Another Missile Defense Success

Hopefully this research will continue over the next 4 years and systems will be implemented when possible. Our enemies don't care about the philosophies of the political parties in charge, other than how they can use them to defeat us. We need many different arrows in our quivers - missile (and/or warhead) defense systems are one of them.

Boeing-led Missile Defense Team Intercepts Target in Most Complex Test to Date - MarketWatch:
"VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., Dec 05, 2008 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX/ -- The Boeing Company (BA:Boeing Co.) , working with industry teammates and the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, today completed the successful intercept of a target warhead in the most challenging test to date of the United States' only long-range ballistic missile defense system.

'This test demonstrated that the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system can defeat a long-range ballistic missile target,' said Scott Fancher, vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems. 'This intercept is further proof that GMD can provide our nation with an effective defense against the threat of long-range ballistic missiles.'
. . .
'Data gathered from multiple sensors gave us a clearer picture of the incoming threat, enabling GMD to achieve the shootdown of a complex target,' said Greg Hyslop, Boeing vice president and GMD program director. 'Integrating sensors separated by thousands of miles is a major engineering challenge, but we overcame this challenge by working together as a team.'"

UPS Low-Emission Hybrid Vehicles

One of these hybrid delivery vans just delivered a package - it looked and sounded pretty much like any other UPS truck (except for the UPS Low-Emission Hybrid Vehicle logo). This is a great way to evolve technology - get it in use daily and see what squeaks - then fix the problems, and do it again. UPS seems to do a good job of incorporating appropriate new technologies more quickly than other large companies - kudos to them!

UPS: Press Release:
"ATLANTA, May 22, 2007 - UPS (NYSE:UPS) today announced its fleet of alternative-fuel vehicles - already the industry's largest - had expanded with the deployment of 50 next-generation hybrid electric delivery trucks.

The 50 hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) will operate in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston and Phoenix. These new trucks join roughly 20,000 low-emission and alternative-fuel vehicles already in use.
. . .
The new hybrid power system allows UPS to use a smaller diesel engine than would be required in a conventional delivery truck, thus saving on fuel and pollution-causing emissions. A battery pack, motor/generator and power control system are added, which allows electric power to be fed into the powertrain when conditions demand it, providing further savings.

The hybrid electric vehicles also use what is known as regenerative braking, meaning the energy generated when stopping the moving vehicle is captured and returned to the battery system as electrical energy. The efficient, computer-controlled combination of clean diesel power, electric power and regenerative braking allows dramatic improvements in fuel savings and emissions reductions."

Obama Project: Space Solar Power (SSP)?

Space Solar Power (SSP) suffers from a chicken and egg problem. It is too expensive for NASA to divert research funding (although they will conduct experiments from the space station soon), and it isn't conventional enough to qualify for traditional investment & funding. Hopefully, as we ramp up to build more Nuclear Reactors some entity will try spending the equivalent amount on an SSP demonstration. (Bill Gates maybe?)

An interesting idea in comments following this article is the use of a beanstalk that can be built with conventional materials IF it ends 1 Diameter of Earth from the surface. We could use conventional (but reusable) chemical rockets to get materials to this low orbit, and then use beanstalks to lift them into the high orbits - saving a large part of the transportation cost, and do-able with today's technology. Another benefit is that such a beanstalk would be much less vulnerable to terrorist attacks.

Political transitions are a time to reflect and change policies - now is the time for the new administration to consider kick-starting the SSP industry. It would cost us less than many of the bailouts currently in the news, and provide enormous on-going benefits. The jobs created for such a program would be high-tech, and the product (energy) would be exportable.

Obama-Biden Transition Project: Space Solar Power (SSP) -- A Solution for Energy Independence & Climate Change | SpaceRef - Space News as it Happens:
"A National Security Space Office (NSSO) study concluded in October of 2007 that 'The magnitude of the looming energy and environmental problems is significant enough to warrant consideration of all options, to include ... space-based solar power.' This NSSO report also concluded that SSP has 'enormous potential for energy security, economic development, improved environmental stewardship, advancement of general space faring, and overall national security for those nations who construct and possess a (SSP) capability.'

We urge the next President of the United States to include SSP as a new start in a balanced federal strategy for energy independence and environmental stewardship, and to assign lead responsibility to a U.S. federal agency.

SSP Falls through the Cracks as Nobody is Responsible: No U.S. federal agency has a specific mandate or clear responsibility to pursue SSP. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) says SSP is a space project, and thus NASA's job. NASA says SSP is an energy project, and thus DOE's job. The NSSO-report found that SSP ''falls through the cracks' of federal bureaucracies, and has lacked an organizational advocate within the US Government.'

SSP has Significant Long-Term Advantages: SSP is unusual among renewable energy options as it satisfies all of the following criteria:

Immensely Scalable -- SSP can scale to provide the energy needs of the entire human civilization at America's standard of living. Most other near-term renewable options are strictly limited in scalability. As the NSSO report states "A single kilometer-wide band of geosynchronous Earth orbit experiences enough solar flux in one year to nearly equal the amount of energy contained within all known recoverable conventional oil reserves on Earth today."

Safe Global Availability -- Nuclear power technology cannot be safely shared with most of the countries on this planet because of proliferation concerns.

Steady & Assured -- SSP is a continuous, rather than intermittent, power source. It is not subject to the weather, the seasons, or the day-night cycle.

No Fundamental Breakthroughs -- SSP does not require a fundamental breakthrough in either physics or engineering, such as those required by fusion.

Highly Flexible and Optimal for Export -- SSP could enable America to become a net energy exporter. We could be the world's largest exporter of energy for the 21st and 22nd Centuries, and beyond."

Our Military Bans USB ThumbDrives, etc.

If you remember "Don't Copy That Floppy!", then you've been through this before. The Viruses, Trojans, and other crud collectively called Malware will get onto computers via any path available. USB Thumbdrives are now very cheap and easy to use as part of a sneaker-net. Unfortunately, they're just as convenient for personal use and this is how malware usually finds it's way into corporate / work / military systems. Scan a computer used by a young adult, and you'll likely find a variety of malware waiting for a chance to spread itself around. In theory, we should all scan our systems before writing files to an external device, but in practice most of us don't even scan our systems on a regular schedule.

In the near future I expect the technology to scan and secure thumb drives will be miniaturized and built into the devices themselves. A few years later, the prices will have come down to the level that we mere mortals consider reasonable, and the hackers will have to find another delivery mechanism. History shows that they will succeed.

Practice Safe Computing!

Under Worm
Assault, Military Bans Disks, USB Drives Danger Room from Wired.com:
"The Defense Department's geeks are spooked by a rapidly spreading worm crawling across their networks. So they've suspended the use of so-called thumb drives, CDs, flash media cards, and all other removable data storage devices from their nets, to try to keep the worm from multiplying any further.

It applies to both the secret SIPR and unclassified NIPR nets. The suspension, which includes everything from external hard drives to "floppy disks," is supposed to take effect "immediately." Similar notices went out to the other military services.

In some organizations, the ban would be only a minor inconvenience. But the military relies heavily on such drives to store information. Bandwidth is often scarce out in the field. Networks are often considered unreliable. Takeaway storage is used constantly as a substitute."

New honeycomb tire is 'bulletproof'

The Humvee was never designed to carry the weight of any armor to protect troops. Fortunately, industry has been working on improvements to make them tougher. Simply replacing all the Hummers is cost prohibitive, and they're very useful vehicles when not under attack.
I wonder how well these tires resist chemicals and fire, but the military needs an SUV in this role, not a tank.

New honeycomb tire is 'bulletproof' Military Tech - CNET News:
"The University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Wausau, Wis., company have come up with a 37-inch, bullet and bomb-proof Humvee tire based on a polymeric web so cool looking there's no need for hub caps.

Resilient Technologies and Wisconsin-Madison's Polymer Engineering Center are creating a 'non-pneumatic tire' (no air required) that will support the weight of add-on armor, survive an IED attack, and still make a 50 mph getaway. It's basically a round honeycomb wrapped with a thick, black tread.

The military wants an alternative to the current Humvee 'run flat' tires, which despite the name, still need a minimal amount of air pressure to roll and can leave troops stranded after being shot or blown out."

Note the comments after the article - several readers were concerned with spaces in the honeycomb loading up with mud and throwing the tire off-balance. I'm sure this was planned for, or revealed in testing, and that the production tires will be skinned with a sidewall making them look like ordinary tires.

The US Leads the World Despite Our Internal Critics

Weekly, sometimes daily, I hear how awful we are in the US in our treatment of people unlike ourselves. Having lived and worked a little in other countries, I'm quite certain that the US is the best place in the world to live. Even in Britain, an ally and the homeland for many Americans, society affords some people fewer opportunities than they would have as immigrants in the US.

Perhaps instead of always trying to push social frontiers further in the US, we should consider working to bring other countries up to our standards. It would give some people a rest, and enable many people to see how unique and valuable our country is.

BBC NEWS | Could Britain have a black PM?:
"When Barack Obama claimed that his story could only have happened in America, he might have been looking across the Atlantic for evidence.

The odds of a black or Asian person taking the keys to 10 Downing Street any time soon are slim.

Tony Blair acknowledged as much in 2001, when he suggested the US was ahead of the UK in having people from ethnic minorities occupying some of the top political posts.

Mr Blair was mindful of Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice at the heart of the White House, but probably hadn't even heard of Obama.

