P3 International's P4400 Kill A Watt

Because of the P4400′s portability, moving the meter from outlet-to-outlet is a breeze, making a complete inventory of power-hungry household items a piece of cake.   You’ll save cash on your electric bill with knowledge gained from your inventory, and conservation will meet less resistance once household members become aware of exactly how much it costs to run various items.

With a low street price of under $25.00 USD, the P3′s P4400 Kill A Watt is a no-brainer investment for anyone interested in saving the planet and/or saving a few bucks off their electric bill.

There are many posts related to energy generation already available on this site, so I won’t delve deeply into specifics.  Suffice it to say energy conservation and a transition to renewable energy should be a private and governmental priority second only to stabilizing the economy. 

The easiest way to reduce energy consumption is through conservation.  Often overlooked, businesses and government agencies have a responsibility and economic interest to revamp and upgrade their enormously inefficient plants, warehouses and offices.  A sweeping energy audit rollout for large corporations and governmental agencies could pay huge dividends in a very short timeframe.  Audit results can provide the information necessary to identify and prioritize areas for improvement.  Obsolete, inefficient HVAC systems can be upgraded to modern, high efficiency systems, while incandescent lighting can be replaced with fluorescent and LED fixtures.  Mandatory restrictions won’t be necessary once private businesses realize the savings and return on investment that can be realized through small, incremental improvements on existing buildings, plants and equipment, while major improvements and upgrades can be approved and capitalized through the normal budgetary process with tax incentives providing additional incentives. Governmental agencies, not as burdened by the bottom line, can expedite improvements either through expensing, budgeting, or as the recipient of some type of public works improvement. 

Just as important, individuals can be shown how to save energy.  Websites can be created to explain how and where to conserve energy, while interactive pages can show just how much an individual or family can save by making changes to lifestyle, personal transportation, appliances and other household items.  Additionally, a website can be created which lists all energy-related governmental undertakings, and the public can sponsor any project he or she feels strongly about.  For example, a person can donate $10 toward building a low-temperature geothermal electrical generation plant in Colorado to replace a coal-fired plant.  When the transaction is made, the donor’s name is recorded (if requested) , and bookkeeping entries are made to earmark the funds to the appopriate project.  He or she can then track total donatons to the project, and when the goal is attained, can monitor the construction progress.  Anyone can view the donors and progress of any project at any time.   Users can create buddy or distribution lists to share their sponsorships with groups, family or friends.

It will take patience, perseverance, sacrifice, knowledge and lots of creativity to get us through this economic and environmental crisis, but Americans are a gritty lot.   Keep the course.

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If you think of an early agrarian society, the recipe for economic success is simple: Times of plenty are used to store excess grain and other foodstuffs which may then be used for seed stock and consumed during times of hardship.

Take the threat of starvation out of the equation and behavior changes dramatically. In modern industrial societies, when things are going well, consumers expect the trend will continue and respond by saving sparingly, spending freely, taking risks and increasing debt. During times of hardship or perceived hardship, consumers pay off debts, cut back on spending and risk, and save more. Governments behave similarly during periods of economic growth by spending freely and creating budgets based on recent tax revenues. During hard times, however, governments are not constrained by budgets and may, and often do, spend freely.

Hang with me, here…

Today, the United States and most of Europe are in a recession. The majority of consumers have responded by, you guessed it, spending less, paying off debts, and not taking on new obligations – not exactly an economist’s recipe to spend one’s way out of a recession. Normally,  governments would respond by reducing interest rates, increasing government spending and perhaps providing a small financial stimulus package.  In an otherwise normal economy with a healthy financial sector, the lower interest rates would stimulate the economy by increasing loans to companies and consumers, but today’s financial sector is anything but healthy. Banks are sitting on cash reserves, while loans to businesses and consumers have dropped dramatically.

That is what makes the current recession different. During the Great Depression, economists believed if you increase the money supply by 25%, spending will increase by roughly 25%. They did not understand that actual money supply equals static money supply times the yearly turnover. Let’s say it’s pre-depression 1928, the money supply totals $10 billion, and average buck is spent (turned over) 4.5 times. Roughly speaking, the real supply of money equals $45 billion.

