REverberations - Environment

Insulated Twitter

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 10:33:23 -0500

Two tweets landed side-by-side in my Twitter feed the other day, highlighting the difference between our current government(s) and optimal reality:

It's time to gooo

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 10:55:51 -0600

Found via Miss Politics.

Required Space

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 06:51:14 -0600

A Pictorial comparison of the amount of space required to transport the same number of passengers by car, bus or bicycle.

Party Politics

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 13:13:21 -0500

A pet hate of mine is the facade of democracy we have here. Either the ALP or the Liberals will be put in charge of the country. Sure, it looks like Howard is on the way out, but does it really matter?

Take your pick of comments I've heard recently:

Why don't we just merge the ALP and the Liberals and stop spending billions on elections pretending that they are any different?
Which half of the party are you going to vote for?

ALP policies one-up the Liberals. The Liberals one-up the ALP. Rinse. Repeat.

Oh, and it's not like the party members get an individual voice any more, it's all about the party line - read this extreme, un-reported example and be shocked at what goes on.

Some people join politics to make a difference. I just don't see that difference if you are towing the party line. Why bother?

With your vote, think about picking an independent, or perhaps a party that gives a stuff about more than being re-elected in three years. Maybe one that isn't going to bribe us with $billions of tax cuts while hospital waiting times reach record levels and public transport serves only a lucky few, and badly at that.

(I don't care if different levels of government have responsibilities for different things - we're all Australians, and if the states don't have money for something the Commonwealth should give it to them).

If you at all care about climate change, see what your local candidates' stances are. You might be surprised.

Dr. Karl

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 13:04:50 -0500

It's hard to be an Aussie and not know and have a degree of respect for Dr. Karl. But if you've managed (or aren't an Aussie), have a quick read of his Wikipedia entry.

So he's running for the Senate, and has a scientific view of the major parties' so called "clean coal", or CCS technology, upon which they are basing their half-hearted attempts at reducing greenhouse gas emissions. You can read Karl's thoughts on SMH.

Sydney alone would produce a cubic kilometre of compressed carbon dioxide every day as a result of the process, he said.

"You can't build a box big enough to store that every day - there is nowhere big enough underground to put it and the ocean is not an option.

"One cubic kilometre of CO2 to get rid of every day? They make reassuring noises that they're spending millions looking for underground caverns, but that is a complete waste of taxpayers' money."

If you're at all interested in leaving your descendants a planet to live on, make your vote count for genuine renewable, non-polluting power sources.

Plastic Spoon

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 09:13:20 -0500

Original on Stumbleupon, found via Treehugger.

Sydney Planning

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 09:47:44 -0500

Cycled up to The Rocks last night for a truly inspiring talk by Jan Gehl. This is the Danish guy who has turned global cities into places you might actually want to live, the closest success to home being inner-city Melbourne.

In a move with a change of making me respect a politician, Sydney's Lord Mayor Clover Moore has engaged Jan to provide his views on Sydney, which makes for amazing reading.

(There will apparently be a podcast/vodcast of the talk available here - well worth your time).

I think after our European travels, the main reason I want to live in places like Paris, Amsterdam, Munich or Copenhagen is that they are just great, friendly places to be. Cars have their place outside the center, but the right there in the middle is a place for people. To meet, to be entertained, to relax, and to watch.

Sydney's CBD just is no use for that. The only public spaces worth talking about are disjoint, and at all times as a pedestrian you are less important than the car. Jan's work on other more visionary cities is but a dream here in Sydney.

After the talk, I changed into my cycle gear and pedaled back to Kogarah. In the city traffic, making the best of what cycle 'lanes' are on offer. More nightmare than dream.

Clover, I challenge you to step up to the plate and implement 100% of the recommendations when you get them later this year, as Melbourne did. Perhaps we will be less inclined to consider the Southern city a place to live, which we did much to our disgust after traveling there last year and being blown away by how good an Australian city could be.

Live Green Festival

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 13:42:18 -0500

The City of Sydney is running a Live Green festival tomorrow, I'm going to try and make it. Have to get off my lazy bum and cycle in, I've slackened off a bit with the recent nasty weather.

Everyone's photos of the festival (including mine hopefully) will be on Flickr, which is cool in itself.