. . . the UK can learn from the way Americans responded to their racist history.

"Since the civil rights movement of the Sixties they have had to put in laws and rules in place because racism was more overt. It's more subtle in this country but there is a sense there's a glass ceiling across most industries.

"In America it's more acknowledged and they've put in positive discrimination. There was much resistance at the beginning but they have the fruits of that, which is people being forced into certain positions."

Consequently the US has a large and powerful black middle class, he says. While the UK is arguably more integrated, he says, a black prime minister will only be closer when there are more black business leaders and commissioning editors, operating the levers of power and educating society about black and Asian experiences.

. . . "In the US they dare to dream the American dream, talking about hope. Using that kind of language is something Americans do naturally. Here, we are I think culturally much more understated. We tend to be more cynical generally.

"And while I don't think we are anti-aspirational, the aspiration of what we are and who we are comes without the language of America. Americans are proud that they have brought about change no-one thought possible in the time they have.

"The language of Barack Obama and Martin Luther King is very singular to America but we're not able to use that kind of language. So we need to find a way to get out of that cynicism." "

Hot Air Ballooning on Titan?

Petrochemicals from Titan may be vital to sustaining a large population on Mars. Research is important, but eventually we also need "boots on the ground" of Luna, Mars, Titan, the asteroid Belt, and many other sites in our solar system. There is enormous wealth out there if we're willing to go get it.

Plan to Send Hot Air Balloon to Saturn's Moon Titan - Yahoo! News:
"A hot air balloon drifts gently in the breeze, gliding over mountain ranges and vast lakes. Thick clouds extend over the entire horizon, threatening rain. The meager light that filters through illuminates one side of the balloon, making it look like a giant question mark in the sky.

This is a vision that floats in the minds of scientists who study Titan, Saturn's largest moon. The Cassini spacecraft currently traveling around the Saturn system has provided us with our best glimpse yet of Titan, but there is still much to be explored.

Athena Coustenis, an astrophysicist and planetologist with the Paris Observatory, is helping draft a plan to send a hot air balloon to Titan, as well as an orbiting spacecraft and a surface probe. Called TSSM – the Titan and Saturn System Mission – this three-tiered approach to exploration could shed more light on the still-mysterious moon.
. . .
The moon's resemblance to Earth was eerily brought to mind when the Huygens probe descended to the surface of Titan in 2005. The photos showed a mountain with river channels carving their way down to a lake shoreline; a geography reminiscent of Earth today, except that on Titan the mountains are made of ice, and the rivers are liquid methane.

The Huygens probe eventually landed in a sandy river bed dotted with pebbles. This soft terrain would prove hazardous for a wheeled rover – the Mars Rover Opportunity got stuck for weeks in a sand dune and was nearly stranded forever. "The ground on Titan may be gooey, and you don't want to get stuck somewhere," says Coustenis.

She says that to move around, the TSSM probe could be outfitted with a helicopter rotor that would allow it to fly from place to place. The probe design also may include floaters that would prevent it from sinking if it landed on one of Titan's hydrocarbon lakes.
. . .
Our knowledge of Titan's geography has improved thanks to Huygens and Cassini. Long before the probe landed, scientists thought Titan was completely covered by a hydrocarbon ocean. This ocean was thought to be the source of methane in Titan's atmosphere. The Huygens probe proved the theory of a global ocean was incorrect, and from what the Cassini spacecraft has seen so far, the lakes of liquid hydrocarbon on Titan are mostly confined to the moon's north polar region. Still, it's hard to speak of Titan's geography with much certainty. While Cassini's radar has allowed it to peer through Titan's thick atmospheric haze, in the end Cassini won't be able to map even half of the moon's surface. The third part of TSSM – an orbiting spacecraft – will give scientists a more complete view of the enigmatic moon.

"We need a Titan-dedicated orbiter because after four years of Cassini, we still haven't mapped more than 25 percent of Titan's surface," says Coustenis. "When you see the diversity the moon has, you realize it needs full-coverage mapping. And we can have a polar orbiter, whereas Cassini only passes by Titan on the ecliptic."

The orbiter also could be used to study Enceledus, a tiny moon that previously had not garnered much attention. Cassini discovered that Enceladus has geysers of liquid water at its south pole, and this spray generates one of the rings around Saturn. Scientists are puzzled how this icy snowball could generate enough heat to keep water liquid. Because liquid water is believed to be a prerequisite for life, some scientists now think Enceladus could be a potential location for alien organisms in our solar system."

Fear of Democrats Drives Gun Sales

Gun laws affect the law-abiding almost exclusively - criminals, by definition, don't obey laws, and many of them get their weapons by stealing them.

This has happened before - the gun industry will do well financially for several months, but will eventually go through hard times when the demand has been sated.

Gun owners need to remember that legislators have a history of making ammunition, magazines, reloading components, and even some accessories more expensive or even banned, when liberals are in power. A gun with no ammunition is merely an elaborate club.

Everywhere that concealed carry becomes legal, crimes decreases - criminals prefer unarmed victims.

Fears of a Dem crackdown lead to boom in gun sales - Yahoo! News:
". . .
Last month, as an Obama win looked increasingly inevitable, there were 62,000 more background checks for gun purchases than in October 2007, a 25 percent increase. And they were up about 8 percent for the year as of Oct. 26, according to the FBI.

No data was available for gun purchases this week, but gun shops from suburban Virginia to the Rockies report record sales since Tuesday's election.

'They're scared to death of losing their rights,' said David Hancock, manager of Bob Moates, where sales have nearly doubled in the past week and are up 15 percent for the year. On Election Day, salespeople were called in on their day off because of the crowd.

Obama has said he respects Americans' Second Amendment right to bear arms, but that he favors 'common sense' gun laws. Gun rights advocates interpret that as meaning he'll at least enact curbs on ownership of assault and concealed weapons.

As a U.S. Senator, Obama voted to leave gun-makers and dealers open to lawsuits; and as an Illinois state legislator, he supported a ban on semiautomatic weapons and tighter restrictions on all firearms."

Orson Scott Card on Media Bias

We should be glad that a bad decision during the Clinton administration took this long to spiral completely out of control. Of course we might feel even better if the Democrats in Congress had allowed the Republicans to fix it before the crash (or even helped them).

Meridian Magazine:: Ideas and Society: Would the Last Honest Reporter Please Turn On the Lights?:
"This housing crisis didn't come out of nowhere. It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration.

It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans.

What is a risky loan? It's a loan that the recipient is likely not to be able to repay.
The goal of this rule change was to help the poor — which especially would help members of minority groups. But how does it help these people to give them a loan that they can't repay? They get into a house, yes, but when they can't make the payments, they lose the house — along with their credit rating.

They end up worse off than before.

This was completely foreseeable and in fact many people did foresee it. One political party, in Congress and in the executive branch, tried repeatedly to tighten up the rules. The other party blocked every such attempt and tried to loosen them.

Furthermore, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were making political contributions to the very members of Congress who were allowing them to make irresponsible loans. (Though why quasi-federal agencies were allowed to do so baffles me. It's as if the Pentagon were allowed to contribute to the political campaigns of Congressmen who support increasing their budget.)
. . .
This financial crisis was completely preventable. The party that blocked any attempt to prevent it was ... the Democratic Party. The party that tried to prevent it was ... the Republican Party.

Yet when Nancy Pelosi accused the Bush administration and Republican deregulation of causing the crisis, you in the press did not hold her to account for her lie. Instead, you criticized Republicans who took offense at this lie and refused to vote for the bailout!

What? It's not the liar, but the victims of the lie who are to blame?
. . .
after Freddie Raines, the CEO of Fannie Mae who made $90 million while running it into the ground, was fired for his incompetence, one presidential candidate's campaign actually consulted him for advice on housing.

If that presidential candidate had been John McCain, you would have called it a major scandal and we would be getting stories in your paper every day about how incompetent and corrupt he was.

But instead, that candidate was Barack Obama, and so you have buried this story, and when the McCain campaign dared to call Raines an "adviser" to the Obama campaign — because that campaign had sought his advice — you actually let Obama's people get away with accusing McCain of lying, merely because Raines wasn't listed as an official adviser to the Obama campaign.

You would never tolerate such weasely nit-picking from a Republican.
. . .
Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That's what you claim you do, when you accept people's money to buy or subscribe to your paper.

But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie — that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain, and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad — even bad weather — on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.

If you had any personal honor, each reporter and editor would be insisting on telling the truth — even if it hurts the election chances of your favorite candidate.

Because that's what honorable people do. Honest people tell the truth even when they don't like the probable consequences. That's what honesty means . That's how trust is earned.
. . .
Meanwhile, you have participated in the borking of Sarah Palin, reporting savage attacks on her for the pregnancy of her unmarried daughter — while you ignored the story of John Edwards's own adultery for many months.

So I ask you now: Do you have any standards at all? Do you even know what honesty means?

Is getting people to vote for Barack Obama so important that you will throw away everything that journalism is supposed to stand for?
. . .
This was a Congress-caused crisis, beginning during the Clinton administration, with Democrats leading the way into the crisis and blocking every effort to get out of it in a timely fashion.

If you at our local daily newspaper continue to let Americans believe — and vote as if — President Bush and the Republicans caused the crisis, then you are joining in that lie."

The election is in less than 2 weeks

In my experience, government is the worst possible provider of any service people need (charities & religious organizations are much more efficient), so choosing between two big government candidates isn't my idea of fun. It is stunning how much more we expect from government than we did 30 years ago, and how much less we get than we expect.

