environment

This New Breed of Generator Can Run on Almost Any Fuel

This New Breed of Generator Can Run on Almost Any Fuel:

It doesn’t matter that it’s been raining for two weeks because your utility is tapping into ammonia produced with last summer’s sunshine. It’s consuming that ammonia in a linear generator.

The linear generator can quickly switch between different types of green (and not-so-green, if need be) fuel, including biogas, ammonia, and hydrogen. It has the potential to make the decarbonized power system available, reliable, and resilient against the vagaries of weather and of fuel supplies. And it’s not a fantasy; it’s been developed, tested, and deployed commercially.

The cofounders of Mainspring Energy, of which I am one, spent 14 years developing this technology, and in 2020 we began rolling it out commercially. It is currently installed at tens of sites, producing 230 to 460 kilowatts at each. We expect linear generators at many more locations to come on line within the next year.

[Facinating.]

The Incentivized Waste of Free Returns and the Gutting of Alexa

The Incentivized Waste of Free Returns — Pixel Envy:

The supposedly efficient marketplace has produced a system where the cost of production has decreased so much — through deliberately seeking the lowest-wage factory workers and taking a hands-off approach to their safety — that it is trivial for some retailers to discard huge amounts of merchandise from returns and overstock. The incentives are all backwards.

Also:

Amazon Is Gutting Alexa:

It seems none of these predictions has fully panned out. There are many people who will continue ordering groceries with curb-side pickup, buy everything online with the understanding anything unwanted can simply be sent back, and maybe some people will yell at their speaker to send them a new box of Dutch Blitz after a particularly aggressive board game night. Most people probably will not. We will mostly continue to click “Add to Cart” and shop in stores near where we live. We should make cities more accessible and less car-centric because that helps our communities far more than pressing a button near your laundry machine to have more detergent shipped to you.

[It can be hard to tell when something isn’t working and when the tech isn’t good enough, and when new horrifying habits are enabled. But I feel like part of that difficulty is momentum.]

Patagonia Founder Gives Away the Company to Fight Climate Change

Patagonia Founder Gives Away the Company to Fight Climate Change:

Rather than selling the company or taking it public, Mr. Chouinard, his wife and two adult children have transferred their ownership of Patagonia, valued at about $3 billion, to a specially designed trust and a nonprofit organization. They were created to preserve the company’s independence and ensure that all of its profits — some $100 million a year — are used to combat climate change and protect undeveloped land around the globe.

The unusual move comes at a moment of growing scrutiny for billionaires and corporations, whose rhetoric about making the world a better place is often overshadowed by their contributions to the very problems they claim to want to solve.
At the same time, Mr. Chouinard’s relinquishment of the family fortune is in keeping with his longstanding disregard for business norms, and his lifelong love for the environment.

[More on this soon… but I’m not surprised, but deeply impressed.]

Unleashing Beaver to Restore Ecosystems and Combat the Climate Crisis

Unleashing Beaver to Restore Ecosystems and Combat the Climate Crisis:

The creek bed, altered by decades of agricultural use, had looked like a wildfire risk. It came back to life far faster than anticipated after the beavers began building dams that retained water longer.

“It was insane, it was awesome,” said Lynnette Batt, the conservation director of the Placer Land Trust, which owns and maintains the Doty Ravine Preserve.

“It went from dry grassland… to totally revegetated, trees popping up, willows, wetland plants of all types, different meandering stream channels across about 60 acres of floodplain,” she said.

The Doty Ravine project cost about $58,000, money that went toward preparing the site for beavers to do their work.

In comparison, a traditional constructed restoration project using heavy equipment across that much land could cost $1 to $2 million, according to Batt.

See also The Beaver Manifesto and this long piece from Places Journal about beavers as environmental engineers.

Across North America and Europe, public agencies and private actors have reintroduced beavers through “re-wilding” initiatives. In California and Oregon, beavers are enhancing wetlands that are critical breeding habitat for salmonids, amphibians, and waterfowl. In Nevada, Utah, and New Mexico, environmental groups have partnered with ranchers and farmers to encourage beaver activity on small streams. Watershed advocates in California are leading a campaign to have beavers removed from the state’s non-native species list, so that they can be managed as a keystone species rather than a nuisance. And federal policy is shifting, too. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service sees beavers as “partners in restoration,” and the Forest Service has supported efforts like the Methow Beaver Project, which mitigates water shortages in North Central Washington. Since 2017, the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service has funded beaver initiatives through its Aquatic Restoration Program.