Rain rain, come this way, then come again another day

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 15:40:05 -0500

Seven days of rain forecast, let's see how that pans out. The timing is nice as our tanks have been empty for just over a week, so they need a good topping up.

Plus, I've done a bit of water blasting cleaning here and there (yes, of hard surfaces), and have a fair bit more to do, but it's only legal with tank water!

The strong forces of Winter and Alina have combined to ravage the vege patch, so I've just spent the morning stripping it, enlarging it, and putting in sub-surface irrigation so as to be ready for spring growing season. A few things have survived, and our citrus trees finally look like they are beginning to understand this whole 'growing' thing, but it will be good to have it all back alive again.

Hopefully, between the backyard and the Organic Farmer's market that starts in Hurstville in a week or two, we should have a good supply of food, with organicfood.com.au to fall back on.

Catchup Blogging

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 10:10:44 -0500

Firstly, Jersey Kerb are playing tonight! Same place - Tailors on Central. Kicking off 6pm.

Had a gig last weekend with The Honeymakers too at Marrickville, which was going pretty well considering I was sight-reading the bass parts, until we lost power half way through the last set! And, as is usual for this type of gig, they seem to underestimate the band and don't do any advertising, so there's not many people around, but at the end they all come up and say "wow, we should put some signs up and tell people next time!" Watch out, there mightn't be a next time if you don't get organised.

At home, we're squished into the back half of the house as I've ripped up all the carpet, and we've had people in sanding and oiling the floor boards. The mix-matching dirty carpet is now all gone, and in its place some great looking natural timbers, topped with natural oils. Sleeping in the dining room is a small price to pay, and we can move back in probably tomorrow.

The ugly room (at the front) is also getting floor boards put down, probably next week. The flooring guy is just making sure that we're getting plantation, not old growth, timber.

It's been good being able to work from home while this is happening, saving loss of another week's pay.

Got some baby furniture off eBay which I am going out to pick up tomorrow. We got a matching set of cot (which changes to junior bed and then a couch), wardrobe and chest-of-drawers with a change table on top. It's been a good way to get things - not new, saving on packaging and materials. Plus it's all also sustainable timber.

The baby itself keeps on growing, kicking now and then. Liz had some pains at work the other day but was able to go straight up and get the all clear - a nice perk of her workplace. It still hasn't really sunk in, not sure when it ever will. Just about the 2nd of December, I'm guessing.

So what are YOU doing?

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 11:43:01 -0500

Richard Branson, in SMH:

Why have I so strongly set out my green ambitions for Virgin Atlantic and other parts of Virgin? Because, from the books I've read and the scientists I've met, I am certain the world is heading for environmental catastrophe if we carry on as we are, relying on fossil fuels to improve our daily lives. Our children and grandchildren will never forgive us for doing nothing to stop climate change.

Even before we found out that we were going to be bringing another Gould into the world, the latter part of the above has always been the primary motivator for me doing something positive to reduce my impact on the world I live in.

We try fairly hard not to preach to people we meet day-to-day, because there is some stigma about being "one of those greenies". Actually, I just give a shit about the future of my species, other species and the planet we all share. Is that so bad? Why does that make me weird? Maybe others should think about their impacts too.

Sure, I preach a bit here, but you choose to come here and read it, and could easily choose not to.

Here's a list of things I personally do to reduce my impact on the world I leave to my children:

We capture rainwater rather than let it run out to sea. Two days rain filled the tanks, and that will last us around two months, give or take. It is plumbed into everything in our house, except for one tap we have in the kitchen.
I researched our new car purchase a lot, discarding things that appear green like Priuses and ended up at the car that emits the least amount of carbon for the style of driving we have. And then we run it on 100% biodiesel. So it's made from plants which have absorbed carbon in the recent past rather than dinosaurs who died millions of years ago. The car is so good we get comments on it regularly and it won Small Car of the Year shortly after we bought it.
I cycle to work most days a week (exceptions are typically bad knees, terrible weather or having to lug instruments, when I use a train instead). I cycle for short journeys, when I don't take the dog out walking instead.
My house is run on 100% renewable solar energy from Origin, and we have actively reduced our consumption of even that. Little things like my Solar Charger I made help out too.
We took a train to Melbourne instead of flying, even though it took much longer. The scenery and relaxation was worth it.
We eat organic food produced without pesticides, and where possible not shipped from the other side of the world or packaged in excessive plastic.
I mow the lawn with a push-mower. At least, that part of the lawn that hasn't been replaced with a vegetable patch instead.