I suppose we get the government we deserve . . . I could do without a tax increase at this time in my life, but with Congress spending like drunken sailors for the last couple of decades that seems inevitable anyway.

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." (Benjamin Franklin, 1755)

I keep reminding folks that we elect a president, not an emperor.

It has often been observed that government by a president from one party and a congressional majority from the other party is the best possible situation for us the Citizens & Taxpayers. Having the majorities differ between the Senate and the House is nearly as good. W had a congressional majority on his side for a while, but squandered it by never using his veto pen while they spent like drunken sailors (apologies to real sailors).

If you hope for a more conservative government, then study up and vote your entire ballot. Those people running for state and local offices are the pool from which we'll get our next round of national leaders. Pick some with the guts to oppose special interests and rescue our country from the bureaucrats.

Obama Would Unleash EPA's Radical Environmentalism

We in the US frequently lead the world by example. We didn't sign the Kyoto Accords because they were disproportionately harsh on first world industrial nations, and didn't address the enormous pollution problems from emerging industrial powers like China and India. Now it looks like Candidate Obama wants the US to lead the world into economic ruin before energy alternatives are feasible - I think the world may just sit back & watch instead of following us.

Obama's Carbon Ultimatum - WSJ.com:
"Liberals pretend that only President Bush is preventing the U.S. from adopting some global warming 'solution.' But occasionally their mask slips. As Barack Obama's energy adviser has now made clear, the would-be President intends to blackmail -- or rather, greenmail -- Congress into falling in line with his climate agenda.

Jason Grumet is currently executive director of an outfit called the National Commission on Energy Policy and one of Mr. Obama's key policy aides. In an interview last week with Bloomberg, Mr. Grumet said that come January the Environmental Protection Agency 'would initiate those rulemakings' that classify carbon as a dangerous pollutant under current clean air laws. That move would impose new regulation and taxes across the entire economy, something that is usually the purview of Congress. Mr. Grumet warned that 'in the absence of Congressional action' 18 months after Mr. Obama's inauguration, the EPA would move ahead with its own unilateral carbon crackdown anyway.

Well, well. For years, Democrats -- including Senator Obama -- have been howling about the "politicization" of the EPA, which has nominally been part of the Bush Administration. The complaint has been that the White House blocked EPA bureaucrats from making the so-called "endangerment finding" on carbon. Now it turns out that a President Obama would himself wield such a finding as a political bludgeon. He plans to issue an ultimatum to Congress: Either impose new taxes and limits on carbon that he finds amenable, or the EPA carbon police will be let loose to ravage the countryside.

The EPA hasn't made a secret of how it would like to centrally plan the U.S. economy under the 1970 Clean Air Act. In a blueprint released in July, the agency didn't exactly say it'd collectivize the farms -- but pretty close, down to the "grass clippings." The EPA would monitor and regulate the carbon emissions of "lawn and garden equipment" as well as everything with an engine, like cars, planes and boats. Eco-bureaucrats envision thousands of other emissions limits on all types of energy. Coal-fired power and other fossil fuels would be ruled out of existence, while all other prices would rise as the huge economic costs of the new regime were passed down the energy chain to consumers.
. . .
Climate-change politics don't break cleanly along partisan lines. The burden of a carbon clampdown will fall disproportionately on some states over others, especially the 25 interior states that get more than 50% of their electricity from coal. Rustbelt manufacturing states like Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania will get hit hard too. Once President Bush leaves office, the coastal Democrats pushing hardest for a climate change program might find their colleagues splitting off, especially after they vote for a huge tax increase on incomes."

Ben Bova to the new President: Energy From Stars

Ben Bova explains far better than I can why Solar Power Satellites may be the most cost effective solution to our current energy problems. Clean energy that isn't affected by weather, available in quantities that enable us to wean society from petrochemicals at a slow enough rate to prevent further injury to our economy.

An Energy Fix Written in the Stars - washingtonpost.com:
"You're heading into some rough times as you move into the White House, Mr. Future President, what with the economy in recession, financial markets in turmoil, global warming, terrorism, war and soaring energy prices. But I can offer you a tip for dealing with that last issue, at least: Look to the stars.

That's right. You can use the powerful technology we've forged over a half-century of space exploration to solve one major down-to-Earth problem -- and become the most popular president since John F. Kennedy in the process.
. . .
Solar energy is a favorite of environmentalists, but it works only when the sun is shining. But that's the trick. There is a place where the sun never sets, and a way to use solar energy for power generation 24 hours a day, 365 days a year: Put the solar cells in space, in high orbits where they'd be in sunshine all the time.

You do it with the solar power satellite (SPS), a concept invented by Peter Glaser in 1968. The idea is simple: You build large assemblages of solar cells in space, where they convert sunlight into electricity and beam it to receiving stations on the ground.

The solar power satellite is the ultimate clean energy source. It doesn't burn an ounce of fuel. And a single SPS could deliver five to 10 gigawatts of energy to the ground continually. Consider that the total electrical-generation capacity of the entire state of California is 4.4 gigawatts.

Conservative estimates have shown that an SPS could deliver electricity at a cost to the consumer of eight to 10 cents per kilowatt hour. That's about the same as costs associated with conventional power generation stations. And operating costs would drop as more orbital platforms are constructed and the price of components, such as solar voltaic cells, is reduced. Solar power satellites could lower the average taxpayer's electric bills while providing vastly more electricity.
. . .
Some people worry about beaming gigawatts of microwave energy to the ground. But the microwave beams would be spread over a wide area, so they wouldn't be intense enough to harm anyone. Birds could fly through the thinly spread beams without harm. Nevertheless, it would be best for the receiving stations to be set up in unpopulated areas. The deserts of the American Southwest would be an ideal location. You could gain votes in Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada and California!

It's ironic, but when solar power satellites become commonplace, the desert wastes of the Sahara and the Middle East could become important energy centers even after the last drop of oil has been pumped out of them. SPS receiving stations could also be built on platforms at sea; Japan has already looked into that possibility.

I admit, solar power satellites won't be cheap. Constructing one would cost about as much as building a nuclear power plant: on the order of $1 billion. That money, though, needn't come from the taxpayers; it could be raised by the private capital market. Oil companies invest that kind of money every year in exploring for new oil fields. But the risk involved in building an SPS, as with any space operation, is considerable, and it could be many years or even decades before an investment begins to pay off. So how can we get private investors to put their money into solar power satellites?

This nation tackled a similar situation about a century ago, when faced with building big hydroelectric dams. Those dams were on the cutting edge of technology at the time, and they were risky endeavors that required hefty funding. The Hoover Dam, the Grand Coulee Dam and others were built with private investment -- backed by long-term, low-interest loans guaranteed by the U.S. government. They changed the face of the American West, providing irrigation water and electrical power that stimulated enormous economic growth. Phoenix and Las Vegas wouldn't be on the map except for those dams.

Solar power satellites could be funded through the same sort of government-backed loans.
. . .
It will take foresight and leadership to start a solar power satellite program. That's why, Mr. Future President, I believe that you should make it NASA's primary goal to build and operate a demonstration model SPS, sized to deliver a reasonably impressive amount of electrical power -- say, 10 to 100 megawatts -- before the end of your second term. Such a demonstration would prove that full-scale solar power satellites are achievable. With federal loan guarantees, private financing could then take over and build satellites that would deliver the gigawatts we need to lower our imports of foreign oil and begin to move away from fossil fuels.

I know that scientists and academics will howl in protest. They want to explore the universe and don't care about oil prices or building new industries. But remember, they howled against the Apollo program, too. They wanted the money for their projects, not to send a handful of fighter jocks to the moon. What they failed to see was that Apollo produced the technology and the trained teams of people that have allowed us to reach every planet in the solar system."

Criminals target criminals in U.S. kidnap capital - Phoenix

It is sometimes hard to know who to root for - ordinary citizens in Phoenix don't usually know that these things are going on. Enough word of it gets into the press to ensure that a lot of Phoenicians have concealed carry permits. ICE says the increase in abductions is a consequence of tighter border security cutting into criminals profits. On the other hand, if the border was really secure, then criminals from Mexico wouldn't be stalking other criminals in Phoenix would they?

Criminals targeted in U.S. kidnap capital | Reuters:
"PHOENIX (Reuters) - The criminal underworld in the sun-baked Arizona capital of Phoenix has long enjoyed the hot money profits from illicit smuggling of drugs and people over the border from Mexico.

But now its members are living in fear as they are stalked by kidnappers after their proceeds, authorities say.

Police in the desert city say specialized kidnap rings are snatching suspected criminals and their families from their homes, running them off the roads and even grabbing them at shopping malls in a spiraling spate of abductions.

'Phoenix is ground zero for illegal narcotics smuggling and illegal human smuggling in the United States,' said Phil Roberts, a Phoenix Police Department detective.
'There's a lot of illegal cash out there in the valley, and a lot of people want to get their hands on it.'

Last year alone, Phoenix police reported 357 extortion-related abductions -- up by nearly half from 2005 -- targeting individuals with ties to Mexican smuggling rings.
. . .
Police say the kidnappers are most often Mexican criminals, sometimes helped by local street gangs in Phoenix. They single out cash-flush targets from among the drug traffickers and "coyotes" -- as human smugglers are known -- in the criminal community.

