by Kenny Luna, North Babylon, NY on 10. 4.07

Water, water, everywhere and not a drop to float in.  Yesterday, I attended a wedding shower for two people who represent everything hopeful about this region.  Smart, smart people.  My smart friend's smart mom arranged the party at the Henn House in Sims Park along the lake.  Henn House has been renovated by volunteers who see the value of fixing and restoring.  After the party, I found myself in the same position as another woman, who wandered down to the beach to admire the sun

The last two realneo headers are pans of a site I pass often, on my way between the East and West sides, which is bounded by East 105, Wade Park and East Boulevard, in one of the most important historic and cultural neighborhoods in America, where I was shocked to find a group of significant apartment buildings being demolished.

This weekend...
Take the Ohio Solar Tour!
Friday-Sunday, October 5-7, 2007
DOWNLOAD TOUR GUIDEBOOKS NOW!!!
Download your free copies at: http://www.greenenergyohio.org/page.cfm?pageID=989

By RAY RIVERA

The Wind - a cute short two minute video from Germany (in English).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mTLO2F_ERY

Carpe diem is one way to say it, but when I saw the glass pedestal cake plate on the sunny bank of the Lower Shaker Lake I had a feeling  “seize the day” was being exercised in the superlative.

Barrels of fun, with a message

Location has always been the key to selling products, this machine has no restriction. Wherever the customers, the machine can be placed, static or mobile. It has its own internal supply of DC energy. Should power cuts occur, it will carry on operating when conventional machine stop. No matter if the skies are grey, rain or even at night, 365 days a year.

Like millions of Americans, Oprah has been diagnosed with thyroid disease.  We know that there is an environmental stressor causing this autoimmune failure.  Maybe, now there will be more of an attempt to pinpoint the cause and spare our children from this silent epidemic.  It mostly affects women (due to body fat?) So ask yourself, what do we add to our water?  It's not just an urban problem--it's a suburban problem, too.  It's not just a Lake Erie problem, it's a Lake Michigan problem, too.  So, maybe the soccer moms will want to do something about it?  Especially, if Oprah leads the charge.

Ask a die-hard altpower fan if they’ve ever seen a functional wind turbine in the urban jungle, and chances are, the answer is no. Today we bring you some exclusive footage of this rare species. This Skystream 3.7, built by Altira-backed Southwest Wind Power, sits atop a remodeled corner house in San Francisco’s Mission District. The blades sit on a skinny 45-foot pole dropped in by crane. Here is the turbine in action on Wednesday’s windy afternoon.

September 21, 2007

First Renewable FIT Introduced in U.S.

Prices for solar and biogas introduced in the Michigan Renewable Energy Sources Act would be the best in North America.
by Paul Gipe
Lansing, Michigan [RenewableEnergyAccess.com]
Patterned after Germany's highly successful Renewable Energy Sources Act, Veteran Michigan Assemblywoman Kathleen Law submitted a bill to the Michigan House of Representatives earlier this week that creates the first comprehensive renewable energy feed-in tariff (FIT) introduced into any U.S. legislature.

Like the German law which has powered the country to world leadership in wind, solar, and biomass energy—and created nearly one-quarter million new jobs in its booming renewable energy industry—proponents of the bill are hoping the tariff will revive Michigan's flagging economy.
"We are extremely excited that Michigan has joined the ranks of so many progressive states in making the commitment to reduce our carbon footprint," said Subhendu Guha, President of United Solar Ovonic, which is headquartered in Michigan and is a leading manufacturer of thin film solar cells. "Policies like this will create new jobs in Michigan and will help maintain a cleaner environment."
The tariffs proposed in HB 5218 (2007) are equivalent to those in Germany and would be the highest in North America if the bill is made a law.
• Hydro less than 500 kW: $0.10 USD/kWh
• Biogas less than 150 kW: $0.145 USD/kWh
• Geothermal less than 5 MW: $0.19 USD/kWh
• Wind: $0.105 USD/kWh
• Wind energy from small wind turbines: $0.25 USD/kWh
• Rooftop solar less than 30 kW: $0.65 USD/kWh
• Solar façade cladding less than 30 kW: $0.71 USD/kWh
Other legislatures in the U.S. and Canada have considered or are reviewing similar FIT programs. The province of Ontario launched its Standard Offer Program (SOP) in 2006, and a bill for solar energy tariffs was introduced into Hawaii's legislative assembly earlier this year. However, neither are as comprehensive as the FIT proposed by Assemblywoman Law.
While Ontario's SOP is seen as a very important step for FITs in North America, the proposed tariffs for solar energy in the Michigan bill are more than 50% greater than the equivalent tariffs in Ontario. Likewise, the proposed tariff for biogas is nearly one-third greater than that in Ontario. The Michigan proposal also includes tariffs for geothermal energy, a technology not covered by Ontario's SOP.
Renewable tariffs, like those in HB 5218 (2007), encourage homeowners, farmers, and businesses to sell their renewable energy for a profit by allowing them to "feed" their electricity into the grid. Many people call such tariffs "Advanced Renewable Tariffs," because the price paid per kilowatt-hour of electricity differs by technology.
For example, because solar is more expensive than wind on a cost per watt basis, the tariff for solar energy is much higher than that for wind energy so that homeowners can profitably install solar panels on their roofs across the state.
HB 5218 (2007) is also the first bill to propose wind tariffs differentiated by wind resource intensity, as is used in France. These differentiated tariffs limit potentially excessive profit from commercial wind farms at windy sites while allowing profitable development in less windy areas. This is important in a state like Michigan so farmers in the interior of the state can profitably develop their wind resources.
The bill has been referred to the Committee on Energy and Technology. Before becoming law, the bill must pass both the House and Senate and must be signed by Governor Jennifer Granholm who has made renewable energy a key element of her administration.
In the spring of 2007 Governor Granholm traveled to Germany. After returning she was quoted in the Detroit News as saying, "In Germany they created 170,000 jobs by changing the incentives for the use of wind and solar. We ought to be doing the same thing in Michigan."

