October 30, 2008 by Rob.

Clair from AustinEV posted a link to the interesting gas2.org site.  They’re a automotive alt fuels multi-author blog.   I found their post about UPS’ hydraulic hybrid delivery truck interesting.  It’s important to keep in mind that Toyota is the only workable hybrid and there are some great alternative designs emerging (e.g. Chevy Volt).

If boxey and brown is not your thing, then consider Peugeot’s very hot looking concept diesel hybrid. A friend was asking me about this at a camp out last weekend and I had not heard about this offering. Looks like fuel efficient is starting to get sexy.

Posted in hybrids, ICE Cars, Alternate Fuels, AustinEV | 1 Comment »

October 19, 2008 by Rob.

I forgot to note that the RAVolt has now logged over 4,000 electric miles or 160 gallons of gas.

Posted in Daily Use | 1 Comment »

October 19, 2008 by Rob.

We had a busy weekend out at the Austin Maker Faire!  As usual, it was a great event.  Better coordinated than last year and bigger too.  I liked the addition of the Robot Wars.

Alex had a great time showing people how to hack their Wii Motes and even got a blue ribbon!  We had some interesting generational challenges because saying “mod wii mote” sounds like “may we mate” to a segments of the population.  Technology brings so much new vocabulary that it’s easy to forget not everyone immediately parses “google blogs from blackberries.”

Since I was busy with Alex, the RAVolt was left with her EV friends in the other part of the barn.  It was nice to drop in and see so many of the AustinEV/SanAntonioEV crowd (Aaron, Chris, Brian, Gary, and Alphonso).  Since Aaron brought the charger we were able to drive electric both days to the Faire!

Posted in Pictures, Storyline, AustinEV | 1 Comment »

October 14, 2008 by Rob.

It’s time for another Blog Action Day post.  This year’s topic is poverty and I wanted to skip the obvious petroleum-poverty arguments and find another link between electric vehicles and poverty.

As an idealist, I’m taking the high ground that people would life themselves out of poverty if they could work.  And they would work if they could get to work.  I believe that lack of transportation or highly inconvenient transportation is a major contributor to global poverty.

If EVs dominated the world then:

• we’d have effective wide area public transportation because EV range limitations require infrastructure for long trips.
• there would be less suburban sprawl so housing would be convenient, affordable, and dense.
• our air would be cleaner and poor people would have healthier air to breathe
• cities would be quieter
• poor people could buy fuel based on time of use and trade convenience for savings
• cars would be more reliable and easier to maintain

Carbon powered transportation increases poverty because our societies consistently make “cheap & easy” choices that stack the deck against the poor.

Posted in ICE Cars, Commentary, Rants, Blogroll | 2 Comments »