The Definition of a Sportsman (4 of 7)

A Sportsman is an Environmentalist

This statement presents a conflict to many Westerners who consider themselves sportsmen. They share a mindset that “environmentalists” are a fringe group out to ruin the livelihoods of blue and white-collar Western workers. Brent from the Corvallis area provides evidence of this mindset in the following quote.

“While environmentalists would like to take credit for protecting everything good on earth, sportsmen do more than their share.”

Brent is correct that sportsmen do a lot for maintaining the areas where they recreate. A National Geographic article entitled “Hunters: For Love of the Land” (Nov. 2007) estimated that “hunters contributed 280 million dollars in 2006 to dozens of groups that devote most of their revenue to conservation,” groups like Ducks Unlimited, National Wild Turkey Federation, and Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. In fact, the article also surmises, “that many species might not survive at all were it not for hunters trying to kill them,” and that “The nation’s 12.5 million hunters have become essentially partners in wildlife management.” So whether Western sportsmen like the title of Environmentalist or not, the proof is in the money; sportsmen are big softies for Mother Nature and that is essentially what an environmentalist is.

Greg Lemon puts it best in quote from, “Blue Man in a Red State”.

“Out here, environmentalists are people who still hunt and fish. They may chain themselves to a tree to keep loggers from cutting it down, but check their freezer and you’ll find steaks from last year’s deer.”

Here are a few of the local issues of environmental consequence that should concern sportsmen.

Drilling on the Rocky Mountain Front
There will be an increased call to allow more coal-bed methane, natural gas, and oil exploration along the Rocky Mountain Front of the United States as the cost of energy continues to rise and with the Bush Administration on its way out. Here are a few questions that need answering: At what point does drilling for fossil fuel trump wildlife and the environment? Is the land only worth what you can extract from it? Who benefits from drilling in the areas where Americans hunt, fish, and hike?

Streamside Setbacks
Streamside development, where structures are built within a few feet of a mountain stream, is an example of an environmentally unfriendly and unsportsman-like activity. A mountain stream naturally moves and changes course from year to year with the spring runoff. Building structures next to a stream leads to eventual streamside stabilization projects like rip-rap which artificially redirect the flow of the river and change the river’s natural local ecology. Montana’s rivers are property of the state and thus every Montanan owns a piece. The sportsmen of Montana have a responsibility to protect this precious resource by installing setbacks in county streamside building permits.

All Terrain Vehicles (ATVs)
Operating an ATV in a non-motorized area is not only illegal, but it denudes the land, leaving ruts that increase the extent of erosion during rainstorms or spring runoff. They are also an unnecessary source of noise pollution that can ruin the experience for law-abiding recreationists. ATVs will always be an important part of recreation and hunting in Western States and there will always be places where riding is permitted, but illegal riding and damage to the environment only adds to the call for further restrictions.

In conclusion, a sportsman is an environmentalist. He never disrespects Mother Nature or fouls another man’s experience when entering the realm of the elk and trout. A sportsman understands the value of leaving a small footprint in life because his actions can have a profound effect on the surroundings and the future. Sportsmen are stewards of this planet. We have a responsibility to maintain the health of its animals and land because as Brent puts it, “If we abuse the resources we have, then we also lose what we enjoy most.”

T. Boone Selling Energy Plan to Presidential Candidates

USA Today -- Obama Discusses Energy Issues With Pickens

What can I say they hasn't been said earlier?

Money buys you attention, as is evident with T. Boone Pickens meeting with both presidential candidates to push the Pickens Plan. To his credit, the Pickens Plan is a good short term solution to cut America's reliance on foreign oil, but it doesn't sit right that the salesman will reap huge profits if the Pickens Plan is implemented as is. I am fairly certain, however, that neither candidate seeks to be seen as buddy-buddy with the man who helped give W his second term.

Revisiting "Common Sense..." (4 of 5)

The 3 R's

My wife and I incorporate the 3 R’s into our daily lives not only because it is a great way to green our world, reduce America’s dependence on oil, and save a few bucks at the same time, but because we want to be good role models for our little girl. I’ll share with you a few of our examples.

The first R is reduce, of course; reduce the amount of waste we generate. It’s completely dumbfounding how much packaging goes into products. Couldn’t we all do without a little more cardboard and plastic wrap in America’s landfills? To do our part to reduce this problem, my family buys in bulk when possible. An example I mentioned in the original post, is purchasing blocks of cheese instead of the prepackaged individual sliced or grated cheese. It sounds like a stupid, nit-picky thing, but it is as fundamentally sound and simple as Obama suggesting Americans properly inflate their automobile tires. The little things do add up. Cheese does not go bad overnight and I don’t feel the need to pay a couple of extra dimes to save myself from a grated knuckle. I keep a supply of band-aides on hand.

Another example, we don’t purchase bottled water. The United States has some of the safest, cleanest drinking water in the world. What a colossal waste of resources needed to make plastic bottles from petroleum, fill them with water, and then ship them cross country so that someone can drink ice cold Vermont tap water in California.

Ideally, I would like to see Americans take it to the next level. First, stop purchasing bottled water. Then, all sports drinks, juices, etc., anything that can be sold as a powder or concentrate should be purchased in that form in order to save the energy necessary to ship the hydrated product. It takes little effort on our part to supply a container and add water to reconstitute a sports drink if it means saving energy in shipping and wasted packaging.

The second R is reuse. Those plastic bottles I mentioned... well, our family is not perfect. When we are away from home for a long weekend at a tournament we may purchase a sports drink from the concession stand. While this is an example of sending vendors the incorrect message of how we want their product packaged, we do save face and a shred of dignity by reusing the bottle. That bottle becomes our water bottle for future games or hikes. Nalgene water bottles and aluminum canisters have become trendy in the light of wasteful disposable water containers. They are good secondary option, but as I still have plenty of used bottles floating around the house, I think we’ll just reuse the plastic.

Another example of reuse: in the spring of this year we invested in reusable grocery bags (a whole dollar!) that we take with us every time we go to the store. To amplify the energy savings we walk and take numerous small trips to the store every week. This saves a couple quarters at the pump, burns a few calories, gets us out of the house, and prepares the little girl for her afternoon nap.

The third R is recycling. We do accumulate plastic bags despite the fact we went to reusable bags. So, we hang on to them and put them in a recycling bin at the local Safeway. But we don't stop with plastic bags, we also save newspapers, magazines, steel cans, aluminum, and plastic jugs. The only major waste product that we do not recycle is glass. It’s disappointing, but there is no place in Ravalli County that will accept glass, steel cans, or plastic jugs. There is also no curbside pickup. In response to this, we store steel, aluminum, and plastic and make an annual drive to Missoula to recycle. The amount of money we receive for trading in our aluminum cans at Pacific Recycling pays for the trip.

Having shared these few examples with you, I must admit that we are not perfect in our practice of the 3 R’s. We do not buy all products with the least amount of packaging available. We will buy a sport drink on occasion and we like the microbrews which happen to come in glass bottles. But the point, like all of my suggestions, is that we try. We actively try to incorporate reduce, reuse, and recycle, despite inconveniences. That is the least of what is asked of anyone, that we just try to do our part to make our space in this world a little better.

