Flash Gordon didn't bother with fossil fuels

Buster Crabbe played the iconic Flash Gordon like a man obsessed, giving the legendary movie serial its high-octane action and frenetic speed.

He didn't wait around for help when faced with certain death, and leaped into action. Somehow rescue always came after the cliff-hanger that ended each episode.

Likewise, the creators of the then high-cost production didn't mess around to make sure all scientific details matched reality or potential possibilities of space-time theory. They created staged sets complemented with electricity arcs, surreal noise and big machines with concentric circles of blinking lights. They fuzzed over details when it came to power sources, transportation and various high-flying technologies. The bird men's floating city comes to mind.

Doctor Zarkov in his introduction to the dungeon-like palace laboratory immediately figured out the nuclear energy source that enabled Ming the Merciless to rule over all of Mongo and threaten the hapless planet Earth. Things that make you go, "Hmmmm," to quote Arsenio Hall found no answers in the script.

Society could use such enthusiasm and blind faith about now. The debate over climate change has dropped out of the presidential campaign. And energy independence is coming to mean relying on burning coal and natural gas. But sordid, particulate-filled air will soon be determined to be the most costly disaster in the history of mankind.

We could use a hero.

Mongo and climate change

Eugene Robinson with the Washington Post calls out the president and his challenger on climate change, saying "neither has mentioned the subject in the debates."

Economy got you down? 4 ways it could get (way) worse

Milla Jovavich dealing with a collapsed economy.

The way I see it, there are four main ways for society to come crashing down.

I'm actually pretty optimistic. It's just that a post-apocalyptic world appears to be gaining interest amongst the geek set yet again. My first brush with this mindset began with the off-grid moves inspired by early 1970s works like the "Last Whole Earth Catalog," evolving to the fiscal depression that accompanied the decade's end and the first of the real resurgence of zombies with "Dawn of the Dead."

Don't grok that? Sky-high interest rates and crap job prospects. Remember Foghat?

For the record, I have nothing against Foghat, or Foreigner for that matter. And the Sonics won the NBA championship so it wasn't all bad.

But back to the topic at hand. Dealing with all forms of the societal destruction I have in mind would require talents of survivalists, off-grid enthusiasts and teachings of pioneers from the past who created all they needed with a Bowie knife, some twine and spit.

Of course, my premise is heavily influenced by the devolving political global landscape, spiraling ecological devastation and science fiction with a good dose of Hollywood suspension of disbelief.

Scenario No. 1: Trickle-down. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer and the cyberpunk culture foreseen by writer William Gibson, specifically in his Bridge Series. In the third and final book, "All Tomorrow's Parties," he paints a society where the Golden Gate Bridge has become shanty housing and various corporations control everything except cardboard chic.

Scenario No. 2: Climate change. The never-ending pursuit of profits pushes the planet over the edge. Oceans rise, island nations disappear and hordes of refugees from low-lying coastal communities pour into higher ground, triggering economic disaster.

Space-based clean energy could alter the future

Harry Harrison at his best.

Clean and cheap energy has been percolating in innovators' minds for centuries.

Far longer ago, alchemists and wizards sought the source of ultimate power somewhat differently, calling it magic.

The economic consequences of cheap clean energy would be tremendous. Imagine energizing rural Africa or infusing India's poorest neighborhoods with uninterrupted inexpensive power. All that brain power just waiting for an opportunity to connect with a money-making idea could make substantial changes in technological development, not to mention economic might.

So far, however, that pursuit remains unrealized. Recall cold fusion? How about the mythic magnetic power generator, a device that purports to produce "free" electricity.

Alas, it's a crock. So far, anyway.

Pursuing clean energy

That doesn't stop the pursuit of some nearly free energy source. Or the daydreaming. Or the bona fide research bringing existing clean energy technologies more in line with the cost of conventional carbon-creating fuels.

Writers regularly take on the challenge, imagining star travel as the likely result of conquering energy. Isaac Asimov's universes were fueled by atomic power. Even Albert Einstein and Otto Stern envisioned a hidden source of power in all things. They called it Nullpunktsenergie, which was later translated to zero-point energy. Imaging that is one thing. Tapping it is another.

