New Ideas for Energy in Houston

Some musing... Houston has an abundance of two things: humidity and sunshine... there ought to be a way to tap into that.

I wonder if anyone has thought to use the roof-tops for city property (including the top floor of the parking garages) for banks of solar panels... or making the various park-and-ride lots around the city both covered lots and using the roof area for solar energy generation.

Looking at a picture from Google Earth at downtown, there are plenty of spots that would provide acres of solar panels -- Bayou Place, Wortham Center and the George R. Brown stand out.

Another thing we have is lots of traffic -- what about vertical windmills placed strategically in and around our freeway systems that could recapture some of the energy lost in transportation to wind capture.

They could be both beautiful and utilitarian... and we certainly could use a different view along stretches of 59 South heading to Sugarland.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Lemon Coolers Similar to Mexican Wedding Cookies, these lemony shortbread cookies (which used to be a staple of Girl Scout Cookies) are a light and airy treat. Ingredients: For the cookies 1 cup butter (1 stick), unsalted 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 cup confectioner’s sugar 4 teaspoons fresh lemon zest 2 tablespoon lemon juice 2 cup all-purpose f lour Powdered sugar coating 2 cup confectioner's sugar 2 tablespoons lemonade mix (Koolaid) Directions Preheat oven to 350 ℉ Cream butter & sugar until fluffy. Add lemon zest, vanilla & lemon juice. Mix well. Mix in flour and beat until combined into a thick dough. (Optional) Chill dough in refrigerator for about 20 minutes. In a separate bowl, combine sugar & lemonade mix. Using a cookie scoop, make 1" balls. Roll cookies in sugar mix and place on parchment-lined cookie sheet about 1-1/2" apart. Bake for about 12-14 minutes or until bottoms are starting to turn golden brown. Remove from oven & cool on a cool...

Just Desserts: Double Peanut Butter Bars

This recipe takes the simple peanut butter cookie and "raises the bar"... with three layers: Peanut Butter Cookie on the bottom Rich peanut butter icing in the middle Topped with a chocolate shell Delicious and decadent! For the cookie base: Preheat oven to 350F. Grease a 9x13 glass baking dish. 1 1/4 cup sugar 1 tablespoon dark molasses 1/2 cup creamy peanut buter 1/4 cup shortening 1/4 cup butter, softened 1 egg 1 1/4 cups flour 3/4 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1/4 teaspoon salt Prepare peanut butter cookie dough (per normal recipe) but do not refrigerate. Instead, spread dough evenly on the bottom of the prepared baking dish. Bake for about 15-18 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely. For the middle layer: 1/2 cup butter, softened 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter 1 tablespoon milk 1 teaspoon vanilla 2 cups powdered sugar In a small bowl, beat the butter, peanut butter, milk, vanilla...

More On Energy: Supply, Demand and the Not-so-free Market

Speculators in the market have, rightly, been targeted for thier use of the Enron-loophole to basically compete (unfairly) in a market that is mixed between highly-regulated (see integrated oil companies) and unregulated players (see commodity brokers). This imbalance of power has led to the free flow of capital to a market from sources that a decade ago largely abandoned investment in oil companies -- in favor of the speculative bubble of the dotcom boom. That lack of capital infusion -- and the capital-intensive nature of the oil & gas business -- led to the mega-mergers of 1999 - 2001. Bear in mind that even with all that merger activity among the multi-nationals, their true competition is with national oil companies -- basically branches of their nation-state governments: Pemex (Mexico), Petrobras (Brazil), Pedevesas (Venezuala), Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia), Cinoco (China) ... you get the picture. On the one end, you have national oil companies -- either in OPEC or non-aligned ...

Administrativia

Search This Blog