skinnyflyer

Here's another article from the National Post titled 'Global warming? Look at the numbers'; http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/columnists/story.html?id=61b0590f-c5e6-4772-8cd1-2fefe0905363&p=1 "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

here, this is a great article about csp; http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2583 "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

i saw this on cnn tonight. they reported that within a few hours, they were able to find a translator willing to volunteer his services who lived within 15 mins from the courthouse. they also said that the suspect graduated from a school that required him to take several english classes and that he also rejected the english as a second language courses and instead took the normal english classes. they also interviewed his neighbour who claimed he was very fluent in english. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

yes it was cp 100%. there were several hundred downloads that had been deleted and all shared a very clear search criteria. ultimately the only real evidence that it was roomate A was that me and roomate B matched the download times to when roomate A was home alone all day. but like others have said it could possibly be some remote controlled virus or something. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

thanks for all the replies and advice. this actually happened several years ago and i don't ever use this persons computer anymore or even go to his place. and like i said the usernames are gone so there is no danger of me being blamed for anything. i only see this person during group activities with old friends because he's still friends with many of them. and like several people posted i didn't want to risk runining this persons life on something that i can't really be %100 certain of. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

This is a true story that happened to me. I was at a friends house downloading music on his computer when i realized that the computer was in the process of downloading porn. not regular porn, the kind that you go to jail for. and it wasn't like maybe its legal, maybe its not. definately not( this was deduced from the titles, not from looking at it.). i then checked the download folder thinking maybe it was just an accident. unfortunately there were hundreds of files downloaded with the same search criteria. normally i would just say this is none my business, however the owner of the computer had set up 5 usersnames to log in with representing himself(let's call him roomate A), my other friend(roomate B), 2 other people and myself. the computer was logged in under my username when i discoverd the downloads(i then logged in with another username but the downloads became invisible). so if anyone else had discovered these download they would presumably think that it was me. in other words whoever downloaded this stuff deliberately used my username in case they were discovered. i assumed that it was roomate B because he was the only person there when i discovered these downloads in progress. this was a close friend for 20years. i confronted him, he denied it, we checked the dates of all the downloads and figured out that it was actually roomate A. in the end he removed the usernnames for logging in but we never confronted him. he is not a close friend of mine but he's friends with all my friends. roomate A and B remained good friends however i will never trust this person again and i don't respect him either. how would you react in this situation? would you still want to participate in group activities if this person were present? "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

Lots of people say that about physics. Doesn't make it true, though. If the Moon rotates about the Earth, then so does the Sun. The Earth AND the Moon rotate about the barycenter. The barycenter is NOT the Earth, any more than you are the Earth. It's easy, really, to be accurate. Why are you so defensive of an ill-posed game show question? u didn't adress my response. the original question was what gravitates around the earth which means what is being pulled by gravity around the earth. so although it might appear that the sun is orbiting around the earth it can be proven that it isn't being pulled around the earth by gravity so the answer cannot be the sun. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

Depends on your frame of reference: If you insist on being geocentric, then the Sun is a correct answer too. If you don't insist, then both the Earth and the Moon both rotate about their common center of mass, and about the Sun, and about the center of the Galaxy, and... i'm trying to understand what u mean by this? the geocentric model is obviously incorrect. and although the translation used the word 'rotate' the actual word is 'what gravitates around the earth?' so regardless of perspective the answer is the moon. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

speaking of solar systems; http://www.nothingtoxic.com/media/1184907254/Never_Poll_the_Audience_on_the_French_Millionaire_Show "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

the IEA's lattest report contains three scenarios; low growth, medium and high growth and all 3 have demand overtaking supply in 2011 and before. this is a very serious admission;(the first graph is IEA) http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/2805/20070713nelder713wp0.jpg (other); http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/1293/discoveriessf5cp3.jpg http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/3561/worldoverview4mc5.jpg "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

i vote solar because its completely renewable and emission free, it can be used in many places especially on site and it has the potential to be very cheap in the futur. lets not forget that nuclear isn't sustainable. supply problems, serious security and disposal issues. didn't those breeder reactors have all kinds of problems and not work properly at all? that being said i think we're going to need a lot of new nuclear power in the face of peak oil but we shouldn't aim to have it as our main power source. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

I strongly disagree. fuel efficient cars are already more economic and will be more so in the future. i posted the example of solar power already being on par with grid electricity in italy. trend; 1barrel of oil in 1999=$10 1barrel of oil in 2007=$70+ 1barrel of oil in 2015=?? "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

from wiki; Grid parity Grid parity, the point at which photovoltaic electricity is equal to or cheaper than grid power, has already been achieved in some regions. Grid parity has been reached in Hawaii and many other islands that use diesel fuel to produce electricity. In Italy, PV power has been cheaper than retail grid electricity since 2006. One kWh in Italy costs 21.08 €-cents. [3] Italy has an average of 1,600 kWh/m2 sun power per year (Sicily has even more, at 1,800 kWh/m2). ........ Some electric companies offer rebates to their customers, such as Austin Energy in Texas, which offers $4.50/watt installed up to $13,500. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

