My new Job

So after over 3 months of searching I landed a job working for Timmons Design Engineers.

I am really excited to get to work and to learn from engineers committed to sustainable design. I am really glad that I didn't settle for just any company and got what I was searching for: a company who's mission was to.... well i just show you what Timmons is.

"TDE’s commitment to energy performance, resource conservation and pollution reduction in the built environment has evolved into a true sustainable design practice. TDE provides integrated engineering and sustainable design services ensuring a true balance of conservation, constructability, schedule and budget. "

I am excited to share what I learn... till then

DCgreen

Hybrid and Electric Cars

Thought I would share a really well design website dedicated to showing people what kind of hybrids and electric cars that are out there.

This is a really great list and one I will be sending people to from now on:

http://www.hybridcars.com/electric-car




DCgreen

2nd BiWeekly Post - New Orleans MIR

This weekend I went to New Orleans for Mardi Gras with Sarah and her coworker Kaile. We drove up and stayed with a friend of a friend and it turned out really great. As soon as we got there we dropped our stuff off and hit up a parade right near Tulane University. Not exactly the most eco-friendly of a holiday. The place gets trashed and beads are literally everywhere. But its a good to relax about that stuff once in a while I guess.

The next day we decided to go west of Tulane and New Orleans to check out the above ground tombs. Here is a shot of Kaile next to some of the Tombs.

Just randomly after breakfast we happen to be stumble upon a really interesting looking house. It was so interesting and we had taken a wrong turn to get there so we got out to check it out. After further inspection I saw it had Solar Panels, Solar Hot Water Heaters, and Rainwater Harvesting... this was not just a normal house. (Its pictured below)

So after some encouragement from Sarah, I went up to the front door (I mean what I figured was the front door... it wasn't that clear) and hoped for the best. What we got was beyond the best. The man inside was the Architect of the building (his home) and his company (Conchordia) had designed 2 of the house designs for Brad Pitt's Make It Right Project we were about to go see! So he took us around the house and showed us all the wonderful ways he had made his house more sustainable. He designed his house to be a lab, where he could see which techonologies worked and which did not. The house was LEED Gold I believe.


After we thanked Steven for showing us his lovely house we headed to the 9th ward to check out The Make it Right Project.

The place was totally devistated, there was nothing on this flat piece of land except 6 or so new houses from the MIR project. There was a group of people hanging outside this house below.
,
They were very nice and actually offered to show us around the house. Gloria, I believe was her name, was given the very first house in the 9th ward and she was able to tell the Architect exactly what she wanted (where as everyone else has to pick from the 13 eco-designs). On the inside the house was pretty normal, but there were a lot of bedrooms and people living in this house. They gave us home cooked Ribs and told us to stay but we were ready to move on and felt they had been kind enough (I tried ribs... 2 bites).

The trip was really great and I am really interested in going back to the 9th ward a year or so from now to see the progress that they have made. They are suppose to build 150 houses and they have funding for 90ish houses so far. Don't forget to check out the website for MIR and more of my pictures on facebook.



DCgreen

1st BiWeekly Post - DC Car Show

Earth 911 is a great site for your questions about how to dispose of things you don't need anymore. For instance, I just looked up motor oil and it went into the hows and whys to recycle used motor oil.

Green Yahoo is another site I just came upon. Its a collection of green blogs.



So this weeks story....



On Sunday, my Dad and I went to the DC car show. We almost could have gotten away with not paying because the main attraction (that I wanted to see - The Green Cars), was at the entrance before they collected tickets.

There were a number of green and "green" cars. Electric cars, propane powered cars, dieseal cars, plug ins, hybrids, biofuel and solar powered cars.

Here is the i MiEV from Mitsubishi

Cool little car, going to be all electric, I couldn't find a lot on it because most of the info was in Japanese.

We saw the old Rav-4 Electric Car that Toyota did years ago in response to California's 90's EV standards.














So then there were a bunch of other "green cars" (like biofuels and weak hybrids) and they were boring. So we did pay $20 for parking downtown and $12 each so we decided to get our money's worth and check out the main show rooms.

