Comments robertogreen has made

  • dave, such a key point

    keep hammering it.
    when i bought my prius, so many people had so many opinions about how little it mattered overall, how it was actually bad (that bit has been debunked) and so on.  now, i was going to get a new car anyway, as my old one wasn't working.  so rather than say how much my prius was as the measure, how much was it versus another car i might have bought.  that's the real cost.  if things are being done anyway, then one does them one of two ways:  green or not green.   the cost of green is in the difference between the two, not in the total cost of the green action.

    it's pretty simple and most people don't get it.On Big emissions gains require big investments; get over it posted 1 year, 2 months ago 5 Responses

  • what about changing the emphasis

    let's make it all about growing your own food at your own house, urban, suburban or rural.  why not?  the inputs are as much as you can afford/have time for, and the output is...dinner.  that's a hell of a deal.  if i grow too much stuff here at my house, i have plenty of neighbors and friends who will be happy to take it off my hands.  and the profit margin is not important.On Can sustainable farming provide a sustainable living? posted 1 year, 3 months ago 26 Responses

  • what a crock

    from a family of people who have suffered from melanomas...

    there is some sketchy, extremely prelimary science that says there MAY be problems associated with sunscreens.  maybe.  in no way certain beyond some very small percentage number.

    there is copious evidence that using sunscreen prevents melanomas and sunburns that can be precursors.

    this headline, blasted all over the world, will create massive damage and harm.

    eiger19, almost every major manufacturer of sunscreen has added UVB and A protection.  you are full of it.On Most sunscreens ineffective or pose a health risk, says group posted 1 year, 4 months ago 10 Responses

  • that's the sad thing

    the smartest minds can't come to grips with the problem in a long term way.  i have to say that ethanol seemed like a terrible idea to me and many of my non-pro friends by 2006.  replacing fossil fuel with food fuel?  how could that possibly not be a terrible idea?  and given that we have a massive midwestern lobby of both ds and rs behind ethanol, one should have been aware of its bullshittery anyway.

    and GROWING SHIT TO FUEL CARS IN BRAZIL?  forgive my hyper-ventilation, but what exactly do you think will be cut down to plant all that sugar?  may i suggest the amazon?

    this whole speech is ultimately risible.  doerr should apologize to his daughter for being such an asshole.On Venture capitalist John Doerr shares four lessons on climate change posted 1 year, 4 months ago 24 Responses

  • not to keep hammering away at the same point..

    but it seems to me that it is a moral imperative for those who can afford it to buy prii and make them plug-ins.  if you can spend 70 gs on a BMW, you can spend less to get a fully plugged-in prius getting well over 100 mpgs.  today.On Why hybrids beat diesels posted 1 year, 6 months ago 21 Responses

  • modding

    the great thing to me about this car is all the mods people are creating.

    i have hybrids-plus's battery and plug adapter in, plus rick eye of go100mpg (here in LA)'s mod of a switch which stops the prius from kicking the gas in until you get over 52 mph.  with these two mods, my prius gets over 200 mpg.  some of that is because the type of driving i do--on LA city streets--is perfectly suited to a car that is electric up to 52 mph, but even if that weren't the case anyone with these mods could get well over 100 mpg.

    it's all available now, with today's tech.  toyota's announcement that it would start making the prius a plug-in in 2010 is extremely disappointing--the battery they are proposing to use, simply put, sucks.  they are trying to keep the price point down but that's a mistake in my view.On Prius sales top one million posted 1 year, 6 months ago 14 Responses

  • vasumurti

    you do more harm with your endless prolixity to you movement then you will ever realize.

    i will give you a free lesson in internet discourse.  read carefully.

    1.  short and to the point.
    2. short and to the point.
    3. use links to support your points, if you are making sweeping statements in particular.
    4. a comments section is a forum to engage the writer of the post first, and other commenters second.  it is not a place to go off on your own endless tangents.  you have a link at your name that leads to your website.

    i would suggest, in future, that you merely say "please check my website for more info" after following rules 1 and 2.

    and to dave roberts et al:  to let someone turn this into a peta recruitment site is shameful and embarrassing.  you really need to do better than this.  in general there are too many posts on gristmill, but this is really pushing it.On PETA VP argues vegetarianism is the best way to help the planet posted 1 year, 7 months ago 77 Responses

