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Thursday, July 24, 2008
831 - Natural gas-powered cars and trucks in Wyoming?
With Wyoming being one of the largest natural gas producing states, would it not make sense for us to lead the USA in usage of vehicles powered by this abundant substance?
As gasoline moves toward $5 per gallon and a natural gas-powered car runs on $1.25 per gallon-equivalent cost, well, would it not make economic sense for us to push for this development?
What if the state gave some kind of economic benefit to companies that put in natural gas stations? Or to car dealers that sold natural gas powered cars? Or to car owners who buy these kinds of cars?
These cars are called CNG cars, for their use of compressed natural gas.
Big news across the country is the vast proliferation of hybrid cars and even the soon appearance of all-electric cars. Yet, here we are in natural gas-rich Wyoming with product that we cannot even get to market. Why not jump into this fray and lead the nation with this type of development?
Up to now one of the biggest problems is lack of fueling stations. Wyoming could pioneer such a thing but in the meantime, a Canadian company has developed a home system where you can re-fuel your car overnight using your own natural gas system in the garage. It is a slow process, though, as the gas is pumped at 3,600 pounds per square inch in order to become CNG and fit in the tank. Ideally you need filling stations, though.
Another downside is that in extreme cold, the efficiency suffers, but it is small price to pay for the overall, year-around benefits.
CNG vehicles have a host of champions. One of the big energy promoters in the country is T. Boone Pickens, the legendary Texas oilman. Three things he is promoting are wind turbines, oil sands and natural gas-powered cars.
His reasoning is that we need to cut down on imported oil, since our country does not produce enough oil to sustain our needs. But switching to natural gas that means less oil needs to be imported.
One of my coffee buddies was telling me about his son-in-law who lives in Brigham City, Utah and commutes 144 miles a day to his job in Magna, Utah.
He says the fellow expects to save many thousands of dollars a year when he takes delivery of a Honda Civic GX car later this month. It burns compressed natural gas rather than the gas hog Toyota Sequoia he has been driving.
Honda has been making these cars for some time. In fact there are about 142,000 natural gas-powered vehicles in this country today. And over eight million worldwide. So the technology is proven.
This technology works very well for big-city buses although one drawback in small cars like the Honda Civic is that the CNG tank pretty much wipes out the trunk space.
Another downside is that the CNG cars are not available just anywhere. Next-door Utah is a big booster of these kinds of vehicles. That state has promoted the construction of 749 special service stations featuring CNG. More than 100 Utah businesses and government agencies are using vehicles powered by compressed natural gas.
In Chicago a week ago, a U. S. Representative announced plans to introduce legislation forcing U.S. car markers to make 10 percent of their vehicles CNG vehicles by 2018.
So how do these cars work? An airline pilot named Jeff Church of Los Angeles has put 53,000 miles on his 2003 model. He says with his home unit, he only pays 98 cents per gallon for fuel. He says it is the perfect vehicle for folks who drive a lot of miles.
Last time I checked, Wyoming people actually drive more miles per-capita than just about anyone in the country. Plus big pickups and SUVS probably outnumber cars in our state. Any way to convert these gas-guzzlers to lower costs would be pretty inviting. Perhaps we need to get on this bandwagon. And soon.
Everyone knows that T. Boone Pickens is no dummy. He believes in wind and so should we, since Wyoming is just as windy as his West Texas.
And he believes in natural gas of which we have a tremendous abundance. If this technology really does work in our high altitude, cool climate, it would be fun to see us leading the nation in converting to a system that makes so much sense at first glance.
More details on his plan can be found on www.pickensplan.com.
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Saturday, July 19, 2008
829 - It feels good to feel good
There was a time not long ago when things just were not going well for me physically. I had a bad sinus infection, my gout had flared up and then a bad cold hit with the accompanying sore throat, coughing and runny nose.
My wife Nancy, who is affectionately referred to by me as Florence Nightingale’s younger sister Attila, was not so sympathetic.
You see I come from a family of spoiled kids – all 11 of us. And our mother always “babied” us when we were sick.
Thus, whenever I have a sniffle or an upset stomach, well, I expect some real sympathy. Instead my dear Attila materializes after about 24 hours.
“You still think you’re sick?” she will ask, with a tinge of sarcasm in her voice. Around my house, if an ambulance isn’t carting you off, you must be doing fine.
It must be admitted that after 42 years of marriage, it seems odd to me that when you are even remotely sick, well, a person should get babied big-time. In conversations with other husbands, it is amazing how often this odd coincidence is mentioned– we were all babied more by our mothers (in our memories, anyway) that we are by our spouses.
My cold ran its course and was soon done just as Attila had predicted.
A miracle drug called colchicine stopped the gout in its tracks, albeit with a few extra side effects that are not so pleasant. Let’s just stay I did not stray too far from a restroom.
