Gray Watson's Blog -- September 2005

Blogging is a useful way for me to record my thoughts and digital travels every so often. Hope you enjoy my digital stream of consciousness.

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September 30, 2005

Just found out about the X-Prize Cup which is happening in Las Cruces, New Mexico on October 6th-9th. Not sure if I would have gone if I found out about it earlier but it would have been fun. I'll certainly be there in the future. Here's the article about the event from Wired.
Last year the X PRIZE Foundation gave away $10 million for the first private spaceflight a history-making achievement that blanketed the front pages of newspapers across the globe. This year were unveiling a new generation of private spaceships at the X PRIZE CUP in New Mexico.
Bring your friends and family to the Las Cruces Airport on Sunday Oct 9th See six different spaceships currently in testing. Watch them fly. Meet the pioneers, pilots and astronauts who conceived them.
Was just thinking about Richard Jewell, the poor bastard who was just about executed by the FBI, media and the public -- accused of being the Olympic Park Bomber. Even after he was exonerated by the Justice Department I remember David Letterman making jokes about the guy because of his weight. Shameful. Here's audio of his speech after being exonerated. I use it as a constant reminder to not to jump to conclusions and to be continually distrustful of the media.
On the evening of July 27, 1996, at Centennial Olympic Park, I did not set out to be a hero. I set out that night simply to do my job and to do it right. I was then and remain now an individual committed to the principles of law enforcement and the protection of the public.
Fun piece regarding "intelligent design". Here's my rant on the subject.
And the Lord God said, "Let there be light", and lo, there was light. But then the Lord God said, "Wait, what if I make it a sort of rosy, sunset-at-the-beach, filtered half-light, so that everything else I design will look younger?"
"I'm loving that", said Buddha. "It's new."
"You should design a restaurant", added Allah.
We were talking about 9/11 at work today and the conversation shifted to the anthrax terrorist. This brought me to Steven Hatfill, a "person of interest" in the federal investigation into this act of domestic terrorism. Is he another Richard Jewell or another Ted Kaczynski? Wikipedia is slim on him. Some discussions of his crucification. Article on Hatfill by the Post. Another on his suing the Justice Department. Here's some background into him.
There is something curious about Hatfill's claim, on his resume, to have worked concurrently with the U.S. Army Institute for Military Assistance in Fort Bragg and with the Rhodesian Special Air Squadron. Indeed, several of his associates have told the Prospect that Hatfill bragged of having been a double agent in South Africa -- which raises some intriguing questions. Was the U.S. military biowarfare program willing to hire and give sensitive security clearances to someone who had served in the apartheid-era South African military medical corps, and with white-led Rhodesian paramilitary units in Zimbabwe's civil war two decades earlier? Or did Hatfill serve in the Rhodesian SAS, and later in the South African military medical corps, at the behest of the U.S. government?
Massachusetts is proposing a bill to add significant incentives to people to buy hybrid cars. Good for them.
The bill, which could come up for a vote in the Senate as soon as Thursday, would reward drivers who buy hybrid or alternative fuel cars with tax breaks, free transponders to get through tolls quicker and open access to HOV lanes.
The bill also would require that at least half of the state's fleet of vehicles run on alternative fuels by 2010, and establish an Alternative Fuels Institute at the University of Massachusetts.

