Quick Reality Check Articles

November 19, 2009

Quick Reality Check – Min Wage

Filed under: Energy — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Administrator @ 01:38

In 1960, the minimum wage was $1.00 and the average wage was about $2.32 per hour.
A 24 ounce loaf of bread costs $0.21 and requires 13 minutes of work to earn.
A pound of ground beef costs $0.33 and requires 20 minutes of work to earn.
10 pounds of potatoes cost $0.49 which requires 29 minutes of work to earn.

In 2009 the minimum wage is now $7.25.
A 24 ounce loaf of bread costs $1.49 and requires 12 minutes of work to earn.
A pound of ground beef costs $3.49 and requires 29 minutes of work to earn.
10 pounds of potatoes cost $4.99, which requires 41 minutes of work to purchase.

In 2009 more people earn minimum wage as the better paying factory jobs have disappeared and minimum wage now buys less than it ever has!

We must create more jobs which can pay higher wages. One way of doing this is outlined as follows:

Individual consumers must demand quality products which are durable and reliable and which can be repaired in locals depots and not thrown away and replaced.

This would enable communities to look at converting local natural resources into the finished products to create the products we need and to reduce the environmental and economic burdens of shipping natural resource materials around the world and then bringing back finished goods.

This would also create employment in repairing and maintaining the products made and sold in the community.

Individuals must demand locally grown food produced by sustainable means without the use of pesticides, herbicides, and oil intensive means. This will enable sustainable distributed agricultural production which may require more labor and create more jobs while reducing our dependence on oil.

Individuals must demand energy independence and embrace emerging new technologies such as solar and wind power which can offer paybacks of four years or less for products with an operating life of 20 years or more.

Future blogs will provide additional details on how individuals can enhance the sustainability of our society and our planet.

October 25, 2009

Quick Reality Check – One step on the road to starvation

Filed under: Energy — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Administrator @ 22:24

* Energy cannot be created nor destroyed, just converted from one form to another, such as from sunlight to plant matter, and during this process energy is lost which is impractical to recover.

* Each day, the sun provides a finite amount of energy to the earth which creates our weather, causes the winds to blow, rains to fall, the plants to grow and shapes the face of our planet.

* All animals eat plants or eat animals that eat plants.

* Plants use photosynthesis to turn sunlight into stored energy in the form of carbohydrates, the basic fuel of all animals. There is no alternative to plant energy, just as there is no alternative to oxygen for animals including humans to live.

* Humans consume about 40 percent of Earth’s “primary productivity” which is the energy collected by plants each year, which may explain why the current extinction rate for other species is 1,000 times that it was before humans dominated the planet.

* The United States uses about half of the world’s primary productivity yet accounts for only about 6.3 percent of its population.

* This disparity is unsustainable. Therefore, in order to ensure a high quality of life for ourselves, our children, grandchildren, and future generations, we must learn to operate our society more energy efficiently.

* The “enhanced crop yields” which we are seeing are not a “scientific breakthrough” but are more like a “simple parlor trick of an amateur magician” wherein we now have crop yields 5 times higher per acre than the 1950s BUT we use 30-50 times more energy to produce these crops. We are actually “less efficient” than we were 60 years ago and our crops are more contaminated with herbicides and pesticides than before.

* We are using hundreds of “calories” of oil (plant energy stored over millions of years), to produce a few calories of food therefore when this oil runs out, we will all starve if current food production and distribution methods are not drastically changed and improved.

* This is only one of many issues facing our food supply which we will discuss in future articles.

* We MUST develop new technologies to use ONLY the energy available from the sun each year, the planet’s “primary productivity” to feed and power our civilization if we are to enjoy a sustainable future for ourselves and future generations.

August 20, 2008

Quick Reality Check – Solar Common Sense-Space heating and Hot Water with a 3-5 year payback

Filed under: Quick Reality Check — Tags: , , , , , — Administrator @ 01:09

1. Solar energy in the form of heat is readily available almost every day throughout the world.

2. Many homes in the United States and Canada are heated in winter.

3. A typical home in the Midwest requires 60 to 80 million btus for a single heating season.

4. Each therm of natural gas, which is defined as 100,000 btus releases 11.68 pounds (5.31kg) of carbon dioxide.

5. A typical Midwestern home heated with natural gas will release 5,840 to 7,008 pounds ( 2655 to 3185kg) of carbon dioxide per year.

6. A simple hot water and supplemental space heating system such as the omachron systems (www.omachrononline.com) cost about $2,400 and will capture about 45 million btus per year in the Midwest which will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 5,256 pounds (2,389 kg) and save you about $541 based upon a natural gas cost of about $1.20 per therm.

7. Remember to caulk and insulate well to reduce your heat losses thereby saving even more energy.

July 11, 2008

Solar Pool Heating. Free energy. Or maybe not …

Filed under: Energy, Solar, Swimming Pools — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Administrator @ 14:26

Solar energy should be free…right?…maybe not. Depending on the system you chose solar energy can still cost you a lot of money and waste a lot of electricity!!

Solar energy collection systems such as solar swimming pool heaters typically require a pump to operate. This pump is driven by electricity. Therefore, electrical power (energy) is needed to collect the solar energy. This electricity use must be factored into your considerations when determining the REAL payback of a solar energy capture system.

This does not mean that solar energy is not a good idea. It is a GREAT idea …

It does mean that you must clearly understand the overall costs of solar energy must include the capital and installation cost, and the energy used to operate the system versus the energy collected.

The Solar Energy Capture Efficiency is defined as the solar energy collected by a system divided by the energy that must be input to make the solar collector work. The larger this number is, the less energy is used to collect the solar energy which means that the operating costs are lower and it is better for the environment..

Example:

A solar collector in Southern Ontario, Canada could collect an average of 1,233 btu/sq ft/day (3.887 kWh/day/sq m) during the 6 month period from Mid April through Mid October assuming a 75% collector efficiency.

If a 1.5hp pump is used to pump the water from your pool through your solar collector and filter the energy use is calculated as follows:.

1.5 hp x 746W/hp = 1.119 kWh/hr.

If the swimming pool pump runs 8 hours per day, it will use 8.952 kWh /day, 1,612 kWh in 6 months of use.

At $0.10/kWh, this amounts to $0.90 per day, or about $162 for 6 months. The price of electricity will continue to rise.

The electricity used by the water pump is equivalent to 3,819 btu/hr, or 30,552 btu/day.

Therefore, a 4′ x 20′ solar collector could capture 4 x 20 x 1,233 btu/sq ft/day = 98,640 btu/day.

This means that you must put 30,552 btu/day of electrical power equivalent into your swimming pool filter and solar water heating system to collect 98,640 btu/day, which is a Solar Energy Capture Efficiency of 3.2:1. Many system provide a ratio of only between 3:1 and 6:1.

Solar energy systems are NOT created equal …
Omachron Technologies Inc. has developed more efficient solar collection systems wherein the Solar Energy Capture Efficiency (energy output to energy input ratio) is up to 40:1, which means that they would cost 10 times less to operate than many current products.

Consider the capital cost of your solar energy system and the cost of operating your solar collection system when comparing different technologies.

When you save money and energy, both you and the environment win.

Wayne Conrad

Powered by WordPress