[I believe they saw similar effects when reintroducing wolves. We should know by now that we should leave well enough alone.]

Source: kottke.org

What it’s about — moderation, preservation, and gradualism.

I wanted to write about what this election is about to me… and I assure you it’s not about parties, candidates, media news cycles, or predictions.

Here’s what I think this is about… it’s about getting small. It’s about realizing that growth is not the only answer to how you improve your life. It’s about doing and creating things that other need, without allowing that to become more important than family, friends, and making the most of the unknown amount of time you have.

Think about the following…in 2008 when you were spending $4 a gallon for gas. It took me back to 1973 when waiting on a gas line (and no cell phones!!) was a thing. Even the folks driving us to school waited on line with us kids in the car, because you needed every advantage. Even if we put up with things like fracking (oh heavens, no), and giant oil lines running across our wilderness (please, have a little respect) we’re running out of oil, no matter which way you want to look at it.

Global warming? It’s not a future problem, it’s a now problem. Please take a few minutes to read through this, and you’ll understand why I say that. The drawing makes it abundantly clear. I know it impinges on the way people want to live their lives, and I feel bad about that. But not so bad that I lose sight of where we are headed to the best of our knowledge. It’s not even a “we’re good, let our kids worry about it” problem—which is venal enough… it’s a now, like we really need to change our behavior problem. When you mix that with the rapidly diminishing oil reserves, and it represents a clarion call to action. Even if all the scientists are wrong (How could that be? All of them?), are you willing to the bet the only inhabitable planet we all live on that they’re all wrong, and that with no particular proof you are correct? C’mon. That’s nuts.

So one last item, the collapse of the banks. Displaying a singular lack of integrity they based their choices on a crazed belief (as is the anti-global warming crowd) that things will not change. That they way things have been recently is all there is. That at the very bottom, in the ooze and muck of “me first”, the personal interest ($$$) of the individuals in the banks is far more important than the needs of anyone or everyone else. They cannot be trusted any more because their interest is uncoupled from yours by an abyss so vast that you cannot expect them to act in even a vague notion of alignment to your interests, which they claim to represent.

We need to stop thinking that the answer to everything is growth. Bigger is not better, and we should stop painting ourselves into a corner that leaves no room for any other answer. Why don’t we ever consider shrinking? Why can’t small be not only good but great? And better or best! Why can’t less really be more? The answer, of course, is it can, because it relies on community, and alignment of values and concerns.

So the election… I’m thinking about the above. I’m thinking about folks who are remarkably not represented in any way shape or form. I’m thinking about folks who just want to live their lives with the dignity and respect accorded others. I don’t see a clear party or candidate that represents “less”, “smaller”, “more simple”. I do not hear anyone talking about moderation, preservation, and talking about a gradual approach to anything. Well, maybe they all talk about gradually increasing taxes in one form or another. But that’s it. So go vote, and do the best you can. That’s as close to a plan as I have for this election.

Planned Obsolescence

Planned Obsolescence:

I’ve long felt that everyone who eats meat should slaughter and butcher and animal in order to get in touch with where meat comes from. I now add to the list that everyone who creates trash needs to go to the dump and take a good long look at where trash goes. So many materials. So much waste. So many things that failed to be worthwhile. So much mass. There were mountains, truly mountains of trash.

[I continue to rebel against consumerism. As much as I possibly can I do without things that are not preferably, made by individual, to last, and avoid things that are “trendy” and designed to be replaced within my lifetime. I may never get all the way there, but I (and my family) are getting closer all the time. Someone mocked me using the words of another “Ingredient driven, farm to table, dishwasher safe, gluten free, kosher for Passover, craft brewed, bean to bar, hand roasted, Fiber speeds but made with dial-up sensibility living according to my opinion.” That’s a lot to ask for, but I’ll take it where I can find it.]