So what are you doing to leave a usable world for your descendants? Is doing something convenient now really worth your children or their children not having a place to do anything at all? Trust me, that's pretty inconvenient.

In my eyes, driving a car/4WD to get everywhere, leaving lights and appliances on powered by coal, flying for the speed of it, and putting jobs now ahead of a world to live in in the future (Mr Howard, et al) is actively saying to your children and grandchildren that you don't care about them.

And if that's how you feel, then go right ahead. I just wish I could find a way to get my own little world for my descendants away from the world you leave for yours.

Water is not just what comes out of the tap

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Wed, 23 May 2007 11:13:10 -0500

Good, thought-provoking article over at The Age:

Eat a kilogram of steak and you are responsible for using up to 16,000 litres of water. A bag of potato chips: 185 litres. An apple: about 70 litres.

I knew activities such as these had huge water usages, but didn't realise that the numbers were so high. Household water use really is tiny compared to agriculture.
Solving sustainability is going to be a huge challenge involving all levels of production - it's not just up to the consumers. The best we can do is reduce our consumption of such water-hungry products.
The graphic at the top of the linked article brings it home quite well.

Water Tanks: Installed!

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 22:35:40 -0500

Due to the crazy demand it took quite a while, but we now have water tanks installed and ready for the next downpour! The rain has been on and off tonight, but it's just a waiting game now.
I've put some photos (with notes) up on Flickr of the installation if you are curious.
The capacity is 5000L at this stage, we can add more in the future if we need. It's all quite clever - a switch reads the level of water remaining and decides whether to pump that out or use the mains instead. All automatic, we don't have to do anything. If the power goes out, the pump wouldn't work anyway so it just uses the mains water.
We decided to keep the kitchen cold tap purely always mains water, but the entire rest of the house is through the system, meaning tank water if there is any available.

Drought: Day Two

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 23:31:23 -0500

Hey: It's World Water Day!

We come in to the day on our dubious measuring system with Tim slightly ahead of Liz, but both well well under the national average.

Tim's running total: 26.85L
Liz's running total: 29.90L

This morning so far we've used a bit of greywater for rinsing, and had two half-flushes of the toilet at 4.5L each.
I've brewed a 0.25L pot of coffee, although that will do me for two cups.
I had a bit of a rinse and then some shower-in-a-can, because the luxury of daily bathing is not something that someone on this sort of tight water budget can afford. Around 0.25L there.
Liz washed her hair with 1.15L of water in the sink, a luxury she usually does every day, but might have to re-think in drought conditions. She then had a splash in the shower with 0.5L of water.
10:30 Another 0.75L bottle of water for me at work.
Lunch was a team affair at a pub up the road. I had vego pasta and one local beer. Not sure of the water load on that yet again.
17:00 coffee again was 0.25L, washing up also about 0.25L.

Liz's updates so far:
1.5L to drink
1.5L washing up
4.5L half toilet flush
2.25L cooking dinner
and a bit of a round up to 1.5L for miscellaneous odds and sods
She takes the lead! But she did cook and wash up, so I'd better not say too much :)

22:00 I get home from band, microwave my pre-cooked dinner (thanks wife!) and tally one final toilet flush, with a bit of water here and there, for another 4.75L.
23:00 40 hours complete! The tallied totals were:
Tim: 26.85L + dinner and lunch at the pub + three beers.
Liz: 29.90L + fish and chips.
So, not sure how much those meals add up to since we didn't cook them (and we don't normally eat out that much either!), but if we had have replaced them with meals we DID cook, we should have ended up with around 30L each, which I think is pretty good considering our target of 40L.

We also learnt a few tricks along the way, such as topping up the toilet cistern with greywater, and being very careful with the tap pressure when you really only need a tiny amount of water for the task.

40 Hour Drought

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 15:23:23 -0500

So Liz found out about the 40 Hour Drought that ABC Local Radio is organising, and we both thought it would be an entertaining way to find out just how hard our farmers are toughing it.
We realise that most people reading this blog will not be doing the same, probably because you haven't heard of the idea, but more likely because of the fact that water is so amazingly cheap here that you have no incentive whatsoever to reduce your consumption. For example, our water tanks, which are being installed in about three weeks time, will save us something like $13 per quarter in the estimates we have been given.
Hardly financial incentive to get them installed, when the cost is quite a way north of $5000.
(People don't seem to realise - the vast majority of your water bill is the sewerage and the service charge. Actual water consumed is a small fraction of the cost. Check yours and have a look)

Anyway, here's a log of our efforts to use no more than 40 liters of water each in 40 hours - the drought started 7:00am this morning.