  • prius mods

    with a lithium-ion battery, and a 250 dollar firewall-breaking wire, you can trick a prius into driving electric only up to 52 mph with a 40 mile range.

    total cost--60 k or down to 55k depending.  and you still have a gas tank that can be used when you flip a switch (from overriding gas mode to turning it back on).

    however, same car with lead-acid battery can go 52 mph with a 15 mile range.  total cost 38k.  still has the gas tank.  getting there on price.  

    of course, this is all mod territory.  toyota could do this with the prius with different battery options (the option they announced is pathetic in the extreme--it's like they don't care).

    i'm looking at putting together a company in LA that will do this kind of modding (with various options) right now.  the tech all exists and works on my prius.  the issue is simply price point.  and one thing i believe more strongly than anything else--price point is a function of will.  the way is there.  can the will follow?  stay tuned.On Electric bike zips up Berkeley hills with ease posted 1 year, 7 months ago 11 Responses

  • it's all here already

    so i've modded my prius with a lithium/ion battery and now have 40 miles of electric range.  i've just met a guy who can give the prius a switch that forces it run exclusively on the electric.  living in LA, i will now have a car that goes up to 52 MPH pure electric, but still has gas for when i need it (almost never will be the answer).

    all technology that exists today.  done as a mod it probably makes a prius cost 40k.  if toyota would get their heads out of their ass it could be 32k for a real hybrid electric that gets at minimum 100 mpg and probably far higher.On Test driving a fully electric car posted 1 year, 7 months ago 8 Responses

  • nope

    just unfunny.

    SNL--still not laughing.

    for the last 20 or so years.On Clinton v. Obama on SNL posted 1 year, 8 months ago 2 Responses

  • nuclear power needs massive inputs

    of water.  we don't have the kind of free water resources laying around anymore to run nuclear.  it's a dead issue.  

    keep it simple.  this point is irrefutable, unfixable and clear.On Big Energy promotes Big Energy at Houston energy conference posted 1 year, 9 months ago 4 Responses

  • "suburban hausfraus?"

    incredibly sexist, IMHO.  i'd go back and edit to not detract from your overall point.On Carl Pope talks market failures with energy execs at Houston energy conference posted 1 year, 9 months ago 2 Responses

  • you haven't addressed my point at all

    how does one shift markets away from one type of consumption to another?  you seem to agree that there are differences that matter in consumption choices.

    i'm buying 2000 sq ft of solar panels for my house.  this has several effects.  the minor ones:  it cuts my energy use.  i agree with you that this is minor for the reasons you enumerated above.  however, lots of people having solar power brings down the construction costs, creates expertise and becomes proof-of-concept for adding it on to lower-income housing and mass structures.  is there any of that that seems wrong?  and as for cutting down rainforests--if we don't create new paradigms (whether from the "top" "down" or the "bottom" "up"--i use those terms extremely narrowly) here in the first world, aka the consumption world, why would anything change in the second, or third, material supplying world?On Sustainable, carbon-neutral community built in Oregon posted 1 year, 9 months ago 35 Responses

  • lots of interesting points pangolin

    cough frustrated architect cough

    but i think your last point is your weakest.  price?   it's too high?

    what a crock of s"it.  if you accept that the 100 or so houses are going to be lived in by people who were going to buy houses ANYWAY (very likely, no?) then the price is just a way to show there is a market for such housing.  and guess what?  if people step up and buy these, it will mean it's worth it to do them on a larger scale, thus driving price down.

    this is how the world works.

    this is the reason i paid an exorbitant amount for a PHEV.  i would have spent the money on a new car either way, so why not spend it on a car that gets 250 miles a gallon rather than 15?  is it somehow better to not try to create a new market for products that are more environmentally sound?

    i just don't get this line of reasoning.  if you are wealthy you don't count, i guess.  weird.On Sustainable, carbon-neutral community built in Oregon posted 1 year, 9 months ago 35 Responses

  • frustrations

    joseph, the article was excellent.  i'm concerned about the venue, however.  salon is great, but the readership there was shaking its head yes, yes as they read.

    this quality of public intellectual writing needs exposure in forums where real consensus is achieved by our elites.  the WAPO, foreign affairs journal, national journal etc.

