Sorry :(

Haven’t posted in (gulp) 18 days!  Wow, I’m terribly sorry – been hacked up at work and just not much time for anything else.  Heck, today’s Valentines’ Day, it’s 10pm and I haven’t even seen my love except for 10 minutes before we both rushed out the door!

So anyway, our new thing is that we’ve been looking into replacing our gas water heater with an on-demand.  I remember traveling in Spain how many places had them and they always worked great and that was ages ago and it got me to thinking, why don’t Americans use on-demand hot water?  Why is it that we all seem to like to waste the energy to keep some 30+ gallons of water hot just for that one shower every day?  At the very least, we should all be doing this … Repair/Replace your Water Heater.  In the meantime, I’ll be looking at some units over the weekend.

Duh of the day

Gore says changing lightbulbs is not enough.

Duh. Are we that stupid?

“Green Collar” – what a bunch of hype

I read Green Collar Jobs posted on Green Tech Gazette and all I can say is what a bunch of crappy hype.  It’s just like Web 2.0 – nothing more than a marketing term to describe jobs that already existed.  So what if the job has a “green” slant – the entire world is making a meek attempt to move toward earth-friendliness so why do we have to put a label on it?  Does that mean that within a few years every job will be “green collar”?  Call your job for what it is.

The part that gets me under the collar the most is:

Kermit the Frog used to say, “It’s not easy being green,” but now green is hot, trendy and popular. Green collar jobs are expected to sprout up and grow over the next several decades. And, this will be putting a little green in many people’s wallets.

Do we really think that it’s going to put money into our pockets?  No, it’s just the right thing to do and we gotta stop worrying about the financial aspect and worry more about whether or not we can survive on the planet.

Reduced emission != sustainability

Now this is a truly great rant from keith…hits the point right on the mark (though sorry, I still love treehugger for my own reasons).  In short, just because “it” (loosely defined) is more earth-friendly than other solutions does not mean sustainable.

Those guys at Treehugger.com, what a bunch of great guys! They love a joke, don’t they?

“In spite of all the bad news about first-generation biofuels, it’s still a thrill to hear that Virgin Atlantic announced yesterday a 747 flown on a mixture of about 20 percent biofuel and the rest kerosene will lift off for a test flight in February, many months earlier than planned.

“The passengerless Virgin flight from London to Amsterdam will be a Boeing 747-400 and will fly the approximately 1.5-hour flight on the alternative fuel, which Virgin spokesman Paul Charles wouldn’t identify but said is from a “sustainable” source that doesn’t compete with food or freshwater supplies.”

Anyone would think they are really supporting flying – good thing it’s just some crazy April Fools joke. What? It’s not a joke?! My source tells me that they really did write an article that said it was “a thrill” to hear about a 20% biofuel plane.

A Thrill?!

Do they really think that making any form of flying more respectable will do anything to make this planet a greener place? 20% biofuels, so that means 80% kerosene, so let’s just suppose that it’s a 20% cut in fossil fuel emissions. Now let’s look at the source of the biofuel.

A “sustainable” source would mean no net transport emissions, no use of fertilisers, no loss of habitat, no reduction in photosythesis…are you getting this?

And let’s just suppose (we’re really stretching the imagination now) that this “sustainable” source is better than kerosene in terms of overall emissions. How many people will stop flying now if they think that it is ok to carry on doing it because their flights are now a little bit greener? How many people who previously refused to fly because of the horrific greenhouse gas growth will now think again, and maybe take the odd Virgin flight?

If flying was truly sustainable then I would be on the first plane to New Zealand to see the glaciers before they all melted away; but it never will be sustainable, and I’m not going. Treehugger, you really have sold out on this one.

Saving pennies for portables

OK, I admit it, I’m a bit envious, which is pretty unusual.  I would love to get my hands on one of the MacBook Air’s when they actually slide off the production line.  Anyone who knows me knows I have no love for either Windows or Mac – they’re both great and they both have their problems.  I started my (former) career in BSD and love much about Unix variants but it’s just way too much work to do anything.

And when the iPhone was released I did not rush out to get one.  I do have a Windows Mobile phone and I think it sucks.  In fact of all the mobile phones I’ve ever had, I still miss my brick Samsung with the roller-dial on the side.  It may have lacked all the conveniences of today but the interface was phenomenally intuitive and usable.

So for work, simply because we’re largely a Microsoft shop, I use a Windows laptop though most of you would probably be surprised to know that I do not keep up with replacements – I’m kicking around with a 7 year-old Dell Latitude with XP on it.  At the office I have both Win and Mac desktops – no preference for either as they both do certain tasks well and both have pros and cons to the interface.  My S/O uses a Mac laptop and loves it dearly after being a die-hard Win user for 7 years.

A friend of mine got one of those EeePC’s and I have to say that I’m truly impressed.  It’s extremely light, screen is bright, cheap of course, and the sucker boots in no time.  Mostly, it’s utilitarian.  Like anyone, I love my little tools and all, but there is something to be said for a lightweight, responsive device that for all instensive purposes does fulfill most basic needs.

So yea, I’m a little intrigued by the MacAir – not so much for the Mac OS but more because of the advances they’ve made with the hardware end.  Would love to buy one but with the impending recessional doom, I guess I should be saving my pennies, or at least for that Frybrid converter kit.