Tim's first 17 hours total: 15.85L
Liz's first 17 hours total: 12.5L
6:00 Alarm goes off. I decide that what I want to do before the drought starts won't take me an hour, re-set the alarm and go back to sleep.
6:30 Wake and shower. Yes, it's slightly cheating doing this before the drought starts, but we're still going to have to work out bathing inside the drought, plus as always we have a bucket to catch the pre-hot water and the water gets turned off while I'm soaping up.
Shave too, justifying this one by saying I would just grow a beard were I in real drought conditions. Actually I pretty much did earlier in the week, and was almost going to leave it that way on Monday morning.
6:55 Liz half-flushes the toilet, ridding us of the night's mellow yellow.
7:00 We're in drought conditions! I go and take a photo of the water meter, I'll post it here later, along with the reading.
7:05 0.25L of water each for tea/coffee. I use a stove-top coffee pot, and even if I want one cup I always fill it to save gas. The coffee I have this morning has been sitting there for a few days, and I just add hot water. Tastes good enough.
7:15 Decide that all the washing up should be done later, in one go, so that we can better judge our water usage.
7:45 Half-flush the toilet, however the inlet tap has been turned off and we fill the cistern with 4.5L of grey water we have previously claimed from the shower with a bucket, taps with a smaller container, etc., when we were washing hands and faces. Wash hands with a bit of soap and bucket of grey water. Will debate/decide whether this 4.5L counts at a later date, as we had it saved from before the drought!
9:10 Do my washing up at work, 0.25L as I use the water from one thing into another, minimising the amount I get out of the tap. Also grab a bit from other people who take their items away before the tap has finished running.
9:15 Fill up my water bottle at work, 0.75L. We have a really stupid cold filtered drinking water tap in our tiny "kitchen" at work, which runs on for about 30 seconds after you turn it off. Supposedly this is something to do with the pressure filter system draining everything out of the pipe so as not to over pressurise, but exactly the same system and tap on other floors of this building don't do the same thing. Lots of people couldn't be bothered waiting and just loose that last water (it's about 0.25L that runs on) down the drain. Those who do choose to wait (such as, obviously, me), have to turn it off early and hope you guessed the right amount to fill your drinking vessel.
We often wonder how much working time per year is wasted to this tap, and obviously how much water.
10:45 Ate an apple at work. It was from our Organic fruit and veg box, so I didn't need to rinse it. Cleaned my hands afterwards with a bit of water from my drink bottle.
12:30 Empty results of drinking water. We have waterless urinals here at work so no problems there. Washed hands with the most amazingly small amount of water, I'll be unkind and call it 0.1L.
13:00 Lunch was some left-over Risotto, haven't washed up the box yet. Filled up water bottle again - supposedly 0.75L, although I suspect that is an over-estimate and I'll check that out later. Despite an orange as well, I managed to avoid washing my hands.
15:20 Another waterless urinal trip, wash hands with tiny amount of water again. I'm going to roll it into the first trip's allowance.
Also, my share of a pot of coffee is 0.25L.
17:00 Toilet flush and wash hands, probably 9L. Ouch. Can't get away with that much on this budget.
18:00 Band rehearsal - finish off my bottle of water. Afterwards we have dinner - me a steak, chips and salad with a couple of beers. This was all purchased - does that mean the water used in the rearing and preparation doesn't count? Not sure. I wouldn't know how to guess anyway, other than the fact that meat is a horribly un-sustainable way to eat so I'm sure it's not good.
22:45 Water the back garden with the remnants of the beer now that it's dark :)

Liz's totals for the day:
Brushing teeth, face, hands, etc: 1L
Drinking: 2L
Bird and dog: 0.5L
Two half-flushes of toilet (with greywater though): 9L

Home-brew Solar Charger

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 09:15:54 -0500

This is just a little something I decided to try and build while shopping for electronic parts the other day.
Basically there's three solar cells, total output 5v, wired in series. They output to a little socket (pictured, left), which has a cord which terminates in a female USB socket (not pictured).
Then, anything which has a USB cable for charging can be connected to that.
So far, I've managed my camera battery (pictured), mobile phone, AA and AAA batteries and Liz's iPod.
My iPod seems to need a little more juice, and also the camera battery here only works in really strong sunlight. I'm going to consider adding either another volt or so or perhaps a few more milliamps.