    still and all, great article.  i too believe in science, and real world observation.  and you have crystallized in those two (cut) sentences why i am so hard on the religious or those who believe anything fantastical--e.g. astrology.  we just don't have time for that crap anymore--it's literally too dangerous for our real world circumstances.On Climate science doesn't rely on a consensus of opinion posted 1 year, 9 months ago 16 Responses

  • sorry

    post written by joseph.  apologies.On Mary Matalin calls global warming 'a largely unscientific hoax' posted 1 year, 9 months ago 17 Responses

  • do you notice

    that carville's formulation has nothing to do with the reality of global warming per se, but rather with the potential for getting votes.

    enough with the empty headed vacuous middlebrow horseshit rhetoric of the clinton era.  obviously it was infinitely better than what we have now, but the carvilles, the penns, the o-hanlons--fuck them all and the horse they rode in on.

    david, i know these are your people but you are just better than them.  move on--realign.  i'm no obama proselytizer but anything is better than mccain or another clinton.On Mary Matalin calls global warming 'a largely unscientific hoax' posted 1 year, 9 months ago 17 Responses

  • and in personal good climate news

    my plug-in hybrid prius arrived.  it already averages over 100 mpg, though in truth i don't see putting any gas into it for a long long time.

    and i'll be charging it off of solar power.On Japan says it can meet Kyoto goals posted 1 year, 9 months ago 11 Responses

  • that rules

    i mean, beavis style "THAT RULESSSSSSSSSS!!!"

    wow.On Wind-powered autonomous artificial life posted 1 year, 9 months ago 3 Responses

  • great post

    inspiring.

    i'm focusing on getting my internal house (literally and figuratively) in order but when that project is done this list will hopefully guide me to the next level of greening my world.

    and it's my name anyway, so i might as well get on the bandwagon.On Green job planning for 2008 posted 1 year, 10 months ago 13 Responses

  • and mine

    commenting less.On My New Years resolutions aspirational goals posted 1 year, 11 months ago 1 Response

  • plug-in arriving

    next week!  so i spent, in total (including the underlying cost of the prius itself) about 60k for a prius.

    insane, i know.

    however, my previous car was more expensive than that, and it got 20 mpg.  this one will get more than 100 mpg, and will be running (Starting next november) off of my solar panels.

    and it is happening.  today.  for real.  hybrids-plus can't scale up, but toyota can look at what they (and hymotion) are doing, implement it, and all of the sudden a 35k car (probably less, but let's be conservative) is massively available.  every car it replaces (minus the cost of actually building a new car versus running the old one, an old debate and one that actually makes a STRONG argument for recycled french fry oil biofuels for the legacy cars) makes a difference.

    cellulose and other potential solutions (particularly hydrogen) are all too late.  it sucks, but the numbers don't give a shit about suckiness.  they just don't.  PPM of carbon go up, the world gets crazier.  though i spent a lot of money on my car, given that i can afford it it seems like a moral imperative.  you can take your money and behave however you want, but the way mr khosla is behaving strikes me as short-sighted and ultimately evil.

    having said that, this post was poorly written and should be retooled to avoid the charges made above, IMHO.On Keeping power broker's hands out of the cookie jar posted 1 year, 11 months ago 57 Responses

  • as usual, evil wins

    secession time, baby.  hey america, enjoy your stupid country without us here in Cali.  we'll lead--can the rest of you just get out of the way?On Breaking: EPA announcing ruling on California waiver at 6:30 Eastern posted 1 year, 11 months ago 3 Responses

  • my plug in!

    deal is done, the car will be delivered in January.  pictures to follow.On Menahem Anderman analyzes the state of car-battery technology posted 1 year, 11 months ago 9 Responses

  • or you could call hybrids-plus in boulder

    and then you'd have a PHEV.  as i will in one and a half months.  which i will charge off our solar panel-led energy to the house (we have 2000 sq ft of panels being installed).

    then i'll have a car that gets 100 mpg (tested and verifiable) and that gets its energy to run from the sun.  all with readily available currently existing technology.

    remind me why there is still a debate about what needs to be done?On High gas prices make hybrids look even better posted 1 year, 11 months ago 45 Responses

  • peter garrett

    a strange dude but one of the great lead singers in rock and roll history.  midnight oil's first 5 or 6 albums are brilliant.

    he's travelling a path previously beaten by joschka fisher--from far leftie to insider.  i wonder how that will end.On Australia national government transforms; conservative party falls apart posted 1 year, 12 months ago 11 Responses