Inside we were able to walk through and pick out the hybrids and concept cars staggered between the SUV's and junk.

Here is the Chevy Volt

It was weird that they wouldn't open up the hood.

My dad and I really liked this Hybrid SUV. The Saturn Vue Hybrid. It is out right now (2009 Car) and in a year or so they are going to have a V6 plug-in version that is going to get even better mileage.

I found a site where this company took this car (2006 version) and made it a plug in that gets 150 mpg. Here is it


This was my Dad's favorite. It in the Ford Escape Plug-in Hybrid. Suppose to get 100 mpg. It is a 2011 car so a little ways off but possible worth the wait. Video here


And My favorite was the Tesla Roadster. It was really cool to finally see this car in person. The black model was all the way in the back and we thought that was so strange. Even when we got to the middle and found this red one, no sales person was telling people about it.

Side note - here is an article about Tesla getting $350 million in a few months to start production of their new car the model S.
Article Here

And Finally to show I am not a cold heartless only electric car person.... here is a nice petro car.

Ford GT i think.



That's It see you next week.


DCgreen

The Story of Stuff

This is a great video i just came across in a blog called jetsongreen.

Its called The Story of Stuff and it is a 20 minute video about the cycle of consumption in our country and the world, how it works and how to break that cycle.

A lot of what troubles people (and me) about this green revolution is "will this really change things." If I take 5 minute showers.... if everyone takes 5 minute showers will this change things? If I don't eat meat am I changing things.

I struggle with these questions (and others like them) everyday. Please Please Please watch this video. And then share it with a friend so you can discuss what it means and what needs to be done.

I just wrote my family an email with the subject "If you love me you will watch this video." I did that because I think this video hits it on the head what is wrong with our current trends in consumption. Also it is in a very easy to understand and visual way.

Enjoy the video.



DC


Quote from the site: "The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever."

Wind technology's future

Wind technology could be big in the United States soon.

Attached at the end is an article and 10 min presentation about the state of U.S. energy and foreign oil by an oil man named T. Boone Pickens. Watch it its good.

The article following talks about how we can power 84% of peoples cars with electric energy when people charge their cars at non peak hours. This means 84% of all cars are plug in hybrids or Electric vehicles and we dont need more power plants to supply this new electricity demand if people charge at night when people are sleeping.


Jetson Green Article

another follow up article

10 Things You Should Know About Natural Gas Vehicles



DC

Fully Electric Factor Cars in 2009-10?

I can't WAIT. For these cars to start hitting the road in substantial numbers.

We are hopefully looking at about 5-10 fully electric cars by 2010. Some of them you can pre-order and some are still in the testing phases. Here are a few of them for you to check out.

The Tesla electric car
Two Seat Sports Car

0 to 60 in 3.9 seconds
135 mpg equivalent
220 miles per charge
2009MY Roadster base price: $109,000


NEW! The Six50
A hybrid 2+2-seater (Electric and Solar Powered)

62 miles per charge
75 mph top speed


The Phoenix Electric SUT
4 Seater Pick up Truck (and they have an SUV model as well)

100 miles+ per charge
75 mph top speed (factory set)
On-Board Vehicle 6.6KW Charger: 5 to 6 hours
Off-Board High-Power 250KW Charger: Under 10 min. to 95% SOC



The Mitsubishi iMiEV

80 mph top speed
100 mile per charge
2010 in US... under $20,000


The Subaru R1e
two-seater city car

65 mph top speed
50 miles range
2012-13 in US... under $20,000



BYD (Chinesse Batter Company)'s E6 Electric Car
5 seater

100 mph top speed
186 mile range

Keep a look out for these cars hitting the road soon. Also check out Zap Cars, Tango T600, and the unimpressive Chevy Volt.



DC


UPDATE: I just found this site with 30 electric cars. I like my list better because the cars I chose are more updated and they are cars that will be mass produced commuter cars. A lot of the cars in this other article are slow neighborhood cars or concept cars that will never be sold to consumers.

Old Man MacCready

Paul MacCready is a very very interesting man. Intelligent and creative he has won countless awards.

