The county’s extreme drought condition will continue to increase
competition for water among agricultural, environmental, residential and
industrial interests, and as the price of water increases, conservation
will become progressively important.
Back in the late 1800s,The Power Cost Monitor and other Energy monitor monitoring products. Mark Twain supposedly said, “Whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting over.”
There is no tangible evidence that the humorist and writer actually said this. Regardless,The Home Energy Management System allows utility customers to track their energy. the phrase illustrates the importance of water in all our lives.
About
the same time this quote was supposedly uttered, the Point San Luis
Lighthouse was under construction. A well was too expensive to drill, so
the builders installed a 15,000-square-foot rain collector behind the
lighthouse that drains into two 25,000-gallon cisterns — tanks for
storing rainwater. Each inch of rain that falls on this collector
produces about 9,400 gallons of water.
It takes a little more
than 5 inches of rain to fill both cisterns. The Port San Luis Harbor
District and Point San Luis Lighthouse Keepers use this water for
irrigation and firefighting.
Local architect and Cal Poly graduate Rick Rengel has done a lot of volunteer work at the light station.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.
He told me, “The Point San Luis Lighthouse cisterns are a throwback to the days of old that are now becoming popular again.”
You
see, LEED, or Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design,
certification for buildings now awards points for cisterns. Today, water
from cisterns is considered nonpotable — in other words, not fit for
human consumption. But it certainly can be used for other needs.
In
the future, water from cisterns will be increasingly used for purple
(lavender) pipe applications. Reclaimed water is distributed in purple
pipes to distinguish it from potable water. Reclaimed water or recycled
water can be utilized in irrigation or to recharge groundwater
aquifers.
Did you know that PG&E delivers some of the
nation’s cleanest power? More than 50 percent of the electricity the
company provides to customers comes from sources that are renewable
and/or emit no greenhouse gases.
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/products/HEMS-1000_6.html for more information.
2013年8月25日 星期日
This paint by numbers style of storytelling
Steve Jobs was the heart and soul of Apple. He shepherded the company
from the throes of bankruptcy to the technology behemoth that it is
today. His story would have to be fascinating, one that focuses on a
personality so dynamic that he can drive a company to success seemingly
on sheer will.
That is why I was confused when I saw that Ashton Kutcher would be playing the man in the new biopic "Jobs." Why would you cast someone of such low acting caliber to play a man whom one would presume to be dynamic? That's like trying to pass off a Zune for an iPod.
"Jobs" is exactly what you would think it is. It is the story of the history of Apple computers, and more specifically of Steve Jobs' role in the founding and nurturing of the company. It is something that should be engrossing, yet from conception to execution it just seems lacking.
Jobs realizes the potential, so he partners up with Woz and the two launch Apple Computers. After seeing it through a successful birth,All you need to know about In home display. Jobs is ousted from the company by the board of directors because his pet project is hemorrhaging money and he seems unable to rein in either the project or himself.
Jobs then starts another software company, but as Apple begins to flounder under its new management, Jobs is brought back into the fold, allowing him to guide the company into its new era of prosperity.
They briefly touch on Jobs' interest in Buddhism, his aversion to hygiene and shoes, his ruthless aggression, his womanizing,The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. his cold-hearted nature, his backstabbing ... each is given a scene or two, then checked off, allowing the movie to methodically move on to the next character trait or important event. This paint by numbers style of storytelling adds an extra blandness to what should have been far more compelling.
The movie wants so badly to be "The Social Network", but all involved are so unprepared that it remains just a shadow of a much better film.
Equally troublesome is Kutcher's portrayal of Jobs. Kutcher is, and I think I'm safe in saying this, a terrible actor. He has managed to ride a disturbing lack of talent to a very lucrative career, much to the befuddlement of struggling actors and producers everywhere. But, to his credit, he looks as though he at least put some effort into this role.
Kutcher has the mannerisms, the body language, even the speech pattern down for Jobs, or at least as best I can tell from the video I've seen of the man. But, as accurate as portrayal may be, it lacks any real soul. It seems simply beyond Kutcher's abilities to infuse the character with anything resembling heart. Impression doesn't equate realism, something that seems to escape the actor.
The movie portrays Jobs as, essentially, a horrible human being who rode the backs of others to great success and wealth. I don't know the man's story that well; I'm told by those who had interaction with him or have heard of such that it is pretty accurate.
But for a movie that I think is trying to humanize the man, it creates instead a sort of inhuman monster. Jobs cheats his partners, cheats on his girlfriend, abandons his friends and backstabs those who helped to carry him to the top. He kicks his girlfriend out when she becomes pregnant, then refuses to acknowledge paternity or have anything to do with his daughter.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.
When he is rightly removed from day-to-day operations at Apple, he bides his time, then comes back to screw over the very man who gave him a second chance. He doesn't seem to be the actual innovator behind any of the products that he is known for.
There is a bright spot in the film, though. Gad nails the role of Woz, adding humor and energy to an often listless film. It is a bad sign when the most compelling character in a movie is not the one the film is based on, but as I was watching "Jobs," I was thinking how much more interested I would have been to see "Woz."
I realize that "Jobs" was rushed to beat a competing film to theaters, but so little care was taken with the development and telling of the story that it would have been better had the movie never even been made. For a man recognized for his innovations, the movie about him is listless, bland and the furthest thing from the man himself.
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/products/HEMS-1000_6.html for more information.
That is why I was confused when I saw that Ashton Kutcher would be playing the man in the new biopic "Jobs." Why would you cast someone of such low acting caliber to play a man whom one would presume to be dynamic? That's like trying to pass off a Zune for an iPod.
