Practice what you preach

Subsidized by SDG&E (our power company in San Diego) so only $2 for a pair. Not bad... good light too, not cold or inhospitable.

Who thought trans fat could rock so hard?

Rock on! This bike is awesome!

Die Moto, a motorcycle that runs on biodiesel, set national and international records on Monday, cruising to a top speed of 130.6 miles per hour.

Built by The Crucible, a group of industrial artists in Oakland, the bike has a modified BMW car engine and a handcrafted aluminum shell. And it's a green machine, too. Running on B100, or pure bioediesel fuel, the bike emits 78 percent less CO2 than a standard diesel engine. The team eventually hopes to crank it up to 160 miles per hour.

Built by a neat group too:

The Crucible is an educational facility that fosters a collaboration of Arts, Industry and Community. Through training in the fine and industrial arts, The Crucible promotes creative expression, reuse of materials, and innovative design while serving as an accessible arts venue for the general public.

I love that an "art school" made this. They also teach welding, blacksmithing, kinetics, neon and light... I'm going to make it a point to stop by here the next time I drive back to WA.

Video here, sounds MEAN!! You can hear the turbos spool when they give it some gas. I'm also really digging the long and low stance this thing presents. Conjures up images of Akira.

Gold mine of alternative energy info

Just getting through this site. It is a green-tech symposium (or, to use their word, a colloquium) where several ideas were presented including a self-recharging EV (electric vehicle). As I work through this site, I'll post some of the highlights but I wanted to get it out there.

The inevitable and infinite progress of technology

The battery may have serious competition:

The patent describes an "ultra capacitor", which functions similarly to other electric car batteries but can charge more quickly and has a more streamlined process of releasing energy. The result is an automotive system that charges in just a few hours and can run for hundreds of miles. The Associated Press reports that a car using EEstor's technology could run for as much as 500 miles before it would need a re-charge.

If you're not familiar with a capacitor, it is a very simple electronic device. It is used in electronic equipment to quickly store and release very small amounts of electricity. It works like a reservoir by allowing for sporadic flow TO the capacitor and steady flow FROM it. Imagine you wanted a constant flow of water but only had a sprinkler. You could attach something that gathered the water first and released it out the other end at whatever flow you wanted.

Not a lot of information to be released yet... the guy doesn't want his idea robbed, right?