He was an inventor, most know for his flying machines. He designed a plane that was bike powered plane, the Gossamer Albatross, that flew 22 miles across the English Channel in 1979. In 1981 the Solar Challenger, flew 163 miles on 400 watts from photovoltaics. His solar powered car, the Sunraycer, crossed 2,000 miles of Australian desert. (This was part of the inspiration for the EV1, GM's fully electric car.

In 1990, he and his team designed the Helios (youtube video). The Helios has about 62,000 solar cells across the wing. The solar cells collect energy from the Sun and convert it to electricity, which runs the 14 small motors, which turn the 14 propellers.

"On August 13, 2001, remote-control pilots on the ground used a computer to fly the Helios Prototype to an altitude of 96,863 feet. That's over 18 miles straight up! Before the Helios Prototype, the highest recorded flight of any aircraft was about 85,000 feet. This was done in 1976 by the SR-71 spy plane, the fastest jet in the world. Only rockets and rocket-powered airplanes have gone higher."
source

Paul gave this speech at TED a few months before he passed away.
Video-21minutes(very cool)

DC

Zero Energy Project

After about two weeks of brainstorming, we have come up with a project for the summer.

Project:
We are going help design Donna Shalala's guest house to be a Zero Energy Building.

Background:
Donna Shalala as well as many other UM teachers are going to be moving into a new neighborhood in Coral Gables called Four Fillies Farm. Her house is going to be too large to do anything major with sustainable design, but the designers expressed interest in designing the guest house to be Zero Energy. The guest house will consist of a garage for her driver? and an apartment on the second floor.

The Plan:
We are going to focus on 2 topics:
Rainwater Harvesting and a
Integrated Energy System

We are going to be exploring permeable pavement, roof rainwater harvesting, pvs, solar water heaters, and reflective roof technologies.

Food for thought!
Starting 2016 all new homes in the UK will have to be zero-emission for heating, hot water, cooling, ventilation and lighting.

California is planing on doing the same for 2020.

DC

Summer Internship

The summer has arrived. I am excited to say that I will be researching "sustainable" technologies this summer. After the first few days of researching and brainstorming, it looks as though I will focusing my energies on studying:

Green Roofs,
Photovoltaics,
Pervious Pavements,
and Rainwater Harvesting

I am really excited I get so much time learning and researching as much as I can about these sustainable technologies.

Meanwhile here is some food for thought:

A new solar technology that is likely to exceed a 35% efficiency, making solar power as cheap as power from the grid. The first product is called a SunBall the second is called the SunCube. These guys from Australia designed them and already orders for millions $$$ of dollars worth of them.

Check an Article about it HERE

And For a Video explaination Click HERE

DC

Living Land & Waters

I was watching Ben Harper on "Green Deets" when I heard him bring up a man by the name of Chad Pregracke. Harper said this guy was one of his heroes. I wanted to find out more about this guy and what I found was really inspiring.

Chad Pregracke is the President and founder of Living Lands and Waters. 10 years ago he starting cleaning up the Mississippi and has continued every since. Here is LL&W website, there you will find a video from CBS about Chad and his endeavors.

LL&W

Also check out this short 4 minute clip from youtube.com where he gives a funny inspirational talk about how he first got started. This is well worth the watch, I think he could be in stand-up.

youtube.com


DC

What can TED do for you?

Al Gore, just recently gave a new slide show presentation entitled "New Thinking On The Climate Crisis." It is an inspirational 22 minute presentation, followed by a short Q&A session.

Check it out here!

http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/243

And if you are pressed for time the video is cut and compressed into a 2 minute barrage of words and images here:

Al Gore Video in 2 minutes


DC

Extra Reading and Sources:

Treehugger.com
TED.com

What is the Best Way to Power Our Cars? Part 3

For the last blog on the topic of alternative fuels in cars, I am going to focus on Electric Powered Vehicles (EVs)

What are they? They are vehicles that are powered by an electric motor. The electric motor is connected to a controller. And that controller is connected to a battery source in the car.

