What is your personal Green solution with high fossil fuel prices?

Question

I would love to hear your ideas & solution.

This is what I've done...I am in NO way bragging or saying there is anything wrong with your life choices.

First, I did a survey of our driving, I found that 82% of all our driving was trips within a 3 mile radius, grocery, pharmacy, kids school, my office etc.

So I bought 2 electric golf-carts...I also bought a solar charging system...it's a 12x12 solar panel attached to a charging wire...so I drive for free 95% of the time. I checked with local police and they don't care if I drive it on our 25 mph streets. Got full coverage insurance........easy pezzzy!

Of course we have our other car for longer trips etc., bad weather that type of thing.

We just completed our 4th month and estimated saving is $2240 on gas....and ZERO enviromental impact. By March 2009 it will more than pay for the cart investment.

what are your ideas...................if you have any question..just ask & I'll answer!

have a great DAY!

Answer 1

Your solution is very over the top.  Don't get me wrong, it works, but if everyone could just reduce their dependence by 1% as much as you did - by say, reducing the number of trips to the grocery, that would go a long way.

Answer 2

The system you have set up is very efficient, indeed. Solar, wind, and water-based power are some of the best ways to extract energy from the environment that would otherwise be wasted.

The wave of the future, however, lies with hydrogen-powered vehicles. BMW has already come out with its BMW 7, with an engine that runs on both gasoline and hydrogen (not at the same time, of course!) The current issue is that the production of hydrogen still requires electricity made at fossil fuel-burning electric plants... If you were to use those solar panels to power a hydrogen generator, you could drive on the stored hydrogen on those rainy days! Plus, you would have a much better range with a hydrogen vehicle than with any purely battery-powered car.

Hydrogen is only an energy transfer medium - it still takes energy to separate hydrogen from oxygen. It's nice, though, because it turns right back into water after it's been used! With some tweaking, this could easily become the preferred method of filling up.

Answer 3

I'm starting abiofuels company. By cosmic accident, I almost had all the knowledge necessary for quite a while. It wasn't until last January I had the "Eureka!" moment. That's when I heard that biodiesel can be made from algae. The cosmic accident is that during a bioremediation project, our group learned how to make a machine (photobioreactor) that can grow multiple tons of algae per day, per acre. I have the technology, the patents, and the know-how. I'm ready to help save the world on a massive scale. If I could find an investor who isn't filled with completely irrational expectations, or completely lacks "vision", or even an investor who would leave me contact information (like a yahoo email addy) instead of telling me to send a proposal, and then not give me any clue where to send it.