Next time...
Buy Local

Revisiting "Common Sense..." (3 of 5)

Make Your Home Energy Sufficient

In other words, we must all ask ourselves, “How much energy is enough to fit my needs?” Notice I wrote needs, not wants; how often people confuse the two. And this is, of course, all about saving energy and money, right?! Let’s start with size. Just like with automobiles, large homes are energy pigs compared to smaller homes. Heating, cooling, and lighting large spaces is pricey. So unless your family is big enough to start its own baseball team, you don’t require a 6 bedroom/4 bath house. You’re just wasting energy and money. But, perhaps you already know that and you can afford it because your house is more of a status symbol of your upward movement through society and a way to cloak inadequacies, kind of like the little red sports car you drive. But… that’s just a guess.

One of the best things we can do to save energy is Get Small! My family fits comfortably into our two bedroom, one bathroom house. We may bump into each other on occasion like when the bathroom is needed, but isn’t haggling about bathroom time part of the family experience? I would also be hard pressed to come up with reasons why I should get a bigger home because it would just mean more stuff needed to fill it up. But that has nothing to do with saving energy, I just hate stuff. But my favorite advantage to a smaller home, as mentioned in the original post: less time needed to clean a house means more time and energy for me!

Location... They say location is the key to success in business. The same applies to saving energy. The location of our home is by far the biggest reason why we are able to conserve energy and money. The house we live in is not modern and not even well insulated. It's more than a hundred years old! The location, however, puts us within a short bike ride or walk from work, shopping, groceries, church, library, farmer's market, school, town activities, parks, and sporting events. So, though our home may require a little more natural gas in the winter, we recoup our savings by not having to put a day’s paycheck in the fuel tank every time we fill up.

Heating & cooling.... Turning down the thermostat during the winter and up during the summer keeps money where it belongs, in the bank. Our home never reads room temperature (72 degrees Fahrenheit) during the winter. We keep the thermostat set between 68 and 66 degrees while we are at home and awake. It's a comfortable temperature and if one of us feels a chill, she can put on a sweater!* At night, we throw on an extra blanket and turn the thermostat down to 62 degrees.

To keep the house cool in the summer we go old school. Forget the AC (we don’t have it anyway), we just use fans and windows. This non-technology is as old as the term Indian Summer. We open the house up at night to let in the cold air and close it up during the day to keep the sun and hot air out. The ceiling fan really shows its worth during the summer and a couple of well placed fans in the bedrooms at night keeps the air circulating. The few hot days we experience in Montana during the course of a summer do not necessitate spending a grand installing AC.

Those are my thoughts. Feel free to share your own.

* Ha-ha. That’s a joke. I love you, honey!

Next time...
The 3 R's

Revisiting "Common Sense..." (2 of 5)

Public Transportation

This is not an option for my family.

Public transportation is a tough sell in a rural area. The valley has the Bitterroot Bus that covers the Hamilton/Corvallis/Granstsdale area, but my pie in the sky idea is a light rail running from the valley to Missoula. It would be nice to be able to leave the family car at home, jump on a train, and ride it up Reserve St., across Broadway, circle through downtown Missoula., and back down the Bitterroot. A train would take some commuter traffic off Highway 93 during the week and provide an easy way to travel to Missoula for the occasional shopping trip on the weekend. But it takes money, a steady ridership, and it would have to be less expensive and/or more convenient than driving. I understand that the Bitterroot doesn’t have a centralized enough population to make it easily feasible, but the track is already there and there is only one way in and out of the valley heading North. But… I won’t hold my breath.

Carpooling

The incentive to carpool is simple. Fewer drivers and more passengers equals fewer fill-ups and more money in the bank. We carpool often during the summer on weekend trips to softball tournaments. I remember in the past I’d ask the fellas, “Who wants to carpool?” I’d often receive a less than enthusiastic mumbled response that was meant to imply that most would rather drive themselves. Now, I don’t even have to suggest it. Everyone is trying to figure out how to fit the maximum number of guys into as few automobiles as possible. It’s funny how pricey gasoline changes attitudes.

Walking and Biking

My daughter and I put a few miles on our shoes in the course of a week. We hit the bank, the library, the book store, the church, and take multiple trips to the grocery store, all under the power of our own legs. Again, where we live makes it convenient, but there are enough incentives to walking that we’d do it regardless. The biggest advantage being after a morning of running errands the little one is ready for her daily nap which leaves time for Dad to catch up on the news, sports, bills, laundry, dishes, writing, reading,… everything a little girl won’t let Dad do when she’s awake.

If we need to travel a little farther, faster, my wife and I bike. She rides her bike to work five days a week and I ride to the park in the evenings to catch a softball game. I have extra motivation to bike, also. I loathe getting into a broiling car on a hot summer day. It brings back too many bad memories of sitting in traffic on a sweltering day in a certain midwestern city's sprawl trying to get home from work.

Walking, biking, and carpooling keeps our fuel bill small. We fill up the car about once a month. Not bad! And by not driving, we're being rewarded twice. The wife, ‘lil Grettlebug, and I get daily exercise and it costs us and the environment nada, zero, zilch, nothing!

Next time…
Make Your Home Energy Sufficient, Green Your Dream Home

Revisiting "Common Sense..." (1 of 5)

It has been interesting to watch America's changing on-road energy habits over the past year. Since the price of gasoline has eclipsed $4 a gallon, people are driving less (down 2.4% from 2007) and downsizing their rides, SUVs and large trucks are sitting idle on showroom floors, and America's auto industry is on the ropes for not anticipating changing consumer habits (for the second time). While I do fear the impact high gas prices and a depressed economy could have on my family and America’s future, I smile and welcome the changes because the nation is moving in the right direction. It’s just sad that it takes something that appeals to our most primitive motivator (money) to change our ways and not the noble, progressive idea of a greener and less oil dependent America. Oh, well…

Ever since posting the series "Common Sense Things We Can Do to Decrease America's Reliance on Oil (and Save a Few Bucks)", I have wanted to follow up and share some of what my family does to conserve energy and cash. I mean, it’s a little self-righteous and hypocritical for me to post what others can do without participating. Also, Wrong Dog has motivated me to add some personal examples since he began an online diary detailing his family’s attempt to cut its carbon footprint in half. I commend Shane, but I confess that I cringe at quantifying my energy savings as he does. Call me lazy. So, I’ll post examples of how my family is saving money and conserving energy minus the numbers and you’ll just have to take my word for it.

Think Gas Sipper

At the time my wife and I purchased our first automobile together, hybrids and flex-fuel vehicles were not as readily available, not to mention a little outside our budget constraints. Plus, gasoline was less than half what it is now, so there was little economic incentive for us to consider more expensive alternative energy vehicles. That doesn’t mean we weren’t thinking about fuel efficiency, however. We traded in two 10+ year old cars and purchased one new vehicle that we trusted could drive us cross country and get us safely to our new home without breaking the bank.