How does it work? Electric cars can use AC or DC electric motors. Without getting into too much electricity jargon, AC stands for alternating current and DC stands for direct current. AC motors are similar to a gasoline engine in that it requires a transition to operate. A DC motor, however, is designed so that you can have continuous acceleration. Both types of engines have their benefits and actually in the case of AC powered cars, a DC components is needed its operation.

These motors can be finely controlled and provide high torque from rest, unlike ICEV, and do not need gears to match power curves. This removes the need for gearboxes and torque converters. Internal combustion engines can weight almost 1000 pounds; where as, an EV motor can weight 75-100 lbs. EVs require a lot of batteries to power their motors, but they can be placed strategically around the base of the car for added stability (rather then a front heavy car).

Speaking of batteries, that needs to be discussed. The batteries are what makes or breaks an Electric Vehicle. And right now it is what is holding back the industry. There are a few important things that these batteries need to accomplish:

First, to give these cars a long range (50-300 miles) these batteries need to be able to hold a lot of charge. Next, to charge quickly (3-6 hours at night). Also, they need to last a long time (5-10 years).

These types of needs are specific to our perception of how any car should preform. We are used driving 200 miles before having to stop for 10 minutes to fill up on gas. And no one wants to have to shell out 2 grand on new parts every 2 years.

What are the benefits? These cars are a lot simpler than ICEV. There are a less parts in an EV, so that means a lot less money for repairs and replacements. When GM EV1s were brought in for repairs there was very little work that needed to be done. Air in the tires, maybe an aliment check, then you were on your way.

In addition, they release almost no air pollutants at the place they are operated. This would be a HUGE improvement to mobile pollution source reduction, one of the most difficult types of pollution to control.

As we talked about in the last section, hybrids use electric energy to get up to crusing speed so that the gas engine can work most efficiency. Electric motors often achieve 90% energy conversion efficiency over the FULL range of speeds and power output. Combine this with regenerative braking and you are really using your energy to the fullest.

Another advantage is that electric vehicles typically have less vibration and noise pollution than a ICEV, whether it is at rest or in motion.


Are EVs the answer? The answer in my opinion is 100% yes. Unfortunately, right now there are not that many available.

What is the Best Way to Power Our Cars? Part 2

For the second part of this discussion I want to talk about Hybrid Vehicles.

What is it? A hybrid automobile is any vehicle that combines two or more sources of power that can directly or indirectly provide propulsion power. You have heard of the Prius storming the nation and Toyota’s record U.S. sales. Are these hybrids the answer to all our problems?

How does it work? One popular type of hybrid is a parallel hybrid. This has a fuel tank that supplies gasoline to the engine and a set of batteries that supplies power to the electric motor. Both the engine and the electric motor can turn the transmission at the same time, and the transmission then turns the wheels.

The benefit to this system is that because the electric engine can assist in propulsion you can design a smaller gasoline for the vehicles. Smaller engines decrease the weight of the vehicle and use less cylinders (less gas). In addition, the electric power can be used exclusively until the vehicle has reached a cruising speed (15-40mph), at which time the gas engine can turn on and operate at its most efficient speeds.

The next advantage of parallel hybrids requires a quick and painless physics lesson. This is that “Energy can neither be created nor destroyed.” Whenever you step on the brake pedal in your car, you are removing energy from the car. The brakes of your car remove this energy and dissipate it in the form of heat. A hybrid car can capture some of this lost energy and store it in the battery to use later. This "regenerative braking” also will increase the life of your break pads.

One of the biggest ways to reduce emissions is to eliminate idling. When a hybrid comes to a stop at a light or in traffic, the gas engine shuts down. A hybrid car does not need to rely on the gasoline engine because it uses the electric motor to power the car from stopped to cruising speeds. So the hybrid car will turn off the gasoline engine, when the vehicle is stopped at a red light, which saves gas and reduces dreaded idling emissions.

Is this the answer? Yes and No. Hybrids are able to reduce tailpipe emissions and to improve mileage, but until recently even with increasing gas prices and new innovations in battery technology, hybrid cars and buses were not cost effective. It is inevitable, however, that with advances in technology the prices for these cars, trucks, and buses will be competitive with standard ICEV (internal combustion engine vehicles). Making them the obvious choice over standard ICEV. But maybe there is alternative?