Cell members may trail identified targets for a couple of days, looking for the moment to pounce. Others may be asking around, looking for likely victims, often big spenders "who throw their money around" in bars and clubs, Roberts said.

Aside from the smugglers themselves, victims have included their wives, girlfriends and even children. They are often held in darkened rooms where they are routinely beaten, tortured or sexually assaulted to extort a ransom that can range from $50,000 to $1 million."

Cheap access to space - 10, 20, 100 years?

Sometimes referred to as beanstalks, or even sky-hooks, the space elevator will probably be the main shipping workhorse from orbit to Mars and the Moon. With Earth's higher gravity, it is a more difficult technology, but if we can get it working then continuous access to space is assured at a price we can afford.

For more information, visit the Space Elevator Reference site.

'Space elevator' would take humans into orbit - CNN.com:
"LONDON, England (CNN) -- A new space race is officially under way, and this one should have the sci-fi geeks salivating.

The project is a 'space elevator,' and some experts now believe that the concept is well within the bounds of possibility -- maybe even within our lifetimes.

A conference discussing developments in space elevator concepts is being held in Japan in November, and hundreds of engineers and scientists from Asia, Europe and the Americas are working to design the only lift that will take you directly to the one hundred-thousandth floor.

Despite these developments, you could be excused for thinking it all sounds a little far-fetched.

Indeed, if successfully built, the space elevator would be an unprecedented feat of human engineering.

A cable anchored to the Earth's surface, reaching tens of thousands of kilometers into space, balanced with a counterweight attached at the other end is the basic design for the elevator.

If it sounds like the stuff of fiction, maybe that's because it once was.

In 1979, Arthur C. Clarke's novel "The Fountains of Paradise" brought the idea of a space elevator to a mass audience. Charles Sheffield's "The Web Between the Worlds" also featured the building of a space elevator.

But, jump out of the storybooks and fast-forward nearly three decades, and Japanese scientists at the Japan Space Elevator Association are working seriously on the space-elevator project.

Association spokesman Akira Tsuchida said his organization was working with U.S.-based Spaceward Foundation and a European organization based in Luxembourg to develop an elevator design.

The Liftport Group in the U.S. is also working on developing a design, and in total it's believed that more than 300 scientists and engineers are engaged in such work around the globe.

NASA is holding a $4 million Space Elevator Challenge to encourage designs for a successful space elevator.

Tsuchida said the technology driving the race to build the first space elevator is the quickly developing material carbon nanotube. It is lightweight and has a tensile strength 180 times stronger than that of a steel cable. Currently, it is the only material with the potential to be strong enough to use to manufacture elevator cable, according to Tsuchida.

"At present we have a tether which is made of carbon nanotube, and has one-third or one-quarter of the strength required to make a space elevator. We expect that we will have strong enough cable in the 2020s or 2030s," Tsuchida said.
. . .
Tsuchida said some possible locations for an elevator include the South China Sea, western Australia and the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean. He said all of those locations usually avoided typhoons, which could pose a threat to the safety of an elevator.

"As the base of space elevator will be located on geosynchronous orbit, [the] space elevator ground station should be located near the equator," he said."

The End Of An Era?

Our 535 congress critters just can't resist using their power and our money to do a bit of social engineering. The trouble is, they aren't very good at it, and we get to clean up their messes.

Edgelings.com » The End Of An Era:
". . . the United States government has embarked on two pieces of social engineering in the last few years. One was to make oil expensive as expensive as possible to drive people to greater use of alternative energy sources - because anything less would be irresponsible and destructive to the environment. The other was to enshrine home ownership (i.e., easy-to-obtain mortgages) as a new American right - because anything less would be unequal and racist.

None of us voted on these decisions - indeed, neither was even spoken about directly, much less debated. But nevertheless, both became national policy… and both have sparked national, now international, crises. Then, once they became crises, both were blamed on ‘greedy capitalism’, instead of what they really were: legislative interference into market forces.

Fine. We’ve been through this before, and no doubt we will see similar, government-induced crises again - inevitably accompanied by Administration officials and our elected representatives pointing at everyone but themselves.

But what makes this particular economic crisis so appalling, at least from this vantage point, is the sheer scumminess, corruption, short-sightedness and general incompetence of everyone involved. At least in the business world, especially in the take-no-prisoners world of high-tech that kind of venality and ineptitude either gets you fired or kills the company; by comparison, in Washington, it puts you in charge of the recovery effort.

Nobody in this mess has covered himself or herself in glory. President Bush seems to have had the right instincts on this, but as a lame duck who long-ago burned up all of his public support, he mostly seems dithering and toothless. The Democrats declare that the nation is at risk… then go about as usual turning the bailout bill into another yet another partisan pay-off scheme to fund the next round of crisis-creating social engineering. It is a measure of just how corrupt the Dems have become that Senators Dodd and Frank, who perhaps more than anyone in Washington are responsible for this crisis, not only are allowed to keep their committee seats, but run the press conference on the bail-out.
. . .
The crowning moment of course comes just before the vote on the bail-out package when Speaker Pelosi decided, putting the needs of her country first, to use the podium to attack the Administration and the GOP.

The Republicans, as we all heard, maturely responded to Pelosi by banging their little fists on the floor and refusing to play any more. Wah-wah-wah. Remember when Republicans were the outsiders in D.C.? Now they are such corrupt Washington insiders that, like a group of palace courtiers, they are willing to put the entire U.S. economy at risk over protocol and etiquette.

As for the two Presidential candidates, the less said the better. Senator McCain, sensing a great PR opportunity to show that he is both a leader and a Beltway Pharisee, blasted into Washington, made a lot of noise, accomplished little, and was all-but run back out of town. Senator Obama, who appears to be up to his neck in Fannie Mae ‘contributions’, did as he always does: said a few platitudes, (metaphorically) voted “Present” and took off as quickly as he could.

Meanwhile, while this absurdity is going on, the stock market tanks, and the U.S. economy loses $1 trillion."

Rep. John Shadegg on the "Bailout"

Looking at the stock market Tuesday it appears the world hasn't come to an end - yesterday's Dow Jones close was -777, today's is +485, so we're 292 points closer to last Friday's close. I expect it will be very up & down for the next few weeks.

Newsmax.com – Ariz. Rep. John Shadegg Takes on Henry Paulson:
"“The sky is not falling,” declares Rep. John Shadegg, and Congress will act to deal with the economic crisis without giving Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson a “blank check.”

The Arizona Republican writes in Monday’s USA Today: “Every Republican who voted against the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act on Monday believes that Congress must address this crisis. They take it seriously and stand ready to vote for reasonable legislation…

“Paulson’s $700 billion plan was fundamentally flawed. The bill asked for a blank check. It did not specify which assets could be purchased or the procedure by which they would be purchased…

“Secretary Paulson is getting a lesson in civics. The world he has entered is different than the wheeling-and-dealing Goldman Sachs world where he made his fortune.”

Shadegg called for the suspension of the “mark to market” accounting rule that requires mortgage-backed securities to be valued at “fire-sale prices.” That would help prevent the current crisis from reoccurring, but Shadegg said it is “incomprehensible” that Paulson and Congressional Democrats refused to include such a provision in the bill.

He also called for an increase in the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.’s $100,000 limit on coverage to alleviate the concerns of millions of Americans, and said “it’s hard to imagine why anyone would oppose such a change.”"

Blame Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Congress

We should get the government out of the mortgage business - this experiment has failed. Of course, this probably won't happen because we've created another big bureaucracy that exists primarily to feed, grow, and defend itself.

The federal government's efforts to create affordable housing by manipulating the mortgage market actually resulted in artificial inflation of home prices. The rule of unintended consequences strikes again, although this mess was pretty obviously coming if you remembered the law of supply and demand. Congress makes more money available and prices go up ... until the bubble bursts - they should get out of this business.

Note that the "total exposure" mentioned below is practically the same number as the proposed bailout - taxpayers now get to pay for bad loans purchased in an effort to appease Congress after they got caught with their fingers in the till (or at least sleeping at their posts).

Also note that elections have consequences - in 2005 the Republican minority was unable to pass reform legislation due to to the Democrat majority's resistance.

Blame Fannie Mae and Congress For the Credit Mess - WSJ.com:
"Many monumental errors and misjudgments contributed to the acute financial turmoil in which we now find ourselves. Nevertheless, the vast accumulation of toxic mortgage debt that poisoned the global financial system was driven by the aggressive buying of subprime and Alt-A mortgages, and mortgage-backed securities, by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The poor choices of these two government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) -- and their sponsors in Washington -- are largely to blame for our current mess.

How did we get here? Let's review: In order to curry congressional support after their accounting scandals in 2003 and 2004, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac committed to increased financing of 'affordable housing.' They became the largest buyers of subprime and Alt-A mortgages between 2004 and 2007, with total GSE exposure eventually exceeding $1 trillion. In doing so, they stimulated the growth of the subpar mortgage market and substantially magnified the costs of its collapse.