September 28, 2005

Was looking for a good online fax service and came across the Trust Fax service. For US$20 per year (all competitors are per month) which comes with 70 fax pages, 15mb storage, toll-free fax number. Additional pages are US$0.10 per page sending and receiving. Pretty cheap. Might see if a friend would want to share the line (yes we'd both get the faxes) to defer the cost a bit since Ro and I send a couple of faxes a year.
Very cool. Just found out about a 4+ megawatt Springerville Generating Station Solar System in northeastern Arizona. Here's a satellite shot of the array. Here's some more information. Here's a wicked cool hi-res image of the array. Here's some near-realtime data from the array. Man does that rock!
The annual net AC energy production in 2004 was 7,064,029 kWh. Based on experience with the installations to date, we expect the annual net AC energy production from the 34 units to be just over 7,750,000 kWh in 2005. Energy production reliability of the inverters was 99.87% and reliability of the entire PV system was 99.72% in 2004.
Current plans are to install 125 AC kW units on two (2) prepared pads in 2005 and to prepare land and power distribution infrastructure in 2006 for the final 28 units. The type of PV modules to be installed in that final phase will be in large part determined by actual energy production of existing systems as well as installed cost data bid for PV equipment.
Interesting articles about how scientists are using cold saline to preserve living creatures after death. This work was spearheaded by Peter Safar from the University of Pittsburgh. He was a good friend of my father and spoke at his memorial service. Here's another story about the work in Pittsburgh. Here is some more research.
Researchers don't understand the details of why cold temperatures protect the body against death. They do know that metabolism continues in the body's cells for a short period of time after a person is already dead; but the remaining oxygen in the blood is no longer sufficient to produce energy. Instead, the cellular respiratory chain produces toxic free oxygen radicals at a higher rate than normal, killing the cells. In other words, the cellular metabolism continuing in a cell after death is in fact the cell's own downfall.
Apparently, the cool saline solution puts a stop to this process. First, the cold temperature dramatically reduces metabolic activity. Second, the solution completely flushes the blood and, along with it, the remaining oxygen out of the body tissue. There is nothing left to fuel the respiratory chain, and free radicals can no longer be produced to kill off the cells. The result? The body glides into a state of suspended animation.

September 26, 2005

Couple of classic stories from the always funny Onion including: Cheney Dropped By White House HMO
In the form letter, AmeriHealth customer-service manager Bob Kielas apologized for any inconvenience caused by the adjustment, and encouraged the vice president to contact an AmeriHealth customer-service representative to make arrangements for his final payments.
And Bill Introduced As Joke Signed Into Law
"I thought it was pretty damn funny when I read over the draft of the thing," said Allen, who said he struggled to keep a straight face when he introduced the law. "Especially the part about how it would create over 10,000 caddy and drink-girl jobs. But I guess it went over people's heads."
And finally Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New 'Intelligent Falling' Theory
Burdett added: "Gravity, which is taught to our children as a law, is founded on great gaps in understanding. The laws predict the mutual force between all bodies of mass, but they cannot explain that force. Isaac Newton himself said, 'I suspect that my theories may all depend upon a force for which philosophers have searched all of nature in vain.' Of course, he is alluding to a higher power."
The World Solar Challenge started yesterday as solar teams from around the world race from Darwin to Adelaide across the outback in Australia. Very cool. Would love to participate in that. The MIT Tesseract car crashed and had to drop out of the competition.
The Challenge, to design and build a car capable of crossing Australia on the power of daylight, comprehends the most innovative research and development of alternative transport technologies. The World Solar Challenge attracts teams and individuals from corporations and universities all over the world.
Interesting news that a bunch of guys at LiftPort Group are working on space elevators. This is a futuristic technology for hoisting vehicles and cargo into space. They have a working robot which climbs fiberglass ribbon. On the 23rd they hoisted their ribbon to 1000ft using a helium balloon and had their robot climb it.
The LiftPort Group (LPG) is dedicated to building a mass transportation system to open up access to the inner solar system (LEO, GEO, the Moon, Mars, and asteroids). We expect the Space Elevator will be at the heart of this revolutionary transportation service. By opening up broad-based access to Earth orbits and the inner solar system, LPG will help bring about the creation of entire new markets. Based in space commerce, these new markets can only become viable through safe, inexpensive, routine access to the inner solar system. In short, we at LiftPort Group believe that development of the space elevator is a crucial step in the future of Earth and space.
Monty just pointed me to the whole Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM) movement. Bobby Henderson has started a movement which is trying to get the Kansas State Board of Education to adopt the teaching of FSM as creator of the universe along with intelligent design. Very apt. I've been looking for something to put on my car to join in the fish, Darwin, truth, evolution, etc. car decal war. Here's the Times article about FSM. Also just found this page defining WWFSMD.
Let us remember that there are multiple theories of Intelligent Design. I and many others around the world are of the strong belief that the universe was created by a Flying Spaghetti Monster. It was He who created all that we see and all that we feel. We feel strongly that the overwhelming scientific evidence pointing towards evolutionary processes is nothing but a coincidence, put in place by Him.