Now, our family has increased by one, but there is still no need to upgrade in size. Our small sedan fits our small family perfectly and gets us safely from point-A to point-B at 30+ mpg on highway, and 27 mpg overall. Our fuel economy is nothing to brag about, but in Montana it seems any vehicle that gets over 15 mpg is the exception.

Drive Smarter

We are not as extreme as hyper-milers, but my wife and I practice common sense, fuel-efficient driving habits like not over accelerating between stop signs and keeping braking to a minimum. We also consolidate trips. If we forget an item on the list, it will just have to be purchased another day. An interesting note: despite the fact we do not live in a busy town, subconsciously I tend to group my stops so that I minimize the number of left turns, or turns where you have to cross traffic. I admit though, that it is more likely a result of my impatience than a fuel saving technique, but whatever works!

One of the smartest (driving) decisions my wife and I have made is not purchasing a second vehicle. That decision has saved us $30,000+ over 5 years if you factor in the initial cost of a new vehicle, maintenance, insurance, and fuel. That makes the ol’ bank account happy! Where we live plays a large role in making it convenient. We live in town, close to work. There are times when we are headed in two different directions, but with the help of scheduling and friends, we always manage to make it work. And a little inconvenience is a fair trade in order to save money, live a little greener, and cut America’s addiction to oil at the same time. It gives you a warm fuzzy feeling all over.

Next time...
Public Transportation, Carpooling, Walking and Biking

T. Boone Pickens: The Plan (3 of 3)

America is addicted to foreign oil. It’s an addiction that threatens our economy, our environment and our national security. It touches every part of our daily lives and ties our hands as a nation and a people. (blue text taken from The Plan at http://www.pickensplan.com/)

I might go further and remove the word foreign and just write, “America is addicted to oil…,” but it is easy to understand why T. Boone doesn’t take it that far. He is an oilman, after-all, and still in the business of feeding America's addiction. He’s just peddling a different flavor this time.

Who is T. Boone Pickens?

T. Boone Pickens, son of a landman from Oklahoma and child of the Great Depression, has amassed a net worth of $3 billion wheeling and dealing in the oil industry. He founded Mesa Petroleum, the nation's largest independent producer of domestic oil and gas, and currently runs BP Capital Management, a hedge fund that invests largely in the petroleum industry.

Pickens has become recently critical (perfectly timed to coincide with the upcoming election) of America's increasing dependence on foreign oil and has formulated a plan to cut oil imports by harnessing the wind and shifting transportation fuel from gasoline to natural gas.

Let us take a close look at T. Boone's ideas

The Problem
In 1970, we imported 24% of our oil. Today it’s nearly 70% and growing. At current oil prices, we will send $700 billion dollars out of the country this year alone – that’s four times the annual cost of the Iraq war. Projected over the next 10 years the cost will be $10 trillion – it will be the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of mankind. Oil is getting more expensive to produce, harder to find and there just isn’t enough of it to keep up with demand. The simple truth is that cheap and easy oil is gone.

Of interesting note: President Jimmy Carter recognized the growing problem 30 years ago during the energy crises of the 70s and tried to address it. In a speech given on April 17, 1977, Carter said that the energy crises "… is a problem we will not solve in the next few years, and it is likely to get progressively worse through the rest of this century. We simply must balance our demand for energy with our rapidly shrinking resources. By acting now, we can control our future instead of letting the future control us. Further delay can affect our strength and our power as a nation." Carter called Americans to “conservation and to the use of coal and permanent renewable energy sources, like solar power.”

Wise words then and appropriate for today.

Pickens's Solution: Wind & Natural Gas
The United States is the the Saudi Arabia of wind power. Department of Energy reports that 20% of America’s electricity can come from wind. Building wind facilities in the corridor that stretches from the Texas panhandle to North Dakota could produce 20% of the electricity for the United States at a cost of $1 trillion. It would take another $200 billion to build capacity to transmit that energy to cities and towns. That’s a lot of money, but it’s a one-time cost. And compared to the $700 billion we spend on foreign oil every year, it’s a bargain.

Pickens is asking America to invest as a nation by subsidizing wind energy with tax dollars. This is a reasonable request. Investing as a nation gets the ball rolling faster and cushions the financial impact on the individual consumer. But the American taxpayer better know that the plan is going to work!

Pickens has a substantial incentive in seeing that his plan be adopted. He is building the world's largest wind farm outside of Pampa, TX. He will seek tax breaks to offset construction costs and tax dollars to pay for power lines to transmit power to cities and towns.

A cheap new replacement to foreign oil. Natural gas and bio-fuels are the only domestic energy sources used for transportation. Natural gas is the cleanest transportation fuel available today. According to the California Energy Commission, critical greenhouse gas emissions from natural gas are 23% lower than diesel and 30% lower than gasoline.

Interesting note: Pickens has admitted that Global Warming is a real phenomenon. This is quite a statement coming from a man whose business it is to keep America hooked on carbon based fuel.

An economic revival for rural America. In addition to creating construction and maintenance jobs, thousands of Americans will be employed to manufacture the turbines and blades. Plus, wind turbines don’t interfere with farming and grazing, so they don’t threaten food production or existing local economies.

No argument here.

Natural gas is our country’s second largest energy resource and a vital component of our energy supply. 98% of the natural gas used in the United States is from North America. While it is a cheap, effective and versatile fuel, less than 1% of natural gas is currently used for transportation. We currently use natural gas to produce 22% of our electricity. Harnessing the power of wind to generate electricity will give us the flexibility to shift natural gas away from electricity generation and put it to use as a transportation fuel – reducing our dependence on foreign oil by more than one-third.

This is an interesting idea.

The Pickens Plan is a bridge to the future — a blueprint to reduce foreign oil dependence by harnessing domestic energy alternatives, and buy us time to develop even greater new technologies.

Pickens admits that his plan is a temporary fix. The key words are "buy us time."

The problem is that shifting transportation fuel from one petroleum resource to another petroleum resource is risky. It's a slippery slope. It is like telling a drug addict in order to get off cocaine he should start smoking crack. It is just too easy to get stuck in the same rut. America might have a large supply of natural gas, but the Middle East has more and it is to easy to see that once we outstrip domestic supply we could start importing natural gas again and be servant to the same master.

Like his wind plan, Pickens has an incentive in seeing the nation switch from gasoline/diesel to natural gas at the pumps. His company, Mesa Petroleum is one of the largest natural gas producers, and Clean Energy, another Pickens company, is the largest provider of vehicular natural gas in North America. He stands to make significant profits if his plan is implemented.

But it will take leadership. On January 20th, 2009, a new President will take office. We're organizing behind the Pickens Plan now to ensure our voices will be heard by the next administration. Together we can raise a call for change and set a new course for America's energy future in the first hundred days of the new presidency — breaking the hammerlock of foreign oil and building a new domestic energy future for America with a focus on sustainability.

This statement is an apolitical plea to Americans to support his plan. But be leery because Pickens's politics is anything but nonpartisan.

