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Saul Griffith calculates what we need to do to keep the world we evolved in

When pondering whether we need to invest in energy efficiency, a smart grid, new storage technologies, or transmission to the best renewable energy resource areas, I urge interested parties to first take some time to watch TV. Specifically, this presentation given by Saul Griffith, MacArthur Genius at the Long Now Foundation:

He calculated what's needed to, in the eloquent words of James Hansen, keep the world we evolved in. The answer? Cut each individual's carbon footprint to the bone via serious lifestyle choices. Then, dedicate an area the size of Australia to renewable energy production. And do so in the next 25 years.

It's not an either/or proposition. We need it all.

Slides available on Griffith's blog, here.

Mall-operating behemoth General Growth Properties plunges in value

In the ongoing collapse at the stock market, big names get the most ink. Weighed down by excessive debt and bad bets in its finance division, industrial giant General Electric has shed more than 80 percent of its value over the last year. Not long ago, it counted as the most valuable corporation in the world. Now, smart people are openly wondering whether it will be the next too-big-to-fail recipient of a government bailout.

AIG, once the globe's premier insurance company, now exists solely by the charity of the U.S. Treasury. It has already consumed $180 billion in taxpayer cash; observers expect it to gobble at least another $70 billion, bringing its total price tag to a staggering quarter trillion dollars. 

Citigroup, Bank of America ... the list goes on: once-mighty corporations that now must beggar the taxpayer in order to live, and whose stock trades at pennies to the dollar of recent valuations.

Here's a name that deserves a bit more attention in this financial meltdown: General Growth Properties, which owns, manages, or has interests in more than 200 shopping malls in 45 states. Staggering under a massive debt load and battered by the bad economy, General Growth looks headed for bankruptcy or a fire sale. As recently as last June, its shares fetched $40. Today, you can snap one up for less than 40 cents.

Does General Growth's plight augur the un-malling of America? Maybe. The Wall Street Journal reported recently that:

Last year, [mall-based] retail sales on a per-square-foot basis in the top 54 U.S. markets declined by their greatest extent since the 1990-91 recession.... Vacancy rates at U.S. malls climbed to 7.1% in the fourth quarter, the highest rate since real estate research firm Reis Inc. started tracking the figure in 2000. And average rents have started to decline.

The mall industry, like so many industries in the modern global economy, thrives on rapid growth fueled by easy credit. Now credit has dried up, debt needs to be repaid, and sales growth has gone into reverse.

Time to start thinking about other economic models?

What the world needs now

More public dancing!

CMU study suggests GM has wildly oversized the batteries in the Chevy Volt plug-in hybrid

Plug-in hybrid vehicles are certainly the car of the very near future and a core climate solution. And electricity is the only alternative fuel that can lead to energy independence (see here). But I have a long been concerned that General Motors has overdesigned its showcase plug-in hybrid electric vehicle, the Chevy Volt (see here).

Now a major new study by a team of researchers from Carnegie Mellon University, "Impact of battery weight and charging patterns on the economic and environmental benefits of plug-in hybrid vehicles" (see here [PDF]) confirms my basic analysis that plug-ins make sense, but a 40-mile all electric range does not:

We find that when charged frequently, every 20 miles or less, using average U.S. electricity, small-capacity PHEVs are less expensive and release fewer GHGs than hybrid-electric vehicles (HEVs) or conventional vehicles ...

Large-capacity PHEVs sized for 40 or more miles of electric-only travel are not cost effective in any scenario, although they could minimize GHG emissions for some drivers.

Bloomberg quotes Jeremy Michalek, an engineering professor who led the study: "Forty miles might be a sweet spot for making sure a lot of people get to work without using gasoline, but you're doing it at a cost that will never be repaid in fuel savings."

Note that CMU considered a "high gas price" of $6.0 a gallon, which is the equivalent about $200 a barrel, a reasonable high price case for the next decade.

Perhaps the most significant finding for car companies who want to enter the plug-in hybrid business, minimize costs, and frankly crush GM, is something I have thought for a long time -- a very short AER can make sense for a large fraction of drivers:

Friday music blogging: Wild Light

Wild Light is a indie pop band out of New Hampshire. One of the band's two key members, Timothy Kyle, was briefly a part of Arcade Fire, is a good friend of AF lead singer Win Butler, and opened for the band on a couple of tours. That partially explains the mega-buzz around the band in music circles, but much of it also traces to their exuberant, ambitious sound -- a welcome antidote to the kind of grim artiness of so much independent music. These guys are not afraid of a hook!

Their debut album, Adult Nights, is a joyful listen from top to bottom, but for obvious reasons, this song captures my current mood. Thankfully, I'm back in Seattle.

Does daylight savings cut energy use? Don’t lose sleep over the question

Daylight savings goes into effect this weekend, and with it comes the semiannual arguments over whether the program actually saves time and energy. Those of us who can change our […]

Slightly off topic but utterly essential

The Daily Show is a national treasure.

The Onion: still funny

"San Francisco Historians Condemn 1906 Earthquake Deniers"

Six firms agree to stop using chemical in baby bottles

WASHINGTON — The six major baby bottle makers in the United States have agreed to stop using the toxic chemical Bisphenol-A, suspected of harming human development, local officials said. “All […]

Slate tricked into publishing a parody of its own reflexive contrarianism

In 1996, physics professor Alan Sokal submitted a paper to the postmodern culture studies journal Social Text. When it was published, Sokal revealed that the paper was an elaborate ruse, a parody, filled with the most absurd postmodernist tropes he could dream up. It became known as the Sokal Hoax.

Slate has just been the subject of what future historians will likely call the Pellettieri Hoax. Jill Hunter Pellettieri wrote an article lampooning Slate's penchant for vapid, picayune, deeply privileged, self-conscious contrarianism ... and tricked Slate into publishing it!

Well played, Pellettieri. Slate, you've been punk'd!