"Jobs" is exactly what you would think it is. It is the story of the history of Apple computers, and more specifically of Steve Jobs' role in the founding and nurturing of the company. It is something that should be engrossing, yet from conception to execution it just seems lacking.
Jobs realizes the potential, so he partners up with Woz and the two launch Apple Computers. After seeing it through a successful birth,All you need to know about In home display. Jobs is ousted from the company by the board of directors because his pet project is hemorrhaging money and he seems unable to rein in either the project or himself.
Jobs then starts another software company, but as Apple begins to flounder under its new management, Jobs is brought back into the fold, allowing him to guide the company into its new era of prosperity.
They briefly touch on Jobs' interest in Buddhism, his aversion to hygiene and shoes, his ruthless aggression, his womanizing,The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. his cold-hearted nature, his backstabbing ... each is given a scene or two, then checked off, allowing the movie to methodically move on to the next character trait or important event. This paint by numbers style of storytelling adds an extra blandness to what should have been far more compelling.
The movie wants so badly to be "The Social Network", but all involved are so unprepared that it remains just a shadow of a much better film.
Equally troublesome is Kutcher's portrayal of Jobs. Kutcher is, and I think I'm safe in saying this, a terrible actor. He has managed to ride a disturbing lack of talent to a very lucrative career, much to the befuddlement of struggling actors and producers everywhere. But, to his credit, he looks as though he at least put some effort into this role.
Kutcher has the mannerisms, the body language, even the speech pattern down for Jobs, or at least as best I can tell from the video I've seen of the man. But, as accurate as portrayal may be, it lacks any real soul. It seems simply beyond Kutcher's abilities to infuse the character with anything resembling heart. Impression doesn't equate realism, something that seems to escape the actor.
The movie portrays Jobs as, essentially, a horrible human being who rode the backs of others to great success and wealth. I don't know the man's story that well; I'm told by those who had interaction with him or have heard of such that it is pretty accurate.
But for a movie that I think is trying to humanize the man, it creates instead a sort of inhuman monster. Jobs cheats his partners, cheats on his girlfriend, abandons his friends and backstabs those who helped to carry him to the top. He kicks his girlfriend out when she becomes pregnant, then refuses to acknowledge paternity or have anything to do with his daughter.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.
When he is rightly removed from day-to-day operations at Apple, he bides his time, then comes back to screw over the very man who gave him a second chance. He doesn't seem to be the actual innovator behind any of the products that he is known for.
There is a bright spot in the film, though. Gad nails the role of Woz, adding humor and energy to an often listless film. It is a bad sign when the most compelling character in a movie is not the one the film is based on, but as I was watching "Jobs," I was thinking how much more interested I would have been to see "Woz."
I realize that "Jobs" was rushed to beat a competing film to theaters, but so little care was taken with the development and telling of the story that it would have been better had the movie never even been made. For a man recognized for his innovations, the movie about him is listless, bland and the furthest thing from the man himself.
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/products/HEMS-1000_6.html for more information.
The historic role of government is changing
Two quite different 21st-century Americas are emerging. The nation is not so much divided by "wars" between the rich and poor, men and women, or white and non-white. Instead, there is the world of reality versus that of triviality.
In the vast plains of the Dakotas and the American West, thousands of men and women of all classes and colors are fracking oil and gas to create new energy for millions of homeowners and commuters — while giving America a second chance at strategic energy independence.
Yet the beneficiaries mostly ignore these elemental efforts. They instead prefer to fixate on the alleged sexual creepiness of big-city political mediocrities like Bob Filner and Anthony Weiner.
As we sleep, 7,000 miles away there are still thousands of American soldiers of all races, ages, classes and genders in godforsaken conditions fighting the Taliban to allow millions in Afghanistan the chance for an alternative to medieval theocracy and to deter terrorists.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.
Meanwhile, back home, the nation is focused not on such existential struggles but transfixed by racial melodramas.
Was Oprah victimized by racial insensitively in a Swiss boutique when inquiring about purchasing a $38,000 crocodile purse? Were 10 black "American Idol" contestants really victims of "cruel and inhumane" treatment because their arrest records were brought up on the show? Should a rodeo clown — whose stock and trade is humor — be sent to "sensitivity training" for wearing an Obama mask?
At the end of two years of near-record drought in California, the fate of hundreds of thousands of acres of irrigated farmlands, which feed millions and earn billions of dollars in critical foreign exchange, hinges on a snow-filled winter in the Sierra. You might never know of that razor's edge from the state legislature. Rather than discussing new dams and canals, it debated whether transgendered youth in schools could use the bathrooms of their choice and whether residents should need a permit to buy ammunition.
The historic role of government is changing before our eyes. President Obama is making the argument that the executive branch by presidential fiat can pick and choose which laws should and should not be faithfully executed — whether Obamacare, immigration amnesties or No Child Left Behind statutes.
The fate of the entire concept of voluntary tax compliance is currently endangered by the politicization of the Internal Revenue Service. Whether the government can monitor the communications of either reporters or average citizens depends on getting to the bottom of the National Security Agency and Justice Department/Associated Press scandals. Instead, the media seem more interested in whether Obama is golfing on Martha's Vineyard.
We have become a nation of instant electronic communications — Twitter, Facebook, cell phones and the Internet — even as reading and math scores plummet in our schools, and newspapers and magazines go broke. We can communicate information at the speed of light but have trouble finding anything meaningful to send back and forth.
In prior times, writers, directors and actors endeavored to present television drama characterized by good acting and engaging scripts. Now,The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. it is more profitable and apparently more entertaining just to film pseudo-celebrities talking, eating and agonizing over the day's banalities, as with "Keeping Up With the Kardashians."
