Reversing Climate Change — Google Fail

Can renewable energy sources, like solar and wind, replace coal and oil?

Google ran some practical experiments to see if they can run some of their data centers on renewable energy, and found it was too expensive.  Economically, coal won.

Read all about it at Spectrum, an extremely reputable source.

We're going to need something more than we've got now.  And both wind and solar are intermittent, and both require large amounts of land and equipment. Some sort of fission or fusion will have to be developed to take up the base load.

Fission has turned out to be disappointing, and fusion is taking forever to get working.  Oddly, aircraft manufacturer Lockheed is very optimistic about their Compact Fusion™ system.  My own suspicion is that they plan on announcing it a failure, because they're really working on something else, some super-secret black project for the Pentagon.  Maybe a stealth ICBM, or a supersonic tunnel boring machine to undermine our enemies.  But since they've got to be hiring fusion physicists to at least provide a cover story, it might be some new kind of thermonuclear weapon that's smaller than any H-bomb currently extant.  We don't need a bigger bomb, they're already too big for most targets.

Morning Coffee

I'm going to tell you how to save the earth and still wake up in the morning.

Now that spring has arrived in the northern hemisphere, it's warmer, even in the morning.  To make the morning coffee (or even tea), you have to boil water and steam up the kitchen, or maybe your whole house.

In the warmer climes, this means that you also turn on the air conditioner in the morning, and you may even accidentally leave it running all day in an empty house.

Perish the thought!

In the warm morning, it's actually nicer to have cold coffee than hot.  I'm not talking about iced coffee, American style.  That is a weak brew made by pouring perfectly good coffee over a half-dozen ice cubes, diluting away all the flavor.

My suggestion is to brew the hot coffee late at night.  The night air is cool and opening a window will be enough to keep things pleasant.  Then let the pot cool, and after 20 minutes or so put it in the fridge.

Next morning, pour a nice cold cup of strong coffee, add the usual stuff to taste, and enjoy.  It simplifies the morning rush and saves electricity.