Pickens has funded almost exclusively Republican campaigns. He donated to George W. Bush’s Texas gubernatorial campaign and his two presidential wins. Pickens was a major contributor ($3 million) of the Swift Boat ads that sunk Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004.

If Pickens was interested in saving the nation from its addiction to oil maybe he should have found a different candidate to fund, rather that the current president who is no friend to alternative energy or environmental policy.

Pickens has also been critical of Gore's energy plan saying, “…Al Gore put forward a framework of a plan that is focused on global warming and climate issues. My plan is aimed squarely at breaking the stranglehold that foreign oil has on our country… Gore’s plan does not address this enormous problem. It is clear that he and I have two different objectives and our plans should be viewed with that in mind."

Why should the two plans be competing? Why not solve both problems? Or does Pickens feel he is fighting over potential customers?

So, what do we do?

Is T. Boone "out to save America", as Carl Pope believes?

I like to think of it this way: If a better energy plan comes along that does not heavily invest in wind energy and natural gas powered automobiles, would T. Boone step aside and say, "Good job, friend. Your ideas are superior to mine. Let us go your way," when he stands to lose billions in investments? My gut says, "No.” Pickens's business maneuvers have put him in a position to profit billions from the implementation of his plan. We should question his motives.

But, sometimes it is necessary to be the bigger man and look above the petty (money) issues. T. Boone has put forth a plan that is a step in the right direction. It's not perfect, but it is progress. If it is implemented I just hope we as a nation can stay on the right track towards ever increasing utilization of green energy without falling victim to our addiction of petroleum of a different flavor.

T. Boone Pickens: The Man (2 of 3)

Thomas Boone Pickens, Jr. was born May 22, 1928 in Holdenville, Oklahoma. He was the son of a landman, a middleman whose job it is to find landowners willing to lease mineral rights and then sell their leases to oil companies. After oil took a downturn, the Pickens family left Oklahoma and moved to Amarillo, TX while Thomas, Jr. was in high school. He attended Texas A&M for a year on a basketball scholarship, but left and continued his education at Oklahoma A&M where received a degree in geology in 1951.

Business
1951 – graduated with degree in geology from Oklahoma A&M (renamed Oklahoma State University in 1957); employed by Phillips Petroleum
1954 – left Phillips Petroleum
1956 – founded Mesa Petroleum
1997 – founded BP Capital Management (formerly BP Energy Fund), hedge fund management company that invests in petroleum and natural gas; founded Clean Energy (formerly Pickens Fuel Corp.)
1999 – founded Mesa Water

++Mesa Petroleum is the nation’s largest independent producer of domestic oil and gas and one of the largest gas producers.
++Pickens Fuel Corp., founded 1997, later reincorporated as “Clean Energy” in 2001 (taken public in 2007) is the largest provider of vehicular natural gas in North America.
++Mesa Water has purchased 200,000 acres of water rights in Roberts County, TX. Mesa Water wants to pump 200,000 acre feet of groundwater annually from the Ogallala Aquifer and send it to water deprived El Paso, Lubbock, San Antonio, or Dallas-Forth Worth.

Pickens rise in the oil industry has more to do with acquisitions than drilling. He obtained notoriety in the 1980s for several hospitable and some hostile takeover attempts over other petroleum companies. He has been accused of taking over companies, breaking them up, and putting people out of work. He has been called an entrepreneurial populist, corporate raider, and greenmailer. T. Boone Pickens amassed wealth is estimated at $3 billion and is the 117th richest man in America (Forbes).

Philanthropy
$400 million to Oklahoma State University (OSU)
$50 million to U. of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas
$50 million to U. of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center at Houston
$7 million to American Red Cross following Hurricane Katrina
$6 million to University of Texas at Dallas Center for Brain Health

Pickens has donated $400 million to OSU to date, 66% of which has been given to athletics for a remodel of the football stadium that now bears his name and the creation of an athletic village. Pickens and OSU believe that improving the athletic facilities will create a platform, or base, in which to encourage better athletes to come to the university in order to improve the school’s athletic teams. This has been done at many campuses and I have no doubt this plan will improve the calibur of athlete coming to OSU, but my advice: Pickens better include some paid tutors and tailored majors to keep the hulks academically eligible.

Pickens’s donation of $165 million to OSU Cowboy Golf Inc., an endowment set up to benefit the golf program, is the single largest charitable gift ever to a university’s athletic department. But the circumstances surrounding the gift raise a few eyebrows. See… Pickens sits on the board of the OSU golf charity and took advantage of a provision in Hurricane Katrina relief legislation that allowed him to deduct for a charitable gift equal to 100 percent of his adjusted gross income, double the normal limit. The money, under his authority, was then reinvested in BP Capital Management, Pickens’s hedge fund. The arrangement offered Pickens a huge tax break and the ability to continue to control the cash.

Pickens’s fortune is his to do with as he wishes, but I have never been a fan of glorifying the big man on campus above the rest of the student body. Despite my fondness for athletics, extra-curricular activities are just that, extra and secondary to education. It is disappointing that OSU students are not receiving an equal monetary gift from Pickens as the athletes have received. I guess this is another example of the misplaced emphasis in our schools.

Politics
Pickens has been a generous donor to Republican campaigns, including infamous names like Tom DeLay (TX), Jesse Helms (NC), Strom Thurman (SC), Larry Craig (ID), Conrad Burns (MT), John Ashcroft (MO), and Rick Santorum (PA). He contributed to George W. Bush’s Texas gubernatorial campaign in which Bush defeated popular Democratic incumbant Ann Richards in 1994. During the campaign, Karl Rove, Bush’s senior political advisor, was accused of using a poll technique in which voters were asked if they would be "more or less likely to vote for Governor Richards if [they] knew her staff is dominated by lesbians." Rove denies having been involved in circulating these rumors about Richards during the campaign.* This is not the first time smear tactics have been utilized by the Bush men. H.W. in his 1988 presidential bid used the infamous Willie Horton ad and Tank ad to raise fears concerning Michael Dukakis’s ability to keep Americans safe. Pickens obviously does not have a problem with sleezy win-at-all-costs maneuvers such as these. As a matter of fact, he not only funds them, he participates also.

In 2004, Pickens contributed $3 million to Republican 527 group Swift Vets & POWs for Truth, a group of military vets from the Vietnam War that opposed John Kerry’s nomination for president. The group stated that "Kerry's phony war crimes charges, his exaggerated claims about his own service in Vietnam, and his deliberate misrepresentation of the nature and effectiveness of Swift boat operations compel us to step forward" (link). It is interesting to note that Pickens contributed a series of donations totaling $3000 to John Kerry from 6/99 to 6/01, interesting not only because of the subsequent Swift Boat attack ads, but because it is one of the few monetary contributions given to a Democrat by Pickens. Kerry in a written letter took up Pickens’s challenge, but as of yet no money has changed hands. ABC News thought the Swift Boat allegations suspect and John McCain condemned the Swift Boat ads as “dishonest and dishonorable.” The Swift Boat ads were in reality, nothing more than an incredibly successful smear campaign and had nothing to do with Kerry’s presidential credentials.**

An interesting and humorous piece of legislation that Pickens’s has lobbied for is the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act (HR 503), undeniably influenced by Madeleine Pickens, T. Boone’s third wife and widow of racehorse owner Allen Paulson. This legislation would permanently prohibit the slaughter of horses for human consumption as well as the exportation of live horses intended for the same purpose. It is humorous because a horse is really no different than any other farm animal. Some will be put to work and some may end up on a dinner plate. If so many were not kept as pets they would be treated no different than a steer. I’ve never eaten horse before, but I’m sure it tastes like chicken.