States

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 08:22:16 -0600

Who needs 'em? Not 61% of the voters over at SMH polls.
While I admit I haven't thought every single consequence through, I tend to agree. I work for an arm of state government and watch us spend huge amounts of money and effort building systems to work only for people on this side of an artificial line in the dirt a few hundred kilometres away.
Those on the other side need the same services, but we won't share any of our efforts with them. Let them work it out for themselves! We had to spend our money, why shouldn't they spend their own to achieve exactly the same goals?!

Strange thinking from where I stand, since we all carry the same passports, sing the same anthem, wave the same flag and claim to be Aussies when we travel overseas.

I understand the theory of a State government, but the practice these days is far away from that theory.

Does anyone really feel good voting for any of the candidates in a couple of week's time? Do you feel that any of them strongly represents your feelings, regardless of whether you are left-leaning, right-leaning, or as apolitical as they come?

When I would have to vote for the most Right major party (Liberals) to get the best environmental water plan (recycling), because the sightly more Left party (Labour) wants to rape the environment with a desalination plan, and the only major alternative is the Democrats who are in a complete shambles, what am I to do with my vote?

Cost of Bottled Water

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 05:09:28 -0600

Back in the time when I ate far more take-away food than I do now, I often opted for the value meal with chips and a drink. Since I've never been the biggest fan of soft drinks, once bottled water appeared on the scene I usually opted for that instead. Never again. From Treehugger:

the manufacture and transport of that one kilogram bottle of Fiji water consumed 26.88 kilograms of water (7.1 gallons) .849 Kilograms of fossil fuel (one litre or .26 gal) and emitted 562 grams of Greenhouse Gases (1.2 pounds).

Add to that the fact that you are paying about 1000% more than you should be for water, and the concept is downright blasphemous. The Ritz in New York even have a water sommelier. That's a concept the world really doesn't need.

Organic Food!

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 19:57:32 -0600

Just a quick post to say that we've been getting boxes of organic fruit, veg and other groceries delivered from OrganicFood.com.au for a few months now. Service is great, quality of the food is excellent, and the fact that it just appears at the door once a week is pretty nice with the crazy hours we end up working.
It's always fun to see what has arrived in the mixed box of fruit and veg - all sorts of odd seasonal things turn up such as real raw beetroot, corn on the cob and pineapple, all of which is nice and healthy to eat while a nice change from what we buy when we enter a fruit market.
Look at their prices and then compare to what you actually spend on this sort of stuff and it actually works out pretty good value.

We'll investigate the two separate local fruit and veg markets supposedly starting shortly too.

Ads selling desalination to cost $1.4m

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 08:56:56 -0600

From today's SMH. $1.4m just for advertising?
According to the propaganda trip we took in school to the electoral center in Canberra, I thought our government was supposed to work something roughly like this:

Vote in people that you think will do the best job running the country.
Let them do "the best job" for their term
At the end of the term, review their progress before deciding who to vote for this time

Where in the above did the elected representatives get to spend our tax money convincing us that their decisions are correct?
In this case, they fairly blatantly aren't - recycling is a far better option that most of the rest of the world uses. Here it's been taken by ignorant people whose dam is almost totally empty as "recycled sewerage" that they just won't drink, instead forming groups called Citizens Against Drinking Sewage.

Why? What better options do you think you have? Do you really think that every glass of water you get out of the tap is brand new, created by God just for you? Nope, we have a limited number of water atoms on this planet, and they go around and around in a big circle.
Water recycling is just shortcutting that a bit.

No matter, we had a friend of ours now in the water tank business over last night and are getting our plans in order to have a couple of tanks installed down the side of our house in a couple of months.

On Yer Bike

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 15:24:25 -0600

Continuing the trend this year, Bicycles outsold cars in Australia. There were less new cars sold also. So, given that people buy more bikes, you'd expect them to be used as transport much more also. But why isn't this the case?