Yet sometimes we get vicarious pleasure from watching oddballs do what most of us won't or can't do. Nineteenth-century-style men who cut timber,All you need to know about In home display. mine gold, drive big rigs and catch fish on the high seas are now big reality-television hits. Apparently, those who did not go to Ivy League schools or make a pile on Wall Street appear as more genuine Americans — at least in our dreams and fantasies.
Yet part of America's confusion about what is important and petty begins at the top. Reggie Love, the erstwhile presidential assistant and "body man" to President Obama recently reported on the critical moments of the mission to kill Osama bin Laden. The president apparently was not glued to live video feeds, as the photos from his re-election campaign suggested.
"Most people were like down in the Situation Room," Love said, "and the president was like, 'I'm not going to be down there, I can't watch this entire thing.' So he, myself, Pete Souza, the White House photographer, Marvin Nicholson, we must have played 15 games of spades."
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/Home-Energy-Management_73 for more information.
In the vast plains of the Dakotas and the American West, thousands of men and women of all classes and colors are fracking oil and gas to create new energy for millions of homeowners and commuters — while giving America a second chance at strategic energy independence.
Yet the beneficiaries mostly ignore these elemental efforts. They instead prefer to fixate on the alleged sexual creepiness of big-city political mediocrities like Bob Filner and Anthony Weiner.
As we sleep, 7,000 miles away there are still thousands of American soldiers of all races, ages, classes and genders in godforsaken conditions fighting the Taliban to allow millions in Afghanistan the chance for an alternative to medieval theocracy and to deter terrorists.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.
Meanwhile, back home, the nation is focused not on such existential struggles but transfixed by racial melodramas.
Was Oprah victimized by racial insensitively in a Swiss boutique when inquiring about purchasing a $38,000 crocodile purse? Were 10 black "American Idol" contestants really victims of "cruel and inhumane" treatment because their arrest records were brought up on the show? Should a rodeo clown — whose stock and trade is humor — be sent to "sensitivity training" for wearing an Obama mask?
At the end of two years of near-record drought in California, the fate of hundreds of thousands of acres of irrigated farmlands, which feed millions and earn billions of dollars in critical foreign exchange, hinges on a snow-filled winter in the Sierra. You might never know of that razor's edge from the state legislature. Rather than discussing new dams and canals, it debated whether transgendered youth in schools could use the bathrooms of their choice and whether residents should need a permit to buy ammunition.
The historic role of government is changing before our eyes. President Obama is making the argument that the executive branch by presidential fiat can pick and choose which laws should and should not be faithfully executed — whether Obamacare, immigration amnesties or No Child Left Behind statutes.
The fate of the entire concept of voluntary tax compliance is currently endangered by the politicization of the Internal Revenue Service. Whether the government can monitor the communications of either reporters or average citizens depends on getting to the bottom of the National Security Agency and Justice Department/Associated Press scandals. Instead, the media seem more interested in whether Obama is golfing on Martha's Vineyard.
We have become a nation of instant electronic communications — Twitter, Facebook, cell phones and the Internet — even as reading and math scores plummet in our schools, and newspapers and magazines go broke. We can communicate information at the speed of light but have trouble finding anything meaningful to send back and forth.
In prior times, writers, directors and actors endeavored to present television drama characterized by good acting and engaging scripts. Now,The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. it is more profitable and apparently more entertaining just to film pseudo-celebrities talking, eating and agonizing over the day's banalities, as with "Keeping Up With the Kardashians."
Yet sometimes we get vicarious pleasure from watching oddballs do what most of us won't or can't do. Nineteenth-century-style men who cut timber,All you need to know about In home display. mine gold, drive big rigs and catch fish on the high seas are now big reality-television hits. Apparently, those who did not go to Ivy League schools or make a pile on Wall Street appear as more genuine Americans — at least in our dreams and fantasies.
Yet part of America's confusion about what is important and petty begins at the top. Reggie Love, the erstwhile presidential assistant and "body man" to President Obama recently reported on the critical moments of the mission to kill Osama bin Laden. The president apparently was not glued to live video feeds, as the photos from his re-election campaign suggested.
"Most people were like down in the Situation Room," Love said, "and the president was like, 'I'm not going to be down there, I can't watch this entire thing.' So he, myself, Pete Souza, the White House photographer, Marvin Nicholson, we must have played 15 games of spades."
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/Home-Energy-Management_73 for more information.
Now might start providing services to students
When school lets out in Pinellas County, thousands of kids rush into their parents’ air-conditioned cars, go to after-school activities and practices or simply take the bus home to watch TV.
But there’s a growing population of students that gathers up everything it owns every night and looks for a safe place to sleep. Sometimes that might be a family member’s couch, other nights a homeless shelter or a sidewalk.
“There are far too many kids going through the traumatic experience of spending their whole school day wondering where they’re going to sleep that night,” said Althea Hudson, the homeless liaison for Pinellas County Schools.
As more students and parents come to the school district for help, school administrators are looking to a Hillsborough County program, Starting Right, Now, for support.
School officials met with the organization on Friday, and Superintendent Michael Grego has said he is on board with the program, which counts Hillsborough County school Superintendent MaryEllen Elia and Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn as board members.
The nonprofit organization helps homeless students obtain identification documents, finds them places to stay and even pays for them to attend school dances or extracurricular activities. It also teaches students the life skills needed to manage their finances, get jobs and earn scholarships for college.
Though Pinellas County offers programs for homeless families and unaccompanied youth — school-aged kids living on their own — in the school district, a team of only six teachers, including Hudson, coordinates everything from school bus assignments and programs for teen parents to shopping for school clothes.