The key to pollution reduction may be to restore more vintage cars

A well tuned engine produces less pollutants.

I spent most of the Labor Day weekend working on my VW.

Certainly not the pursuit many would choose. But getting the thing back on the road one of my over-riding goals. The next one is cracking that novel. Can't do one without finishing the other. At least, that's the way my mind works.

The engine's back in. The wiring harness is replaced. The engine-insulating tarboard is installed. Rust has been painstakingly removed from the floorboards and Por-15, the rust-murdering paint, applied. The interior heater hoses have been replaced (finally figured out how to source them). I figure the 1974 Super Beetle has several more major weekends before I can haul it off to somebody to put the final touches on the electrical and I can hear it roar to life.

Then it's off to my friend, another class of 1979, in downtown Fresno, Calif. for fresh paint.

All said, this will be a three- or four-year project. But we car guys do what we do. We love this stuff. I'd enjoy nothing better than pulling my bug into the Madera VW show and rubbing shoulders with more aging air-cooled enthusiasts.

Truly, this car is more sculpture than gas-burner. The NOx and related pollutants coming from its dual exhausts have been curtailed significantly.

Yet, that's exactly where many of our current vehicles are headed.  And that may be a good thing for the environment. Economics and regulations will be removing most of the older vehicles on the road that don't have support from nostalgic collectors like myself to restore and repurpose them as spares or show cars.

Reducing emissions

It's hard to imagine the discontinued Ford Excursion finding many such fans. Or the AMC Pacer. At one point, I day dreamed of taking a rocket launcher to that particular model. But the Edsel will remain. So will the 1955-57 Chevy and a host of others.

How ripping off my roof put me on the fence about solar

Back in spring 2010, my wife said it was time: Rip off the roof and put on a new one.

Simple right?

Hardly. It took four months.

But it got me thinking: With a fresh, new 30-year composition shingles, what would it cost to put a solar system on the roof? Hmmm... So I called Julie at Solar City. I told her some of the details of my house -- that it's 1,278 square feet, that my kWh consumption according to my PG&E bill never exceeded 900 per month and that I was only looking to pick her brain for information.

Not a great way to get information, but at least I was straightforward. Julie told me a number of things I missed but did say I'd be spending between $20,000 and $25,000 for a system and that I could get a 30 percent tax incentive. One thing I would have that she said was important: a new roof.

Roof quality a must

Or at least I will have a new roof. Some day. Anybody ever watch an asphalt shingle melt in your hands? Not a pleasant experience. That means, when it's hot, don't roof.

That's -- mostly -- another story.

Solar could unlock path to clean energy; the sooner the better

The man with gnarled hands was a legend in Skagit County.

Many in the Washington state farming region said he could find water in a desert. The man's name eludes me and I'm sure he passed from this world, but he developed a reputation for finding the shortest route to tap fresh ground water. He charged nothing, and people from all walks swore by his skills.

I feel like asking that old water witcher for his advice now. But rather than water, I'd ask him to work his magic on the clean energy industry. Maybe take that fresh-cut Y-shaped branch and point to the shortest route for unlocking thousands of jobs in the promising sector.

Kind of a wise man (or woman) on the mountain thing.

After several years of hype, the clean energy industry appears on the verge. Solar's finally looking like it's got the chops to compete. Biofuel breakthroughs may propel relatively cheap new sources of U.S.-made fuel into the domestic pipeline. And wind continues to kick up dust, not to mention a bubbly hillbilly cousin, geothermal.

Cool new fuel: Scientist leads innovation that could spur biofuel revolution

James Liao may be one of the most important people in the nation's energy sector.

And while his name may be unfamiliar to just about everybody not intimately involved with biofuel innovation, that could quickly change.

He leads a team that has developed a microbe capable of turning cellulosic material, or grassy and woody matter, into isobutanol, a fuel with huge potential. Just how huge, we'll likely find out in coming months. But suffice to say it's important, especially with gas prices pushing $4 per gallon.

This fuel is a far bigger deal than ethanol, which is made in this country from corn. Liao's team's feat is the first time isobutanol has been coaxed directly from cellulose.