So now we understand a little about T. Boone Pickens’s businesses, philanthropy, and politics. This should give us a little insight into his motivations for creating and publicizing the Pickens Plan. Remember, things are not always as they seem.

*Interesting tidbit of information: Karl Rove was on George H.W. Bush’s staff during his failed run at re-election in 1992. He was fired in the middle of the campaign for leaking information to the press. Fast forward to today and the Valerie Plame CIA leak case. Hmmm… it makes you wonder.

**If it is unpatriotic to say that McCain’s “riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is [not] a qualification to be president,” as former Gen. Wesley Clark surmised, then why is it okay to smear John Kerry’s service record in the military? I guess turnabout is not fair game with Pickens and Republicans.

T. Boone Pickens (1 of 3)

Who is T. Boone Pickens? You see his face every day in a 60 second commercial decrying America's increasing dependence on foreign oil and offering a solution, wind energy and the Pickens Plan. This oil man and chairman of his own hedge fund is pushing renewable energy! Sounds fishy, doesn't it? Yes, this is the same man who has his name all over the Oklahoma State campus. Yes, this is the same man who was a financial backer of George W. Bush's Texas and presidential campaigns. Yes, this is the same man who gave $3 million to "Swift Vets and POWs for Truth" group who attacked John Kerry in 2004.

The contradictions give me pause. I like his ideas on domestic renewable energy, but wasn't he backing the wrong horse in the last two presidential elections? I have to ask again, "Who is T. Boone Pickens?"

Starting tomorrow, let’s spend a few days learning about The Man and The Plan.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 10 of 10)

Buy Local

The organic food movement has changed the way American’s look at food. We no longer take for granted how produce in the supermarket was grown, the meat raised, and the prepackaged food put together. We read box labels and ingredient lists looking for unnecessary additives. We question where food came from. Seeing this, food companies identified the organic food niche and now market food as organically grown. Americans more then ever understand the saying ‘you are what you eat’.

There is another food movement that is as important and maybe even more relevant with today’s high gasoline prices. It is Buy Local. How far does food travel to get to your plate? Much of the food we see in our supermarkets, organic or not, comes from hundreds, even thousands of miles away, often spending days being trucked or flown from field to store. Transportation of food costs money, energy, and adds pollution to our ecosystem. Your local farmer’s market, community garden, food co-op, or seed savers group specializes in food grown locally. Some independently owned supermarkets supplement their stocks with locally grown food. Select restaurants (Charleston, Twin Cities) fill a niche by only preparing locally grown food. There is a name for people who buy and eat only locally grown food. Call them locavores.

There are many benefits to buying local. By cutting out the middle man, more money from the purchase of local food ends up in the farmer’s pocket and stays in the local economy. Local food systems encourage multiple cropping, in other words, growing multiple species and a wide variety of crops at the same time and same place, as opposed to the prevalent commercial practice of large-scale, single-crop farms. This encourages crop rotation, keeping the soil in better condition. More, smaller farms decrease the risk of a bio-terrorist attack crippling the entire nation’s food supply. That’s something even President Bush could get behind (maybe). Criticisms to the buy local food movement include loss of variety and availability year round. Local food proponents turn these negatives into positives by saying that local food translates to more variety because farmers are free to try small crop varieties and regional varieties. And by eating with the seasons, you eat foods when they are at their peak taste, and are the most abundant, and the least expensive. This is something our grandparents would appreciate.

The Buy Local movement can be applied to anything, not just food. How many goods do we get from half way around the world? Do we need them and can we Buy Local?

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 9 of 10)

The 3 R’s

We live in a disposable society. We buy new clothes when we haven’t worn out the old ones. We throw away extra food when we’ve eaten our fill. It’s a sad truth, but Americans are a wasteful people. I think we could all benefit from a few “Back in my day…” stories from grandparents who grew up in leaner times. Luckily, a simple set of rules for improving our wasteful habits is already laid out. Just incorporate the three R’s into your daily routine: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

Reduce. There are many ways to implement this rule into your daily life, but it starts with shopping smart. Purchase goods that use less packaging, especially plastic, because guess what, if it’s plastic it’s made from oil and it takes oil to get it to the store. For example, instead of buying pre-shredded cheese for your salad or tacos, buy a block of cheddar and grate it yourself. Cheese doesn’t go bad overnight, you save packaging material, and by buying in bulk, you save a little money at the same time. Another example, instead of buying bottled water, get a home filtration system. 60 million disposable plastic bottles per day are disposed of in the U.S. alone and millions of gallons of fuel are wasted transporting filtered tap water around the world. Not only is it wasteful, but it doesn’t make economical sense. Why pay two dollars a bottle for filtered water when America has some of the safest drinking water in the world and it comes out of the tap for fractions of a cent?

Reuse. The grocery industry shares responsibility with consumers for the wasteful “paper or plastic” question at the end of the checkout lane. We’ve gotten used to disposable bags, but grocers and consumers are seeing the light and jumping on the green bandwagon. There is a new niche market that sells reusable shopping bags; some are even 'fashionable'. Chain grocers like Safeway and Albertson’s sell their own reusable bags for a small price and sometimes offer them free during promotions. Safeway has an in-store recycling program where you can bring in used plastic grocery bags also. Less “paper or plastic?” means the store saves a little money, a few ounces of oil are saved for other purposes, and a few trees are saved from the mill.

Recycle. Everyone knows to separate paper from plastic and steel from aluminum, but there is a form of recycling that Nature practices everyday, composting. Composting removes kitchen, garden, and yard waste from the landfill and yields an organic rich material. All you need is a little space dedicated to it. You can actively compost, passively compost, compost with worms, use bins, or just pile the refuse in the corner of your yard. Any way you do it, the end result greens up your garden, your lawn, and the earth.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 8 of 10)

Green Your Dream Home

The first concerns when undergoing a home renovation project or building new from the ground up should address heating, cooling, and lighting, the largest energy drains in a home. Consider the following options to green your dream home because a home renovation should improve your eco-lifestyle, not waste more energy and money.

Start by adding a layer of insulation. Any home built before 1980 more than likely is under-insulated. Choose a form of insulation that fits your needs (blown cellulose, foam, fiberglass). By increasing the amount of insulation in the attic alone you can reduce your heating/cooling bill by as much as 10-50%.

