are being deforested and US western forests devoured by pine beetle because of droughts.

The head of Brazil's EPA - IBAMA - said on Australia's "60 Minutes" that it's not his job to protect the environment. It's "to minimize the impacts" of destructive projects (new dam in Amazon). But he went on to suggest indigenous tribes that stand in the way of  "progress" should be dealt with harshly. Ouch. Ya vol. Sheesh. Um, Brazil, check your government out. We like your growth. And energy policy. But you may be running into ugly. Remember your history.

CA supreme court upheld plastic bag ban. Should cut down on the plastic in the Pacific gyre. Hopefully in time. Hello Oregon, Washington and Alaska. And Mexico and Canada. And west coast Central America and South America and east coast China, Japan and the rest of Asia. I take my plastic bags back to Kroger's recycle bins myself.

Shell has pulled out of their Canadian Arctic NG stake, worsening future prospects of the $16B pipeline project, citing the shale gas boom and regulatory delays. Confident, though, that their assets will be bought.

Sony will start making lith-ion batts for EVs for mid-decade sales. Making since '90's for consumer items, of course. And lithium phosphate batts for grid storage. Panasonic already making batts for Tesla, Toyota. Lith-cobalt batts more E dense, but not as safe or long lasting. Exxon actually produced 1st lith-ion batt in '77. But for whatever reasons stopped.

~130k US homes now outfitted with solar. Of 65M homes.

NY Academy of Sciences: cost of coal-fired elgen in US as high as 28 cents/kwh with enviro and health costs factored in. The good news: since '07, 153 proposed coal plants have been cancelled or postponed and 190 existing plants are set to close in coming years because of age and too dirty for investment in scrubbers. Um, I thought all coal plants had scrubbers. O. O Congress. O House of Representatives. Um, what's our health bill these days? Why?

I know. I carry on. But hopefully I don't tarry.

Here's another example of how stupid things are. Hawaii gets 75% of its elgen from imported (not from US) oil. And is 90% dependent on fossil fuels for elgen, which is 36 cents/kwh on avg. and $4.7B/y. (Let alone think about a tanker oil spill there). The entire island chain has 2.4GW gencap. And one hell of a lot of sun and wind. So far, the largest solar farm is 1.2MW. Good news: more solar and wind farms coming.

Corning to open a KY factory in '12 to make thin, textured glass for solar that scatters light so photons spend more time in the semiconductor layer. Their glass has been used for record-setting GE CdTe, Oerlikon's tandem-junction amorphous silcon and maybe soon-to-be-announced CIGS cells.

Research underway on 2 new types of solar: cuprous oxide and tin sulfide.

Finally, every dollar rise in oil costs the US military $31M.

Happy motoring, pards.Thanks for visiting here. Our numbers are growing. Things are always getting better with good thinking. Onward and upward. Godspeed.