raphsperry’s Recent Comments

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  I'm confused - how can an area be an "urban zone" and have "90 percent of the area devoted to green space"? Does this mean a 10-acre area that is 9 acres of parkland and 1 acre of housing? Or is it more low density cities where detached houses are surrounded by front, back, and side yards, so that those together outnumber the square footage of paved roads, sidewalks, driveways, and rooftops 9:1? That would probably be a suburban density, wouldn't it?On A touch of green trumps the blues posted 1 month ago 2 Responses

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  This sounds like a clean approach, but what about emissions from agriculture and deforestation or credit for carbon sequestration?On New Cantwell climate bill is simpler and more equitable posted 1 month, 2 weeks ago 5 Responses

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  I am also puzzled at the attack on, say, NRDC when there are real villains out there on the other side. Why not protest at, say, the US Chamber of Commerce, which continues to deny global warming exists (even as its membership shrinks as a result)? Or why not take part in the direct actions against mountaintop removal mining, and coal lobbyists, or the ever-evil Massey Energy? Just a guess, but I bet environmental activists in appalachia would appreciate that support much more than hounding middle-of-the-road environmental groups. I admire the people who are currently demonstrating at the headquarters of Aetna and elsewhere - that's taking a principled stand on the health issue. I wonder if targeting other environmentalists is just a way to deal with someone who will actually listen. I'm as tired as anyone of having genuine left-wing voices shut out of the mainstream media and what passes for the "national debate," but taking that frustration out on would-be allies seems counterproductive. Is this the best way for that position to be heard, and which audience is really the target?On ‘No compromise’ faction attacks climate bill posted 1 month, 2 weeks ago 104 Responses

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  I'm with NHSolarGuy and Norcalplanner - it's just kind of wacky to create a mountain of maintenance problems with a scheme like this.  What if every pothole created an electric outage somewhere?  These panels would be covered a lot of the time.  Panels hundreds of miles from load will suffer distribution losses, and placing high-voltage distribution underground has its own lion's share of problems.  Placing them in cities means they'll be shaded by buildings and be over other underground infrastructure (pipes, sewers, telecom,etc.) that regularly dig up the streets for their own maintenance.  The idea of ignoring all these problems by just multiplying the square footage of road surface by the efficiency of solar panels is kind of cute but mostly a waste of time.  DOE gave this effort $100,000- that won't even pay one engineer for one year to work on this, let along get one square foot installed.

   

  I am all for visionary thinking, but I'd like to see if have one foot in reality as well.  Otherwise how can we criticize equally hare-brained schemes like releasing oil shale with underground thermonuclear explosions with a straight face?

  On Could we replace the nation's pavement with solar panels? posted 2 months, 3 weeks ago 30 Responses

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  Increasing energy prices is actually not enough to motivate building owners and developers to make buildings more efficient.  For one thing, most commercial buildings and new homes are built on spec, and the developer won't be around to see the energy savings.  Consumers should look for savings, but consumer behavior has been shown not to put a huge premium on energy cost, and even if it doubled, it would be be a small cost compared to a mortgage or, for commercial buildings, other operating expenses.California has achieved the level of energy efficiency we have precisely because of minimum codes; it's time for the rest of the country to follow our example, because this is a proven win-win situation for all parties.  It's not like California home builders have suffered for 30 years under our energy codes.  

  Having a federal agency review energy performance would be a real intrusion on building regulation,and is a good issue to raise. The ADA is an interesting precedent to consider of federal standards being applied in the area of building standards.  My opinion is that ADA enforcement is poorly coordinated with other building codes; maybe the fear of another federal program would motivate all states to adopt tough standards!

  On The case for a national building energy code posted 4 months, 1 week ago 10 Responses