There’s an ever-growing “wish list” of services that Starting Right, Now may be able to provide Pinellas students, Hudson said. With more schools switching to school uniforms or enforcing stricter dress codes this year, there’s a huge need for collared shirts, basic slacks and shoes that meet requirements. There’s also a need for storage space for all of the supplies the school district gives students, including duffel bags full of items such as alarm clocks, flashlights and towels given to homeless graduates.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. The school district would also like to include laptops or iPads in those bags.
“But most of all, we would love for our high school students to have the opportunity to visit colleges so they can see that there is support on the postsecondary level and that if you have a dream and you want to go to college it can become a reality,” Hudson said. “Most times,The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. they don’t see that as an option for them.”
At least 100 students have been referred to the Starting Right, Now program by the Hillsborough County school district, and each is paired with an adult mentor. About $816,000 in grants and contributions made to the organization last year also help those efforts. Pinellas’ entire homeless education program has a budget of $114,000.
Eventually, Starting Right, Now might start providing services to students here in Pinellas County.All you need to know about In home display.
Though the Pinellas school district’s homeless education team has actually grown over the years, more families realizing they can get help in a confidential and substantial way have begun to seek out its services, said Christine Cantrell, the school district’s homeless student progress monitor. There is extra support for the team’s efforts from organizations such as the Juvenile Welfare Board, the Daniel Foundation and the Salvation Army. But Cantrell said “there is still a huge need that needs to be met.”
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/category/products/2 for more information.
But there’s a growing population of students that gathers up everything it owns every night and looks for a safe place to sleep. Sometimes that might be a family member’s couch, other nights a homeless shelter or a sidewalk.
“There are far too many kids going through the traumatic experience of spending their whole school day wondering where they’re going to sleep that night,” said Althea Hudson, the homeless liaison for Pinellas County Schools.
As more students and parents come to the school district for help, school administrators are looking to a Hillsborough County program, Starting Right, Now, for support.
School officials met with the organization on Friday, and Superintendent Michael Grego has said he is on board with the program, which counts Hillsborough County school Superintendent MaryEllen Elia and Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn as board members.
The nonprofit organization helps homeless students obtain identification documents, finds them places to stay and even pays for them to attend school dances or extracurricular activities. It also teaches students the life skills needed to manage their finances, get jobs and earn scholarships for college.
Though Pinellas County offers programs for homeless families and unaccompanied youth — school-aged kids living on their own — in the school district, a team of only six teachers, including Hudson, coordinates everything from school bus assignments and programs for teen parents to shopping for school clothes.
There’s an ever-growing “wish list” of services that Starting Right, Now may be able to provide Pinellas students, Hudson said. With more schools switching to school uniforms or enforcing stricter dress codes this year, there’s a huge need for collared shirts, basic slacks and shoes that meet requirements. There’s also a need for storage space for all of the supplies the school district gives students, including duffel bags full of items such as alarm clocks, flashlights and towels given to homeless graduates.Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. The school district would also like to include laptops or iPads in those bags.
“But most of all, we would love for our high school students to have the opportunity to visit colleges so they can see that there is support on the postsecondary level and that if you have a dream and you want to go to college it can become a reality,” Hudson said. “Most times,The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. they don’t see that as an option for them.”
At least 100 students have been referred to the Starting Right, Now program by the Hillsborough County school district, and each is paired with an adult mentor. About $816,000 in grants and contributions made to the organization last year also help those efforts. Pinellas’ entire homeless education program has a budget of $114,000.
Eventually, Starting Right, Now might start providing services to students here in Pinellas County.All you need to know about In home display.
Though the Pinellas school district’s homeless education team has actually grown over the years, more families realizing they can get help in a confidential and substantial way have begun to seek out its services, said Christine Cantrell, the school district’s homeless student progress monitor. There is extra support for the team’s efforts from organizations such as the Juvenile Welfare Board, the Daniel Foundation and the Salvation Army. But Cantrell said “there is still a huge need that needs to be met.”
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/category/products/2 for more information.
2013年8月21日 星期三
The carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere
One of these days, the tipping point will be reached. No, not the
tipping point that leads to a continued warming of the globe. That one,
unfortunately, is probably behind us. The even more elusive tipping
point is the action,The Home Energy Management System allows
utility customers to track their energy. event or increased collective
concern that finally prompts Americans to make combatting climate change
a national goal akin to winning a world war.
Hurricane Katrina didn’t do it, and neither have Hurricanes Sandy and Irene. So the notion that a slim book and a barnstorming state senator from Iowa will spur the nation to action seems far-fetched. But Sen. Rob Hogg’s book, America’s Climate Century, and his talks across the state this week should move the needle in the right direction.
Hogg, who met with Monitor editors yesterday, makes the convincing case that for the next half-century or more “every aspect of our lives will be affected by human-caused global warming and its resulting climate changes,Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. and by the actions necessary to stop climate change before it devastates the world.”
All citizens should, in their personal life, do what they can to minimize energy use, which can be done without compromising one’s quality of life. Every business should maximize its energy efficiency, both to help spare the planet more drastic changes, and because it’s good for the bottom line. Every household and city should do what it can to minimize the damage from the more violent and erratic weather that occurs when more energy pours into the complex system that is the climate. And every citizen, Hogg said, should lobby elected representatives at all levels to support efforts to reduce the pace of global warming. Among the needed measures are a tax on carbon emissions. He’s right.The Power Cost Monitor and other Energy monitor monitoring products.
Hogg’s visit coincided with the premature release of the fifth report of the United Nations Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change. The vast majority of the world’s scientists now believe that the burning of fossil fuels is driving climate change that will increase sea levels by, in their best estimate, 3 feet by the end of the century. In worst case scenarios predicated on the collapse of one or more ice sheets, sea levels could rise 10 feet or more and drown coastal cities like Boston, New York and Miami.
he current issue of National Geographic, available online now and on newsstands later this month, depicts Lady Liberty up to her knees in the rising waters of New York harbor. If we continue emitting greenhouse gases at our current rate, a scientist quoted in the article says, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, now circling 400 parts per million, will hit 1,000. At that level, which was last seen 50 million years ago, the Earth was ice free and the seas 216 feet higher than they are today.
The carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere, plus additions caused by what Hogg calls “magnifiers” like the methane released from melting permafrost and the added warming caused when solar energy is not reflected by snow and ice but absorbed by land and sea, means temperatures will continue to rise if all fossil fuel use were abandoned tomorrow.
Preventing an even bigger temperature increase will require U.S. leadership, which in turn, require bipartisan support. That support has been wanting among Republicans, but that too may be changing. Earlier this month four former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency, William Ruckelshaus, Lee Thomas, William Reilly and Christine Todd Whitman, authored a joint column in The New York Times. It was called “ A Republican Case for Climate Action.” They wrote, “The only uncertainty about our warming world is how bad the changes will get, and how soon. What is most clear is that there is no time to waste.”
Read the full story at www.owon-smart.com/AMI-Home-Energy-Monitor_24!
Hurricane Katrina didn’t do it, and neither have Hurricanes Sandy and Irene. So the notion that a slim book and a barnstorming state senator from Iowa will spur the nation to action seems far-fetched. But Sen. Rob Hogg’s book, America’s Climate Century, and his talks across the state this week should move the needle in the right direction.
Hogg, who met with Monitor editors yesterday, makes the convincing case that for the next half-century or more “every aspect of our lives will be affected by human-caused global warming and its resulting climate changes,Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. and by the actions necessary to stop climate change before it devastates the world.”
All citizens should, in their personal life, do what they can to minimize energy use, which can be done without compromising one’s quality of life. Every business should maximize its energy efficiency, both to help spare the planet more drastic changes, and because it’s good for the bottom line. Every household and city should do what it can to minimize the damage from the more violent and erratic weather that occurs when more energy pours into the complex system that is the climate. And every citizen, Hogg said, should lobby elected representatives at all levels to support efforts to reduce the pace of global warming. Among the needed measures are a tax on carbon emissions. He’s right.The Power Cost Monitor and other Energy monitor monitoring products.
Hogg’s visit coincided with the premature release of the fifth report of the United Nations Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change. The vast majority of the world’s scientists now believe that the burning of fossil fuels is driving climate change that will increase sea levels by, in their best estimate, 3 feet by the end of the century. In worst case scenarios predicated on the collapse of one or more ice sheets, sea levels could rise 10 feet or more and drown coastal cities like Boston, New York and Miami.
he current issue of National Geographic, available online now and on newsstands later this month, depicts Lady Liberty up to her knees in the rising waters of New York harbor. If we continue emitting greenhouse gases at our current rate, a scientist quoted in the article says, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, now circling 400 parts per million, will hit 1,000. At that level, which was last seen 50 million years ago, the Earth was ice free and the seas 216 feet higher than they are today.
The carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere, plus additions caused by what Hogg calls “magnifiers” like the methane released from melting permafrost and the added warming caused when solar energy is not reflected by snow and ice but absorbed by land and sea, means temperatures will continue to rise if all fossil fuel use were abandoned tomorrow.
Preventing an even bigger temperature increase will require U.S. leadership, which in turn, require bipartisan support. That support has been wanting among Republicans, but that too may be changing. Earlier this month four former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency, William Ruckelshaus, Lee Thomas, William Reilly and Christine Todd Whitman, authored a joint column in The New York Times. It was called “ A Republican Case for Climate Action.” They wrote, “The only uncertainty about our warming world is how bad the changes will get, and how soon. What is most clear is that there is no time to waste.”
Read the full story at www.owon-smart.com/AMI-Home-Energy-Monitor_24!
who as a child showed greater affinity for animals
Kenny Irwin Jr. is not one of those brooding, creatively blocked artists, as one glance at his father’s backyard confirms. Ken Irwin Sr. once owned a pristine two-acre spread in a prized part of town. Then he made the generous or foolish decision, depending on your viewpoint, to hand over the property to his son as a place to build and display the astonishing over-scaled sculptures that Kenny Jr. makes by fusing found materials with tons of glue.
Now, Santa’s Battle Wagon and a team of 12 robot reindeer occupy a patch of lawn near the pool, while a 50-foot-tall, 54-ton robot made partly of junked electronics diverts attention from the tasteful desert landscaping.
Georgia Eisner, his older sister, recalled how, years before he took over the backyard, he would appropriate her possessions as material for his art while she was away at boarding school. “It was clear my typewriter ended up in one of his structures,” she said. “My shell collection disappeared. He glued it to the wall.All you need to know about In home display.”
Kenny Jr.The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction.’s ideas come in a geyserlike rush, he explained, inspired by vivid dreams of aliens and distant planets. His main challenge is keeping up with them. “The amount of energy that goes through me is absolutely, utterly relentless,” he said. “Think of it as the floodgates are unleashed and the flood doesn’t ever stop. It’s been that way my whole life.”
For several years, his creative energy has been channeled into Robo Lights, the ever-expanding holiday display he began in 1986, at age 12. Last year, 20,000 people visited the sprawling installation, which features Santa’s Pink Robot Store and a manger scene with baby Jesus wearing a Sumo-style topknot and wise men bearing gifts of toy microwaves.
“Kenny is one of a handful of people who continue to fascinate me,” Ms. Hoffberger said. “There’s a lot of sci-fi work out there, and it tends to look alike. His work looks like no one else’s.”
