Green Expo 08

I attended the Green Expo at the Palm Beach Community College
yesterday. It was a small but interesting collection of displays and
tables manned by representatives of various vendors and public
agencies. Some of the people there were former colleagues of mine at
the SFWMD and we had a nice visit with them. There was one solar
installer represented. They showed great interest in our home and in
the monitoring software. I now wish I had brought some of our
brochures for our monitoring software along to distribute to them.
They were really interested in our product so I gave them the website,
http://www.mysolarlog.com/ and am confident they will visit it.
Their website is http://www.abundantenergy.com/ .


One vendor had an interesting product that I may follow up on. It
is a clear acrylic addon for your windows that works like a storm
window. The product installs a clear acrylic pane in a magnetic frame
over the existing windows creating a double pane window at 70 percent
less cost than replacing the windows. I might look into it for certain
windows on my house that give the greatest heat load. Their website,
which I have not visited yet, is http://www.window-insulators.com/


We bought a couple of plants from the Native Plant Society table
where we also chatted for a bit with an old friend who is a member of
the society.

All in all it was a pleasant experience but I
was struck by the fact that it could have been much, much more than it
was. We did not attend the rain barrel workshop even though we have an
interest in that area. But there seemed to be little advertising of
the event in advance in the wider community. I had hoped that the
Florida electric car group could have exhibited there and that other
workshops and talks could have been available to the public. There was
great interest in our house and what our experience has been living
with PV. Perhaps we can have more participation in the next one. It
was a rainy day all day and that probably prevented more people from
coming.

Utility Trucks Head for Texas

My son travels a lot for his work.  Using his Iphone he sent me this photo this morning of Florida Power and Light trucks traveling west on I-10 west of Tallahassee headed for Texas for relief work.  As a resident of South Florida where we had four hurricanes in one year I can only say that it is amazing that we live in a country where the states can help each other out like this.  I know that they are reimbursed for the expenses incurred but even so the fact that a day or two after a major storm like Ike these trucks can be on the road and on their way to help is fantastic.

Timelapse

Here is a short timelapse I took this morning. It is fascinating to shoot these things by just leaving the camera running using a CHDK script that enables an intervalometer control. The atmosphere is fascinating and as you see here when speeded (sped?) up so that we are more aware of it, it is always in motion and beautifully so.

Update for our friends and family:

Solar Logging Software

We are nearing completion on our solar logging software. This is my test site.

http://bbbrown.mysolarlog.com/

...and this is the main site.

http://www.mysolarlog.com

Automated Camera Scripting and KAP Robots

I have been experimenting with loading CHDK scripts on my Canon point and shoot A700 camera. You can read more about CHDK at http://www.hackaday.com/2008/05/27/how-to-expand-your-camera-with-chdk/ . My first attempts at time lapse using the scripts can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FICIKSYeioA and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8p2V8bOGNM&feature=related . Needless to say this also involved an exploration of Mencoder in Linux to create the video clips. Video clip creation from series of stills is pretty easy in Linux but the editing is still maturing.

All of this CHDK stuff is in preparation for launching an automated KAP rig based on the old one but using a small circuit board that automates all of the pans and tilts. http://skyware.fam-engels.de/aurico/overview_en.htm This in combination with CHDK KAP scripting eliminates the need for radio transmitter and receiver. It also eliminates the need for a shutter servo. Removing those two components should lighten the rig quite a bit. Bench testing proved flawless operation of all components. Flight testing needed next. It will be fun to just fly the kite and get the photos as a side benefit.

Router Soup Ups

That spare Liniksys WRT-54G router has now been put to good use. I loaded the DD-WRT software on it thereby enhancing greatly the capabilies of the router. DD-WRT is open source router software that replaces the Linksys firmware. http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page My goal in doing this was to create a repeater that could be used in the motorhome to enhance weak signals in campgrounds. I got that working today and the repeater now resides in the motorhome providing an extra benefit of filling in the north side of the house with solid wifi signal. I will add a high gain antenna to the motorhome and we will create our own ad hoc networks on the fly with this setup. No more struggling to aim the laptop to acquire a signal blocked by trees or poorly located antennas. It works and it works great. Next time WRT-54Gs go on sale you might consider picking up one to use as a repeater.