Some hybrids require plugging in to recharge electric power. While some may avoid this, citing higher electric bills, plug in hybrids can achieve 150 mpg for their first 50 miles. Regular hybrids rely on the gas engine for the first part of a trip because the batteries need to be recharged by the alternator and the “regenerative breaking.” This means the gas engine would not shut off – when the car stops at a light and would kick on before the car reached cruising speeds – until the batteries have been charged.

My mother purchased a Ford Escape hybrid two years ago. It is an SUV and she was excited about having a more efficient large car. She didn’t do it for the money; she did it for the environment. The hybrid model cost about 7,000 more than the non-hybrid, she figures she’s not going to make that back, even with oil now at $100 a barrel.

· Escape FWD 4-cyl. - $19,995

· Escape AWD 4-cyl. - $23,235

· Escape AWD 6-cyl. - $27,145

· Escape Hybrid FWD - $26,970

· Escape Hybrid AWD - $28,595

Although this SUV is rated at 36 mpg City/ 25 mpg Highway, she has a computer on the dash that says she averages 27.8 mpg. This is despite that fact we live just outside of Washington, D.C., where she works.

DC

Extra Reading and Sources:

Ford Escape "How Stuff Works"

Hybrid Cars "How Stuff Works"

Hybrid Vehicles Wikipedia

What is the Best Way to Power Our Cars? Part 1

I want to break down this topic and talk about the pros and cons to alternative fuels in cars.

First lets analyze E-85 biofuel.

What is it? E-85 is a mixture of 85% ethanol and the rest gasoline. E-85 ethanol is used in engines modified to accept higher concentrations of ethanol. The gasoline ensures that the engine starts in cold weather, because straight alcohol won't.

So whats the purpose? In an attempt to decrease our dependence on foreign oil, the government, oil companies and car companies are investing in biofuels because the ethanol in the fuel can be produced from corn (a renewable source). There are some claims that E-85 burns cleaner, however, this fact is under debate.

Is this the answer? While the idea is seems noble, it is very short sighted and is not the end solution to our problems.

Let me explain why:

In 2005, the republican controlled congress passed The Energy Policy Act of 2005. This was in the writers words, "an attempt to combat growing energy problems provide tax incentives and loan guarantees for energy production of various type." This bill had many shortcomings, one of which was that it required that any federal vehicle that could operate on alternative fuels be operated on these fuels exclusively.

What you may be wondering is: why weren't they running on these fuels before? Well a recent GM study found that roughly 70 percent of its flex-fuel vehicle owners didn't know they could use E85, and fewer than 10 percent did so. The government at this time was only operating their own flex-fuel vehicles 51% of the time (the majority).

Well now this is good, the feds are going to use E-85 more and our dependence on oil will drop. Not quite. What this bill did is double the governments needs for E-85, creating a storage, limiting public availability and increasing its price. Currently, there are only around 800 public E-85 stations in the US and 1 in Canada. Bummer.

So why are car companies building E-85 vehicles anyway? Because as an incentive to develop alternative fuel cars, fuel economies for E-85 cars are multiplied by a factor. For example, a 15 MPG duel-fuel E-85 capable vehicle is rated as a 40 MPG under U.S. standards.

So even when it is estimated <1%>used in E-85 capable vehicles is actually E-85. By producing E-85 cars car companies are able to inflate their average fuel economy for all their vehicles.



DC


Check out a few of my sources if you would like to learn about E-85 in more depth.

Article by Car.com
Wikipedia E-85


to be continued...

DC Green

Welcome to DC Green, where I plan to discuss pressing Environmental issues and ways to be more "Green."

In the last 2 years, I have been studying politics and researching green topics. I have found that the public is generally uninformed in both respects. While you can watch the news: it's biased; while you can find website articles: it is easy to get distacted and know which sites are based on real facts. I want to share some crediable facts and ideas that I have found and create a discussion on these green topics.

Thank you and enjoy.

DC