Hidden costs of fossil fuels amplify case for clean energy

Hidden costs lurk everywhere.

Buy a car on credit and pay double the sticker price. Same with a house. For instance, adjustable mortgages and balloon payments contributed mightily to the real estate meltdown. And taxes take a big bite. Just ask any small businessperson.

Maybe that's why we Americans like our energy costs low, or at least relatively.

But there are hidden costs there, too. Harvard Medical School's Center for Health and the Global Environment released a study that pegged the estimated hidden yearly cost of coal-generated electricity at a high of $538 billion, or an additional 18 cents per kilowatt hour. Peswiki.com listed the commercial cost of coal power at 4.8 to 5.5 cents per kWh.

For some perspective, solar costs between 15 to 30 cents per kWh and wind 4 to 6 cents.

Heavy burden

"Coal carries a heavy burden," the "Mining Coal, Mounting Costs" report said. The Harvard study factored in health costs (11,000 deaths annually from lung cancer, heart, respiratory and kidney disease) and environmental impacts of fly ash spills (53 from 1974 to 2008) and mountaintop removal (500 removed and 1.4 million acres transformed).

Rooftop solar & decentralized generation can save California

Rooftops may not be the final frontier, but they do provide ample fields for cultivating solar panels.

So says Al Weinrub, who has penned "Community Power: Decentralized Renewable Energy in California." Weinrub is a member of the Sierra Club California Energy-Climate Committee and serves on the Steering Committee of the Bay Area’s Local Clean Energy Alliance. He said he relied extensively on work from both.

"Decentralized generation means that local residences, businesses, and communities become electric power producers," he writes. "Businesses with large rooftops or parking lots can become small power companies that feed electricity into the grid."

The beauty is that these buildings are already connected to the electrical grid and have an existing footprint, benefits that a remote solar installation doesn't always have. Industrial solar on empty land requires extensive permitting, studies and review of environmental impact, especially if its federal. Those panels definitely can change a picturesque landscape.

Algae biofuel develops momentum; could we see $30 bbl fuel?

Algae keeps nosing around clean energy news.

It doesn't have the sunny cache of solar or the exotic qualities of wind, tidal and geothermal power. But the potential of algae fuel's reported advances are hard to ignore. At least for this former reporter.

In my backyard at the University of California, Merced, researchers received a grant to "perform a comprehensive life cycle analysis study of algae biofuels." The money, a modest $142,747, is part of about $3.5 million issued by the California Energy Commission's Public Interest Energy Research program.

Algae takes a back seat in the grant to other projects that include improving grid reliability, energy efficiency and automobile fuel economy. But, hey, it's algae. Pond scum. This is the stuff that may be grown in wastewater settling ponds, harvested and turned into diesel fuel. Or food additives, you never know.

It's not cold fusion
 
The important thing is algae wasn't left out. It's not cold fusion. This stuff shows true promise as an alternative energy source.

Algae fuel and solar could use a little entrepreneurial True Grit

Developments in solar and biofuels lead me to believe that the sunny San Joaquin Valley could indeed become a leader in the emerging clean energy industry.

My friend Sandy Nax has called the Valley a Petri dish for alternative energy development because it has so many of the necessary attributes: available land, scorching sun and/or clear days a majority of the year, wind in the mountains and scads of agricultural resources for biofuel or biogas.

Sandy has often said, "Clean energy could be a game changer." He was referring to the economy.

Sandy and I discuss the attributes of the sorry state of economic affairs that have devastated the region's real estate, toppled government tax revenues and put many of our neighbors out of work.

Changing the world
 
We used to work in the newspaper business, which hasn't fared well these past several years. As part of our jobs writing and editing business stories, we spent years analyzing trends and making sense of them.

This clean energy trend has been fascinating to watch. I still have no idea where it's going and what particular component will be the first to fuel jobs, but indicators have been extremely positive.

Here comes fat algae; research unveils potential commercial fuel production

Less so now but until recently every couple of weeks appeared to bring an algae fuel technological breakthrough, study or news of a pilot venture to bring the process from the laboratory to your corner fuel station.