LIKE A ONE-MAN RECYCLING CENTER, Kenny Jr. collects old phones, cassette tapes, wood, the innards of slot machines, garbage can lids, pool filters, a neighbor’s wrecked glider, an air compressor from a commercial building — anything he can get his hands on, basically — and using multiple cans of Touch ’n Foam sealant, gives form to his visions.
His sculptures have a Seurat-like quality: a pink Clydesdale looks monumental from a distance; up close, its hooves are revealed as boxy computer monitors, its noble head a printer and fax machine glued together, its mane a tangle of power cords.
Still, the exposure didn’t translate to wider recognition for his art. Kenny Jr. isn’t represented by a gallery, but sells his art out of the house. And beyond the Visionary Art Museum, his work is not championed by museums, including the Palm Springs Art Museum. He works each day in relative obscurity, treating his father’s palm-shaded yard as his Roden Crater, hFind Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.is Chinati Ranch.
For Kenny Jr., who as a child showed greater affinity for animals than for humans, art is an attempt to connect. “The major reason I create is to share with people,” he said. “I always saw what enjoyment people got out of my art. It made me happy because it makes them happy.”
In addition to his astonishing sculptures, Kenny Jr. makes ballpoint-pen drawings that blend futuristic and Islamic imagery, and strangely beautiful ceramics in which materials like pigeon feathers or cicada skins are encased in resin skulls. As with the sculptures in the yard, the smaller works have started to fill the large house he shares with his father, and Kenny Jr.’s uncontrollable creative output has put a strain on his family.
Either it was the greatest miracle or the greatest mistake of my life,” Ken Sr. said, and laughed. He was sitting in the air-conditioned, vaulted-ceiling living room of the house he designed and built, which has a conversation pit and electric-blue rug that date it to the era when Burt and Dinah roamed Palm Canyon Drive. Viewed through sliding-glass doors, Kenny Jr.’s sculptures loomed impressively on the lawn, as if eyeing the house and its residents for a takeover.
As Kenny Jr. grew older, and his installations consumed more and more of the property, “I had to make some decisions,” Ken Sr. said. What he decided was to become his son’s Lorenzo de’ Medici, supporting Kenny Jr. financially and allowing him to turn prime Southern California real estate into “a canvas.”
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/category/products/2 for more information.
Now, Santa’s Battle Wagon and a team of 12 robot reindeer occupy a patch of lawn near the pool, while a 50-foot-tall, 54-ton robot made partly of junked electronics diverts attention from the tasteful desert landscaping.
Georgia Eisner, his older sister, recalled how, years before he took over the backyard, he would appropriate her possessions as material for his art while she was away at boarding school. “It was clear my typewriter ended up in one of his structures,” she said. “My shell collection disappeared. He glued it to the wall.All you need to know about In home display.”
Kenny Jr.The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction.’s ideas come in a geyserlike rush, he explained, inspired by vivid dreams of aliens and distant planets. His main challenge is keeping up with them. “The amount of energy that goes through me is absolutely, utterly relentless,” he said. “Think of it as the floodgates are unleashed and the flood doesn’t ever stop. It’s been that way my whole life.”
For several years, his creative energy has been channeled into Robo Lights, the ever-expanding holiday display he began in 1986, at age 12. Last year, 20,000 people visited the sprawling installation, which features Santa’s Pink Robot Store and a manger scene with baby Jesus wearing a Sumo-style topknot and wise men bearing gifts of toy microwaves.
“Kenny is one of a handful of people who continue to fascinate me,” Ms. Hoffberger said. “There’s a lot of sci-fi work out there, and it tends to look alike. His work looks like no one else’s.”
LIKE A ONE-MAN RECYCLING CENTER, Kenny Jr. collects old phones, cassette tapes, wood, the innards of slot machines, garbage can lids, pool filters, a neighbor’s wrecked glider, an air compressor from a commercial building — anything he can get his hands on, basically — and using multiple cans of Touch ’n Foam sealant, gives form to his visions.
His sculptures have a Seurat-like quality: a pink Clydesdale looks monumental from a distance; up close, its hooves are revealed as boxy computer monitors, its noble head a printer and fax machine glued together, its mane a tangle of power cords.
Still, the exposure didn’t translate to wider recognition for his art. Kenny Jr. isn’t represented by a gallery, but sells his art out of the house. And beyond the Visionary Art Museum, his work is not championed by museums, including the Palm Springs Art Museum. He works each day in relative obscurity, treating his father’s palm-shaded yard as his Roden Crater, hFind Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category.is Chinati Ranch.
For Kenny Jr., who as a child showed greater affinity for animals than for humans, art is an attempt to connect. “The major reason I create is to share with people,” he said. “I always saw what enjoyment people got out of my art. It made me happy because it makes them happy.”
In addition to his astonishing sculptures, Kenny Jr. makes ballpoint-pen drawings that blend futuristic and Islamic imagery, and strangely beautiful ceramics in which materials like pigeon feathers or cicada skins are encased in resin skulls. As with the sculptures in the yard, the smaller works have started to fill the large house he shares with his father, and Kenny Jr.’s uncontrollable creative output has put a strain on his family.
Either it was the greatest miracle or the greatest mistake of my life,” Ken Sr. said, and laughed. He was sitting in the air-conditioned, vaulted-ceiling living room of the house he designed and built, which has a conversation pit and electric-blue rug that date it to the era when Burt and Dinah roamed Palm Canyon Drive. Viewed through sliding-glass doors, Kenny Jr.’s sculptures loomed impressively on the lawn, as if eyeing the house and its residents for a takeover.
As Kenny Jr. grew older, and his installations consumed more and more of the property, “I had to make some decisions,” Ken Sr. said. What he decided was to become his son’s Lorenzo de’ Medici, supporting Kenny Jr. financially and allowing him to turn prime Southern California real estate into “a canvas.”
Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/category/products/2 for more information.
Whole house and for individual lights
Perceptive Automation, the leading provider of Mac-based home automation software, has announced the immediate availability of Indigo 6, an update to the company's intelligent home control and automation server for Mac OS X. With Indigo, users can easily monitor and control lights, appliances, thermostats, lawn sprinklers and dozens of other items found in the home, thereby helping to reduce energy usage.
New with this release is support for many Z-Wave lighting, appliance, thermostat, and sensor devices. Z-Wave devices, which are widely available worldwide, are a significant step forward in technology for those outside of North America who have had to rely on X10 or other older solutions to meet their automation needs. With this new addition, Indigo now has built-in support for three of the most popular home automation protocols: Z-Wave, INSTEON, and X10.
"I know the INSTEON world has had this for a long time, but being able to poll devices and know what state they are, along with the incredibly reliable communications, is such a steep improvement from the X10 world where most devices can only receive commands. Z-Wave is brilliant for that and it's thanks to Indigo that we can now leverage it," said Indigo customer Nic Barnes from England.
"Indigo's Z-Wave support enables Mac users, especially international users in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, to finally realize the benefits of an advanced home automation solution," said Jay Martin, a partner at Perceptive Automation. "While X10, along with similar technologies,Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. have provided automation solutions to our international customers, none of those protocols were as capable and reliable as Z-Wave. The additional benefit is that Z-Wave devices are available from a variety of vendors which allows for many device styles and capabilities."
Other new features include expanded INSTEON support for many new and updated INSTEON devices including the Leak Sensor,All you need to know about In home display. Smoke Bridge, and DIN Rail modules.A new Virtual Device interface makes it easier for users to integrate other devices and services and to create cross-technology scenes. New energy monitoring capabilities, for both whole house and for individual lights and appliances, have been added since energy monitoring and reporting has become a key aspect to home automation systems.
Another area of focus in this release is improved usability. Users will now find a more unified experience with more context sensitive help. Indigo now includes more device specific in-application help links to online documentation, which includes device information, usage tips, and a community forum section where users can discuss their experiences with a specific device. Additional context sensitive menus have been added, including a detailed dependency report and object shortcut references for simplifying writing Indigo scripts.
Server security has been improved with the addition of a visual password strength indicator, which shows how well the entered password is constructed. Also, more prominent warning dialogs have been added to alert the user if they configure the server in an insecure way, encouraging them to fully enable secure authentication.
The plugin API has been enhanced to support several new types of hardware as well as to more directly integrate plugin devices, events, and actions into the user experience. This usability enhancement means users will now find plugin functionality in the UI directly alongside built-in functionality.
"We are thrilled to be able to offer our customers a Mac-based home automation solution that supports many common Z-Wave devices," said Matt Bendiksen, founder of Perceptive Automation. "Indigo's support of Z-Wave and INSTEON devices, along with the availability of dozens of powerful and robust 3rd party plugins tightly integrated into Indigo, make it a professional quality solution for both home automation do-it-yourselfers and commercial integrators worldwide."
The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction.Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/AMI-Home-Energy-Monitor_24 for more information.
New with this release is support for many Z-Wave lighting, appliance, thermostat, and sensor devices. Z-Wave devices, which are widely available worldwide, are a significant step forward in technology for those outside of North America who have had to rely on X10 or other older solutions to meet their automation needs. With this new addition, Indigo now has built-in support for three of the most popular home automation protocols: Z-Wave, INSTEON, and X10.
"I know the INSTEON world has had this for a long time, but being able to poll devices and know what state they are, along with the incredibly reliable communications, is such a steep improvement from the X10 world where most devices can only receive commands. Z-Wave is brilliant for that and it's thanks to Indigo that we can now leverage it," said Indigo customer Nic Barnes from England.
"Indigo's Z-Wave support enables Mac users, especially international users in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, to finally realize the benefits of an advanced home automation solution," said Jay Martin, a partner at Perceptive Automation. "While X10, along with similar technologies,Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. have provided automation solutions to our international customers, none of those protocols were as capable and reliable as Z-Wave. The additional benefit is that Z-Wave devices are available from a variety of vendors which allows for many device styles and capabilities."
Other new features include expanded INSTEON support for many new and updated INSTEON devices including the Leak Sensor,All you need to know about In home display. Smoke Bridge, and DIN Rail modules.A new Virtual Device interface makes it easier for users to integrate other devices and services and to create cross-technology scenes. New energy monitoring capabilities, for both whole house and for individual lights and appliances, have been added since energy monitoring and reporting has become a key aspect to home automation systems.
Another area of focus in this release is improved usability. Users will now find a more unified experience with more context sensitive help. Indigo now includes more device specific in-application help links to online documentation, which includes device information, usage tips, and a community forum section where users can discuss their experiences with a specific device. Additional context sensitive menus have been added, including a detailed dependency report and object shortcut references for simplifying writing Indigo scripts.
Server security has been improved with the addition of a visual password strength indicator, which shows how well the entered password is constructed. Also, more prominent warning dialogs have been added to alert the user if they configure the server in an insecure way, encouraging them to fully enable secure authentication.
The plugin API has been enhanced to support several new types of hardware as well as to more directly integrate plugin devices, events, and actions into the user experience. This usability enhancement means users will now find plugin functionality in the UI directly alongside built-in functionality.
"We are thrilled to be able to offer our customers a Mac-based home automation solution that supports many common Z-Wave devices," said Matt Bendiksen, founder of Perceptive Automation. "Indigo's support of Z-Wave and INSTEON devices, along with the availability of dozens of powerful and robust 3rd party plugins tightly integrated into Indigo, make it a professional quality solution for both home automation do-it-yourselfers and commercial integrators worldwide."
