The Alguita Returns Home

"For a solid two hours, we fished as fast as we could, pulling up floats, toothbrushes, plastic and glass bottles, a golf ball, a billiard ball, an unused glue stick for a hot glue gun, and several rope boluses filled with crabs and tiny striped fish - But most appalling was the plastic confetti. An endless stream of delicate, white snowflakes, like plastic powder coating the ocean’s surface. This, remarked Charlie, is indicative of the gyre, “where the trash comes home to roost and degrade…..” - From The Alguita's Blog

My friends Anna and Marcus are returning tomorrow from their trip across the Pacific to study the Pacific Gyre. I fear that I have been less than active in passing on their words from the voyage, mostly due to being sick at first and then overwhelmed by all of the things I didn't get to while I was sick. Theirs is an unbelievable journey and story and one that should be heard by everyone. As soon as they have settled in, I will surely be speaking with them to hear first hand accounts of what they found and pass along what I learn.

In the meantime, here are a few links to some stories that have been written about them, and links to the remainder of the posts from their voyage.

Common Dreams
San Francisco Chronicle
LA Times
London Independent

And from the blog

Calm After The Synthetic Storm
Following A River Of Trash In The Sea
It's A Plankton Eat Plankton World
Algalita’s message traveling around the world. Day 18 – Travel day
Day 19 - Sifting The Sahara
Entering the Eastern Garbage Patch "Where Our Trash Comes Home"
Dinner Dissection and A "Safe Seafood" Recipe
Return To the Garbage Patch Sampled In 1999
Creatures of the Night Emerge
Words From The Crew
Valentines Day
Keeping Our Wits In The Doldrums
No Title Today
Questions Lead To Questions
72 hour Countdown
Come join us in welcoming ORV Alguita back to Long Beach!
Let's Talk About The Weather

Live Sustainably

Dave

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Tesla Raises Big Bucks

Tesla Motors has just announced that they have successfully raised $45 million in financing. The money will be used for further development of the 4 door all electric sedan that they are presently calling White Star. The vehicle, which should be here in 2010, will be in the pirce range and styling of an upper tier Lexus type sedan and will most likely get 200+ miles to a charge.

Live Sustainably

Dave

PRESS RELEASE



Tesla Motors, a manufacturer of high-performance production electric cars, recently completed $40 million in bridge financing. The round was co-led by Valor Equity Partners and Elon Musk, entrepreneur and Chairman of Tesla Motors.


The financing will be used for the continued development of a 4 door, five passenger sports sedan planned for introduction in 2010, the establishment of company-owned sales and service infrastructure, and the continued production of the Tesla Roadster, a stylish, high-performance, zero emissions car.


The first production Tesla Roadster was delivered to Elon Musk on February 1, marking a historical milestone for the company. Series production is scheduled to commence March 17th. The entire production run of the 2008 Tesla Roadster is sold out and the company is currently taking orders for the 2009 model year.

Tesla Motors is establishing nationwide sales and service capabilities, beginning with flagship stores inMenlo Park and Los Angeles. Both stores are scheduled to be opened early this Spring.


"The delivery of the first production Tesla Roadster marks a great historical milestone along the way to Tesla becoming one of the great car companies of the 21st century," said Elon Musk, Chairman of Tesla Motors. "The Roadster now in production is just the first of a series of models from Tesla, soon to be followed by our 4 door sports sedan. Eventually, Tesla Motors will offer a full line of electric vehicles, leading the way in the changeover from gasoline cars to an electric future."



About Tesla Motors

Tesla Motors develops and manufactures electric vehicles with exceptional design, performance and efficiency, while conforming to all U.S. safety, environmental and durability standards. The Tesla Roadster is the only highway capable production electric car of any kind for sale in the United States.



With a 0 to 60 mph acceleration of 3.9 seconds and the fastest 30 to 70 mph acceleration of any production car ever tested by Car & Driver magazine, combined with an EPA rating of 135 MPG equivalent, the Tesla Roadster is unique in providing super car performance at twice the energy efficiency of the best hybrids. For more information, visit www.teslamotors.com.

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Washin' the car

This morning was a rainy day in LA and as a result, I decided to wash the car. Now at first, washing the car in the rain may seem a bit strange, but in reality it makes perfect sense. You don't need to wet down the car, and you don't need to worry about the soap drying, so you can take your time and really clean it. The whole operation used a small bucket of water for rinsing the rag, and about a 2 minute rinse with the hose, which was on low (it was just misting at that point). Of course, you're going to end up with some water spots, but not too bad.

For suds I like to use Simple Green as it is non-toxic, biodegradable, and works really well (it smells cool too). We buy it in bulk, dilute it in a spray bottle, and use it forever. It's great stuff.

I don't wash my car too often but because I show it to school kids I don't like it to get too dirty either. When it's summertime, I try to wash it early in the AM or later in the evening, and I pull the car up on the lawn so the water ends up being used rather than heading down the street as run off.

And on top of saving water and feeding the lawns, both of these activities get a few weird looks from the neighbors, so the way I figure it, it's all good!