It is important to understand that, as GSEs, Fannie and Freddie were viewed in the capital markets as government-backed buyers (a belief that has now been reduced to fact). Thus they were able to borrow as much as they wanted for the purpose of buying mortgages and mortgage-backed securities. Their buying patterns and interests were followed closely in the markets. If Fannie and Freddie wanted subprime or Alt-A loans, the mortgage markets would produce them. By late 2004, Fannie and Freddie very much wanted subprime and Alt-A loans. Their accounting had just been revealed as fraudulent, and they were under pressure from Congress to demonstrate that they deserved their considerable privileges. Among other problems, economists at the Federal Reserve and Congressional Budget Office had begun to study them in detail, and found that -- despite their subsidized borrowing rates -- they did not significantly reduce mortgage interest rates.
. . .
The strategy of presenting themselves to Congress as the champions of affordable housing appears to have worked. Fannie and Freddie retained the support of many in Congress, particularly Democrats, and they were allowed to continue unrestrained. Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass), for example, now the chair of the House Financial Services Committee, openly described the "arrangement" with the GSEs at a committee hearing on GSE reform in 2003: "Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have played a very useful role in helping to make housing more affordable . . . a mission that this Congress has given them in return for some of the arrangements which are of some benefit to them to focus on affordable housing." The hint to Fannie and Freddie was obvious: Concentrate on affordable housing and, despite your problems, your congressional support is secure.

In light of the collapse of Fannie and Freddie, both John McCain and Barack Obama now criticize the risk-tolerant regulatory regime that produced the current crisis. But Sen. McCain's criticisms are at least credible, since he has been pointing to systemic risks in the mortgage market and trying to do something about them for years. In contrast, Sen. Obama's conversion as a financial reformer marks a reversal from his actions in previous years, when he did nothing to disturb the status quo.
. . .
In 2005, the Senate Banking Committee, then under Republican control, adopted a strong reform bill, introduced by Republican Sens. Elizabeth Dole, John Sununu and Chuck Hagel, and supported by then chairman Richard Shelby. The bill prohibited the GSEs from holding portfolios, and gave their regulator prudential authority (such as setting capital requirements) roughly equivalent to a bank regulator. In light of the current financial crisis, this bill was probably the most important piece of financial regulation before Congress in 2005 and 2006. All the Republicans on the Committee supported the bill, and all the Democrats voted against it. Mr. McCain endorsed the legislation in a speech on the Senate floor. Mr. Obama, like all other Democrats, remained silent.

Now the Democrats are blaming the financial crisis on "deregulation." This is a canard. There has indeed been deregulation in our economy -- in long-distance telephone rates, airline fares, securities brokerage and trucking, to name just a few -- and this has produced much innovation and lower consumer prices. But the primary "deregulation" in the financial world in the last 30 years permitted banks to diversify their risks geographically and across different products, which is one of the things that has kept banks relatively stable in this storm."

The Fallacy of 'Green Jobs'

Excellent comments from John Stossel -

RealClearPolitics - Articles - The Fallacy of 'Green Jobs':
"Politicians always promise that their programs will create jobs. It's used to justify building palatial sports stadiums for wealthy team owners. Alaska Rep. Don Young claimed the infamous 'bridge to nowhere' would create jobs (link). The fallacy is the same in every case: Even if the program creates jobs building bridges or windmills, it necessarily prevents other jobs from being created. This is because government spending merely diverts money from private projects to government projects.

Governments create no wealth. They only move it around while taking a cut for their trouble. So any jobs created over here come at the expense of jobs that would have been created over there. Overlooking this fact is known as the broken-window fallacy (link). The French economist Frederic Bastiat pointed out that a broken shop window will create work for a glassmaker, but that work comes only at the expense of the cook or tailor the shopkeeper would have patronized if he didn't have to replace the window.

Creating jobs is not difficult for government officials. Pharaohs created thousands of jobs by building pyramids. Our government could create jobs by paying people to dig holes and then fill them up. Would actual wealth be created? Of course not. It would be destroyed. It's like arguing the hurricanes create jobs. After all, the destruction is followed by rebuilding. But does anyone seriously believe that replacing destroyed buildings creates wealth?
. . .
Politicians have a lousy record trying to make "strategic investments." President Jimmy Carter's Synthetic Fuels Corporation cost taxpayers at least $19 billion but failed to give us alternative fuels (link). In the 1950s Japan's supposedly omniscient Ministry of International Trade and Investment rebuffed Sony and was sure the country should have just one car producer (link).

Neither Gore nor Obama can know how the money should best be invested. Investing is about predicting the future, and the future is always uncertain. We know from experience that people who have their own money at risk -- who face a profit-and-loss test and possible bankruptcy -- are much better predictors than people who play with other people's money. Just compare North and South Korea.
. . .
If "green jobs" make so much sense, the market will create them. They will be created by private entrepreneurs and venture capitalists who are eager to profit from winning investments. The best ideas will rise to the top, and green energy will gradually replace coal and oil.

If politicians were serious about creating jobs and cleaner technologies, they would step aside and let the free market go to work."

Outreach, Empowerment, Funding, & Networking don't work if their leaders preach hate

Another reason for energy independence - the people selling us oil are using our money to spread hatred - of us. Desipte the apparent objectives of our own "Hate America" crowd, we don't really want our grandchildren to end up broke & powerless in a world that hates them.

Islam's Advance: PostGlobal on washingtonpost.com:
"Why have many Muslims in the UK resisted full integration into British society?

The British government has been trying to address this issue for the last decade, mostly by using the discourse of 'multiculturalism.' According to that line of thinking, solutions to alienation among Muslims include community outreach and empowerment programs, funding for youth groups and social networking sites, and large inter-faith conferences.

British Muslim leaders have largely supported these initiatives and helped generate the impression, at least in government circles, that everyone is working together to separate rogue extremists from the religious establishment. But Monday night, the Dispatches documentary series revealed a very different picture of what goes on in some of the UK's flagship Muslim institutions. Why have many Muslims in the UK resisted full integration into British society?

The filmmakers went undercover at the London Central Mosque in Regent's Park, one of the most prestigious in the country, to show the discord between what imams preached outwardly to the public and what they preached to their faithful in private. Many exalted interfaith dialogue to the government and mainstream media, but turned to teaching radical and isolationist doctrines once behind closed doors.

According to the documentary, they teach the faithful that God orders them to kill homosexuals and apostates; that they should curtail the freedom of women; and that they should view non-Muslims in a derogatory manner and limit contact with them. Many of these leaders are trained in Saudi Arabian Wahhabi philosophy, and use Saudi-approved textbooks and pedagogical materials to teach young students.
. . .
Saudi Arabia's education and religious outreach programs, whether in the form of textbooks, library endowments or madrassah construction, constitute one of the largest aid programs in the world - roughly $4 billion a year - and introduces hundreds of millions of schoolchildren to radical Wahhabi doctrine via Saudi Embassy-run schools and educational programs in mosques."

Is Your Media Biased or Objective?

Anyone who looks at the coverage objectively will see that Sarah Palin & Joe Biden are being treated differently. Is this sexism? Sometimes, yes, but mostly it is media bias against conservatives.

It amazes me that professional journalists have abandoned their ethics to impugn anyone who has slight differences of opinion regarding how government should operate. When I was growing up, journalists kept their opinions to the editorial pages - now they blatantly hype Obama and fiercely attack any who oppose him.

Republican or Democrat, their solution to any problem is more of our money, and more power for the government - the differences between them are usually in the percentage of the increase, not in the fundamental philosophy.

If differences of opinion can't be discussed in public without all this emotion & skulduggery, why bother having elections at all? Feudalism worked well for the elites in the middle ages - perhaps we should go back to that? Or maybe we could agree that honorable people can have different opinions and that's OK ...

Striking Back at Critics, One by One - washingtonpost.com:
"From the moment she was introduced Friday, Palin has been on the receiving end of an almost unprecedented barrage of criticism. On Wednesday night, she took the opportunity to answer back, and she put her critics -- Democrats, the media and the Washington political establishment -- on notice that she is ready for a fight.
Palin knew her targets and went after them one by one. It was an us-vs.-them attack, designed to attach Obama and the Democrats to the cultural elite and to tie herself and McCain to the values of the hardworking, God-fearing, patriotic middle of America. But while her speech seemed aimed at energizing the Republicans' conservative base, Palin also sought to introduce herself as a fellow reformer with a maverick's spirit to match the message that McCain hopes to send from here on Thursday night and through the rest of the general-election campaign."

"May you live in interesting times"

It's official - this will be a historic presidential election regardless of who wins. McCain picks Alaska Gov Sarah Palin as veep! I'm sure Mitt is disappointed, but it's a bold move that should bring some unhappy conservatives back to the voting booth.

While these are not necessarily my issues; she is strongly pro-life, an NRA member & hunter, thinks we should drill for oil in Alaska, and has a son who'll deploy to Iraq before the election.

She should play well with many disenfranchised Hillary voters - some, certainly not all, but maybe enough to make a difference.

A friend notes "Interestingly enough Obama choosing Biden defangs a lot of his arguments about McCain as an insider - a possible minus for Obama. Palin gives McCain more of the guy trying to change things - a possible plus for McCain."

I was mildly rooting for Romney, but I doubt he added enough to the ticket. Biden just gives me chills, but I'm sure most traditional liberals think he helps Obama - trouble is, he needs more than that group to win.

I wonder if McCain/Palin can pull some conservative congress-critters to D.C also? I expect a lot of turnovers this year.

NOW will probably shoot Palin down on the pro-life issue - their one issue doesn't seem to be women when those women are conservative.

McCain picks surprise running mate - Yahoo! News UK:
"Republican John McCain made a surprise choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate on Friday, adding a political unknown to the presidential ticket who could help him appeal to women voters.