The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction.Click on their website www.owon-smart.com/AMI-Home-Energy-Monitor_24 for more information.
The turbines have a little road
The first wind turbine in Willacy County went up on March 30, 2012, and since then the landscape has changed dramatically.
The county’s residents saw an immediate economic benefit leading up to that day from the flood of construction workers assembling the towering turbines on farm and ranch land.
Now, more than a year after the wind farms went online, farmers, company representatives, environmentalists and county officials weigh in on how the turbines have affected the area. Which way the wind blows for opinions on the turbines depends on who you ask.
In many cases, company representatives say, the turbines are exceeding expectations and a farmer who leases property to a wind farm says the arrangement has been beneficial. Environmentalists say the turbines are a threat to migratory birds and a businesswoman says they have hurt her crop-dusting business.
Russell Klostermann, who farms in Willacy County, says he is reaping benefits from the turbines.
“It’s easier to farm wind than anything else,” Klostermann said of the three turbines on his 160-acre grain sorghum field. “They’re connected by an underground line… and don’t take up much area at all.”
Klostermann Farms worked with E.ON Climate and Renewables, which owns the turbines on Klostermann’s property.
E.ON has built 112 turbines that make up the 203-megawatt Magic Valley project, E.ON spokesman Matt Tulis said.The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. The name “Magic Valley” has to do with the first settlers that arrived in the Rio Grande Valley, he said. The area was called “magic” because of the fertile land. “That’s where we got the name from,” said Tulis.
The E.ON turbines produce 1.8 megawatts of energy each per hour on full speed, which is about 20 to 30 miles per hour, Tulis said. Some turbines appear idle due to regularly scheduled routine maintenance.
“The turbines are monitored 24 hours a day,” said Tulis. “We’re able to see the performance of each turbine and are in constant communication.”
“They don’t look like they’re moving that fast, but there’s definitely a certain speed we want to maintain,” Tulis said.
The turbines have a little road that goes up to them and use a little piece of land, he said. “We’re harvesting right around them,” he said.
“It’s beneficial to the county,” Klostermann said. The company has improved some roads and the 24-hour monitoring adds to security out in the country, he said.
South of the Magic Valley project, Duke Energy has built 171 turbines in its Los Vientos I and Los Vientos II projects, said spokesman Milton Howard.
“They’re all in operating condition,” said John Polomny, the area plant manager. Some are shut down for maintenance though, he said. Duke is also installing a new engineering design with their turbines. “We’re retro-fitting them,” Polomny said.
“At full production, in the best conditions we produce 400 megawatts,Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. which could power approximately 280,000 homes,” Polomny said.
Many of the turbines are outperforming, exceeding expectations, he said. On average, a turbine will have about 20 rotations per minute. “The blade tip can go about 170 miles per hour,All you need to know about In home display.” Polomny said.
Read the full story at www.owon-smart.com/AMI-Home-Energy-Monitor_24!
The county’s residents saw an immediate economic benefit leading up to that day from the flood of construction workers assembling the towering turbines on farm and ranch land.
Now, more than a year after the wind farms went online, farmers, company representatives, environmentalists and county officials weigh in on how the turbines have affected the area. Which way the wind blows for opinions on the turbines depends on who you ask.
In many cases, company representatives say, the turbines are exceeding expectations and a farmer who leases property to a wind farm says the arrangement has been beneficial. Environmentalists say the turbines are a threat to migratory birds and a businesswoman says they have hurt her crop-dusting business.
Russell Klostermann, who farms in Willacy County, says he is reaping benefits from the turbines.
“It’s easier to farm wind than anything else,” Klostermann said of the three turbines on his 160-acre grain sorghum field. “They’re connected by an underground line… and don’t take up much area at all.”
Klostermann Farms worked with E.ON Climate and Renewables, which owns the turbines on Klostermann’s property.
E.ON has built 112 turbines that make up the 203-megawatt Magic Valley project, E.ON spokesman Matt Tulis said.The Home energy monitor market continues to struggle for more traction. The name “Magic Valley” has to do with the first settlers that arrived in the Rio Grande Valley, he said. The area was called “magic” because of the fertile land. “That’s where we got the name from,” said Tulis.
The E.ON turbines produce 1.8 megawatts of energy each per hour on full speed, which is about 20 to 30 miles per hour, Tulis said. Some turbines appear idle due to regularly scheduled routine maintenance.
“The turbines are monitored 24 hours a day,” said Tulis. “We’re able to see the performance of each turbine and are in constant communication.”
“They don’t look like they’re moving that fast, but there’s definitely a certain speed we want to maintain,” Tulis said.
The turbines have a little road that goes up to them and use a little piece of land, he said. “We’re harvesting right around them,” he said.
“It’s beneficial to the county,” Klostermann said. The company has improved some roads and the 24-hour monitoring adds to security out in the country, he said.
South of the Magic Valley project, Duke Energy has built 171 turbines in its Los Vientos I and Los Vientos II projects, said spokesman Milton Howard.
“They’re all in operating condition,” said John Polomny, the area plant manager. Some are shut down for maintenance though, he said. Duke is also installing a new engineering design with their turbines. “We’re retro-fitting them,” Polomny said.
“At full production, in the best conditions we produce 400 megawatts,Find Home Power monitor blood pressure monitor ads in our Miscellaneous Goods category. which could power approximately 280,000 homes,” Polomny said.
Many of the turbines are outperforming, exceeding expectations, he said. On average, a turbine will have about 20 rotations per minute. “The blade tip can go about 170 miles per hour,All you need to know about In home display.” Polomny said.
Read the full story at www.owon-smart.com/AMI-Home-Energy-Monitor_24!
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