I originally posted this in another thread, but it really deserves its own topic, so I created a thread for it.

What are some ideas you have to save energy and impact? How do you do it around you own house? How can we do it as a city? State? Country? Race?

Here is a breakdown of my ideas...

I wonder how much energy and carbon emissions we would save if (1) every single rooftop either had solar panels or genetically modified grass (2) every light bulb was LED technology (3) every house, apartments etc had rain barrels for lawn watering (4) all of the car port roofs(mainly found in apartment complexes) had solar panels mounted on top (5) all of the street lights were motion activated and dimmed when no cars were within a certain distance from them (6) if all lawn irrigation actually watered the lawn and not the streets while having rain sensors and were properly set (7) if people actually used native plants to landscape with (there are a reason why certain plants grow in certain areas, but I am kind of a hypocrite on that one because I collect tropical plants)

Those are just a few examples. I have many more. If we did some little things to help the environment and reduce our impact, the changes would be huge.

I want to stand for personal freedom, but if people refuse to do things that will help our planet, should we force them to?

What about a law that states every rooftop either has to solar panels or covered in grass? I know the grass part would be difficult because the weight would require structural modifications, but if someone could create a genetically modified grass that stays green and continues photosynthesis during drought, grow very slow, and perhaps a type of soil it can grow in that weighs less than other soil compounds, it can work for certain buildings. As far as the solar panels, if every rooftop, car port etc... had them, think of all the energy they could produce and feed back into the grid.

The light bulb is another freedom issue. But why the hell are we selling incandescent's? LED technology has been around for nearly 90 years now, so keep that in mind.

How about the roofs of buses? We could create hybrid buses that have solar panels on top of them that can charge the battery constantly and switch to gas when the battery runs low.

Street lights could also dim to lower light outputs when no cars are detected within a few hundred feet. Every light could have a sensor and they could "talk to each other" and turn on a certain stretch lights for the oncoming car.

For sprinkler systems: if everyone could have rain sensors, routinely check heads for leaks and broken heads, make sure the water is directed to the vegetation and not the street, and don't over to where you start flooding the yard and water running off pouring into the street... so much water would be saved. It's also best to adjust watering seasonally. You don't have to water most grasses in the winter more than once a week and Bermuda really is already dormant and doesn't need to be water more than once every two weeks.

If everyone also had rain barrels that they could use for irrigation that would be a plus.

Another thing I would like to see are land bridges across and under highways for wildlife.

I'll post some more later. I realize this could very expensive and would likely require government assistance to implement it. A big first step would be to increase our standards of new construction. After that, we could then start government programs to help with existing properties and making them eco-friendly.

What do you think and what are your ideas?

Live closer to where you work.

Trade in your SUV or pickup for a hybrid. I went from 14 to 43 mpgs

Live closer to where you work.
I guess that will be one way I won't save energy, but yeah, that's true.

Die and have your body sent to the body farm at Texas State Uni. Give back to Nature and science.

A smaller, less overbuilt road system.

Stop constructing auto-based environments that make it to where you need a car to do literally anything. That would reduce emissions and body fat.

Stop having the government subsidize energy costs. Right now about 1/2 of your energy cost is paid on yuor utility/fuel bills, the other 1/2 is though your tax bill. But that wouldn't be politically correct to "the poor" that aren't paying taxes to begin with, since they would pay the true cost of energy. The rich would benefit more in reduced taxes than they would pay in increased utility/fuel costs.

Just look at what other countries pay for energy. If energy costs in the US cost what they do overseas, green tech would become viable in the free market. You won't find 15MPG daily commuters, tank water heaters, or residential Central AC units (they use minisplits if they have AC at all) overseas. Only in the US do they exist due to government (aka taxpayer) subsidized energy.

If you choose to keep your SUV, convert it to CNG. The fuel economy will be the same, but it does reduces carbon emissions quite a bit and definitely cut fuel costs by over half and by about 3/4 if you have a home fill station. It's not cheap but there are plenty of state incentives to help make the cost more manageable.

If you choose to keep your SUV, convert it to CNG. The fuel economy will be the same, but it does reduces carbon emissions quite a bit and definitely cut fuel costs by over half and by about 3/4 if you have a home fill station. It's not cheap but there are plenty of state incentives to help make the cost more manageable.
Even with a tax payer foodstamps the price of conversion to cng is huge.

The return on investment takes longer than a normal person owns a vehicle and you get alot less miles per gallon.

I say that because i almost covered a few years back.

Hydrogen fuel cells are what the tax payers should focused on subsidizing.

Even with a tax payer foodstamps the price of conversion to cng is huge.

The return on investment takes longer than a normal person owns a vehicle and you get alot less miles per gallon.

I say that because i almost covered a few back.

