Photo courtesy of efusco at Flickr.com.
Hybrid cars make me drool. The idea of getting 50 miles per gallon instead of 25 is almost enough to make me run out and get one today. But, hybrid cars are expensive and there’s an environmental case to be made for getting the full life out of my current car before I go shopping for a new toy.
It’s tempting to try for the best of both worlds and shop around for a used hybrid car. But, we’re rapidly approaching a milestone in the age of hybrid cars. Battery packs from Priuses made in 2001 were only rated for 100,000 miles (what do you call more than one Prius, anyway? Priusi?). Assuming the previous user drove 12,000-15,000 per year, that means the cars are likely to have 100k or more on the odometer. So, a first generation Prius is likely to come with a geriatric battery.
Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem. Used cars have all sorts of maintenance issues, and car buyers pay a discounted price because they know that costly repairs are a possibility. Battery packs break the mold because battery technology is complicated and hybrid battery packs are shockingly expensive. When these battery packs wear out, they can cost several thousand dollars to replace, and require expert technicians to do the work. From the Newsweek article:
Philip Card of Utica, N.Y., says a Toyota dealer wanted to charge him $3,900 to replace the battery on his 2001 Prius, which had 350,000 miles on it when he bought it used on eBay this year for $4,357.
So, here are a few things to bear in mind:
1) A huge aftermarket is developing for hybrid batteries from wrecked hybrids. If your Prius is totaled by hail damage or a fender bender with an SUV, don’t let a savvy scrap dealer take advantage of you by “taking the wreckage off your hands”.
2) The resale price of hybrids is falling in line with the resale price of the non-hybrid versions. Due to uncertainty over the value of hybrid batteries (and the cost of upcoming replacement), there may be some real deals out there if you can find hybrids with cosmetic wear but value under the hood.
So, Caveat Emptor! When shopping for a used hybrid, it might be a good idea to pay for a diagnostic evaluation of the battery pack. And, if you’re one of those Prius, Insight, or other hybrid drivers who I’m jealous of, here are a few rechargeable battery tips that you can use to get the most mileage from your battery pack before it needs replacing. One way to put these battery saving tips into practice is with a trickle charger that keeps the battery above 50% of charge without overheating it.
Photo courtesy of garyhymes at Flickr.com.
Popularity: 5% [?]
Photo courtesy of Berni Beudel at Flickr.com.
Whether they’re transporting a package across the world or just across town, shipping companies use a lot of fuel. As more consumers become carbon conscious, these companies are facing customers with new priorities.
Recently, uShip announced a new program to offset carbon emissions. In partnership with TerraPass, the shipping company is offering a new option to highlight green transport options. Now, whenever you ship items, you can choose a company that offsets the emissions of its planes, trains, trucks, and boats with “…domestic wind farms, “cow-power” projects, and energy efficiency projects.”
This is a great development! But, until all shippers start reporting their emissions, voluntary carbon offsets are only a drop in the bucket. The container shipping industry accounts for about 4.5% of all CO2 emissions - and that figure doesn’t include air cargo emissions. Cargo ships and oversize delivery vans are gas hogs, and often have very poor emission controls.
By giving consumers a way to offset carbon emissions, uShip offers a way to judge the efficiency of our service providers. Imagine if the carbon cost of all the companies we shop with was included in the price tag. That way, the greenest companies would have a competitive advantage over their dirty competition!
Photo courtesy of fboosman at Flickr.com.
Popularity: 10% [?]
School Buses are nearly a perfect fit for biodiesel. They travel local, well planed short routes so they can always be refueled from a biodiesel facility so that the driver doesn’t have to settle for fossil fuels in a crunch.
A couple of years back Gloucester Co. started a trial in which 20 of its school buses would be run off of biodiesel. Now, according to this article at WVEC every single school bus is run off of bio fuels made locally.
Roger Kelly, head of transportation for the district says that even the drivers are noticing a difference, although the accountants are not. Fuel cost is nearly the same for both biodiesel and regular but money is not always the most important thing.
“It’s hard to put a price on cleanness,” he said. “We’re definitely saving on better health for kids growing up,” said Kelly. “Buses going up and down the road that are putting out less emissions. So, there’s a dollar amount there.”
The drivers are noticing that the buses run better on biodiesel (something I have noticed in my own car) and because biodiesel lubricates better and cleans out fuel lines and tanks that buses will last longer possibly providing a financial benefit in that area.
Other area school districts are consulting with Gloucester about making the switch to biodiesel as well.
Popularity: 10% [?]
Previously we talked about Jatropha as a new biodiesel source here, here, and here. Now The Naples Daily News reports that My Dream Fuel LLC is has been cultivating a Jatropha SW Florida. Jatropha produces four times the fuel per acre than soy and ten times more than corn. Paul Dalton, a former attorney owns the company and says demand is great:
“There are about 100 buyers for every gallon you produce,” he said.
Dalton already has close to a million plants in the ground and hopes to plant another million before June and is in the process of opening a 15,000 square foot seed crushing and plant cloning center in Ft Myers. The seeds of the of the plant are crushed in order to make biodiesel.