I came across this for california; --------------------------------------------------------- PV CELL INSTALLATION BREAKDOWN Here is a breakdown on the price for a 2KW gridtie from me in the SF Bay Area: Contract Price: $18K Rebate: $4K Tax Credit: $2K Net Price To Customer: $12K My Cost For Modules: $10K My Cost For Inverter: $1.7K My Cost For Other Equipment: $1.2K Remaining To Cover Labor and Overhead: $5.1k --------------------------------------------------- how much is electriciy there? if only u had the 42c/kwh subsidy over there. combine that with the cheaper concentrated pv cells and it would be really competitive. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

you're right the example i came up with is terrible and doesn't work. like i said i'm not an investor and i don't know what i'm talking about. i'm just someone who's curious about the economics of alternative energy. not sure why i thought u said 10 years instead of 15. lets try a different example http://www.energyrefuge.com/archives/Solar_panel_subsidy.htm so in ontario canada they will pay you 42c/kwh for all the electricity you produce. and for the electricity that u consume u buy from the grid at 6c/kwh. this is certainly the best subsidy in canada, possibly north america? so lets say a 2kw system runs u 20k. there are ~2000 hours of sunlight/year there. 2000x2kw=4000kwhx0.42c=$1680/yr we can ignore ur actual usage since ur buying it at 6c. 1680/20000=0.08% its not the same as a compounding 0.08%return but thats $33600 over the life of the 20year contract they're offering. plus if they last another 15+years after that as they are expected then u would get 25000 more assuming that electricity is that expensive or they renew the subsidy. if ur capable of getting 8-10% in stocks or whatever then u could take ur 1680/yr and have it compounding. and lets not forget that the government is promising you that rate for at least 20 years. now lets say that theres a leap in the technology; http://www.soliant-energy.com/products.php they don't give any prices yet but they claim that its signifigantly cheaper than traditional pv cells. if you could built the same 2kw system for 10k then it certainly would be worth it to borrow the whole 10k at 5%. lets say its 15k for the 2kw system. 1680x20yrs=33600 0.05%x15000x20yrs=15000 -________ $18600+20yrs more obviously at some point u have to pay off the capitol if you borrowed. so if u put all ur profit to pay off the capitol then its paid in off in ~11 years. but i guess if ur earning 10% with other investments then maybe its better not to pay it off until the day it earns less than the interest on the loan. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

yes i am not an investor and don't know what i'm talking about. tax rate is much higher here in qc canada. 50% for over ~50k. what if you borrowed the 10k at 5%= $500/yr in interest. and the system saves you 500$/yr and more and more each year as fossil fuels become much more expensive. if i use 10% compounded interest and a 50%tax on gains then i will have $16284 in 10 years. where did you get 40k? even at 10% tax free its no where near 40k. 70/%growth=doubling time. 70/7%(your numbers after tax)=10years =20k you're right its not a winner with those numbers but the point i was trying to make is that its not that far off from competing with grid price. not as some great investment to get rich. maybe a better example would be one of my family members has has ~1million in assets and is happy making a safe 5-6% return and paying ~%50 of that return in tax. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

i'm no expert but if the claims of the company from the link I posted above are accurate then solar might be priced much more competitely. these are just random numbers but if a system runs you 10k and saves you $500/yr you're getting a 5%return tax free vs if you invested 10k in the stock market and are skilled enough to get a 10% return you'll probably end up paying half that 10% in taxes. so i think that it's not there yet but it might make sense financially in the near future. especially as fossil fuel energy becomes more expensive. and if you're estimated return on your investment beats the current interest rate then why not borrow. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

one very important factor when considering solar is whether or not your state has net metering. net metering allows you to sell back any excess electricity you don't use back to the grid. this means that u don't need expensive batteries and your system will be much simpler and therefor cheaper. for example in ontario canada they're offering to buy solar electricity from customers at 42c when the market price is something like 6-10c. i believe some states also offer tax rebates and possibly other subsidies. also check this out; http://www.soliant-energy.com/products.php its concentrated solar power. they use mirrors to concentrate the solar rays on to a photovoltaic cell. this allows them to use much less of the expensive pv cells in order to produce the same amount of electricity. they're supposed to be much cheaper than traditional pv cells though they're not coming to the market until 2008. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

i second that idea. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

imagine that you live in an ancient small island society and one day you discovered that one of your co-islanders was a homicidal maniac. the jeffrey dahmar of that time. you lack the ability to properly imprison this person so the only real alternative is to execute him. so, immoral or not, the islanders execute him out of necessity for the island community as a whole. i believe that overpopulation is the greatest underlying problem of modern civilization. it is a serious threat to civilization. so i believe the same argument is true here. abortion should be allowed at any time during the pregnancy. when the population is sustainable then you can talk about whether its moral or not, whether it should be 3 months or 6 months. in the end if we don't chose a way of being sustainable then nature will chose one for us. i am not saying that abortion is the solution but it is certainly one of the things that helps us control population levels. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

By you guys do you mean the rest of the world? (bar Venezuela and Iran etc.) Look at the gas prices around the world and count yourself very lucky. gas prices per country; "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

http://911research.wtc7.net/essays/pm/ "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

can someone who operates or works at a dz please share some information. i know people have posted break downs of jump tickets before but i would like to have a break down of current prices as well as predictions as to what a jump would cost with rising gas prices. if gasoline in the us currently averages 3$/gal and your jump ticket costs x $, then how much would x$ be if the cost of gas went to; 5$/gal 7$/gal 10$/gal 15$/gal 20$/gal feel free to add thing like; at x price of gas it is no longer economical to take small loads and we would only be able to take large loads of x jumpers in plane A. at x price of gas we would no longer be able to operate a profitable or break even dz. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

this graph shows discoveries vs consumption. "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs

the source that i used seems to be down. i googled it and found this; http://www.energybulletin.net/14745.html they use 600 hours for gasoline, although they don't explain how they arrived at it. this is actually an interesting article; EROEI (Energy Return on Energy Invested) for Various Fuels Biodiesel- 3:1 Coal- 1:1 to 10:1 Ethanol- 1.2:1 Natural Gas- 1:1 to 10:1 Hydropower- 10:1 Hydrogen- 0.5:1 Nuclear- 4:1 Oil- 1:1 to 100:1 Oil Sands- 2:1 Solar PV (2) - 1:1 to 10:1 Wind (2) - 3:1 to 20:1 "Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." A. Sachs