Mine was about $3,000 after incentives 3.5 years ago and it paid out at about the 2 year mark. Average vehicle ownership in the us is about 6 years. It all depends on how much you have to drive which is why it's such an attractive option for fleet vehicles. I was commuting from Norman to north OKC everyday at the time so it went pretty quickly.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

A few years ago the incentives were much nicer, but obviously as you know the price has gone up for conversion and fuel price.

But with that said I do think cng is good for fleets, but harder for a regular users to absorb and write off those cost.

I really do think that if we are throwing public money at problems fuel cells are the way to go but that's too much of a paradigm shift for the current controlling powers.

15 years ago I put 30,000 miles per year on my car. That translates to about a 1200 gallons burned every year in a car with 25 MPG. Now I put about 7,000 miles per year on my car. That's less than 300 gallons a year - ONE FOURTH of my previous consumption - if driving same car. I put a few odd more miles on a 90 MPG scooter, which I can ride often because I don't have far to go, I walk quite a bit for the same reason. I ride a motorcycle for fun, but that adds up to a few dozen gallons per year, if that. I could drive a Hummer today and still have a smaller carbon footprint than I did in the late nineties, when I drove an economy car.

We can and will spend billions subsidizing solar and hydrogen and whatever else (all noble pursuits) and we'll eventually make a difference, decades from now. Or we could find a way to encourage people to live closer where they work, right now. Why we focus almost exclusively on the former and ignore the latter - in fact still often undermine it from a policy standpoint - is amazing to me. It ain't rocket surgery.

15 years ago I put 30,000 miles per year on my car. That translates to about a 1200 gallons burned every year in a car with 25 MPG. Now I put about 7,000 miles per year on my car. That's less than 300 gallons a year - ONE FOURTH of my previous consumption - if driving same car. I put a few odd more miles on a 90 MPG scooter, which I can ride often because I don't have far to go, I walk quite a bit for the same reason. I ride a motorcycle for fun, but that adds up to a few dozen gallons per year, if that. I could drive a Hummer today and still have a smaller carbon footprint than I did in the late nineties, when I drove an economy car.

We can and will spend billions subsidizing solar and hydrogen and whatever else (all noble pursuits) and we'll eventually make a difference, decades from now. Or we could find a way to encourage people to live closer where they work, right now. Why we focus almost exclusively on the former and ignore the latter - in fact still often undermine it from a policy standpoint - is amazing to me. It ain't rocket surgery.
You could also drive sports cars from the 80s and 90s that 40mpg vs. today's American economical cars that get 30 or so.

Urbanized summarized it well.

I have a college friend who lives in Chicago now. When I first went to visit him I was surprised at how nice his apartment was and how nice the downtown and urban core were. I asked what he did with his car and he said he got rid of it and it was the most liberating thing he has ever done.

After spending a few days with him I realized what he meant.

Trade in your SUV or pickup for a hybrid. I went from 14 to 43 mpgs

I kept my pickup and two SUV's, but added a hybrid (Prius), does that count?

I want to stand for personal freedom, but if people refuse to do things that will help our planet, should we force them to?

The divergence of opinion on what constitutes actual help is what compels me to answer this question with an emphatic "no." Great to talk about ideas. But "forcing" people makes me very, very nervous.

The very fact we've spent so much subsidizing solar energy and found so little in return (at least in terms of mass use) should suggest to some folks that we've possibly maximized what we can do with the technology in practical terms. I find no small irony in that reality in light of a lecture at one of my very earliest engineering classes at OU thirty years ago about "unrealistic expectations" for some alternative energy, and solar was among the prime discussions accompanied by a rather sobering mathematical demonstration of just how much you can physically extract.

LED technology has only started to become remotely affordable in the last few years.

The true revolution in energy won't come in the mass production of supply to the grid at the macro level, but at the micro level. Fuel cell technology, or one of its descendants, is going to play a big role in that, IMHO. Fuel cells won't face the inherent problems of solar, and when they hit their stride, I believe it could fundamentally change everything about our notions and concepts of how things are powered.

Urbanized summarized it well.

I have a college friend who lives in Chicago now. When I first went to visit him I was surprised at how nice his apartment was and how nice the downtown and urban core were. I asked what he did with his car and he said he got rid of it and it was the most liberating thing he has ever done.

After spending a few days with him I realized what he meant.

Three of my children, one spouse and one boyfriend have one car between all of them. I have three nieces and a nephew who live in NYC that have one car between them. Almost none of their friends have cars. When people say millenials as a group don't care about cars, my limited experience says they are not wrong. All my carless kids say they are thrilled not to have to drive, pay for insurance, repairs and gas. It allows three of them to live in San Francisco. I'm not sure they could afford their rent if they had a car. Again though, if OKC wants to attract young professionals like them, we have to make massive changes in our mass transit.