Get off the grid. Support your electricity needs by installing solar panels. There is no better way to get off fossil fuels than to take advantage of an unlimited renewable resource, like the sun, and in a place like Las Vegas with 200+ days of sun per year, using solar energy is good common sense. They are expensive. A five-kilowatt system that meets the needs of a conventional home could run between $30,000-40,000. Put the initial cost in perspective, though. If you are shelling out $200 a month for heating/cooling/lighting, solar panels will pay for themselves in 15 years and as the cost of natural gas, electricity, and heating oil increases, even sooner. Other advantages to solar power: solar panels add value to your house, there are government incentives in some states that will reduce the cost of installing solar panels, and as more people choose to go solar, the cost of materials will decrease.

Install a geothermal heat pump. Anyone with a split unit air conditioner is familiar with the idea of a heat pump. In a simplified explanation, the evaporator coil extracts heat from the air inside and transfers it to the condenser outside your house where heat is dispersed to the outside air leaving cooled air to be recirculated through your house by a fan. Geothermal heat pumps are similar to ordinary heat pumps, but instead of using heat found in the air, they use the constant temperature of the earth to heat, cool, and in most cases provide hot water. Studies show that approximately 70% of the energy used in a geothermal heat pump system is renewable energy from the ground. An average American home will need a three-ton unit costing approximately $7500 to install, nearly double that of an ordinary heat pump system (small change in the long run). Add electricity supplied from a small solar panel to power the recirculating pump and fan, and you’re heating and cooling your home efficiently, off the grid, with a green mindset.

Go old school. Remember before air conditioning, when all homes had front porches and homes in tornado alley all had a ‘storm cellar’? There was a reason homes had porches and basements and it wasn’t merely for aesthetics and added home value. In mid-August when evening temperatures cool to slightly less than ‘hotter than hell,’ what better place to try and catch a cool breeze than on the front porch. The front porch was also the meeting place to exchange the news and gossip amongst neighbors after a long hot day. Someone living in tornado alley understands the utility of a basement, but it is also a cool place to escape to when the temperatures outside are unbearable. Porches and basements may not be as comfortable as sitting in an air conditioned room on a hot day, but for a little physical discomfort you can reduce your monthly energy bill and help ease America’s dependence on fossil fuels.

Finally, a little planning goes a long way in saving you energy and money. Here are five simple things you can do in the construction and positioning of a new house that can make a difference in your energy bill.

1. Place the house with the long or main axis of the house running east and west for maximum solar gain in the winter.

2. Window roof overhangs extended at least 30 inches provide shade from direct sunlight in the summer, but allow sunlight to warm the house during the winter when sun is lower in the sky.

3. Position windows in the house to take advantage of summer breezes from prevailing winds to cool the house.

4. Position unheated areas and the garage on the sides of the house to act as buffers against the brunt of winter winds.

5. Plant trees to provide shade on the side of the house that receives the most sun exposure during the summer and as buffer from the prevailing winds in winter.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 7 of 10)

Make Your Home Energy Sufficient

The previous posts in this series have focused on fuel-efficient methods of transportation. While greening up your commute goes a long way to decreasing America’s reliance on oil, most of us spend more time in our homes than in our car and the home is a perfect place to save energy and money. Let’s start with the basics, things you can do without demolishing a home and rebuilding or retrofitting an existing structure.

Before you buy, think smaller. In the case of energy efficiency, smaller is better. The economy of the 90s not only allowed us the ability to super-size our rides, but super-size our homes as well. And just like with larger vehicles, larger homes take more energy to run. Ya, ya, ya,… I know what you’re saying. I’ve heard the excuse before. “But my home is an investment.” Listen, you have to be able to afford your monstrous house before you can live in it. Or did you not learn your lesson the first time it was foreclosed on. One of the best ways to reduce your energy bill is to live in a home that fits your family’s size and needs. Not everyone in your family needs their own bedroom and bathroom. Less space means less energy necessary to heat and cool your home. My favorite advantage to a smaller home: less time needed to clean it. More energy for me!

People will tell you that success in business is all about location, location, location. This simple motto extends to your home also. To be energy efficient, start with a home that is near public transportation or places you frequent. You can jump on the commuter rail to get to work or walk to the store to pick up groceries for the day without firing up your car. By doing this alone you already have a heads up in the energy race.

Turn it up in the summer and down in the winter. It’s just common sense. Turning down your thermostat during the winter and putting on an extra layer of clothing saves you money. Turning down your thermostat six to ten degrees when you are away from the house and at night when you’re underneath the covers will also save you a chunk of change also. Another benefit, you get to wear more of those fashionable winter sweaters. Did you know it costs more energy to cool a house than to heat it? By turning up the temperature on your thermostat in the summer you can save 5 to 10% on the operating cost of your air conditioner for every two degrees of cooling you are willing to give up. Use a programmable thermostat instead of a rheostat. It will take all the thought process out of remembering to adjust it manually and increase your overall savings.

Don’t be a dim bulb. Use energy efficient fluorescent light bulbs. A 15 watt fluorescent bulb lasts 10,000 hours compared to 500 for a 60 watt incandescent and uses one quarter the energy. Yes they’re more expensive, but they pay for themselves in the long run.

Use energy efficient appliances. For example, front-loading washers use 40-60% less water and 30-50% less energy than typical top-loaders. Your clothes will last longer with a front-loader also, because they gently tumble your clothes instead of jerking them around with an agitator. Couple the front-loader with drying your clothes on a line during the summer to further reduce your energy consumption. Look for appliances marked with the Energy Star label.

If you have forced air, clean or replace air filters as recommended. Energy is lost when air conditioners and hot-air furnaces have to work harder to draw air through dirty filters. Cleaning a dirty air conditioner filter can save 5 percent of the energy used. That could save 175 pounds of CO2 per year.

Wow, that was easy. We didn’t even have to knock down any walls. I’ve saved the dirty work for tomorrow.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 6 of 10)

Walking and Biking: Alternative Modes of Transportation

Alternative modes of transportation are anything other than a car, bus, or train. Because in America, motorized transport is primary. Anything else and you might have to break a sweat (and we don’t want to do that).

What’s the best alternative mode of transportation in America? Walking. Just put one foot in front of another. As they say in the infomercials, “It’s that easy!” Add in a pair of comfortable shoes and you’ve got a healthy, cost effective, eco-friendly way to transport yourself from point A to point B. Of course, effective walking does require some forethought. Ideally you have chosen a place to live that puts you within a short pedestrian commute from work, the grocery store, post office, and/or good shopping. By being within walking distance of a place you frequent it cuts down on the number of times you have to fire up that engine and fuel up the tank. And if you happen to be running a little late, just kick it into high gear. A little running never hurt anyone. Are you sold yet?

Do you have a little longer commute? Rather then creating stress by driving to work, reduce your stress by biking. Bicycling can be one of the most pleasant ways to commute. You experience the environment outside the confines of your automobile. You get to work and work out at the same time. It’s easier to park a bike than a car (and less expensive). And bike friendly towns like Missoula, MT and Madison, WI give cyclists their own lane on the road. If you are within five miles of your destination, biking is a great way to get there.