Now, let’s fast-forward to 1932. The Federal Reserve has been printing money like mad, and let’s say the static money supply has increased by a whopping 100% in 4 years to $20 billion. Imagine the government’s dismay as the depression continues to worsen. What they did not realize was the turnover of money had decreased from, say, 4.5 to 2 times annually so, in effect, the real money supply had contracted from $45 billion to $40 billion.

We are certainly not in a depression, but apply this scenario to current economic conditions and it fits rather nicely. Banks have cash but aren’t loaning, customers aren’t spending, and posts on the Where’s George website are down 20% because turnover is down by a fifth. Because the Fed has not begun printing more money, the real money supply and spending are down a cool 20%.

Let’s say it is now February 1, 2009, and economic conditions have not improved.  Since calling Ben Bernanke of the Federal Reserve and requesting he increase the money supply 20% by the end of the month is not a viable option, a more likely scenario would be for now President Obama to push through a one-time stimulus package that equals roughly 20% of the average household’s annual income, which amounts to about $10k per head of household and $5k per individual filer.  A month or two later, the checks are in the mail.

Consumers get their fat checks, bank deposits swell, spending increases almost immediately, perceptions improve, employers hire, borrowers pry out their wallets and begin lending money, the sun shines, birds sing, and the patient is stabilized – for the moment.   

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By 2007, it became obvious residential real estate values were not sustainable given current wages and interest rates.   For example, according to city-data.com, the 2007 median household income for a family in San Diego, California was $62k, while the average house or condo value was $558k.  Thus, the average house value was approaching 10 times median household income.  A typical prime mortgage costs the homeowner about $600/month per $100,000 borrowed, so financing $500k for a $558k home (58k down payment) results in a monthly mortgage payment of about $3k.  Dividing $62k median income by 12 months, we arrive at a median monthly income of about $5200.   Doing the math, on average, a staggering 57% of the median gross monthly household income would be required to pay the mortgage on a house purchased in San Diego, which is about twice the recommended mortgage obligation of 25-35%.

Remember, these numbers are for prime mortgages.  Subprime mortgage interest rates would increase monthly payments even further.  Regardless, there was no way for many housing markets to sustain the alarming appreciation that was often seen in the 1990′s.  Something had to give.

How did we get there?  Residential sales and construction began to level off in 2002-2003, and left to its own devices, the housing market quite possibly could have followed a normal cycle of recovery.  On the contrary, with limited exposure, financial incentive, and often well-meaning but questionable judgement, lending agencies and mortgage brokers began to relax qualifying standards which refueled demand with a flood of new mortgages, many of which were subprime.  The real estate market had been so strong for so long that many individuals and investors had never experienced a down market.  Why wouldn’t valuations continue to rise?

Consisting of mortgages purchased from the U.S. Federal Housing Administration and Veterans Administration by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the issuance of mortgage-backed securities, which are securities backed by the principal and interest of a group of mortgage loans, peaked in 2003 with a staggering value of over $2 trillion usd which represented about 1/3 of all outstanding mortgages.  Just when the residential housing market was poised to take a breather, Fannie, Freddie, brokers and investors hit it with a stimulus of unprecedented proportion.    The market on steroids, real estate valuations continued to rise until mid-2007.  What began as a typical housing market cycle had turned into a tsunami.

Many investors and fund managers had become enamored with Fannie and Freddie’s success story, and proceeded to purchase large amounts of mortgage-backed securities, often on margin.  In the summer of 2008, as reality set in, the current value of these securities dropped precipitously.  As a typical scenario, an investor calls his/her broker and requests the purchase of $1 billion worth of mortgage-backed securities on margin.  Buying on a margin of 40:1, the investor is out $25 million, with 10% or $100 million, backed by the security, going to the broker.  If real estate values contained in the mortgage-backed security drop only 10%, the current value drops to $900 million.  Subtracting the broker fee of $100 million, the initial investment of $25 million has turned into a loss of 225 million.  Multiply this scenario times a thousand, and it’s easy to see how quickly things can go from manageable to catastrophic.