Three of my children, one spouse and one boyfriend have one car between all of them. I have three nieces and a nephew who live in NYC that have one car between them. Almost none of their friends have cars. When people say millenials as a group don't care about cars, my limited experience says they are not wrong. All my carless kids say they are thrilled not to have to drive, pay for insurance, repairs and gas. It allows three of them to live in San Francisco. I'm not sure they could afford their rent if they had a car. Again though, if OKC wants to attract young professionals like them, we have to make massive changes in our mass transit.I'm not sure whether I just live in a completely different dimension, but every millennial I know, loves their car and was very excited to get one.

I'm not sure whether I just live in a completely different dimension, but every millennial I know, loves their car and was very excited to get one.

I'm a millennial and I use my car but ONLY because I'm rather forced to use it because of the spread out low density built environment. I wish I could get rid of my car...I would love all of that money back from fuel, insurance, maintenance, registration, toll fees, etc...

To sum it all up, I'm a millennial that doesn't like his car but uses it.

I'm not sure whether I just live in a completely different dimension, but every millennial I know, loves their car and was very excited to get one.
Cars are a huge expense. Monthly payments, upkeep , gas, insurance, parking, etc. It's very easy to spend over 1k a month for a depreciable asset.

If a person has convient, reliable, and safe transportation it's a easy choice.

I have spent months traveling on the east coast with work and never missed having it.

We can and will spend billions subsidizing solar and hydrogen and whatever else (all noble pursuits) and we'll eventually make a difference, decades from now. Or we could find a way to encourage people to live closer where they work, right now. Why we focus almost exclusively on the former and ignore the latter - in fact still often undermine it from a policy standpoint - is amazing to me. It ain't rocket surgery.

Having lived in different cities, I always have to laugh when people say "live close to where you work". What if where you work changes? In the 12+ years I spent in Chicagoland, I worked in the Loop a few times, River North, Downers Grove, and Lisle, bouncing back and forth among the suburbs and Chicago. So I should've moved about 4 times in that span to "live close to where I work". Here in OKC, I've worked at MacArthur and NW Expressway and Reno/Portland, can't easily live close to both those places at the same time, so I should've moved when I got my new job. Life just doesn't work that way, not that easy.

Having lived in different cities, I always have to laugh when people say "live close to where you work". What if where you work changes? In the 12+ years I spent in Chicagoland, I worked in the Loop a few times, River North, Downers Grove, and Lisle, bouncing back and forth among the suburbs and Chicago. So I should've moved about 4 times in that span to "live close to where I work". Here in OKC, I've worked at MacArthur and NW Expressway and Reno/Portland, can't easily live close to both those places at the same time, so I should've moved when I got my new job. Life just doesn't work that way, not that easy.The fact is, yeah, it would save energy if people lived closer to work. I am simply not going to do that.

Some people rely on a certain demographic to operate their businesses and where they work, but make more money and can afford to live in another area far away that has better demographics and is a better area. Some people work downtown in a concrete jungle, and want to live in open air suburbia. I support large, high-speed highways to serve those people as I support mass transit in dense areas.

There are so many urban housing that are horribly inefficient and leak air, water, and waste electricity. There are plenty of people who live far out in the suburbs who drive across the city and contribute less emissions and environmental impact then people who live in DD and bike to work. It is also the other way around and probably more so, but my point remains valid.

Alternative forms of fuel and more energy efficient cars coupled with new technologies such as composite materials that may replace asphalt and cement for highways that would make them last 4-5x longer is going to virtually make nearly all of these arguments against suburbia invalid. It's a lifestyle choice such as any other thing.

My post was not point out things like living closer to work. Even though that is certainly a valid point--and I knew someone was going to say that--we could force everyone to live inside the urban ring(I-44,I-235, and I-40) and live on top of each other and just THINK how much energy that would save if we people living in 500, 100 story buildings all in the core.

But, we could also save energy if all lived under rocks. gave up things like TV's and Dryers and all of that rubbish, eh?

My thing is..... is people conserved water, electricity, and the state started a program to implement solar technology on rooftops(which I think are one of the biggest wastes of space), the energy we could save would be incredible almost. I might even venture to say with all the rooftops, we could almost supply ourselves with the energy needed just from sending excess power back into the grid especially in the future as solar gets more efficient. Funny thing, I am actually against solar power plants that spread out, go figure, huh. But, if people want to just sit back and take more jabs at sprawl saying just live closer to work, I guess we won't get anywhere.

