Google Offers a Million Bucks For a Better Inverter

But I paid $.25 each for the bulbs. ;-)

If they leave their lights on and need to skimp elsewhere, their choice. The problem is that they don't want me to have that choice.

presently and

or allowing solar connections, and a week ago, the Lees completed their lon g journey through the energy bureaucracy: They had their rooftop unit insta lled. They're no longer worried about turning off the lights in empty rooms .

it was worth it.""

I only paid $1 :-). They're good, except some are slow to start in cold weather. I put those in less-used places.

I've got enough CFL stock to last until LED bulbs get better. LEDs are slick, but truthfully, I'm suspicious of their big blue spike. I betcha 20 years from now we'll find they cause cataracts and are bad for retinas. Blue and shorter does that, and it's cumulative. That's why sailors of old were night-blind.

Not only do they deny you the choice, they insist you pay for theirs and the incredible bureaucracy that doles it out.

Cheers, James Arthur

It's not that I don't use CFLs but not in so much the "living" spaces. I have a bunch of them in the basement, where I my have them on for extended periods of time. I'm replacing them with T10s, though.

For living spaces, I don't like the light and the slow turn-on. For most uses, by the time a CFL will come up to full brightness, it's turned off. Some are really bad and it's impossible to know which is which. Brand doesn't matter.

I feel the same way about tungsten bulbs. I bought a hundred 60W (hundred each clear and frosted) 100W (clear) from 1000bulbs, a couple of years ago. I may have used ten so far, mostly in new fixtures.

I'm not to worried about cataracts. I fully expect to go through the surgery soon enough. A high percentage will, it's a pretty simple procedure, and it has its benefits.

That's what government does and why it has to be choked.

resently and for the past 20 years has been to offload the peak demand req uirements on the grid.

fluctuating power taking the grid into overload and trip states:

r allowing solar connections, and a week ago, the Lees completed their long journey through the energy bureaucracy: They had their rooftop unit instal led. They're no longer worried about turning off the lights in empty rooms.

it was worth it.""

ing lights off in empty rooms.)

Different people get obsessive about different subjects. Few people object to sunlit rooms being brightly lit even when empty.

ng CFLs, using bulb life as a cost advantage to overcome the initial outlay . I blow *maybe* one incandescent bulb a year (I have one in the garage th at does it) because I do shut off lights when we're watching TV and when I leave the room and usually have none on in the room to begin with. None ar e on more than an hour a day.

It isn't as if krw is going t read anything.

;-)

Not that it's a competition that anybody sane would get into. CFL's are sup posed to last longer if you don't turn them on and off too frequently - kee ping them on for about 20 minutes was once calculated to be optimal for som e specific electricity price.

get subsidies so they can leave their lights on.

James Arthur does have a rather odd way of looking at life. People who inst all solar panels mostly want to emit less CO2 - the subsidies (where they e xist) do encourage them to go to the trouble of getting the panels and gett ing them fitted, and - once you are using renewable power - it does reduce the guilt about leaving the lights on in empty rooms, but text-chopping thi s sequence of motivations down to a desire to get subsidies for leaving lig hts on in empty rooms does throw out a great deal of relevant information.

But James Arthur is into posting a political message, which is pretty much the polar opposite of informing other people.

presently and for the past 20 years has been to offload the peak demand req uirements on the grid.

uctating power taking the grid into overload and trip states:

or allowing solar connections, and a week ago, the Lees completed their lon g journey through the energy bureaucracy: They had their rooftop unit insta lled. They're no longer worried about turning off the lights in empty rooms .

it was worth it.""

turning lights off in empty rooms.)

ing CFLs, using bulb life as a cost advantage to overcome the initial outla y. I blow *maybe* one incandescent bulb a year (I have one in the garage t hat does it) because I do shut off lights when we're watching TV and when I leave the room and usually have none on in the room to begin with. None a re on more than an hour a day.

I win ;-)

get subsidies so they can leave their lights on.

choice. The problem is that they don't want me to have that choice.

If krw showed any sign of being able to make rational choices, he'd be enti tled to complain about feeling that he was being deprived of that option.

As it is, he just tells us about his deeply felt convictions, without every actually justifying any of them. He may be capable of rational thought, bu t he's never demonstrated that he has that capacity.

te:

t presently and for the past 20 years has been to offload the peak demand r equirements on the grid.

-20121118

for allowing solar connections, and a week ago, the Lees completed their l ong journey through the energy bureaucracy: They had their rooftop unit ins talled. They're no longer worried about turning off the lights in empty roo ms.

ut it was worth it.""

urning lights off in empty rooms.)

shing CFLs, using bulb life as a cost advantage to overcome the initial outlay. I blow *maybe* one incandescent bulb a year (I have one in the garage that does it) because I do shut off lights when we're watching TV and when I leave the room and usually have none on in the room to begin with. None are on more than an hour a day.

cold weather. I put those in less-used places.

lick, but truthfully, I'm suspicious of their big blue spike. I betcha 20 years from now we'll find they cause cataracts and are bad for retinas. Bl ue and shorter does that, and it's cumulative. That's why sailors of old w ere night-blind.