And with the help of some antibiotics, the sinus infection disappeared too. Some chicken soup probably helped, as did a limited amount of scotch. And lots of sleep. But recovery could have been quicker with some serious babying. Oh well.
And since that time, well, it is easy to say, “it feels good to feel good.”
These thoughts on health and well being have come to mind recently as a series of bad events have been happening to friends and people in the news.
Two of the good guys in national media recently died. Tim Russert, 58, was just the best political interviewer and Tony Snow, 53, was a great radio commentator. Tim died of a heart attack and Tony died of colon cancer.
In Wyoming, the loss of Bill Paddleford in Jackson of cancer at the age of 55 is a big loss. He was a hoot. Just a great guy and he had a lot of great work ahead of him. We also lost a young Lander business leader, Joel Martens, 45, who died in this sleep this past week. A big shock.
President of the local Wyoming Catholic College, Fr. Bob Cook, is recovering from a blood clot in the lung. Another friend was recently diagnosed with a benign brain tumor. He is frantically seeing sights all over the world, just on the chance the tumor will turn aggressive.
Two coffee buddies are dealing with prostate cancer. One’s surgery went badly initially. The other one just got the verdict and is having surgery next month.
Personally, I recently had a colonoscopy at Lander Regional Hospital and it was an easy procedure. Also had one of those CT heart and body scans in Denver, which came out fine, too.
We try to go to health fairs and get blood screens to determine how we are doing.
And if gout is the worst thing you have to complain about, well, life is not treating you too badly. Yes, it truly does feel good to feel good. Good health is something that we so often take for granted.
With the above written, it now seems pretty selfish to have felt as bad as I did about my ailments. Plus gout is a malady that prompts those smug looks. Gout is known as the rich man’s disease and can be exacerbated by wine, beer, steak, etc
I was looking for a health-related joke and all I could find was this one, which pokes fun at a lawyer grilling a pathologist during a trial:
Q: Before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse? A: No.
Q: Did you check blood pressure? A: No.
Q: Did you check breathing? A: No.
Q: So, then it is possible the patient was alive when you began the autopsy? A: No.
Q: How can you be so sure, doctor? A: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
Q: But could the patient have still been alive nevertheless? A: It is possible he could have been alive and practicing law somewhere.
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Wednesday, July 9, 2008
828 - Blame it on the Tetons
A very popular national music group is called Modest Mouse. Saw them not too long ago on Saturday Night Live, for example.
One of their popular songs (which I guess I am the last to know this) is called Blame It On The Tetons.
It is easy to blame a lot of things of the overwhelming beauty of the Teton Mountain Range.
Not sure why that theme was picked by this group, which does not hail from Wyoming, but no doubt one of their songwriters has some experience here.
* * *
Our state was also mentioned on Saturday Night Live about the same time. Back on March 3, a hilarious cartoon called “The Obama Files” started out with a scene with a caption across the front: WYOMING, FEB 21, discussing some secret Obama plan.
Wyoming?
We know that Sen. Obama has a 50-state strategy. Even Gov. Dave Freudenthal, who is a big booster, talked about it to a nationwide audience on Meet the Press from Jackson Hole last Sunday. He also said that it would be a huge upset if the young candidate could carry the Cowboy State.
The governor also contended that Vice President Dick Cheney had lost some support in his home state but that he would regain it once he retired from office.
∑ * *
Well, I went to the lake with my grandkids instead of visiting the Rainbow Family.
Sorry to my faithful readers who were counting on me for a first-hand report, but, well it just did not seem as exciting to me as taking these young kids fishing at Flaming Gorge.
Not sure I would have wanted to be there when the riot broke out on July 4 – some 400 rainbows surrounded Forest Service personnel who were trying to arrest a marijuana user.
After tasers and rubber bullets, well, somehow the USFS folks got away safely.
Yeah, it was a lot more fun at the lake. The folks there were not quite as scantily clad as the Rainbows. The water was just 61 degrees. And assumably the scene at the lake was much more wholesome.
* * *
We looked at a hybrid car recently and discovered something quite unusual. This car got better mileage in town and than it did on the open road. The mpg in town was 26 and on the road was 24.
How could this be?
The salesman pointed out that the stop-and-go driving actually lets the car recharge its battery system and it switches back and forth from battery and gas engine. Yes, it actually got better mileage in town than on the road.
Had not heard about this phenomenon before and perhaps it does not occur in all hybrids but it did in this small SUV.
Tom Laycock of Cheyenne says his Prius behaves the same way.
* * *
While pouring $100 of gasoline into my big SUV, I saw a big old motor home come lumbering into the station.