Of course, biking to work does require some planning, especially if appearances are important. A locker room at work with showers where you can store work clothes for the week is ideal, but if it isn’t available, a bathroom to change in and alcohol towelettes will clean you up quickly. If you bike in your work clothes, invest in some saddlebags for your bike to carry anything you’ll need for the day. Wearing a pack will leave you with a sweat stain on your back.

What are my bike options? We all have images of ourselves as Lance Armstrong on our bikes, but only he benefits from a carbon fiber composite frame, machined aluminum wheels, high-end rim breaks, and the latest and greatest footwear. He, unlike many of us, benefits from endless cash reserves also. Hi-tech, expensive equipment will hardly improve your morning commute. Commuter bikes and hybrids provide comfort and utility at a reasonable price. The rider sits taller, more comfortably, on a commuter bike than on a road bike and the larger diameter wheels make pedaling more efficient than on a mountain bike. A reasonable commuter bike or hybrid ranges in price from $300 to $1000. You can add on features like saddlebags, lamps, and fenders for small change. If you need to stow your bike in your workspace, a collapsible bike is a good fit. Some fold down to the size of a suitcase.

If you can’t bike or walk all the way to work, mix and match. Walk to a bus stop. Bike to a park-and-ride and meet your carpool. Bike to the platform the nearest commuter rail. Drive to a park near work and bike the rest of the way. The ways to green up your morning commute are endless and you might get a little exercise in the process.

I’d like to thank Rusty for jumping the gun with his questions on May 19th. He was right on the mark. You can check out his bicycle woes on his blog, Rust Never Sleeps. I don’t mean to discriminate against lazy people, so for those who hate to break a sweat, check out these green motorized options (scooters, mopeds).

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 5 of 10)

Carpooling

For those who live outside the reach of public transportation, carpooling is an appealing alternative to the solo drive to work. Commuters take turns driving to work or money is exchanged for the cost of fuel. It benefits the driver, the passengers, and everyone on the road because it is cheaper, it allows the passengers to relax (eat breakfast, read the paper, etc.), reduces air pollution, and reduces traffic congestion. Larger cities like San Francisco and Houston have encouraged carpooling by designating carpooling lanes on highways. Missoula, MT offers a Vanpool for five or more passengers. The Missoula Ravalli Transportation Management Association supplies the van, passengers pay per mile they ride, and the driver rides for free. Companies, universities, governments, and cities now offer incentive programs such as free parking, preferred parking, and reward programs to promote carpooling. Now that you've got your carpool buddy, there's only one question: Rock, Country, or Talk Radio?

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 4 of 10)

Public Transportation

Prior to the 19th century, the suburbs were characterized as where the poorest could afford to live and where work was hardest to find. The invention of the automobile, the post WWII economic boom, and the passing of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 put more money in Americans’ pockets and encouraged the exodus of families from the crowded cities to the suburbs. How things have changed. The increased congestion on our highways coupled with the increased price of fuel has many Americans rethinking their commuting experience. Buying hybrids and driving smarter only goes so far in conserving fuel if you work and drive in a city stuck in grid lock five hours a day. Mass transit, take center stage!

Larger, older, mostly Northeastern cities, like New York, Boston, Washington D.C., and Philadelphia have always relied on public transportation (commuter rail, subway, bus) to move the city. It is an efficient, cost-effective way to move people, especially in towns that grew-up before the invention of the automobile. But even here, mass transit has experienced a revival over the last decade. In this year alone, cities with established mass transit systems, like New York or Boston, report ridership up 5% or more. But the largest increases have been in the South and West where gains between 10 to 15% have been reported. This can be attributed solely to the cost of fuel approaching four dollars a gallon. Skeptics of mass transit will point out that today’s automobiles out perform the aging diesel driven trains and buses. While this is true at face value, consolidating commuters on one mode of transportation is still greener and more fuel efficient, and the biggest motivator, CHEAPER than driving oneself. And newer, greener trains and buses (Seattle, Iceland) are coming on line.

But why have some cities lagged behind others in embracing public transportation? Why has a city like Indianapolis (metro pop. 1.6 million), a few miles to the Southeast of mass transit friendly Chicago, not adopted a commuter rail system? I’m going to take a sidestep now and give a little history because for someone who is only witness to the Indianapolis of now and not familiar with the Indianapolis of the early 1900s, it turns out these are the wrong questions to ask. At one time Indianapolis had a vibrant mass transit system built on rails, so much so that Indianapolis was known as “Railroad City.” At the beginning of the 20th century, Indianapolis boasted 340 electric streetcars, was servicing 200 passenger trains per day at Union Station, and had a fleet of “interurbans”, electric railcars that ran between Indy and the surrounding cities of Anderson, Fort Wayne, Kokomo, South Bend, and Terre Haute. At the time, Indianapolis boasted the largest interurban station in the world, Traction Terminal. During its first week in 1904, which coincided with the State Fair, Traction Terminal handled 10,000 passengers per day.

So what happened? What brought about the downfall of commuter rail? …A barrage of several facters. Railroad infighting played a part. Rail in its hay-day was a mix of privately owned business franchises more interested in turning a profit than serving the surrounding community. The infant automobile industry had a large helping hand from the government. Unlike rail lines, roads were and are still built and maintained with the use of public tax dollars. Anti-competitive business practices by the auto-industry drove more riders to the road. The auto industry and subsidiary companies bought up rail lines and broke them up or turned them into less popular bus services. In 1949, General Motors was found guilty of criminal conspiracy by a federal court and fined a modest sum of $5000. Add in the sense of freedom owning an automobile gives someone coupled with gasoline at a nickel a gallon, and it is easy to see the bleak outlook rail transit faced in cities like Indianapolis.

Indianapolis mass transit is but a breath of what it once was. Amtrak, the only passenger rail service available, makes one daily run through the city. IndyGo, the Indianapolis bus system, runs the old electric streetcar routes. But there is a renewed interest to revisit the rail. I-465, the interstate encircling Indy and the answer to the automobile congestion of the 60s, is now itself crowded as the city continues its outward expansion. IndyGo ridership is up 13.5% in the first quarter of 2008 and a Commuter Express bus line from Fishers and Carmel is seeing increased ridership. A new Express route to and from Greenwood is proposed. The Clarian people mover, an elevated train connecting the downtown hospitals, was completed in the spring of 2003 and is an example of what commuter rail could be. There is interest in a commuter rail line between Noblesville and downtown where seven years ago there was little.

There are hurdles to bringing rail back. One must change people’s attitudes towards mass transit. The independence an automobile provides us has made us dependent on it. Four dollar a gallon gasoline will make the argument easier. Indianapolis does not have the geographic constraints like Chicago or New York City to keep its population centralized (see urban sprawl). This makes it difficult to determine the positioning of rail lines and stations where ridership can be maximized. It will be expensive! Much of the rail infrastructure from the 1900s is long gone. Existing track like that from Noblesville to Indy can provide relatively cost effective stepping stones in the process, though. Showing the utility of commuter rail in these areas could win over skeptics.