While down in Adelaide, I had chosen a campsite for us right next to the university where we needed to be, however it would still have been at least a half-hour walk to get there. No matter, about ten minutes on the bike and it was done. Bass strapped to my back, music stand on the rack at the rear and everything else I needed in my pannier bag.

Liz came the second night too, and we rode home together. However, we needed food, so we stopped, grabbed two pizzas, chucked them on the rack also and kept riding. It was actually the most fun we'd had in ages, loaded to the hilt with everything we needed for the night, no cars, no fossil fuels, no emissions. Well, after the pizza perhaps, but that's another story.

What will it take for people in this world to wake up to the fact that we can't continue using cars to get everywhere, especially for highly wasteful short journeys? Statistically more of you reading this have bikes than cars, so put a rack on the back, get some bags and ride! You'll get fit and enjoy it much more while you're at it.

Hydrogen - why?

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 07:09:23 -0600

Continuing the alternative transport technology theme, this article about using Algae as a source of biodiesel also has a great section at the end explaining just how little potential there is for hydrogen to be a valid alternative fuel.

Biodiesel has an energy density of 950 kBtu/cu.ft, and hydrogen stored at 3,626 psi (250 times atmospheric pressure) only has an energy density of 68 kBtu/cu.ft.4 So, highly pressurized to 250 atmospheres, hydrogen's volumetric energy density is only 7.2% of that of biodiesel. The result being that with similar efficiencies of converting that stored chemical energy into motion (as diesel engines and fuel cells have), a hydrogen vehicle would need a fuel tank roughly 14 times as large to yield the same driving range as a biodiesel powered vehicle.

That, plus the costs of creating the hydrogen, potential for explosions, and the need to actually put pumps everywhere mean that hydrogen is a very strange fuel for the likes of America to be pushing.
The cynic in me thinks of the fact that we can use biodiesel in cars we have today (Liz and I do, in today's version of one of these), whereas in the so-called "hydrogen economy" everyone would need a new car, plus the oil/energy companies get to invent, rollout and sell us all sorts of crazy stuff and make piles of money in the process.

Diesel Hybrid Development

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 06:56:27 -0600

Some clever thinkers over at Zytec have created a working prototype of a diesel hybrid (good review).

All UK designed and built, this is the cleverest combination of technology I've seen in this space to date. The focus has been on ultra-low carbon emissions, but the resulting fuel economy is pretty impressive also.

Off to the evil "other" Australian city

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 14:11:37 -0600

The theory for the next few days goes as follows. Up horribly early tomorrow to get on a train down to visit Melbourne for the first time ever (that counts anyway - half an hour waiting in the airport for another plane doesn't).
So why via train? Everyone seems to want to know why we'd choose to pay slightly more than a plane to sit on a train for about twelve hours instead of one.
Here's some reasons:

Plenty of relaxing time reading books and stuff - things we just don't do enough of these days. That's a small reason.
I'm a train buff. I used to have a picture of an XPT on my bedroom wall, but have never ridden one. That's a big reason.
Less carbon emissions versus a plane - about a third. While not rabid greenies we do want to leave our descendants a planet worth living on. That's an even bigger reason.

Once we get there, we have almost no plans other than finding our way to our hotel and working the rest of the weekend out as it comes. Plenty of cafés and wandering (yes, girls, and shopping...) will no doubt happen over the three nights we are there, before we jump on the train to return Tuesday night.
What fun!

Low-voltage home wiring

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 21:09:04 -0500

I was talking with the two most clever electrically-minded people I know about the idea of running a low-power DC voltage around modern homes a couple of months ago, as everything from your PC to your mobile phone takes the 240v from the wall and converts it down to 3.5-12v, loosing power and heat in the process.

So imagine my surprise today to see that Google is promoting the same thing. Must have been a good idea after all. Go Google.

Breathing Earth

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Fri, 15 Sep 2006 11:42:20 -0500

Go stare at this for a few minutes. It's nice to see things in this kind of global perspective now and then.

Mowing Update

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 22:50:24 -0500

It's about time I posted a progress update on Manual Mowing and the Junk Mail Experiment, a post from one year ago.

The mowing went ok for a while, then the thing broke three times, and when we returned from honeymooning I decided to get it fixed good and proper. Back to Bunnings, where they were quite understanding and allowed us to upgrade it to a better model no questions asked.

