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A new idea for how to transport the stuff in cars

I have never been a fan of hydrogen technology as a solution to the climate change problem. It would be great if we could power automobiles with hydrogen (generated, of course, with renewable energy), but how do you carry the hydrogen around in your car? Do you really want to be driving around on top of a tank full of compressed hydrogen? Can you say Hindenburg?

I just listened to a great segment on this week's Science Friday. The guest, Jerry Woodall, a professor at Purdue, has an interesting idea for how to carry hydrogen in a way that seems extremely safe to me.

The idea is that you carry around a bunch of aluminum. You react the aluminum with water, and that produces hydrogen, which would then be immediately burned. In the end, you're left with a tank full of aluminum oxide, which will be recycled back into aluminum (using, of course, renewable energy) at a recycling facility.

This seems like a great idea, one that makes me reconsider my skepticism towards hydrogen. But listen to the segment yourself. Also, check out the presentations on this site.

Umbra on seltzer bottles

Dear Umbra, I love drinking fizzy water, especially in the summer, but I am appalled to learn that the plastic bottles use petroleum in their production. Plus, hauling them home from the supermarket burns gas. I’ve been looking at seltzer bottles, also known as soda siphons, the original source of carbonated water, and also much […]

A reality TV show that will knock your socks off

Crude: a great overview of how, when, where, and why oil is obtained, and a fascinating look at what happens when you burn a bunch of it real fast.

Think The End of Suburbia meets An Inconvenient Truth.

Fred Thompson delivers rational, informed, passionate speech about the need for immediate action to

Just kidding. He's an ass:

Scary stuff

More and more experts are saying global warming is as grave a threat to our national security (PDF) as terrorism and nuclear proliferation. Some in the media are coming to the same view.

The Financial Times set up their coverage with the following scenario, pulled from a Pentagon memo:

Poor guy

Poor Bush, he just can’t get a break. He announces a shiny new climate-change strategy, and what does he get? Nothing but grief. Nancy Pelosi called it "the same stale proposals he has repeatedly put forward to the international community." Al Gore called it "purely and simply smoke and mirrors [that] has the transparent purpose […]

Whatever happened to local control is good?

From Organic Consumers:

Failing to suppress grassroots control over food safety laws and labels in the last session of Congress, industry has now called on their friends in the House Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy, and Poultry to slip a similar poison pill into an obscure section of the voluminous 2007-2012 Farm Bill. The provision would give the White House appointed Secretary of Agriculture the power to eliminate local or state food and farming laws, such as those in four California counties banning genetically engineered crops, and set an ominous precedent undermining states' rights.

Hy-Wire hydrogen car

BBC takes a closer look at the Hy-Wire, GM’s hydrogen fuel cell car. According to the incredulous host, it’s “the future.”

It’s not part of the precipitate, it’s part of the solution!

Free public transit.

Watch at your own risk

I was going to wrap this into a previous post, but this kind of spectacular cluelessness deserves its time in the spotlight. Watch two mandarins of Beltway "moderation," Mark Shields and David Brooks, discuss Bush’s "new" climate strategy: Astounding. You really could not ask for a more crystalline example of the intellectual tics that have […]