My Dream Fuel is one of the first companies to bring large scale planting to the US of Jatropha, a plant native to Mexico and South America. The company expects to be able to turn out plants at the rate of one million per month
“We studied our mother trees that we use to clone for over six years, and we have over 500 of them. So we have the largest bank of mother trees in the world, of any company,”
“We know of a couple of groups from New York and from Spain that want to plant in Texas and Brazil. So in the next couple of weeks, we may exhaust our current supply,” Dalton said.
Dave Wolfley, the owner of Sunshine Biofuels is working towards establishing a fuel plant. He has been campaigning to convince local farmers to take a chance on the new fuel crop and has a few ready to try it.
Jatropha evangelist are targeting citrus groves in Florida with diseased trees and cattle ranchers looking to branch out. With the reported ability of this plant to grow in nearly any environment that is a lot of land in a lot of the country that these plants could be grown on.
Popularity: 11% [?]
I’m not detail minded enough to make my own Biodiesel for my old Mercedes Diesel. I occasionally have dreams about driving for free and going around siphoning WVO (Waste Vegetable Oil) from the waste tanks at the local fast food restaurants. But then I remember how I had to buy three little screws for the oil pan on my Benz and how those three little screws costs over 10 dollars and I extrapolate that out to how much a new injection pump would cost when I make a mistake and I head on over to DFW Biodiesel and feel confident that my 300D will live another day.
But if you are more competent than me and are planning on gathering up used fryer grease to run your diesel off of make sure that you get permission before you harvest the sludge.
The Mercury News writes about a man in Morgan Hill California who is was arrested for stealing 300 gallons of grease from a Burger King. My first reaction to this is that we had another case of a big corporation bullying some poor environmentally friendly citizen who was just trying to get some WVO for personal use…I mean, sure they should have asked but arrest is a bit harsh. But as it turns out the man worked for a Las Vegas company, Restaurant Oils of America, and was not even licensed to operate in the state. The driver was harvesting the WVO to resell to a company in Atascadero for $1.35 a gallon.
It’s interesting to note that most restaurants, including the “victim” here pay someone to haul off their waste grease; so if you are just polite enough to ask most establishments will allow you to take all you want without being arrested or anything.
Popularity: 8% [?]
Photo courtesy of laure_et_carlos at Flickr.com.
Green wine sounds about as appealing as green eggs and ham (which, coincidentally, IHOP is currently offering), but a group of wine producers in the Languedoc region of France has come up with an unusual and environmentally friendly way to ship their product.
Soon, a fleet of ships will be at work carrying French wine to Dublin and crushed glass back for recycling. For each bottle, 4.9 ounces of carbon emissions will be prevented (at 60,000 bottles per trip, that’s more than 18,000 pounds or more than 9 short tons). To put it another way, each of these 4 day sailing trips will reduce emissions of CO2 equivalent to what an average car produces in a year. Now that’s something worth toasting to with a tall glass of wine!
Photo courtesy of RR de Facto at Flickr.com.
Popularity: 7% [?]
23 Mar 08 |
Photo courtesy of job_earth at Flickr.com.
An increasing number of religious leaders are promoting environmental causes at the pulpit. From using organic bread during mass to promoting water conservation as a path to peace in the Middle East, these leaders are connecting the dots between conservative faith and conservation. Here are 20 very different leaders who stand out for their environmental activism.
Additional newsworthy developments include:
Photo courtesy of Magda-50 at Flickr.com.
Popularity: 5% [?]
18 Mar 08 |
Photo courtesy of PlumPoet at Flickr.com.
Gas prices are going through the roof, and it seems that roads are getting more crowded all the time. Car pools look better every day!
Photo courtesy of cheezelsmurf at Flickr.com.
(Sorry, I couldn’t resist the visual metaphor!) Shared commuting gives you a chance to spread the costs around while also reducing the pollution that your drive causes. Many cities even offer special lanes for car pools, which means you can make better time on the road and also get better gas mileage while driving!
Photo courtesy of corksurf at Flickr.com.
Check out carpooling opportunities at ERideShare.com and CarPoolConnect.com. You can also talk with your co-workers and create your own carpool - it’s a great way to keep up with the latest office gossip and build goodwill with the people who can help advance your career.
Popularity: 5% [?]
16 Mar 08 |
Photo courtesy of fastfoodforthought at Flickr.com.
Rooftop gardens, which are also sometimes called “Green Roofs”, have been encouraged in the developed world as a way of moderating urban temperature and rain water flood surges. In India, a new program is developing rooftop gardens with different goals in mind.
Rooftop gardens offer urban farmers a chance to turn squalor into nutrition. Equally important, they offer diversity to the household income. In a country where many women and low-caste men are often shut out from job opportunities, green roofs can do more than minimize the impact of weather.
Photo courtesy of /\ltus at Flickr.com.
Popularity: 7% [?]
13 Mar 08 |
Photo courtesy of expom2uk at Flickr.com.
A new study by the University of Colorado at Boulder has found a direct link between human activity in the American West and dust storms. This is the first time that the effects of human development (such as the introduction of wild horses, cattle grazing, and intensive farming) have been directly linked to dust. Researchers studied the sediment found in the bottoms of alpine lakes and concluded that dust levels have been 500-700% higher in the American West since the 1860’s.
On the plus side, dust levels have been declining since the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act, which was introduced during the Dust Bowl to prevent further erosion in American farmlands. So, while the study proves that humans can cause dust events, it also suggests that we can take steps to reduce our impacts.
Popularity: 5% [?]