Image from: https://recycleraccoon.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/landfill.jpg

Rivers Run Free… Nation’s Biggest Dam Removal Is Done

Rivers Run Free… Nation’s Biggest Dam Removal Is Done | Gear Junkie:

Last year, 72 dams were removed across the country, including the final portion of the Glines Canyon Dam along the Elwha River in Washington, the largest dam ever removed.

American Rivers keeps track of all the dams removed across the country. In 2014, those 72 removed dams were found in 19 states.

[According to American Rivers, 15O,618 acres of riverside land was protected and 4.2 million pounds of trash were removed through their National River Cleanup program. Progress!]

How things go… (car camping)

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As a kid my parents shared their love of the outdoors, passed on I’m told from my grand parents, and while we as family never did more than day hike together, some how that lead to my love of backwoods hiking and camping. I’ve since sectioned hiked the AT a bit, “bike” camped, and now, in my latest incarnation car camped.

I never would have thought it.

But my wife is more of a city girl, and so far my son is a city boy as well. Now he’s young, and there’s plenty of time for him to develop the put it on your back and walk aesthetic I enjoy so much, but I recognize that if I’m going to maximize my own outdoor time, it’s going to be with necessary compromises on how I go about that… so car camping it is. Recently, The Kid slept in a tent all night with me for the first time and loved it. He’s hiked up various paths in NY, ME, and NH… and loves rock climbing (like many kids). I appear to be off to a good start.

Some unexpected additions?

A solar chargeable battery arrangement that allows my son to use his devices. We also have the ability to recharge it from the car, and or run various things while in the car. There’s more LED lights than I would have expected, but they do make it easy to see. There’ll be more cooking related things than I would have thought. We have an excellent cooler that will hold ice for days (or other things frozen or cool).

In short, there’s way more gear than I ever considered in my light and ultra-light days. but it sure does make it homey regardless of where we hang out.

If anyone cares for details about what gear we’re using… feel free to get in touch.

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Sowing a Change in Kitchens

Sowing a Change in Kitchens:

The soil-tilling food experts happen to be every bit as expressive, and iconoclastic, as their knife-wielding counterparts in the kitchen. These days, many in the culinary world tend to view produce in a black-and-white way: You have either your delightfully lumpy, bumpy farmers’ market treasures, or your scarily uniform corporate Frankenfood. As Mr. Barber said, it’s “heirlooms over here, Monsanto maniacs over there.”

But Monday’s convocation, overseen by the Basque Culinary Center, suggested a third way: Independent breeders are ready to help make our breads and salads richer with deep flavor, bold color and plenty of nutrients. They just need someone to ask them.

What they do may also be seen as an old-school alternative to the spread of genetically modified plants, which have not been shown to be harmful but still frighten and concern many people.

“We’re making crosses within the same species, and we’re doing it the way it’s been done for 300 years,” said Dr. Stephen Jones, a wheat breeder from Washington State whose accessibly folksy lecture had the room transfixed. “There’s no forcing here. We put these plants together and we let them mate.”

[Since this ultimately will be driven by business and not love, it cares me a bit. But I’m curious to see where it goes.]

Zoë Goes Running

Zoë Goes Running | Running Le Tour de France for World Pediatric Project:

When I finally did finish, at 1:05 am, my knees and elbows were crusted with blood, and my palms dotted with blood blisters from falling down, my skin pickled and covered in a sun rash, my ankles swollen red and hot, dirt everywhere, and my face completely flushed with fever.  It was, after so many runs in my life, the first time I felt so deeply that I could not possibly have gone one extra step.  So often people have commented upon seeing me after a 30 mile day that I look great, considering.  I’ve always felt conflicted about that – sure it’s nice I can run that much and not look awful, but on the other hand, I want to look awful!  I want to look like I’ve been through something.  And finally, at 1 am on Friday morning, I looked like I had been through something.  23 hours, 110 degree heat, 8000 feet of elevation gain, all of it was written on my face, etched in my body.  Finally, I looked like hell.   And it felt great.

[It’s amazing anyone ever thinks of these things… let alone complete them.]