While wandering over to pick up a windshield brush, I asked the motor home owner if the prices for motor homes had come down? Oh yes, he replied, It’s because of fuel stops like this one!
He said that they loved theirs and really did not mind the high prices since most of their trips were here in Wyoming. “We take our home with us so it is not so expensive,” he said.
That reminded of an expression being used in some tourism campaigns. It is called “Stay-cations,” which, of course, describes taking just local trips.
Clay James ran the Grand Teton Lodge Company for decades and recently retired. He and wife Shay just bought a 31-foot motor home. He says he spent his adult life working in the summer and this year they are going to see Wyoming. Sounds like several “stay-cations,” are on tap for them.
* * *
One of the best-loved newspaper columnists in the country was the late Erma Bombeck. Here is one of my favorite Bombeck bombasts:
“In a recurring dream, I am asked to give an accounting of my life to a higher court, it goes like this:
“`’So, empty your pockets. What have you got left of your life? Any dreams unfulfilled? Any unused talent that we gave you when you were born that you still have left? Any unsaid compliments or bits of love that you haven`t spread around?
"I will answer, `I`ve nothing to return. I spent everything you gave me. I`m as naked as the day I was born.`"
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Friday, July 4, 2008
827 - Could Wyoming run out of elecricity?
Water, water every where, nor any drop to drink. – from the Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Despite its reputation as the energy breadbasket of the western hemisphere, is it possible that Wyoming people would someday soon find themselves without electricity?
Can you imagine people in Wyoming suffering power shortages as soon as next summer?
Projections by the North American Electric Reliability Corporation have the people of the west enduring brownouts and blackouts possibly by next year because there is not enough power. This study can be accessed on the Internet at: www.nerc.com/pub/sys/all_updl/docs/pubs/LTRA2006.pdf.
Across the nation, demand is projected to rise 40 percent by 2030 and the amount of power plants coming on line is down to almost none. The Global Warming folks have successfully managed to shutter the construction of new coal-fire power plants in the USA.
It is easy to agree that global warming is occurring. But what are we going to do when the lights go off?
Wyoming people have always smugly felt that since the coal is here and the power plants are here, well, heck, we will not have to worry when the power goes off in other parts of the country.
Not so. When we have no ownership interest in the power generation facilities, it looks like we have little say as to who gets the power.
Our multi-state utilities have the same obligation to their customers in Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, etc. as they do to their Wyoming customers.
Rob Hurless is the governor’s advisor on energy, is a former publisher of the Casper Star-Tribune and is former member of the Public Service Commission. He says:
“If you are talking about rolling brownouts or rolling blackouts . . . most utilities have what is called a reserve margin built into their system and watched by the Public Service Commissions. These reserve margins are generation margins, which are designed to handle ‘normal’ peaking demand events like a spell of hot or cold weather. If the reserve margins have been allowed to deteriorate from a normal range of 10-15 percent then the service territory could be at risk of a rolling brownout.
“Often utilities can predict when these might occur and ask customers to cut back on their electricity consumption. That may be effective enough to avoid shutting anyone`s power off.
“The next stage in the cycle is to `shed load`. In some areas of the country like California, a number of the utilities have agreements with large customers that call for the customer to shut down or curtail their consumption when the utility calls for load shedding.
“In the event that simple notification and load shedding are not sufficient to manage the grid successfully then the utility would be forced to resort to rolling brownouts to keep the entire grid from crashing in a cascading type event.”
Sorry Rob, but this scenario does not sound that comforting.
The NERC study predicts brownouts and blackouts in Texas and other parts of the country next summer but what surprised me is that areas of the West were also predicted for 2009 to 2011. Is that us?
Here is what Mr. Hurless had to say to that:
“With respect to outages, I have not seen the report you are referencing. What I have seen is that our reserve margins are falling as we fail to build generating capacity to keep up with demand. But I haven`t seen anything that says we will definitively have outages by 2011.”
His final comment:
“My guess is that the entire Rocky Mountain Power system would operate as a unit as far as sharing the pain across the entire service territory. And of course the utilities and the commissions want to avoid the possibility of outages altogether.
“By way of numbers, Wyoming produces roughly 6,000 megawatts of power of which we export 3,000. Of the remaining power used internally, the residential sector would use about half in our homes and half would be used by the industrial sector.
“The entire residential load is about 1,500 megawatts. That is the equivalent of about the output of 3/4s of a Jim Bridger or Laramie River Station or about two Dave Johnson plants,” he concluded.
I have always advocated the state should get involved in the ownership of power generating facilities, although the constitution clearly prevents this until new laws change it.
But what an amazing situation it would be if Wyomingites would soon find themselves sitting in a sea of energy production, much like the thirsty ancient mariner, drifting in an ocean of electrical generation, with power, power everywhere but none that we could claim.
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