Dave

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Sigg Re-Usable Drink Bottles

I picked these up for my kids today for their lunches. We've been using plastic ones and they were getting pretty old (we've set them aside for outside squirting fun now). They are all aluminum, don't smell, have no taste, and are leakproof. They are made by a company called Sigg in Switzerland and I know several folks who use them (they make large sizes too). Here's the kicker though - they were $17!!!!! I was shocked. The nice thing thoguh is that the larger sizes are only about $4 more so while they are expensive, at least they represent what it probably costs to make these things. The way i figure it, my kids health is worth it, if they last 10 years, they are 1.70 a year, and for others, as compared to store bought bottled water or juice boxes everyday, they're a steal.

Live Sustainably

Dave

P.S. A friend emailed me that at Re-usable Bags there is a good comparison between Siggs and KleenKraft another good option. Check it out.

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Packaging Insanity

I ordered some tapes online for my video camera and look at what they came in. 10 tapes (they are on the right there) and 14 other pieces of stuff. Incredible. I'll give you that the plastic air bags are better than the styro-foam peanuts which end up blowing all over the place, but come on. This could have been packed in a box half it's size and used much less packaging. No wonder we're in trouble.

Everything in the pic goes into our mail area and will eventually be re-used for shipping something else, except for the tape box, which will be used to organize shot tapes.

Dave

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Carbon, It's the New Chocolate

Christian's Told To Give Up Carbon For Lent

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Dave

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Virgin Atlantic Biofuel Test Flight

Pretty cool little article about Virgin Atlantic's first test flight on biofuels. Apparently they will run one engine on 20% algae derived biofuel. This is a pretty major step forward. Branson, the owner of VA has pledged to have his entire fleet running on biofuels by (I believe) 2020. It's a pretty steep promise but he seems to be serious about it and it's getting it out there which is good. Better yet, algae based biofuels, which can be grown in tanks just about anywhere, have a tremendous amount of potential and won't add to global devastation ala what is currently going on with the biofuel craze. Let's hope this is only the beginning.

Live Sustainably

Dave

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The Poop On Plastic Bags

This one has been on the back burner for a while and I'm finally getting around to it. It seems like a pretty simple one, but old habits die hard sometimes, so here goes.

Plastic Bags Blow!

There I said it. It's really amazing how prevalent these things have become in our society. Around the world we go through about 1 million of these little lovelies every minute (that's right, every minute) and roughly 90% of them end up in landfills. Now some of them claim to be biodegradable but unless they are truly biodegradable (made of corn or some such thing), than they are photodegradable, which is great, unless they happen to be 20 feet underground in a landfill. If that is the case, which often is, than they are NON degradable. They'll basically sit there for 1000 years or so and muck up the works.

Plastic bags litter, they use an incredible amount of petroleum that is already running out, and it takes a tremendous amount of energy to create them.

The amazing thing though is that there are so many good alternatives. For starters, China and Taiwan have outlawed them to get things under control. Ireland added a Plastax on them and eradicated 95% of them in a year. And NYC...well NYC has passed a law to strongly urge the recycling of the bags!!!! For some reason, in this country, we are not recognizing the problems that these things cause. And when you think about how they are used, it's generally for transporting something from the store to your house and then it gets thrown out. Incredible.

The simple solution is that you can buy a cloth or other re-usable bag and get years worth of use out of it. Whole Foods is selling really good cheap ones now and with 5-10 cents back per bag from most chain super markets, they'll pay for themselves in no time and then actually make you money.

A lot of people complain that they always forget their bags, which was a problem that i had at first. But in all fairness, this is just like breaking yourself of any bad habit. You don't forget your wallet when you go to the store do you (well if you do, maybe you have a point to stick on with the bags)? If you promise yourself that you will never take another plastic bag, trust me, it only takes one time of having to juggle everything out of the store to make you remember to bring them with you next time. And once you train yourself, voila, your good to go.

On another note, produce bags, those little ones that hang above the produce aisles. My suggestion for these is that most items don't need them. Do you really need a bag for apples that will then go in your fridge before you chuck that bag? Sure it's easier to carry, but throw them in your cloth bag while you are shopping. As far as certain things like bulk and wet stuff, just bring the bags back to the store the next time you go and re-use them. It sounds like a hassle but it really isn't.

And for those things that you can't get around, like dog poop, there are truly compostable bags you can buy. Yes, they cost more, but in the case of the dog, you've accepted the responsibility to pick up after them right? Than why should it be ok to send plastic to the landfill in doing so?

So there you have it. Not pretty or truly well thought out, but come on, does anyone really think these things make sense anymore?

Live Sustainably

Dave

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Whole Foods Ditches The Plastic

Whole Foods announced in January that they are giving up plastic for good.  As of Earth Day they will no longer offer plastic bags at all but will still offer paper for the time being. They are also presently selling these cool looking free standing bags that are made from 80% recycled plastic bottles, cost just .99 and will be replaced for free should they ever break. They're pretty hearty though so they should last a long time. When you consider that you get .5 back every time you use them (and lately they've been unofficially upping that in order to convince you it's the right thing to do), these bags will be making you money in no time.  Cuhl.

A hale an hearty Huzzah to Whole Foods for boldly going where no supermarket chain has gone before.

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Dave

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Shell's CEO Says Peak OIl Is 7 Years Away

In a startling bit of honesty, Shells CEO Jeroen van der Veer wrote an inter company memo in which he states that Peak Oil is a mere 7 years away. It's an amazing read, not because it is so startling in what is says, but because it's coming from a source who should know what he's talking about and who has nothing to gain by saying this, and everything to lose. And yet, there are still those who will say that he's off his rocker. Mark my words.

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Dave

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