Granted, fueling up with algae products is likely many years away. But it's being taken seriously. Right here in the San Joaquin Valley, experts at the University of California, Merced have been awarded a grant to analyze emerging algae biofuels technologies.

And the U.S. Department of Energy has recently announced that it will be accepting applications for $12 million in grants over the next three to four years for about five "laboratory or small pilot-scale projects that support the development of advanced biofuels." Technologies like cellusic ethanol or fuel-tank-ready butanol may be first to the gate, but algae research has a strong shot.

Algae breakthrough

For instance, John Sheehan, who coordinates research on biofuels at the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment, just produced a 34-page study about a algae-to-fuel breakthrough discovered by scientists researching cancer treatments. The study was developed on behalf of VG Energy, a subsidiary of San Marino, Calif.-based. Viral Genetics Inc.

Those researchers found that molecules which disrupt the burning of fats, or lipids, in tumor cells "also encourage microscopic plant cells like algae to accumulate and even secrete fats," Sheehan wrote.

Even the Sub-Mariner can't stop the rising sea

Back during the Golden Age of comics, Bill Everett in 1939 conceived of the under-sea superhero Namor, the Sub-Mariner, as a scourge against evil.

His target, initially, was the Nazis.

"He is a rare hybrid endowed with great strength, power over the undersea world, the ability to breathe both in and out of water, and the gift of flight," writes blogger and Sub-Mariner expert J. Chivian at chivian.com. "He fought valiantly with the Allies in both the Atlantic and Pacific during World War II. He has been King of Atlantis."

Namor left the comic scene in 1955 but returned in the 1960s, or Silver Age as it's known to fans. But this time around, he was furious not with the Axis powers but with earth-dwellers in general for fouling his oceans with leaky barrels of nuclear waste and assorted garbage and for exterminating sea life with nets and pollution.

Prince of seas was right to worry
 
He's likely less pleased today (although I stopped buying the Marvel books in the early 1980s and know nothing of his present-day adventures). A two-page release issued sometime back by the California Energy Commission's Public Interest Energy Research Program said that rising sea levels will have significant impacts, causing coastal flooding and erosion.

"Melting of the land-based ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica, as well as the thermal expansion of warming seawater, has contributed to a rise of global sea level at an average rate of approximately 3 millimeters per year from 1993 to 2010," the release said.

Clean energy is bigger than birthdays: Hello solar valley

I turned 50 and marked the occasion as I normally would.

"Oy vey."

Now I'm facing 52, and it's no different.

Yet, such landmarks are memorable for a number of reasons. A co-worker got honored with both barrels with a combination of family members and fellow employees decorating his cubicle with RIP messages. In my case, it means I'm the age Saturday Night Live alum Molly Shannon made fun of as Sally O'Malley in quite a few high-kicking bits.

But the achievement, the coming new year and the birth of my second grandchild has gotten me to think even more about the big picture, the grand scheme. And not so much my role in it but how everything shakes out. 

Real existential, almost Kierkegaardian?

Tiny homes gain followers as energy prices climb

The tiny house movement has gained steam since the late 1960s and early 1970s when counter-culture types with no money made due with what they could and built homes out of whatever they could find.

In fact, it's almost mainstream. For instance, students at Green Mountain College in Poultney, Vt. have come up with a home design not much larger than an extended cab-over camper mounted to the old Ford F-250 pickup. Their "tiny house" measures 8 feet wide and 12 feet long and cost a paltry $1,927, school officials said.

"The $20 per square foot cost is pretty low compared to the $80-$200 per square foot cost of new construction," said senior Todd Sirak of Poultney, in a statement.

Indeed.

Kyosho jutaku
 
Although still not on every block, this small home trend is getting increased interest as energy efficiency and living with less gain mainstream attention. Elaborate micro homes have even become chic in Japan where even postage-stamp parcels of land cost a premium.

In Japan, it's referred to as kyosho jutaku, or ultra-small homes. In a recent piece, NPR reporter Lucy Craft said the homes "conserve space by dumping conventional elements like entranceways, hallways, inner walls and closets."