Also, I am going to start a thread talking about why people on here seem to look to Europe for sustainability. Sid Burgess made a comment at me about Europe not being a problem, but an article that just so happened to pop up in my news feed inspired to compile some data and take a look. Extremely high unemployment, poverty(and poverty standards there are lower than they are here so it's actually much higher if you look at it by our numbers), very low GPD per capita, low income, more rioting, more road rage incidents(ironic)... etc. I'll post figures with links to back it all up and I haven't even had time to begin work on the thread, but I hope to tonight. The overall happiness rate seems to be higher, but that kind of contradicts the more frequent rioting and road raging. Again, I will go more in depth and I am NOT trying to bash Europe, but I am going to present some facts and figures and ask a very legitimate question. I actually like Europe and hope to live there one day as it is very beautiful.

The housing near enough to my work to make a difference is not desirable. No way will that happen for me. I'm happy to do something to be more efficient and save money, but there are limits to what I will do. LED lights definitely need to come down in price.

The housing near enough to my work to make a difference is not desirable. No way will that happen for me. I'm happy to do something to be more efficient and save money, but there are limits to what I will do. LED lights definitely need to come down in price.

I've always lived close to where I work until I moved to OKC. It one point I lived across the street from my job and walked there. Now, I commute about 30 minutes one way. Unfortunately here there is simply nothing safe and affordable that is close enough to make it worth the hassle of moving. If I move downtown, which I will likely do if I decide to stay in OKC, I will still have a pretty decent commute.



But, we could also save energy if all lived under rocks. gave up things like TV's and Dryers and all of that rubbish, eh?


We could ban the internal combustion engine and just let everything else sort itself out.

We could ban the internal combustion engine and just let everything else sort itself out.
while you're at it, go ahead and ban breathing.

Whatever steps you take or new regulations, etc you promote, please remember that banning this, requiring that, infringes on the rights of others to choose their own lifestyle. Personally I would hate to live in any city, state, etc that puts limits on lifestyle (for the common good or whatever).
If you want to save energy do your own energy savings. Install a heat pump. Ours is a 5 ton 15 seer. Install a hybrid electric water heater. Ours uses less energy and costs less to operate than a natural gas water heater. If you own a large home look into heating and cooling it with the Mitsubishi style split mini systems, I have a 1 ton in my shop that's a 20 seer. As for transportation costs, buy a small car for commuting. I commuted in a little Toyota for 18 years which likely let me pay off my house mortgage 11 years early. It's just common sense. No need to reinvent the wheel or look down on your neighbors.

Check the AHRI rating on your "15 SEER" heat pump/air handler combination. 5 ton systems rarely get the "up to" rating, and are short on airflow 90% of the time. I can't tell you how many I've seen where the customer increased the size of the AC but not the ductwork... But yes, a heat pump saves a lot compared to expensive electric resistance or propane heat !!

REAL energy savings comes from tightening the house/ductwork and installing smaller HVAC equipment. Silly rules like "500sqft per ton" that have been around since central AC was first installed in homes need to go. If your house is as leaky as one built in the 70's then you may need 500sqft per ton. A decently insulated house should be able to go at least 750sqft per ton. A PROPER (No inaccurate input values) manual J calculation should be done before installing/replacing AC systems.

Good example is you can buy a blue motion vw desiel in the UK that gets 65 mpg , yet in America their most efficient unit gets 45 mpg. There are better atlernatives around us, they are just not allowed here for some reason.

Clown Puncher,
The same can be said about a car purchased in California and the same car purchased in the other 49 states. I know that Great Britain doesn't have the strict emission requirements that we have and California has more than the rest of us. For a couple of years, Saab quit exporting to the U. S. because of the emission requirements. I guess it cost them too much money so they are now exporting to us again. I don't know if the differences would amount to a 20 mpg difference though.
C. T.
Good example is you can buy a blue motion vw desiel in the UK that gets 65 mpg , yet in America their most efficient unit gets 45 mpg. There are better atlernatives around us, they are just not allowed here for some reason.

I thought Saab went away a few years ago. This article sorts of hints at that, as well.
Struggling Auto Firm Loses Right to Use Saab Name - WSJ (http://online.wsj.com/articles/saab-auto-owner-files-again-for-bankruptcy-protection-1409308717)

RM,
Looks like they quit exporting to the U. S. after GM sold them (2010) and they filed for bankruptcy in 2011. You will find the 2011 models available around the country. They stopped exporting them sometime in the 90's and started again a few years later, that's what I was referring to, I wasn't aware that they had stopped again, this time, apparently it had more to do with change of ownership/bankruptcy than emission controls. I guess they can't export what they no longer manufacture. Too bad, it was a really nice car. As far as auto makers no longer exporting to the U. S., there were several that used to be available that are no longer, due to the expense of meeting our emission controls.
C. T.
I thought Saab went away a few years ago. This article sorts of hints at that, as well.
Struggling Auto Firm Loses Right to Use Saab Name - WSJ (http://online.wsj.com/articles/saab-auto-owner-files-again-for-bankruptcy-protection-1409308717)