State and federal budgets are headed for the cliff to varying degrees with few exceptions. Here in Wisconsin, we’ve had the Battle Royale fight to the death cage match with the repubs on one side and the unions on the other while the dems were hiding out in a witness protection plan. Meanwhile at the federal level, we are on a dangerous trajectory unseen in my lifetime. People have whined about the deficit and debt since my adolescence – the Miracle on Ice days against the Soviet Union. I kept saying, “It’s not a problem. It’s not a problem.” Why? …
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We, as an industry, have our work cut out for us in coming years. Months ago an industrial energy efficiency consortium that puts on training events held a two-day workshop on motors. Motors! Talking about the common Swingline stapler for two days would be more interesting. The efficient motor uses less energy in the amount of the difference in the reciprocals of old minus new. I.e., (1/eff – 1/eff). Multiply by nameplate horsepower then by 0.5 (don’t ask, just do it) then by annual hours of use. Bingo! There are your savings. Two days! There are more complex issues that…
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Some things in life you have to fully commit yourself to or they will end in colossal failure, or immeasurably small success. When I was a kid I played Evel Knievel by setting up ramps of 2x12 planks and concrete blocks. I jumped my bike across maybe a five foot “canyon”. Note, this was before mountain bikes. Gary Fischer may have been developing his mountain bike in his garage but there was nothing available on the market. I used a purple girl’s bike, single speed, no shock absorbers, no foot clips, and certainly no helmet. Why the girl’s bike? The…
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Like any respectable pets, our dogs Bailey and Atlas have us trained, very well. I roll out of bed on the weekend, slog downstairs to make a strong mug of coffee, light a fire (in the wood stove), sit in my chair to read the paper and then the dogs position themselves in their kennels with their entitlement look. They were trained since puppyhood to like being in their kennels so when they kennel up, they get a b-i-s-c-u-i-t. We have to spell certain things out or use aliases to avoid undesired reactions. For example, we say “There is a…
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This week I am testing an additional medium for the The Energy Rant; the cartoon. Click here to try it out. Send email comments with your thoughts regarding this mechanism to me at jli@michaelsenergy.com. Major barriers to EE for large commercial and industrial end users include; Lack of time Lack of expertise Lack of capital Risk aversion If you don’t think end users are short on availability, just ask them. Most end users don’t have time to commit to energy efficiency projects and most of the rest think they don’t have time. The ones who really don’t have time get…
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I was pretty much like every other 12 year old boy. I liked fire, explosions, and crashes. If you think I’m crazy, why are movies sometimes beginning to end filled with the same? Enough said. Growing up on the farm there were always plenty of things to burn. One time I asked my dad if I could burn an old cattle feeder that we no longer used. No problem. You never see these things anymore but they were wood structures, like a weekend cabin that could withstand an F4 tornado, except it was all wood, nails and fasteners – solid…
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You know what torques me off, or make that torques us off more than anything else? I’m saving it for a future rant. Stay tuned. No really, it’s “prospective” clients, many times end users that have screwed up buildings beyond reproach or wasting energy as though they just want to release all the carbon locked up in fossil fuels and get it over with. They ask for help but in no way intend to pay for it or take action for anything substantial. We may have even demonstrated, clearly by benchmarking or other means with specific measures that they could…
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The Wall Street Journal this week weighed in on the ban on incandescent from the energy bill of 2007 signed by Bush to phase out the incandescent light bulb by 2014. Naturally, their opinion is that banning products that are essentially harmless and in demand from citizens is bad policy. As usual, I have multiple points of view on this issue as well. First, I agree with the WSJ that ramming things like this down peoples’ throats is never a good idea. It appears that next month we are going to see the political fallout of such lawmaking processes. In…
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Many posts ago, I wrote “The More You Spend, The More You Save” explaining how poor system control wastes energy but results in even greater energy savings for efficient equipment. For example, consider an air handling system that wastes heating energy provided by an efficient boiler. The boiler saves x% versus a conventional model, so x% multiplied by greater use (wasted energy) results in “more” savings. Recently I picked up on buzz that argues greater efficiency results in greater energy consumption. At one point I recall reading in the Wall Street Journal an editorial that argued more efficient vehicles just…
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How many times have you read "we can create 40 million jobs and reduce our energy consumption by 90% if only we did x, y, and z." Lester in this article says by 2035 we can double our fuel economy. Well I should hope so! Lester is actually one guy that is conservative in his estimates/goals. David Goldstein in the same article says we can decrease our energy consumption by 88% by 2050. Now where does he or any other egghead come up with these numbers? I had to laugh out loud regarding the results of an energy efficiency potential…
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