- Virgin is testing the use of babassu oil and coconut oil blended with regular jet fuel in commercial flights [1]. They have flown with 20% bio-fuel and tests indicate that they could use up to 40%. This is a difficult problem to solve as most bio-fuels either have problems with vaporising at low pressures or becoming too viscous at low temperatures, it’s good to see some progress on this.
- Interesting Rolling Stone article about the US government encouraging idiot “terrorists” [2].
- Cory Doctorow predicts a poor future for hardware e-book readers [3]. For my personal use a laptop is better for reading. In most cases when I’m going to do some reading I’m likely to want to write notes or be in a situation where I need my laptop for other purposes. So a laptop plus an e-book reader would be more weight and more battery problems than having just a laptop.
- On page 2 of this article about what might happen if the source code to Windows was released freely [4] I am quoted. One thing I should note is that I have nothing against OpenSolaris, it’s merely one large project for which I could inspect the source if I didn’t have legal advice to the contrary. The situation of OpenSolaris may have changed in recent times, but I have not felt the need to seek further legal advice as there seems no real benefit in viewing the source. There is no shortage of GPL source that I would like to read if I had the time…
- Location Independent – a blog about working from no fixed address and how to live on the move [5]. Should be of interest to all the people who seem fascinated by my living in hotels for ~18 months.
- Martin Luther King Jr’s letter from a Birmingham jail [6]. Inspirational and it is also relevant when considering the positions that churches take today on moral issues. I found the link from The Reid Report blog [7] which is an interesting analysis of US politics.
- Scientific American has an article about high altitude destroying brain cells [8], apparently this can happen even when there is no noticable injury and it is permanent. It seems that it would be a good idea to try and locate conferences to minimise air travel by delegates and speakers…
- [1] http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/news/travel/coconut-jet-fuel-thats-nuts/2008/02/25/1203788223183.html
- [2] http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/18137343/the_fear_factory
- [3] http://www.locusmag.com/Features/2008/03/cory-doctorow-put-not-your-faith-in.html
- [4] http://www.itwire.com/content/view/17132/1090/1/0/
- [5] http://locationindependent.com/blog/
- [6] http://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html
- [7] http://blog.reidreport.com/
- [8] http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=brain-cells-into-thin-air
Hi,
bio-fuel is evil. Believe me — once you’ve factored in whatever is necessary to produce bio-fuel at a price competitive to oil (land use, fertilizers, pesticides) it starts looking like a bad idea.
At a higher price, though (a *much* higher price)…
but the Good Thing of a higher price is just less fuel use (*much* less).
Regards
— tomás
http://etbe.coker.com.au/2007/03/15/worse-than-fossil-fuel/
At the above URL I make some rough estimates at the ways of reducing fuel use. According to my estimates the 5% target for bio-fuel could be reached without growing any new fuel crops, but by merely using waste products.
I agree that fuel prices should rise a lot. Fortunately there have been significant increases in the wholesale price, we just need to wait for the retail price to increase accordingly.