September 23, 2005

Doug got me onto absorption cooling technology which uses waste-heat (or natural gas) to provide cooling. As unlikely as this seems, many large commercial cooling systems are use absorption or so-called gas-fired cooling. The process uses some gas (ammonia or lithium bromide) absorbed in water. The heat is used to separate the gas from the water and when it is absorbed back and then boils, it absorbs heat from the surrounding environment. I can see solar collectors being used for this. Here's a number of links that I've collected.
- Solar Airconditioning Project
- How it Works
- Do it Yourself Plans
- Solar Absorption Cooling Project for Greece
- An Air Conditioning System Using Solar Energy (from Duke University)
- Solar Absorption Cooling and related technology
- Absorption Heat Pumps from the DOE
- Natural cooling for your home
- Solar ICE Making
Interesting article about Saddam and terrorism ties. Looks like there was evidence that Saddam was supporting terrorist elements. That his and the radical Islamic organizations shared hatred for the US was able to push the otherwise opposition parties together. There is some evidence tying him to the World Trade Center bombing. The evidence is still slim on 9/11 ties although there is the Prague connection where Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir al-Ani, the consul at Iraq's embassy in Prague possibly met with 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta although it has not been corroborated. Certainly the administration guessed wrong on the subject of WMDs. Here's another interesting timeline from PBS about the development of Al Qaeda.

September 21, 2005

The EFF has a nice article about the Commission on Federal Election Reform report on the country's electoral health. It makes a number of recommendations on electronic voting systems. Wired.com also covered the story.
"The Commission joins a growing chorus of concerned groups and citizens urging that electronic voting technology and related procedures be overhauled," said Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) Staff Attorney Matt Zimmerman. "This high-level, bipartisan panel confirmed that e-voting has introduced an unacceptable amount of uncertainty into voting, which should be the most trusted task performed by government. Congress and the states need to move quickly to ensure that another election doesn't go by with the same systemic flaws. Luckily, on the federal level, HR 550 could help us reach some of those goals by mandating a voter-verified paper trail and mandatory audits."

September 14, 2005

Another technology that I've been wanting to play with is evaporative coolers which use water evaporation to cool. It is most efficient on days with low humidity and high temperatures. Here's a collection of links:
Here's a cool site that just caught my eye entitled a tracking solar concentrator for the home experimenter. Very interesting. I also just found a site for fresnel lenses. Have to play around with those things. They seem pretty cool! I'm still interested in playing around with Stirling engines combined with solar collectors. Fun, fun.

September 13, 2005

Interesting story about how scientists from Israel, Sweden, Switzerland and France have developed a process to get hydrogen from zinc and water. Here's the Zdnet article about it. Concentrated solar energy will convert zinc-oxide into zinc and some CO2. The zinc powder then can be distributed and when added to water produces zinc-oxide and hydrogen.
This process has many advantages over existing ways of producing hydrogen. First and foremost it uses a renewable form of energy - the sun. Furthermore the main material required for the process is the relatively inexpensive zinc oxide which is almost completely recycled back by the end of the process. Another important advantage is that the hydrogen could be produced where it is needed, i.e., at the local fuel station instead of transporting large amounts of explosive hydrogen across the country. Trucks loaded with safe Zn powder would transport it to the fuel station where it would undergo the relatively simple treatment of extracting the hydrogen using steam. Last but not least, the entire process is relatively clean and when biomass will replace the coal as an additive to the ZnO mix, the process will be completely non-polluting.