Is America alone to blame for the housing and financial crises?  By no means.  Fact is, housing had become grossly overvalued throughout Europe as well, especially in Ireland, the U.K. and France.  Could the United States have done a better job regulating these securities?  Absolutely.  Unfortunately, regulators , rating agencies and auditors tend to become sympathetic to those they regulate, which makes catching major problems in a timely fashion extremely difficult.  What started out as a typical housing cycle has become a worst-case scenario, and it will take a tricky bit of balancing by the Government and Federal Reserve to pad the fall.

Part 1 Part 3 Part 4

Part 1:
Chinese labor and manufacturing costs are often substantially understated

It’s obvious China is no democracy. The government and/or businesses can arbitrarily set wages and costs resulting in artificially low total costs of production.  Coal-fired power plants are being constructed at a rate that rivals the 90′s proliferation of Starbucks stores, and dangerous mining conditions, dubious environmental regulations, and regulated electrical costs provides absurdly cheap power to feed China’s insatiable appetite for growth.

To see how sideways things have become, let’s look at a couple of examples.  In the United States, it now costs about as much to buy a nice roast, a couple potatoes and some carrots to cook in the microwave as to buy the microwave itself, and reasonably complex inkjet printers can be purchased for under $30 USD.  The majority of Chinese goods are not just cheap; they are disturbingly, perplexingly, eerily cheap. This is not indicative of a world economy in balance.

In the last two decades, the low price of Chinese goods have led directly to artificially high demand for their products.  Across the United States and Europe, houses, flats and garages have been filled with millions of tons of nondurable Chinese goods, and containers from container stores and mini-storage units catch the overflow. If televisions are cheap, why not have one in each room? If silk blouses are only $20, why not buy five? And since economic times have been so good for so long, why not buy on credit or with equity borrowed from primary housing? Now the debts have come due, while the goods bought during this unprecedented spending spree have little or no current value, and contribute little toward quality of life.

As China enjoys its day in the sun, the manufacturing base in developed countries has been seriously eroded by its inability to compete with China’s seemingly unfair competitive advantage, forcing many American and European manufacturers to either become distributors and shut down domestic production facilities or go out of business. As factories and assembly lines close, displaced workers accept lower-paying positions in the service industries which lowers purchasing power and widens the income gap.  I personally and economically have no problem with letting Bush’s tax cuts expire. However, while raising taxes on businesses and the wealthiest individuals to restore purchasing power to a displaced middle class can provide a temporary fix, it is not a viable long-term economic solution. New domestic high-tech design, production and manufacturing jobs must be created to reverse the trend toward low-skill service jobs, or the long-term economic prognosis is poor.

Of all the issues that face us, China may prove the most problematic. Protectionism is not typically a good economic policy, but the developed world is not on an even playing field, and cannot stand by while China gobbles up the remaining manufacturing base. The Chinese are already working their way up the food chain to large durable goods such as heavy equipment and automobiles, and everything being equal, the results are likely to be the same.

Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

After researching a number of environmentally friendly detergents, I was struck by the similarities between many ‘green’ brands and their brand-name competition. One highly rated ‘green’ detergent contains sodium laureth sulfate, sodium borate, calcium chloride and sodium hydroxide (lye), so I did a little research.

Sodium laureth sulfate (SLES) is typically derived from coconut oil soap (sodium laurate), but since soaps are not as effective in hard water, chemists replaced the carbon-based acid in sodium laurate with a sulfur-based acid and added etheylene oxide, which is made from petroleum to reduce irritation to eyes and skin. While SLES is not a carcinogen, does NOT cause blindness, and is less irritating than is sodium laurel sulfate (SLS), it has been linked to hair loss, and may increase absorption of toxins through the skin. Also, the chemical used to make SLES, ethylene oxide, can form a by-product called 1,4-dioxane which is a known carcinogen.

Sodium borate (borax) in wastewater can be toxic to plants, and the United States Environmental Protection Agency has found a possible link between sodium borate and male developmental toxicity in humans. Calcium chloride changes the pH value of wastewater, and sodium hydroxide (lye), while not dangerous at low concentrations, is extremely corrosive.