Palin, 44, a self-described 'hockey mom,' is a conservative first-term governor of Alaska with strong anti-abortion views, a record of reform and fiscal conservatism and an outsider's perspective on Washington.

'She's exactly who I need. She's exactly who this country needs to help me fight the same old Washington politics of me first and country second,' McCain told a roaring crowd of 15,000 supporters in Dayton, Ohio.
. . .
The choice of Palin was a risk for McCain given her lack of national experience, but her record in Alaska will help him reinforce his reform message. Palin built a reputation as a reformer in a state that recently has been hit with corruption scandals.

Elected in 2006, she is Alaska's first woman governor. She is also an avid sportswoman who would bring youth and vitality to the ticket. McCain turns 72 on Friday and would be the oldest person to take office for a first term in the White House if elected.
. . .
The choice of a vice president rarely has a major impact on the presidential race. Palin will meet Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in a debate in October.

McCain and Republicans open their national convention on Monday.

In his acceptance speech on Thursday, Obama attacked McCain and linked him to the Republican policies of President George W. Bush. He also said McCain was out of touch with the day-to-day concerns of Americans and had been "anything but independent" on key issues like the economy, health care and education."

$4,000.00 per second paid in taxes by "Big Oil"

As Reagan said "... government IS the problem". Also, we need to remember that Jimmie Carter's "windfall profits tax" resulted in less production, not lower prices - a big part of the reason the US imports 70% of our oil today.

Today in Investor's Business Daily stock analysis and business news:
"On July 31, Exxon Mobil reported an $11.7 billion second-quarter profit, breaking the record for a U.S. company that it previously set.

Naturally, politicians and the public, provoked by a financially ignorant media, reacted as if the company had stolen the money.

Barack Obama called the earnings 'outrageous.'
. . .
Too often, business leaders choose to duck when the arrows of outrage come flying. But Exxon Mobil CEO and Chairman Rex Tillerson made an unusual and courageous stand Wednesday, appearing on ABC's "World News" with Charles Gibson.

"I saw someone characterize our profits the other day in terms of $1,400 in profit per second," Tillerson told Gibson.

"Well, they also need to understand we paid $4,000 a second in taxes, and we spent $15,000 a second in cost. We spend $1 billion a day just running our business. So this is a business where large numbers are just characteristic of it."

We can't think of anyone who would be willing to pay $4,000 in taxes for every $5,400 they earn in salary or wages. Yet many in our country believe it's OK, even desirable, for oil companies to do just that.

What's needed here is a bit more perspective, a sense of proportion. Though Exxon Mobil set a record for nominal profit, the oil industry isn't actually making the biggest profits.

In the first quarter of this year, the profit margin for oil companies was 7.4%. That trailed the electronic equipment industry (12.1%) and the pharmaceutical and medical industry (25.9%).

Last year, 63 industrial groups posted bigger profit margins than the oil industry.

Also obscured by the moaning over Exxon Mobil's profit is the fact that investors expected higher earnings from the company. After second-quarter profit was announced, the company's stock price fell almost 5% because of its disappointing performance.
. . . .
And with more than half of all Americans owning stock, that means millions are poorer when Exxon Mobil shares fall."

The Future of Warplanes?

Remotely piloted vehicles are coming into their own, but I certainly hope we maintain a manned Air Force for that day when some enemy manages to interrupt communications with our unmanned vehicles, or finds convenient methods to disrupt their electronic brains.

We need to remember that "the next war" will be different than the wars we're fighting now. Combat equipment needs to be flexible enough to meet the challenges of that "next war". As discussed below, UAVs are an important component of our air power - an advantage we may not retain forever. Hopefully the Air Force has some realists making these decisions.

Warplanes: The Rise Of The Droids:
"August 11, 2008: The U.S. Air Force is, for the first time, converting a fighter wing from manned (F-16) combat aircraft, to unmanned ones (the MQ-9 Reaper.) The conversion, for the 174th Fighter Wing, has been in the works for three years, and the last combat sorties in manned aircraft were flown last week, by members of the 174th serving in Iraq.

The air force has already converted several combat wings to fly Predators which, while armed (with two 107 pound Hellfire missiles), are considered reconnaissance aircraft. The Reaper is considered a combat aircraft, optimized for seeking out and destroying ground targets.
. . .
Strafing and "intimidation" (coming in low and fast) attacks have been very useful in Iraq and Afghanistan, so the Reaper is not going to put the F-16s out of business right away. But the 19 ton F-16 costs three times as much as a Reaper, and is much more expensive to operate. The F-16 uses over a hundred times more fuel, per hour in the air . . .

. . . It's cheaper, more effective, and safer (for pilots) to use Reapers (or similar aircraft) for a lot of the ground support work. Fighters are still needed to keep the skies clear of enemy aircraft, although Reapers are better suited for the dangerous work of destroying enemy air defenses. But for fighting irregulars, the Reaper is king.
. . .
It's been noted that most of what F-16s (and F-18s) are doing these days is dropping smart bombs, and using their targeting pods to do recon for the ground troops. Reaper does both of these jobs better and cheaper.

The major advantage of the Reaper is it's "persistence." It can stay in the air for 14 hours (or more), and that means you can put it over an area of interest, and wait for the enemy to do something. If that happens, the Reaper is there with Hellfire missiles and smart bombs. . . . one Reaper can fly out with over a ton of munitions, and stay out for over ten hours. An F-16 can do that, but only if you want to wear down the pilot. The Reaper operators work in shifts, and are in much better shape to handle whatever comes up."

Storage for Solar & Wind Energy

Both solar and wind power-plants require a storage mechanism in order to deliver energy to the grid in a controllable manner that won't put stress on other energy producers.

It looks like the idea here is to produce Hydrogen & Oxygen via electrolysis when the output is strong (or demand is weak), and to use them to produce energy when the output is weak (or demand is strong). Less expensive materials (catalysts) will lower the cost of electrolysis but this, like any form of storage, still increases the cost of the wind or solar power-plants. It would be interesting to see how these costs compare to the cost of a modern nuclear plant.

Solar Energy, All Night Long - Forbes.com:
. . .
"Nocera's discovery--a cheap and easy way to store energy that he thinks will be used to change solar power into a mainstream energy source--will be published in the journal Science on Friday. 'This is the nirvana of what we've been talking about for years,' said Nocera, the Henry Dreyfus Professor of Energy at MIT. 'Solar power has always been a limited, far-off solution. Now we can seriously think about solar power as unlimited--and soon.'

Plants catch light and turn it into an electric current, then use that energy to excite catalysts that split water into hydrogen and oxygen during what is called photosynthesis' light cycle. The energy is then used during the dark cycle to allow the plant to build sugars used for growth and energy storage.

Nocera and Matthew Kanan, a postdoctoral fellow in Nocera's lab, focused on the water-splitting part of photosynthesis. They found cheap and simple catalysts that did a remarkably good job. They dissolved cobalt and phosphate in water and then zapped it with electricity through an electrode. The cobalt and phosphate form a thin-film catalyst around the electrode that then use electrons from the electrode to split the oxygen from water. The oxygen bubbles to the surface, leaving a proton behind.

A few inches away, another catalyst, platinum, helps that bare proton become hydrogen. (This second reaction is a well-known one, and not part of Nocera and Kanan's study.)

The hydrogen and oxygen, separated and on-hand, can be used to power a fuel cell whenever energy is needed.

"Once you put a photovoltaic on it," he says, "you've got an inorganic leaf."

Chemists, it turns out, are always worrying about the stability of their catalysts and end up doing backflips to try to synthesize materials that won't corrode. Photosynthesis, though, is so violently reactive that the catalysts involved break down every 30 minutes. The leaf has to constantly rebuild them. Maybe, thought Nocera, instead of fighting corrosion, he should work with it. "It's a bias a lot of scientists have. We want something to be structurally stable. But all it has to be is functionally stable."

This thinking led Nocera to try his cobalt-phosphate mixture. He knew it wouldn't hold together, but he thought it might still work. Sure enough, Nocera's catalyst breaks down whenever the electricity is cut, but it assembles itself again when electricity is reapplied.

Nocera's discovery is still a science experiment. It needs plenty of engineering before it can be a useful device. The cobalt and phosphate at the center of Nocera's work is cheap and plentiful, but the hydrogen reaction uses platinum, which is rare and expensive. The electrode needs to be improved so the oxygen-making process can speed up. And the system needs to be integrated into some kind of electricity-producing device, ideally powered by solar or wind on one end and a fuel cell on the other."

Also see this link, for pictures of the process etc.

Variable wind causes power grid problems

Wind power is interesting because it is available even when solar collectors aren't working, but wind tends to be highly variable. Our electrical grid is designed around power plants that are slow to change the amount of energy they provide. For best effectiveness, wind power ought to be stored on site (in batteries or capacitors?) and delivered to the grid in a predictable manner - however, that adds to the cost and isn't being done at this time (except in Japan).

Loss of wind causes Texas power grid emergency U.S. Reuters:
"HOUSTON (Reuters) - A drop in wind generation late on Tuesday, coupled with colder weather, triggered an electric emergency that caused the Texas grid operator to cut service to some large customers, the grid agency said on Wednesday.

Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) said a decline in wind energy production in west Texas occurred at the same time evening electric demand was building as colder temperatures moved into the state.

The grid operator went directly to the second stage of an emergency plan at 6:41 PM CST (0041 GMT), ERCOT said in a statement.