Linux and Our PCs

Running Kubuntu Linux quite comfortably on all machines now. I have kept my desktop as dual boot to use for the Microsoft Flight Simulator. My laptop has KDE 4.1, under developmant, and KDE 3.5, rock solid.

Current Reading

"The Assault on Reason" by Al Gore. This book is taking me longer to read than any I have read recently. I read a few pages, get pissed off and put it down for a while. Then I go back to it. I feel like a "Pawn in Their Game" as made famous by Bob Dylan's song.

Movies

While watching some YouTube videos of places we have visited and one town in Colorado in particular I found a video that took scenes from "True Grit" and found the real life locations where scenes were filmed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EUP9rOLf30 They all were in our favorite town in Colorado, Ouray. Now "True Grit" is at the top of our Netflix que followed by "The Kite Runner." Gotta get those Dalai Lama videos back in the mail so I can move on the John Wayne. The other one is old concerts of "The Grateful Dead."

Photos and Videos

I have been working on my project of getting all my old color print negatives digitized. Walgreens does such a good job at such a reasonable price. I have been taking them to the new store at Forest Hill and Congress. Finally getting a lot of my valuable travel photos and aviation pics on CD. I have also been pumping them up to Flickr to share with others. http://www.flickr.com/bbbrown Scanning the old photos myself is a long and tedious process that I have not given due diligence to.

Random Day Trips

About to ressurect our old one random trip a week thing. Not sure how we are going to do it but Ikea is on our list and I have a set of waypoints named "Mom and Pop Burger Joints" loaded in the GPS. There is also that barbecue place in Fort Peirce. Too bad we have to travel that far for reallly good barbecue.

Solar Cooker

So far I have just boiled water in my solar oven. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsWZ0sLubXU Hope to cook a meal in it when the sun comes back out.

Plug In Hybrid Conversion for Trucks and SUVs

Hybrid Electric Vehicle Technologies, Inc (HEVT) | An IIT (Illinois Institute of Technology) Startup in Chicago | News

This sounds like a great startup company. Watch the video, it is impressive. There are many who need pickups for their work, their farms, and other needs. This conversion makes them into high efficiency vehicles. This just proves that given the right incentives we can come up with solutions to the high price of fuel. Who knows? Maybe someday these power systems will exist even for motor homes.

Good summary of cause and effect for oil prices

ALTERNATIVE ENERGY BLOG - Solar-Energy-Wind-Power.com: Why are Oil Prices So High?

'.................................
Were per capita oil use in China and India to reach the same level as in the United States, this would fully deplete the world's remaining proven oil reserves in just 15 years and prospective resources, in 26 years.
.......................................

With a presidential
election this year in the United States and gas prices at record
levels, oil and energy in general is set to be a key issue. There is
the opportunity to have a serious debate about energy - a fundamental
part of our lives which has been taken for granted for far too long.
However the responses from the presidential candidates so far have not
been encouraging.

In 2002 McCain declared that ethanol is a
"giveaway to special interests in corn-growing states as the expense of
the rest of the country." In 2003 he put out a press release saying
"Ethanol does nothing to reduce fuel consumption, nothing to increase
our energy independence, nothing to improve air quality." He went on to
describe it as "highway robbery." Hillary Clinton signed a letter
saying that there is "no sound public policy reason for mandating the
use of ethanol".

McCain, Clinton and Obama all seem to have
drunk the ethanol Kool Aid and seen the bright white light that has
converted them to E85. In 2008 none of these presidential candidates seems to have anything negative to say about ethanol.

Solid State Laptops. The future of computers?

Samsung Q30 Solid State Laptop

Samsung
announced that next month it will begin shipping to the Korean market
its Q30, the first notebook PC with a solid-state hard disk. The
12.1-inch screen notebook will be equipped with a 32GB NAND flash based
solid-state disk (SSD).

The lack of moving parts will also allow it to go fanless, making it
absolutely silent, plus it'll be more efficient, boosting battery life.
Here comes the downside, though: it's going to cost $3700 for all this
solid-state goodness, and it's saddled with an old-fashioned Celeron M
753 (1.2GHz) chip. Bring on the Core Duos, and lower that price! Come
to think of it, it wasn't too long ago when all laptops cost that much
or more. Just think of this as a peek into the future.

From Gizmodo.com