Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Just What The Women of America Ought to Do With The US$ in A Tail Spin

Oh, The Irony: Geothermal Probe Sinks German City



Geothermal probe sinks German city

By Bojan Pancevski in Vienna
Last Updated: 2:02am BST 31/03/2008

A German town is subsiding after authorities drilled underground in order to harness green energy.

Staufen, in the Black Forest, was proud of its innovative geothermal power plan that was supposed to provide environmentally-friendly heating.

But only two weeks after contractors drilled down 460ft to extract heat from below the earth, large cracks have appeared in buildings as the town centre subsided about a third of an inch (8mm).

The baroque Town Hall, the main church, two schools and over 64 other buildings in the historic centre were severely affected. Experts said buildings in the outer part of the town had risen by a similar amount.

...

A spokesman for Staufen council said: "The community was so proud of the environmentally-friendly geothermal energy project that it would be a painful irony if that was the cause for this incredible occurrence."


Hat Tip: Kids Love Cheese

You Could Too if the ONLY had a Beak and No Bones



HT: Netscrap

Earth Day and Sussex Avenue Part II


Could Harper not have put the lights out for an hour at 24 Sussex? How much would that have hurt? How many cheap shots could that have avoided? And what’s wrong with saving a bit of power anyway, less than 6% I understand for 1 hour of 1 day of 1 year. Well, a lot--and that is perhaps what Harper was thinking, Borat not! If, for arguments sake, 10% less power was used during the hour (which is high), if my sums are correct, we would have saved 0.114077116% energy for the year. Spreadsheet available on request. Now if we subtract that figure from the amount of energy spent on Earth day (some would say incalculable, others invaluable—and you know who you are) I am pretty sure we would seriously be in the red and it is no wonder that the power companies get behind such projects: they look good and sell more power! Nonetheless, the Grades 1s, under the auspices of that August apolitical institution the Toronto District School Board, are being made to write letters to Harper about his failure to flick the switch. Why give the TDSB such fun? Dumb.