System operators curtailed power to interruptible customers to shave 1,100 megawatts of demand within 10 minutes, ERCOT said. Interruptible customers are generally large industrial customers who are paid to reduce power use when emergencies occur.

No other customers lost power during the emergency, ERCOT said. Interruptible customers were restored in about 90 minutes and the emergency was over in three hours."

Surge in wind power causes spike in NW power grid Local News kgw.com News for Oregon and SW Washington:
"PORTLAND, Ore. -- The wind huffed, and it puffed, and it nearly caused major problems in the Northwest's electrical grid last week.

Power managers say they have some fixing to do.

A surge of wind last Monday afternoon jumped far beyond levels forecast by operators of Oregon's burgeoning wind-farm industry, sending more power into the regional grid than it could handle.

The Bonneville Power Administration is responsible for adjusting hydropower generation levels to accommodate the power from wind turbines so the system isn't overloaded.
It realized by Monday evening that it could no longer handle the surge without increasing spills of water through hydroelectric dams to levels dangerous to fish. Spilling the water keeps it from the hydropower generators.
. . .
So, for the first time, BPA power managers began calling wind-farm operators with orders to curtail power generation.

But calls to some wind farms reached only answering machines, and at another the operators misunderstood and kept generation steady. One wind-farm, which BPA wouldn't name, did reduce generation.

As it turned out, water the BPA had to spill wasn't heavy enough to do damage.

But a BPA official said it demonstrated a need to make sure that the growth of wind power in the Columbia Basin doesn't cause more such problems."

Oregon power council releases wind energy plan Daily Journal of Commerce (Portland, OR) Find Articles at BNET:
"Electrical utilities may have a lot of power, but they can't force the wind to blow.

And as Northwest states increasingly develop wind power projects and pass mandates for renewable resources, regional power suppliers must determine how to provide constant electricity from wind turbines at a minimal cost to customers.

'Wind is an intermittent resource and tends not to blow on the hottest and coldest days, which tend to be the days of peak load,' Steve Wright, administrator of the Bonneville Power Administration, said. 'Fundamentally the question here is, 'How do you make wind resources work in a system in which consumers demand high reliability?''

A new wind integration plan, released yesterday by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, has taken the first step in solving the region's wind power problems.

The plan does not, however, evaluate the consequences of implementing Oregon's proposed renewable portfolio standard (RPS), under review by the Oregon Senate, which would require utilities to obtain 25 percent of their new energy production from renewable resources by 2025.
. . .
Spreading wind farms throughout different geographic regions, building additional transmission lines, and coordinating transmission scheduling and new resource development among regional electrical utilities will be the key steps to integrating additional wind resources, according to the plan.

Because electricity cannot be stored and must be used when it is produced, the plan also calls for a number of backup measures to offset periods when the wind isn't blowing.

The region's hydropower system currently acts as a fallback for wind projects already up and running. Power can be "stored" by retaining water behind dams along the Columbia River while the wind is blowing, and released to spin the hydro facilities' turbines on still days.

But the hydro system is nearing its production capacity due to increased regional demand for power and tougher fish and wildlife regulations that limit power production in an effort to better protect the river's wild salmon.

The plan "is timely- We've got a hydro system that is increasingly being constrained," Tim Culbertson, general manager of the Grant County public utility district, said. "Planning for it now is going to give us many better options on how to plan for that as a resource that can be counted on in the region.""

Japan's wind-power problem [National Wind Watch]:
". . .
Wind farms make their money by selling energy contracts to electric companies. When the regional utilities don’t agree to buy the full amount of the electricity they generate, developers are left in a bind.

But utilities don’t view wind as the perfect power. After all, the electricity that wind-power projects supply fluctuates depending on the wind’s strength, setting up a risk for power surges and outages. To neutralize this problem, utility companies have asked developers to store the energy created from wind power in batteries that can be tapped when needed, rather than to channel the energy directly to the grid.

In an effort to appease utilities, wind developers have begun to do just that. Japan Wind Development Co. and battery maker NGK Insulators have partnered to install battery accumulators at a wind-power site in the Aomori Prefecture this year (see Batteries for the Grid). NGK’s sodium-sulfur batteries store energy created when the wind blows and dispatch the smooth energy to the grid during peak demand periods.

Still, batteries are not ready for wide-scale adoption, mainly because of their price. They can double the cost of a project, and it is unlikely project developers will be able to pass these costs to the utilities.

Off-shore wind developments are another attractive, and possibly less costly, option.

It is both more powerful and more predictable than land-based wind power, two factors that may help allay utility concerns about power surges and capacity, and also can be located closer to main city centers, where the electricity is used. Most wind farms in Japan today are located in the far north or south, where land is cheaper and less inhabited, and none are near Tokyo.

European countries have been looking to the sea for years. Japan too has experimented. Two turbines have been in operation in the northern island of Hokkaido – less than 1 kilometer off the coast – since 2003, and the University of Tokyo and Tokyo Electric are investigating the possibility of an off-shore wind farm near Tokyo.

But Japan’s geography complicates such projects. The country is surrounded by deep water, and deep-water wind-farm technology is still in its infancy. Last year, Scotland installed two 87-meter-high wind turbines 25 kilometers off its coast. The installation is the biggest project of its kind in the world and still in the trial stages.

Mr. Iida said similar plans for Japan may be years off if they happen at all. Aside from the expense (off-shore wind farms can cost two to three times onshore projects), it must contend with opposition from the politically powerful fishing industry"

A Problem With Wind Power [AWEO.org]:
"In 1998, Norway commissioned a study of wind power in Denmark and concluded that it has 'serious environmental effects, insufficient production, and high production costs.'

Denmark (population 5.3 million) has over 6,000 turbines that produced electricity equal to 19% of what the country used in 2002. Yet no conventional power plant has been shut down. Because of the intermittency and variability of the wind, conventional power plants must be kept running at full capacity to meet the actual demand for electricity. Most cannot simply be turned on and off as the wind dies and rises, and the quick ramping up and down of those that can be would actually increase their output of pollution and carbon dioxide (the primary 'greenhouse' gas). So when the wind is blowing just right for the turbines, the power they generate is usually a surplus and sold to other countries at an extremely discounted price, or the turbines are simply shut off.

A writer in The Utilities Journal (David J. White, 'Danish Wind: Too Good To Be True?,' July 2004) found that 84% of western Denmark's wind-generated electricity was exported (at a revenue loss) in 2003, i.e., Denmark's glut of wind towers provided only 3.3% of the nation's electricity. According to The Wall Street Journal Europe, the Copenhagen newspaper Politiken reported that wind actually met only 1.7% of Denmark's total demand in 1999. (Besides the amount exported, this low figure may also reflect the actual net contribution. The large amount of electricity used by the turbines themselves is typically not accounted for in the usually cited output figures.
. . .
The head of Xcel Energy in the U.S., Wayne Brunetti, has said, "We're a big supporter of wind, but at the time when customers have the greatest needs, it's typically not available." Throughout Europe, wind turbines produced on average less than 20% of their theoretical (or rated) capacity. Yet both the British and the American Wind Energy Associations (BWEA and AWEA) plan for 30%. The figure in Denmark was 16.8% in 2002 and 19% in 2003 (in February 2003, the output of the more than 6,000 turbines in Denmark was 0!). On-shore turbines in the U.K. produced at 24.1% of their capacity in 2003. The average in Germany for 1998-2003 was 14.7%. In the U.S., usable output (representing wind power's contribution to consumption, according to the Energy Information Agency) in 2002 was 12.7% of capacity (using the average between the AWEA's figures for installed capacity at the end of 2001 and 2002). In California, the average is 20%. The Searsburg plant in Vermont averages 21%, declining every year. This percentage is called the load factor or capacity factor. The rated generating capacity only occurs during 100% ideal conditions, typically a sustained wind speed over 30 mph. As the wind slows, electricity output falls off exponentially.

In high winds, ironically, the turbines must be stopped because they are easily damaged. Build-up of dead bugs has been shown to halve the maximum power generated by a wind turbine, reducing the average power generated by 25% and more. Build-up of salt on off-shore turbine blades similarly has been shown to reduce the power generated by 20%-30%.
. . .
Despite their being cited as the shining example of what can be accomplished with wind power, the Danish government has cancelled plans for three offshore wind farms planned for 2008 and has scheduled the withdrawal of subsidies from existing sites. Development of onshore wind plants in Denmark has effectively stopped. Because Danish companies dominate the wind industry, however, the government is under pressure to continue their support. Spain began withdrawing subsidies in 2002. Germany reduced the tax breaks to wind power, and domestic construction drastically slowed in 2004. Switzerland also is cutting subsidies as too expensive for the lack of significant benefit. The Netherlands decommissioned 90 turbines in 2004. Many Japanese utilities severely limit the amount of wind-generated power they buy, because of the instability they cause. For the same reason, Ireland in December 2003 halted all new wind-power connections to the national grid. In early 2005, they were considering ending state support. In 2005, Spanish utilities began refusing new wind power connections. In 2006, the Spanish government ended -- by emergency decree -- its subsidies and price supports for big wind. In 2004, Australia reduced the level of renewable energy that utilities are required to buy, dramatically slowing wind-project applications. On August 31, 2004, Bloomberg News reported that "the unstable flow of wind power in their networks" has forced German utilities to buy more expensive energy, requiring them to raise prices for the consumer.
. . .
In the U.K. (population 60 million), 1,010 wind turbines produced 0.1% of their electricity in 2002, according to the Department of Trade and Industry. The government hopes to increase the use of renewables to 10.4% by 2010 and 20.4% by 2020, requiring many tens of thousands more towers. As demand will have grown, however, even more turbines will be required. In California (population 35 million), according to the state energy commission, 14,000 turbines (about 1,800 MW capacity) produced half of one percent of their electricity in 2000. Extrapolating this record to the U.S. as a whole, and without accounting for an increase in energy demand, well over 100,000 1.5-MW wind towers (costing $150-300 billion) would be necessary to meet the DOE's goal of a mere 5% of the country's electricity from wind by 2010."

