NeutralAxis

What nuclear fuel can be carried safely in your pocket, has a nearly inexhaustible supply in nature, leaves minuscule waste, and can run a reactor that could fit within a medium sized suburban house?  Need a hint?  Its named after a Norse god and was pretty much forgotten about by the nuclear power industry because it was too safe. (continue reading…)

A new electric vehicle (EV) charging corridor is being established along a corridor linking LA and San Francisco for owners of electric vehicles to recharge their battery.  Its the first of its kind in the country.

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I thought I’d do a little review of the Irritrol lawn irrigation controller they call, unimaginatively, PC-Control.  Its a hardware package with a Windows software module that provides for detailed scheduling and smart operation of a lawn irrigation system.  [Updated July 10, 2009 with information about program errors.][New version 2.0.37 beta software is available and hopefully will be more stable. Screenshot of new software below.] (continue reading…)

I’d always heard that refrigerators were a major energy user within the home, and decided to check mine against the modern norm.  The results were not what I expected.

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No, that’s not a 1990′s caller ID box.  That’s TED, The Energy Detective; a gizmo that monitors your whole house electric usage.  If you’ve ever seen a kill-a-watt, TED is basically the same thing with better data collection, and it monitors the whole house instead of a single circuit.  With a 15 minute installation that’s only mildly deadly, you can get a detailed breakdown of your home’s energy usage. (continue reading…)

The current issue of WIRED magazine has a good article about the need for updating the nation’s electric grid and goes into what needs to be done and why.  Check it out in print in the Aptil 2009 issue, or online.  My electric utility company expects to have smart meters in place by the end of the year.  I’m hopeful they’ve done their homework and picked a good system.  More on that when it happens.

Wired.com

AO Smith and State water heater companies make identical 96% efficient gas-fired water heaters.  But they have what I consider to be a design flaw that can render them unsuitable at best, or useless at worst, in certain settings. (continue reading…)