Expect more stories like the incredible sink hole that swallowed my backyard.   The infrastructure of Cleveland and the inner ring suburbs is crumbling.  Instead of repeating the same mistakes, Cuyahoga County needs to find a way to reimburse these homeowners and collectively allow these stream corridors to revert to their natural function.  It is certainly the most cost effective way of fixing this problem and it will serve the dual purpose of cleaning our waters and regreening our community.

Brutalism against Breuer in Cleveland, Ohio. 

A Green Movement Is Roiling America

Clothesline Has Neighbors Bent Out of Shape in Bend; An Illegal Solar Device?
By ANNE MARIE CHAKER
September 18, 2007; Page A1
BEND, Ore. -- It was a sunny, 70-degree day here in Awbrey Butte, an exclusive neighborhood of big, modern houses surrounded by native pines.
To Susan Taylor, it was a perfect time to hang her laundry out to dry. The 55-year-old mother and part-time nurse strung a clothesline to a tree in her backyard, pinned up some freshly washed flannel sheets -- and, with that, became a renegade.
The regulations of the subdivision in which Ms. Taylor lives effectively prohibit outdoor clotheslines. In a move that has torn apart this otherwise tranquil community, the development's managers have threatened legal action. To the developer and many residents, clotheslines evoke the urban blight they sought to avoid by settling in the Oregon mountains.
"This bombards the senses," interior designer Joan Grundeman says of her neighbor's clothesline. "It can't possibly increase property values and make people think this is a nice neighborhood."
Ms. Taylor and her supporters argue that clotheslines are one way to fight climate change, using the sun and wind instead of electricity. "Days like this, I can do multiple loads, and within two hours, it's done," said Ms. Taylor. "It smells good, and it feels different than when it comes out of the dryer."
The battle of Awbrey Butte is an unanticipated consequence of increasing environmental consciousness, pitting the burgeoning right-to-dry movement against community standards across the country.
The clothesline was once a ubiquitous part of the residential landscape. But as postwar Americans embraced labor-saving appliances, clotheslines came to be associated with people who couldn't afford a dryer. Now they are a rarity, purged from the suburban landscape by legally enforceable development restrictions.

Nationwide, about 60 million people now live in about 300,000 "association governed" communities, most of which restrict outdoor laundry hanging, says Frank Rathbun, spokesman for the Community Associations Institute, an Alexandria, Va., group that lobbies on behalf of homeowners associations.

Whoever is culling through the news and posting at the

U.S. Plans a Switch To All Fluorescents For Efficiency's Sake

WASHINGTON -- The House and Senate are working on legislation that over the next seven years would phase out the conventional light bulb, a move aimed at saving energy and reducing man-made emissions believed linked to climate change.

Cool Cleveland this week ran a piece by Chris Whipple  about re-naming Cleveland’s Terminal Tower.  Mr. Whipple suggests that “terminal” (as in "terminally ill", dead, or dead end) is too much a downer name and that instead the building should be called  VanView  after the Van Sweringen brothers who built the tower and Shaker Heights, etc. 

Cindy Hale visited the Shaker Lakes Regional Nature Center on September 13, 2007 to lead a small hands-on seminar on worm census techniques.  Cindy hails from Duluth, Minnesota and is the author of  Earthworms of the Great Lakes.