WhiteKnightTwo Space Plane - Getting Ready for Space Tourism

Hopefully this is the start of real commercialization of space. Only when companies are making profits in space will we generate the infrastructure required for humans to eventually live off-planet full-time. Commercial satellites haven't created this yet because it is cheaper to throw them up and let them fall when they're no longer of use - people need a bit more coddling than that.

Virgin Galactic Unveils WhiteKnightTwo Space Plane:
"The Virgin Galactic company today unveiled the WhiteKnightTwo, a new class of carrier airplane that will help loft space tourists beyond Earth's atmosphere.

The first plane in the WhiteKnightTwo class was christened EVE in honor of Virgin founder Sir Richard Branson's mother, who performed the official naming ceremony this morning at the Mojave Air and Spaceport in California.
. . .
WhiteKnightTwo will ferry the not-yet-unveiled SpaceShipTwo crafts, six-passenger versions of the original SpaceShipOne, up to 50,000 feet (15,240 meters) above Earth.

The passenger ship is then launched from the underside of WhiteKnightTwo to continue its ascent to the very edge of space—about 65 miles (104 kilometers) above Earth—under its own power. SpaceShipTwo crafts make the return trip to Earth unaided."

Scaled Composites White Knight Two - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
"The Scaled Composites Model 348 White Knight Two (WK2) is a jet-powered carrier aircraft which will be used to launch the SpaceShipTwo spacecraft. It was developed by Scaled Composites as the first stage of Tier 1b, a two-stage to suborbital-space manned launch system. WK2 is based on the successful mothership to SpaceShipOne,White Knight, which itself is based on Proteus.

Virgin Galactic has two WK2's on order.[1] Together WK2 and SS2 form the basis for Virgin Galactic's fleet of suborbital spaceplanes. The first two WK2s will be named after Steve Fossett (Spirit of Steve Fossett)[2], a close friend of Richard Branson, and Richard's mother Eve (Eve)[3]."

They've slipped the estimated roll out date based on the September 2006 article below, but compared to other historic projects, they're not doing badly.

SPACE.com -- Virgin Galactic Unveils SpaceShipTwo Interior Concept:
"NEW YORK - Future passengers aboard Virgin Galactic spaceliners can look forward to cushioned reclining seats and lots of windows during suborbital flights aboard SpaceShipTwo, a concept interior of which was unveiled by British entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson Thursday.

'It won't be much different than this,' Branson told reporters here at Wired Magazine's NextFest forum. 'It's strange to think that in 12 months we'll be unveiling the actual plane, and then test flights will commence right after that.'
. . .
The air-launched SpaceShipTwo is designed to seat eight people - six passengers and two pilots - and be hauled into launch position by WhiteKnightTwo, a massive carrier craft currently under construction by Scaled Composites, Virgin Galactic president Will Whitehorn said.

For an initial ticket price of $200,000, Virgin Galactic passengers will buy a 2.5-hour flight aboard SpaceShipTwo and launch from an altitude of about 60,000 feet (18,288 meters), while buckled safely in seats that recline flat after reaching suborbital space. A flight animation depicted passengers clad in their own personal spacesuits as they reached a maximum altitude of at least 68 miles (110 kilometers).

While the spacesuit designs are not yet final, they will likely be equipped with personal data and image recorders to add to SpaceShipTwo's in-cabin cameras, Whitehorn said.

"If it was ready next week, I'd be there," Alan Watts, who has traded in two million Virgin Atlantic frequent flyer miles for a ride on SpaceShipTwo, told SPACE.com. "I'm really looking forward to it.""

Solar Power Satellites go Mainstream

With the NY Times endorsing the idea, perhaps now this decades old idea will get some funding - we can hope.

Op-Ed Contributor - Satellites With Solar Panels Can Beam the Sun’s Energy to Earth. - Op-Ed - NYTimes.com:
"As we face $4.50 a gallon gas, we also know that alternative energy sources — coal, oil shale, ethanol, wind and ground-based solar — are either of limited potential, very expensive, require huge energy storage systems or harm the environment. There is, however, one potential future energy source that is environmentally friendly, has essentially unlimited potential and can be cost competitive with any renewable source: space solar power.

Science fiction? Actually, no — the technology already exists. A space solar power system would involve building large solar energy collectors in orbit around the Earth. These panels would collect far more energy than land-based units, which are hampered by weather, low angles of the sun in northern climes and, of course, the darkness of night.

Once collected, the solar energy would be safely beamed to Earth via wireless radio transmission, where it would be received by antennas near cities and other places where large amounts of power are used. The received energy would then be converted to electric power for distribution over the existing grid. Government scientists have projected that the cost of electric power generation from such a system could be as low as 8 to 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, which is within the range of what consumers pay now.
. . .
In terms of cost effectiveness, the two stumbling blocks for space solar power have been the expense of launching the collectors and the efficiency of their solar cells. Fortunately, the recent development of thinner, lighter and much higher efficiency solar cells promises to make sending them into space less expensive and return of energy much greater.

Much of the progress has come in the private sector. Companies like Space Exploration Technologies and Orbital Sciences, working in conjunction with NASA’s public-private Commercial Orbital Transportation Services initiative, have been developing the capacity for very low cost launchings to the International Space Station. This same technology could be adapted to sending up a solar power satellite system.

Still, because building the first operational space solar power system will be very costly, a practical first step would be to conduct a test using the International Space Station as a “construction shack” to house the astronauts and equipment. The station’s existing solar panels could be used for the demonstration project, and its robotic manipulator arms could assemble the large transmitting antenna. While the station’s location in orbit would permit only intermittent transmission of power back to Earth, a successful test would serve as what scientists call “proof of concept.”

Over the past 15 years, Americans have invested more than $100 billion, directly and indirectly, on the space station and supporting shuttle flights. With an energy crisis deepening, it’s time to begin to develop a huge return on that investment. (And for those who worry that science would lose out to economics, there’s no reason that work on space solar power couldn’t go hand in hand with work toward a manned mission to Mars, advanced propulsion systems and other priorities of the space station.)"

And of course, once we have huge arrays in space, we can position them to block sunlight if we're getting to warm (global warming), or reflect more sunlight onto Earth if we're getting a bit chilly (a new ice-age).

Google's Wikipedia Copy with Attribution

Given time, citations to Knol may be more acceptable to college professors than Wikipedia. Competition is usually good for any product, so perhaps both will be improved over time.

Google Offers Knol, a Wikipedia Copy with Attribution - Yahoo! News:
"On Wednesday Google took the lid off a new product called Knol. The search-engine giant first announced it was testing the product in December. Knols are authoritative articles about specific topics, written by people who know about those subjects.
. . .
"With Knol, we are introducing a new method for authors to work together that we call moderated collaboration," Dupont and McNally wrote. "With this feature, any reader can make suggested edits to a knol which the author may then choose to accept, reject or modify before these contributions become visible to the public. This allows authors to accept suggestions from everyone in the world while remaining in control of their content. After all, their name is associated with it!"

Knol includes community tools for interaction between readers and authors. People can submit comments, rate or write a review of a knol. At the discretion of the author, a knol may include ads from Google's AdSense program. If an author chooses to include ads, Google will provide the author with a revenue share.
. . .
Experts can access the new site at knol.google.com."

One creature's waste is another's power.

This is more cost effective at bigger operations than small family farms. As it should also reduce the noxious odors, I would almost favor legislating this process for pig farms.

Cow power could generate electricity for millions:
"The journal paper, 'Cow Power: The Energy and Emissions Benefits of Converting Manure to Biogas', has implications for all countries with livestock as it is the first attempt to outline a procedure for quantifying the national amount of renewable energy that herds of cattle and other livestock can generate and the concomitant GHG emission reductions.

Livestock manure, left to decompose naturally, emits two particularly potent GHGs – nitrous oxide and methane. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, nitrous oxide warms the atmosphere 310 times more than carbon dioxide, methane does so 21 times more.

The journal paper creates two hypothetical scenarios and quantifies them to compare energy savings and GHG reducing benefits. The first is 'business as usual' with coal burnt for energy and with manure left to decompose naturally. The second is one wherein manure is anaerobically-digested to create biogas and then burnt to offset coal.

Through anaerobic digestion, similar to the process by which you create compost, manure can be turned into energy-rich biogas, which standard microturbines can use to produce electricity. The hundreds of millions of livestock inhabiting the US could produce approximately 100 billion kilowatt hours of electricity, enough to power millions of homes and offices.

And, as manure left to decompose naturally has a very damaging effect on the environment, this new waste management system has a net potential GHG emissions reduction of 99 million metric tonnes, wiping out approximately four per cent of the country's GHG emissions from electricity production.

The burning of biogas would lead to the emission of some CO2 but the output from biogas-burning plants would be less than that from, for example, coal."