Recycle the Heat From Your Dryer

This is a really great idea especially if you live in colder climates … the Heat Keeper.  Basically it filters the particles out of your dryer exhaust and back into the home.  Simple and inexpensive.  I can’t believe I’ve never even really thought about doing this.  Just to be sure, yes, you can in fact get it for just about $6 on Amazon.  If your place is like mine, you can probably then attach some extra ducting and run it outside of the laundry room into another common area – be sure to insulate the duct so that you can benefit from both the radiant and blown heat!

[read a thumbs-up about it here]

Make Your Office Green in Less than 10 Minutes

Making your office “green” or starting a environmental policy for company is easy! In fact you can get started and have a significant change in your office environmental thinking in less than 10 minutes. These are 10 extremely simple steps that you can implement immediately without much effort.

My office has been slowly making headway largely because of employees taking a few extra steps.  The obvious one – going paperless – is often a lot harder than one would think (especially in a tech office) but a little effort goes a long way.

[read the rest of "Make Your Office Green in Less than 10 Minutes"]

Story of Stuff

Like many people, I realize that the earth is dying and that we can pretty much blame ourselves.  I spent about 10 years in Boy Scouts and was fortunate to have experienced and learned about environmentalism from a young age and as a consequence have looked for ways to play my part.

One reason I learned as much as I did was because of the way I was taught.  As years have passed, the complexity of understanding the environmental problem from the perspective of how we contribute to it has become nearly impossible to describe, so I was very happy when I came across this site – The Story of Stuff.  In it, the narrator does a great job of not only explaining the extent of the problem but the vicious cycle of consumerism and how it makes the problem worse.

It got me to thinking, and probably something you all ask – why should I care (as a web designer)?  It still matters.  Remember that the Internet has become a ubiquitous lifestyle for our culture, and what we do as web designers directly influences everyone who comes in contact with our designs.  In other words, you have that power to change the way people think!  Use that power to your advantage.

For my new round of UCD classes starting in 2008, we will be adding a new dimension to the mix – what sustainable production is and how our actions as designer/developers can influence people to react in a certain way. 

[pulled from Story of Stuff post]

Food for thought

[original post here] This last week, I had the class write opinion papers about convergence of technologies and how the fact that the U.S. was actually behind technologically in many respects (particularly, in this case, e-commerce convergence).  I got a lot of really interesting thoughts.  The focus that I was particularly looking for - whether it was cultural compulsion or big business or even government that was preventing us from moving forward – was examined from as many angles as there were papers.

In reading one of my regular daily reads (GreenDaily), there was an interesting post made about the underachievement by the auto industry to generate interest in more fuel efficient cars that I feel, oddly enough, summarizes one of the biggest reasons for the techno-deficiency of this country:

Responding to lobby efforts to thwart a bill in Congress to increase light truck mileage minimums to 35mpg by 2020: Could it be that Americans would be more enthusiastic about domestic cars if they actually offered an advantage over their foreign competitors? — i.e. better fuel economy. 35mpg for cars and light trucks does not sound like a very lofty achievement for our auto industry, even by today’s standards. In their letter to congress, the autoworkers group states that we already have the technology now to meet an average of 37mpg (not that I necessarily trust their info). As far as I’m concerned, In 2020, getting 35 miles a gallon should be laughable. If our auto industry can’t meet this kind of goal, it’s in worse shape than we thought.

What are your thoughts?  If you’re interested, here’s the article on Green Daily.

The value of old fashioned ways in a Web 2.0 world

[Commentary on article from CNet’s Matter/AntiMatter blog of the same title by Richard Adamson]

Everyone knows that despite my techno-evangelism, I am pretty much old-school and new technologies that actually truly excite me are few and far in-between.  More often than not it’s the underlying principles behind certain consumables that I appreciate – the keyword/link paradigm from Google, the flexbility and coming-of-age of Web Services, and so forth.

This article by Richard Adamson from CNET is a pretty good idea to consider – it’s not so much broadening what you do, but refining how you do it and taking the time to communicate the ideas.  Web 2.0 is just a buzzword in reality – it describes a convergence of interface technologies with the use of Web Services but beyond that and its accompanying visual design changes, it really hasn’t amounted to much (save for the conceptual use of AJAX).  I’m not even sure the purported Web 3.0 is really all that except refocusing the Web 2.0 backdrop into the foreground.

Sorry to say but I am a fervent believer in old fashioned ways, including how I approach programming logic and user experience.  And despite all the glitz of all the new tech toys (and they seem to be coming out at a geometrically increasing rate), the old stuff still works – if it didn’t it wouldn’t still be around (ok, except for certain politicians).

On a side note, my S/O and I are going increasingly green.  Not that I haven’t been a less-than-vocal supporter of various crusades, but she recently got onto it on a relatively dramatic level and it’s done well for us.  Just the basic stuff – swapping out light bulbs, changing electrical-usage habits, fervent recycling, changing clothes rather than the thermostat, dumping one vehicle and riding the bus, and so forth – has already made a major impact in our monthly bills (and I mean more than 50%).  We are considering going full-bore and getting solar panels to go off-the-grid but this is still under deliberation.  We coupled that by moving our basic organic diet to GFCF and it’s really changed the way we approach things.  Anyway, I’m not making the big rant about going green but yes, it’s a problem and every contribution you can make on a regular and habitual level will help extend what’s left of this sputtering planet.