Was having this discussion with a colleague just yesterday. It is difficult to pull in all the threads that go into the manufacture of something like a modern automobile, but here is a pretty honest reckoning. Takeaway: EV are somewhat more energy intensive to manufacture, but after about 25k miles, the overcome this deficit. My plan: drive less and drive you car (hopefully an EV) longer. From CNET.

Are Electric Cars Really Better for the Environment?

Havent done much in the way of projects lately. In fact, I’ve been dismantling lots of old house projects, including my electrified riding mower and my Raspberry Pi sprinkler controller. We are selling our house, so we are getting rid of lots of stuff, and doing lots of generic cleaning and repair. Nothing too interesting.

A long story with battery powered tools. Bought a 20V Black and Decker battery powered drill many years back. Little did I realize I was locking into future Black and Decker gear. Not a huge problem, but I probably would have bought something different if I had realized this. But I ended up buying a Black and Decker hedge trimmer and a leaf blower. The leaf blower was a mixed bag. Nicer than using a cord, but not much oomph or time on the batteries. Some bigger batteries fixed that problem and I bought a nicer charger.

I was looking to buy a small battery powered push mower, and instead of going with Black and Decker, I got a worx. Had read the 20V batteries were compatible, and the mower came with two big batteries. Well, they were just a little off. Couldn’t make them work with the Black and Decker equipment. Not a tragedy, but would have been nice if everything worked together.

I looked into adapters (there are some available to share batteries on some popular tool platforms). All I could find for Worx was an adapter for home projects. Just the plastic holder and two wires. Bought one and decided to cannibalize an old smaller battery pack and make my own adapter. Not as easy as I expected. Everything inside the battery pack was tightly fitted and even with the batteries removed, I still had to cut away lots of plastic to get the wires to where they had to go. Anyway, in the end it worked. Now I have batteries and chargers that will keep my leaf blower going for as much as an hour.

From The Ruffian.

Seven Varieties of Stupidity (and what to do about them)

The number one cause of death for 1 – 19 year olds in the US is now guns, passing long time top cause of death, auto accidents. From the New England Journal of Medicine.

Current Causes of Death in Children and Adolescents in the United States

Back when this pandemic started, in March 2020, I was trying to get a grip on want was going on. There was lots of noise and conflicting information. I remember talking to a neighbor and telling him my estimate was one million dead before this is all over. I didn’t mean this as an exact tally, but an engineering estimate. It was going to be more than a few thousand, more than a hundred thousand, but less than many millions. He seemed skeptical, but I still remember the hard look he gave me. I decided to document my concerns (Weighing in on COVID-19). It didn’t happen quite the way I expected, but here we are at a place that was unthinkable to most people. I also believe this is a very low estimate. It will take time to see what part of excess deaths get assigned to covid.

From Axios, with data from Bloomberg. EVs are displacing 1.5 million barrels of oil per day. The real story is about 2/3 of this is from 2 and 3 wheeled vehicles.

EVs are shoving aside real volumes of oil

From The Guardian (UK).

French dijon mustard supply hit by climate and rising costs, say producers

The Texas power grid seems to have trouble with both cold and hot weather. It also can’t seem to get electricity from where it is made to where it is needed. Finally, it won’t buy power from neighboring states. All of this means electricity prices will go up, way up. I expect rolling blackouts as we hit records across multiple days here, and it’s only May. Anyone out there still remember Enron? That was the last time the Texas energy boys figured out how to make vast amounts of money while delivering less of their product (electricity). Could even be the same people.

ERCOT urges Texans to cut back on power usage over weekend

I see inflation stories at the top of the news every day. Even the local news. Oil continues at $100 bbl for no particular reason, and big oil companies like BP, Shell and Exxon dial in record or near-record profits. How much of inflation is caused by, let’s call it what it is, oil company profiteering? I can’t seem to find any data making the link. Hers the latest Big Oil news.

Saudi Aramco overtakes Apple as world’s most valuable company

Texas refuses to buy power from other states, even given the recent stunning shortfalls of the Texas power grid. This seems to be simply to avoid Federal regulation, and allow overcharging to Texas consumers. It turns out it is even worse than that. There is extremely cheap power in places right in Texas that can’t find it’s way to where it is needed. So people are paying very, very high prices when there is very, very cheap power right nearby. It is almost as if the Texas power companies don’t want to save customers money. From Shelby Webb on Twitter:

This is wild. Wholesale power prices have spiked in the Houston region, north of $317 per megawatt hour. But less than three hours away in Calhoun County (where there’s a lot of wind power), prices are NEGATIVE $883