Monday, July 16, 2012

Renewable Energy

Just saw a documentary from "Modern Marvels" produced by A&E Television Networks in 2006. entitled
"Renewable Energy". Ok, so it's not quite as current as I would prefer, but it sure boosted my optimism towards renewable and sustainable forms of energy.
It was only 50 minutes long and was available at the local public library.
It's ISBN is 1-4229-1581-6

It describes in simple common terms the most basic forms of renewable energy that
modern man is exploring and currently utilizing successfully.
Some of the energy forms discussed in this documentary are:
Wind Energy, Solar Energy ( including photo voltaic forms as well as solar thermal power,
geothermal energy, biomass energy from crops such as Switch grass, bio diesel, ocean wave energy, ocean current energy, and I'm sure there's a few more that I can't recall at the moment.

In particular, I found the discussion of using biomass quite intriguing. Those who are working in the field and research of biomass were trying to figure out which crop would produce more power with as little effort and expense to grow. Their discovery was an easy-to-grow grass called "Switch grass". Apparently this type of grass is easy to grow in a variety of climates and produces a much higher yield than is retained from using biomass sources like corn or sugar cane.

There was quite a long section about wind energy. I find the wind turbines to be amazingly powerful, but wonder if it isn't a bit of an eyesore to be putting up more than a modest amount of these wind turbines in public places. But I am sure that smaller wind turbines could be added in smaller versions for smaller uses even on top of our homes and they wouldn't have to reach unsightly heights to be effective in a windy city like mine.
Perhaps we need to stop insisting on energy "superheroes" and accept smaller helps, such as personal home sized solar power water heaters, such as are now mandatory in Israel.
I learned earlier this week that Israel has also issued a  very progressive water saving toilet design for all it's households. Apparently each household toilet has two buttons for flushing. Therefore the user can choose one button for liquid flushes (urination only) and another button for larger flushing (feces ). This change in toilet choices saves gallons and gallons of water consumption in only one week and could so easily be adapted for use in Canada and elsewhere and save our nations millions of dollars in water costs.

If any of my wonderful blog readers have some input on these matters I would greatly enjoy your comments which you can leave by pressing the comments tab.
Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
blessings.
Carla

Monday, June 25, 2012

Gluten Free At KFC

When I contacted KFC to find out if anything on their menu is gluten free this is the link that they
sent me.

http://kfc.ca/en/assets/pdf/KFC11834_AllergenChart_Eng.pdf

Therefore, from my quick check of their listing there are only about four items that would not usually contain gluten and that would be their potato salad, coleslaw, sweet potatoe fries, and mashed potatoes. That's it.
Please note that there is much written in fine print on their allergen notice, so read the fine print  for their full disclosure and disclaimer. Bon appetit!

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Shave 14% off your Electricity Bill

Good Afternoon All!
I read a statistic somewhere (sorry I can't quote the source) that drying your clothes in the clothes dryer makes up at least 14% of your electricity bill.
I also read that if everyone in the USA stopped using clothes dryers completely that there would be no need for nuclear power.... Hmmm how interesting.

Well, perhaps you have nannies, butlers, housekeepers and maids and you don't actually touch your own laundry any more. You could still instruct your household helpers to hang some of your laundry out to dry.
The things that don't fluff up well when hung dry could be put into the dryer after being hung up to dry and then added to the electric clothes dryer just for 10 minutes to add fluffiness..
( such as towels)

Perhaps you don't have an official clothes line, complete with wheels and pulleys. No problem, a simple
rope/string made of some sort of plastic will suffice. you can tie it up between two fence posts and have a diagonal clothesline hanging across one corner of your backyard.

Some housing communities forbid the use of clotheslines, as they think they are an eyesore. So, you may have to find out if there are rules like that in your community. But I find that a really high hydro bill is more of an eyesore than a few lines of string hanging in my own backyard :)

Perhaps you detest manual labor and the lugging of wet clothes from the washing machine to your outdoor clotheslines. Well, I do understand, but I do find that sometimes a little old fashioned manual labour soothes the soul and refreshes the spirit, much like gardening.
God bless y'all. I treasure your presence. Feel free to publish your input on the comments section.Caio.