So, three crappy GMC mowers in our wake, we picked a much better model for not much more money, brought it home and assembled it. The difference was like night and day. I can honestly say that pushing this around is no more effort than using a petrol mower. When you factor in the weight of the petrol mower, this thing glides around the lawn just as easily! Liz even gives it a whirl now and then.

As for the junk mail, it's been pretty good really. Some people distributing the dead trees printed with (mostly) useless crap ignore or fail to see the sign, but by far the biggest offender is The Leader. This already advertising-laden publication comes filled with its own weight in inserts and property guides twice a week.

I'm interested in what is happening in my local community, and The Leader is the old-world way of getting that communication happening. It would just be nicer if they were a little more enviro-friendly.

Let Me Out

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 10:37:19 -0500

Crazily hot on the (non-airconditioned) train into work today - and it's still winter. At least the government appears willing to let us out in case of terrorism, crashes, etc.
Not sure what ill-advised person decided that we should be locked in a big metal box In Case of Emergency, but surely the ability to run away up an embankment or something is far more important than protecting the Darwin award candidates who want to run along the other tracks, not realising there could be oncoming trains. Besides, with the new timetables there's hardly any other trains and when there are they are running far slower anyway.

I have a weekly ticket at the moment but am organising myself access to lockers, showers and a guide with the plan of cycling in to work, at least on a trial basis, starting next week. I know it will take longer, but the freedom combined with the exercise (which I have long had trouble fitting into my busy schedule) may yet be worth it.

Got my copy of Bike-it yesterday, which is excellent, and coupled with the community-driven Bikely there's plenty of info about good ways to get around.

It's a New Car!

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Mon, 28 Aug 2006 20:08:01 -0500

OK, so I've used that title once or twice before, but this time we mean it.

We've never owned a new car before, but yesterday, after lots and lots of research, saving, and deliberating, we went out and plonked down a deposit on a shiny new Volkswagen Polo TDi, ticking plenty of option boxes. (Reviews: #1 #2 #3)

This is a small-medium car, plenty big enough for us for a while, crazily economical (6-7 l/100km around the city or 4-5 on the open road), and it's capable of towing our soon-to-be-back-in-the-water boat.
The last two items on that list above come courtesy of the fact that it is a diesel car. We've loved both Percy the Peugeot and more recently Schnee Three the Citroën, both of which have been diesel powered, and finally you can get good enough diesel in Australia to make buying one here a sensible move.

The fact that you can run these cars on biodiesel is a great plus for the environment. We can even create our own fuel out of waste oil from local take-aways should we so choose! Otherwise, either our local servo carries B50 (meaning 50% biodiesel) or we can buy B100 (100% biodiesel) from The Biodiesel Station in Marrickville (possibly closed at the moment).

As for towing, being a diesel means that this little car actually has more towing power (ie. torque) than a Subaru Forester, while using about half the fuel when you aren't towing - making it the perfect dual-purpose car for us.

I should talk a little about the Prius here, as we have mentioned several times we were thinking about one of those. The big killer was that the manufacturers don't want you to tow with them at all. Perhaps as the technology gets a little more mature, we could have a biodiesel-powered hybrid which the manufacturers supported towing with.

So it's still a little while until delivery, giving us time to save up the remaining cash, but it's done now - too late to change our minds!

A quick last note here that yes, we do need a car living in suburban Sydney. I'd love to say that wasn't the case, but the buses are of little use, the trains pretty good from our station but don't go everywhere you want, and it's pretty hilly for cycling.

Getting across suburbs to my grandparents' place or Liz's mum's place is not really possible with any of the above options (except cycling, which I have done on occasions, but isn't possible with lots of gear, a dog, gifts, instruments, etc.)

Interest Rates hit 6%

webmaster@reverb.com.au (reverb) — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 10:50:49 -0500

Story here.
Remind me again why we didn't buy in England, where rates (used to, at least) wallow around 4%? Not quite sure why Australia has the highest rates in the Western world.

Perhaps our bank will be nice to us again...

In my simplified view of the world, if we stopped either blowing up or being dependent on the middle east for oil supplies, inflation would be lower and our home loan repayments would be lower.

Thinking about a new car shortly, and very high on the list is the oil-miser Prius. Plus, if I lived just a little closer to work and Sydney-siders knew how to deal with cyclists I'd ride to work every day too.