Because there are currently no laws regulating what constitutes a ‘green’ household cleaning product, it is easy, and even tempting, for a company to charge a premium price for a ‘green’ laundry soap that is little more than a name-brand soap in a different container. Additionally, creating a laundry soap that cleans well without the use of bleaches, borax, and salts is a daunting task for a company without the resources of large corporations. While most of the ‘green’ laundry soaps I researched struggled to be green and/or clean, ECOS® Liquid Laundry Detergent, by Earth Friendly Products, got consistently high marks for its cleaning capability and environmentally responsible ingredients. Made from plant (coconut) based surfactant, soap bark, chamomile, horsetail (the plant), lavender, rosemary, soy based fabric softener, essential oils of magnolias and lilies, and water, ECOS contains no SLS, SLES, borax, or added salts. If you are aware of other quality ‘green’ laundry soaps or have differing opinions, please feel free to comment.

Image courtesy of Earth Friendly Products

So before you pick up some ‘green’ detergent at your local grocery or health food store, do some research and make an informed purchase.

Let’s check the facts:

*2006 United States Electrical Generation by Fuel in Megawatts

Total                    464,000

Coal                      220,000

Natural Gas            92,000

Nuclear                  89,000

Hydroelectric         33,000

Wind                       21,000 (2008)

To put things in perspective, Hoover Dam produces 2,000 Megawatts of power.

Natural gas is a far cleaner fuel than is coal. And according to a Navigant Consulting survey, tapping into unconventional gas supplies could raise production by 50% in 10 years.  While not a long-term solution, replacing coal-fired power plants with gas-fired generators would have a substantial, positive impact on the environment.

Ethanol is a clean burning fuel, but America’s breadbasket cannot be emptied to create electricity.  As a source for biofuel, a tree or a plant that is both rich in oil and able to tolerate drought and frost would be ideal.  Rather than competing with corn and wheat production, biofuel sources could be grown and processed on (conventionally) unproductive land in the Southwestern areas of the United States. The jatropha plant is rich in oil, is well suited to the desert Southwest, but cannot survive a freeze.  However, grown in greenhouses warmed by low temperature geothermal energy (see below,) jatropha could provide the oil needed to replace petrol-based diesel with cleaner, sustainable bio-diesel, which is of vital importance to the military and the long-haul trucking industry.

When it comes to generating electricity, wind power is becoming a real player. There are, however, certain costs. Those huge blades, drive-trains, and towers are made of steel, aluminum, and copper. Somewhere, raw materials are mined, smelted, machined, processed, and transported to produce the end-product. Nothing comes without a price. That said, wind power is one of the few alternative energy sources that can provide America with the substantial quantities of electricity so vitally needed for the transition away from fossil fuels.

Low Temp Geothermal Generator - Image courtesy of Raser Technologies

Another promising technology uses low temperature geothermal energy to produce electricity. While high temperature geothermal energy production amounts to roughly 2,800 megawatts annually and is geologically limited, low temperature geothermal generating plants have the potential to produce more than 100,000 megawatts. Using already existing technologies, low temperature geothermal well-water transfers heat to fluids that boil at temperatures lower than water does. The possibilities are huge, but current production constraints do limit the impact on America’s total energy requirements. A retooling by Ford, Chrysler and/or GM to low temperature geothermal generators would be necessary to provide the scale required to make the transition from fossil fuels.

When it comes to a clean energy policy and energy independence, getting from here to there is a road fraught with peril.  Short of a major technological breakthrough, weaning America off fossil fuels will prove to be a painful, expensive process and a single misstep could put America’s security or economy at risk. Major resource shifts are required, but concessions may be necessary. Economies in ruin are not concerned with going green.

*Source: Energy Information Admintration

Image courtesy of The Old Fashioned Milk Paint Company

The brainchild of founder Charles Thibeau, the Milk Paint Company’s original line was created for porous surfaces such as furniture, timber and cabinetry. Specially developed as a flat wall paint, their new SafePaint line gives home builders and remodelers the option of choosing responsible, organic pigments for all interior surfaces. Both paints are available in 20 elegant colors, or as a base with no pigment.