September 12, 2005

I've also been thinking about roof tie downs for my house. When strong winds hit a building, often the roof gets pulled off since it is usually just sitting on top of the house -- usually just secured with framing or roof nails. Once the roof is off, the rain that comes with the storm destroys the building. In addition, many houses sit on top of their foundations. In earthquake zones, the wooden headers and joists are usually anchored to the foundation but it looks to be harder to retrofit an old house. Most houses just sit on top of the foundation making their susceptible to being knocked off their foundations. Here's a collection of links on the topic:
Wikipedia is starting to rival traditional news sources and has turned into the web's #1 reference site. Well done. Here's the article on CNN.
Wikipedia attracted 22.3 per cent of users searching for information about the Gaza Strip as Israeli troops closed down settlements and withdrew from the region. Wikipedia's market share numbers meant it drew five times more traffic than Google News, Yahoo News or the BBC and tied with CIA World Factbook for information on the strip.
Katrina has had one positive outcome in that many municipalities, businesses, and families are taking a good look at their disaster plans. The recent past (Katrina, 9/11) has demonstrated that our federal and local governments are not always the best protector. Ultimately, we all need to take responsibility for ourselves and our communities. I'm not a nut about this but I also realize that for a couple of hundred US$, we could improve our chances of surviving a disaster in our area. I need to improve our stock of canned and dehydrated food. I just placed an order for a gravity water filtration system for US$90.

September 8, 2005

Found this page about how to rotate movies using Quicktime Pro. All this does is to set a rotate bit or something in the quicktime move itself. It seemed to work great and helped me fix some good movies that we took, inadvertently, with our camera in rotated mode. You have to pay for Quicktime Pro (currently ~US$30) to get this feature. Also, here's a cheaper iMovie plugin which may do the same thing but I didn't try it. I think that it does the actual job of changing the aspect ratio. It probably has to add in black background around the frames to keep the same ratio.
Interesting site which makes composting toilets. These are toilets that use no water and generate usable and protein rich compost after a couple of months for the solids to break down.
The Human Humus Machine produces high quality humus, which has the same appearance and aroma as high-quality topsoil. Heat-generating and pathogen-consuming microbes control pathogens in the finished compost.
- Saves over 1,500 to 3,000 gallons of water per year when compared to typical toilets
- Turns a waste product into a valuable soil amendment, a key for sustainable agriculture
- Nutrients and pathogens don't end up polluting waterways
- The infrastructure is much cheaper than a conventional sewage system

September 1, 2005

Gas prices surge around the nation in response to hurricane Katrina effects the gulf coast oil production and infrastructure.
Concerns over the damage caused by Katrina to oil platforms, refineries and pipelines along the Gulf Coast have driven energy prices to record highs in recent days. Ninety percent of U.S. oil production along the Gulf Coast was shut down in Katrina's wake, causing crude oil futures to briefly reach $70 a barrel and wholesale gasoline costs to spike to near-record levels of $2.90 a gallon. That led to gas station prices rising to almost $4 a gallon in some U.S. markets.
Here's another story from Reuters:
For all the outrage from U.S. drivers over soaring prices, they still pay much less than their European counterparts, who have learned to adapt with much smaller cars and shorter commutes. In Britain, for example, petrol prices hover over roughly $6 a gallon.
Already, there are some signs that the shock of climbing gas prices is prompting some Americans to give up their penchant for big cars and big road trips.
A Californian woman visiting Chicago said she and her family planned on visiting the Abraham Lincoln Museum in Springfield, Illinois, over the Labor Day weekend but decided against it because of the high cost of gasoline.
Added a bunch of Katrina images collected from various news sources. What devastation. I can only assume that it will get worse as we learn about the full extent of the destruction.
Just collecting a list of sites with good information about how to make your own Yagi antenna. It involves a tube, precisely distanced conductors, a reflector, and connections.

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