I have a personal interest in Indianapolis because I lived and went to school there. I love Indianapolis’s atmosphere. It is a young and vibrant city. It has revitilized its downtown but maintained its historic and ethnic districts. I love the food, the art, the festivals, and the athletics. I have friends and family in Indianapolis. I have lived inside the circle and outside in the burbs. Indianapolis is a great city. …But I hated the driving. It was a daily chore that squeezed much of the fun out of living there. It shouldn’t have to be that way. Why can’t there be another option? Why can’t I look across the breakfast table at my beloved after shoveling a healthy slice of banana granola pancake in my mouth and mumble, “Say honey, you feel like doing some shop’en in Indy?” “Sure,” she’d reply. “But I don’t feel like driving.” “Me neither,” I’d respond. “You want to take the 10:05 and maybe catch a little lunch in Broad Ripple?” “Ya, sounds good,” she’d finish. And then, “What are you eight? Finish chewing before you open your mouth.”

It doesn’t have to be a dream.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 3 of 10)

Drive Smarter

Of course, trading in that gas-guzzling SUV for gas-sipping hybrid is ideal, but there are many common sense things you can do to improve your automobile’s fuel economy without going ‘granola’ overnight. The worst fuel economy you achieve is when you are accelerating. Newton’s First Law of Motion states: Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it. In other words, it costs a lot of petrol to get your brick on wheels from idle up to cruising speed. Accelerating uniformly up through the gears and minimizing braking saves fuel. You may find that your brakes last a little longer too. The greatest force acting against your vehicle at higher speeds is wind resistance. Cruise at a speed that gives you optimal fuel efficiency, usually around 55-60mph (this is dependant on your automobile’s gear ratio). Other things to avoid: excessive idling, unneccesary weight, and anything that creates drag (bike/ski racks, carriers, etc.). Using cruise control during long distance driving and keeping your vehicle well maintained will also keep gas in your tank and dollars in your pocket.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 2 of 10)

Think Gas Sipper

If you are looking at buying a new vehicle or looking to downsize your gas-guzzler, there are a few options available right now that will reduce your gasoline consumption. Electric hybrids are the latest craze. They achieve excellent fuel economy for the consumer and because the vehicle still runs on gasoline, it was relatively inexpensive for the automobile industry to retool and there was no need for the petroleum industry to retrofit their service stations. The most fuel-efficient hybrid, the Toyota Prius, gets 48mpg city (45mpg hwy). You no longer sacrifice automobile size because most vehicle classes now have electric hybrids available.

Flex-fuel vehicles have been around since the 1980s. Flex-fuel vehicles can run on gasoline as well as E85, a bio-fuel blend composed of an 85% ethanol/gasoline mixture. Flex-fuel vehicles reduce gasoline consumption but at the expense of fuel economy. E85 gets 20-30% less miles per gallon than gasoline alone. There are a few other disadvantages. There has been a backlash against the bio-fuel industry because ethanol plants compete with the food industry for corn, the main source of ethanol in America. This has driven up the prices of food goods in the supermarket. Flex fuel vehicles are not any greener than your regular gasoline powered car or truck. E85 is cheaper than gasoline, though, and as the cost of gasoline continues to increase, an E85 blend will become more economically appealing to consumers. There is no argument that based solely on the mission of reducing reliance on foreign oil that flex fuel automobiles make good sense.

So, what’s the next evolution in the auto industry? A common sense way to increase fuel economy is to reduce the automobile’s mass. A car that weighs less takes less fuel to push it down the road. Now, I know what some of you are thinking, “Man, I’m not giv’en up my Suburban to drive something akin to a Yugo.” That of course, would be ideal, but it’s not how it has to be. I said lighter, not smaller. Breakthroughs in materials science have provided automakers with a lighter alternative to the steel frames in today’s vehicles. Quite possibly the car of the future will have a carbon fiber composite frame, the same material used for the skin of the Boeing 787 “Dreamliner”. Carbon fiber is light and strong. It weighs 1/5 as much as steel and is just as strong and stiff. A carbon fiber frame could increase fuel economy by as much as 30% without tampering with the internal combustion engine. Prototypes with carbon fiber composite frames like the Hypercar and Toyota 1/X are already road tested.

Now couple carbon fiber technology with a better engine. Electric cars are an attractive alternative to gasoline-powered automobiles because they “don't have to be as complex mechanically as their gasoline counterpart. Sophisticated electronics and software take the place of the pounds and pounds of machinery required to introduce a spark and ignite the fuel that powers an internal combustion engine.” Another bonus, electric cars produce zero road emissions. Not only do they reduce our reliance on foreign oil, but they are greener. Just plug the car into the wall socket at night and you’re ready for your morning commute. Critics argue that electric cars merely divert pollution to the smoke stacks of power plants. To the contrary, electric vehicles are at least 50% cleaner than their gasoline counterpart when powered by coal source energy and the capability is there for power to come from renewable sources like water, wind, and solar. The biggest knock on electric vehicles is that they are still comparably expensive to today’s automobiles. There are companies, like Tesla Motors, that are trying to make a go of it. And if you can’t get over the stereotype that an electric car won’t have the same ‘muscle’ as your GTO, check out the Tesla Roadster.

If hybrids and flex-fuel vehicles don’t fit in your budget and you can’t wait for the next generation gas sipper, simply think lighter. Lighter vehicles with smaller engines burn less gasoline. Yes, you may sacrifice testosterone laced, muscle throbbing engine power, but your checking account won’t take a hit every time you fuel up. And possibly maybe the ladies or the soccer moms will respect your patriotic, environmentally sound, pocket book friendly, good common sense.

Common Sense Things We Can Do To Decrease America’s Reliance On Oil (and Save a Few Bucks) (Part 1 of 10)

As we have all witnessed over the past few years, it isn’t until the cost of gasoline starts taking food out of our children’s mouths that Americans start thinking about changing their attitude towards energy consumption. Bigger homes, bigger cars, bigger lifestyles and higher energy prices have put the squeeze on all of us. Politicians have offered a solution. We’ve heard the cries for a 3 month holiday on the federal gas tax. What a joke! Merely, pandering for votes! Come on, we’re smarter than that! A gas tax holiday may help Americans in the short term, but it is not a solution to America’s problem. Our problem is that America is addicted to oil and a good percentage of that oil comes from foreign sources; sources that can charge whatever they want because we will pay. For once I agree with President Bush’s assessment that there is no quick fix to our energy problems. We are far from helpless, though. The solution is two part. Part one: the federal government must invest in domestic renewable sources of energy, like water, wind, solar, and bio-fuel and pass fuel efficiency laws. Part two: Americans need to become more energy conscious because there is a lot each and every one of us can do to reduce our energy needs. Working hand in hand, there is no reason America should not be able to meet its own energy demands while at the same time becoming greener and keeping more money where it belongs, in our back pocket.

Starting Monday and over the following nine days I will offer common sense solutions in daily installments to the West Fork Blues outlining ways Americans can incorporate good energy habits into their lives. You will find that some suggestions are expensive or ask for drastic changes to your lifestyle, but most are things that every American can easily incorporate into their daily routine and cost nothing more than a little convenience. Let’s all try and do our part to make America more energy independent. Think of it as your patriotic duty.