Catering to home owners, artists and craftsmen, all Milk Paint Company paints are 100% guaranteed. What is not to like?

America is on her back, her soft underbelly exposed.

Forget about your party affiliation.  For the last 35 years, our executive and legislative branches have totally ignored America’s energy problem and put our national security at risk.  From the mid 70s until just recently, drunk on artificially cheap imported oil, America enjoyed one of the greatest periods of economic growth in history.  There was no immediate need to develop alternative energy sources, nor was there reason to construct nuclear or coal-fired power plants.  Lacking a visionary leader, America fell asleep at the wheel.

In a period of prosperity, our infrastructure began to crumble.  Elected officials and corporate executives alike were more interested in short-term gains than in the country’s long-term health, and the consequences could prove devastating.  As is the case in most economic booms, governments and businesses made counter-intuitive economic decisions.  Rather than saving for a rainy day, they spent like drunken sailors, and leveraged themselves based on projected revenues and income.  They mortgaged our futures.

During the good times, many individuals became consumed with financial and material excesses.  Not surprisingly, in many cases, personal gratification and narcissistic behavior had negative impacts on family and personal relationships.  Many children, often the innocent victims of divorce or separation, began to withdraw.  Exercise and social interaction were replaced with computers and games.  Feeling as if something were missing, an increasing percentage of the population turned to prescription drugs to somehow fill the ambiguous, anxious void.

Driven by consumer demand skewed by cheap oil, personal vehicles grew to grotesque proportions. The Big 3 auto manufacturers continued to resist the move to smaller vehicles, and successfully convinced Congress not to raise minimum fuel economy standards.  What was the result?  Sitting on massive quantities of cash earned from the sales of high-margin trucks and SUVs, Ford and GM went on buying sprees, and paid handsomely for the likes of Land Rover, Saab, and Volvo.  Driven by the artificially low price of energy and commodities, personal vehicles continued to gain weight, resulting in the need for yet larger engines.

After just a few years of high oil prices, their cash is gone.  America’s auto manufacturers are left producing many vehicles the public no longer wants, and are selling off assets to avoid bankruptcy.

The over-inflated real estate market has collapsed, and industries dependent on new construction are reeling.   Fueled by greed, artificial demand, and undercapitalized risk, our financial markets are on fire.  Televisions continue grow in size, as does the percentage of the population that can be classified as obese.  The middle class shrinks, as the income gap between the poor and rich grows.  Excuses replace personal responsibility, and fundamental liberties are at risk.

There is little wonder why the current presidential election has energized the electorate.  Americans are a practical bunch.  We, the people, realize this country is at the edge of a great abyss.  Now, all we can do is hope and pray we take a step in the right direction.

Image courtesy of Flying Pigs Natural Farm

Large farms now dominate the production of beef, chicken, pork, eggs and dairy products that supply most of America’s protein. Because more profit can be realized by the concentration of animals, antibiotics are widely used to prevent illness, and since protein is valued by weight, steroids are introduced to promote growth.

Our exposure to meat containing residual antibiotics and steroids is huge. Studies have shown an earlier onset of puberty in girls who consume beef injected with steroids, and earlier puberty increases the risk for breast cancer. And while there is no iron-clad evidence that residual antibiotics in food constitute a health hazard, why take the chance?

Meats are not the only foods at risk. As the price of fertilizer rises, fruit and vegetable producers are tempted to use sewage and other waste to supplement nitrogen and increase yield. The result has been several major E.coli outbreaks in the last decade.

What can the concerned public do to help? First and foremost, stop basing every purchase on cost. The American consumer’s pattern of maximizing utility by purchasing whatever is cheapest is sending the food industry the wrong message. Insist on meats that are raised without antibiotics and steriods. Resist the urge to purchase inexpensive, farmed seafood from the Far East. Instead, buy fresh, sustainable foods that are available in your region of the country, and insist that your grocer do the same.