It seems unlikely. The LED "big blue spike" is in the visible spectrum. CFL 's use phosphors to move rather harder UV down into the visible.

Sailors had to cope with the UV-A and UV-B in natural sunlight, not that th ere's a lot of UV-B, even in the tropics

and there's a lot less UV-A as you get well away from the equator - light-r ays traveling diagonally through the atmosphere lose quite a bit more UV-A than those going straight down.

get subsidies so they can leave their lights on.

. The problem is that they don't want me to have that choice.

and the incredible bureaucracy that doles it out.

James Arthur's bureaucracies really are incredible - they waste orders of m agnitude more money than real bureacracies ever do. You'd never know from h is rhetoric that Medicare and the UK National Health scheme spend a higher proportion of the money paid into their coffers on their patients than any private medical insurance scheme does.

ote:

and the incredible bureaucracy that doles it out.

In fact that's what krw and James Arthur think that government does. They h ave an irrational prejudice in favour of being ripped off by private enterp rise - they dream that the miraculous free market keeps private enterprise honest, but in fact without government intervention and monitoring private enterprise conspires to over-charge everybody.

Adam Smith was aware of it. But James Arthur and krw missed that particular lesson.

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and dive rsion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."

BULL! Most have two to four homes per pig. Singles are for either large consumers, or (GASP!) where someone lives on a lot of acreage with a very long driveway or a private road.

two to four per, so that would be every second pole?

We get 20 to 40 per transformer in suburban areas, and three phase is available for those who want it.

e:

presently and for the past 20 years has been to offload the peak demand r equirements on the grid.

for allowing solar connections, and a week ago, the Lees completed their lo ng journey through the energy bureaucracy: They had their rooftop unit inst alled. They're no longer worried about turning off the lights in empty room s.

t it was worth it.""

rning lights off in empty rooms.)

t to sunlit rooms being brightly lit even when empty.

Irrelevant.

hing CFLs, using bulb life as a cost advantage to overcome the initial outl ay. I blow *maybe* one incandescent bulb a year (I have one in the garage that does it) because I do shut off lights when we're watching TV and when I leave the room and usually have none on in the room to begin with. None are on more than an hour a day.

Ad hominem.

in ;-)

upposed to last longer if you don't turn them on and off too frequently - k eeping them on for about 20 minutes was once calculated to be optimal for s ome specific electricity price.

I already get optimal life.

stall solar panels mostly want to emit less CO2 - the subsidies (where they exist) do encourage them to go to the trouble of getting the panels and ge tting them fitted, and - once you are using renewable power - it does reduc e the guilt about leaving the lights on in empty rooms, but text-chopping t his sequence of motivations down to a desire to get subsidies for leaving l ights on in empty rooms does throw out a great deal of relevant information .

How much should taxpayers pay so the Lees can leave their lights on? How m any resources should be wasted on that?

As for snipping, sifting out extraneous detail is a service, not a vice.

h the polar opposite of informing other people.

Pointless sniping.

It's a technical point--they could've simply turned out their lights.

That saves even more carbon and costs nothing. Instead they've used more r esources, ravaged the planet, and inconvenienced others for nothing.

Too many people throw technology at non-technical problems.

Cheers, James Arthur

In some cases there seems to be two or even three pigs on a single pole. Are the pigs making a nest :-) or is it so that if some customer really needs three phases, you have to buy three single phase connections ??

In Finland the situation is the opposite. In most places you can't even get a _new_ single phase connection, it might still be available in some city centers but then only with a 25 A main fuse (5.7 kW). Of course, there are still a lot of old apartment single phase connections, but even those are slowly upgraded to three phase.

Sounds like someone has pig-envy.

My neighborhood has one pig per two houses but that's done for cabling reasons (between houses at the street). Each house has a 300A (72kW) entrance, as well, so the layout makes sense.

Oh, yes there is! Telecom centers traditionally have massive 48VDC battery systems, and those are the same folk that standardized 19" racks.

What you're talking about, is the server manufacturers (Dell and such) who want to sell you a rack system with their service contract, and (because their major customers aren't telecoms) don't fully support that 48V standard. So, their local repair subcontractors are not ready for an emergency service call with the 48V spares.

If you contract instead for a multirack/UPS system, you might find that the units that show up are PCs with 48V power inlets, prewired, with a big battery/charger/generator/AC-handler section. And water cooling.

ote:

st presently and for the past 20 years has been to off-load the peak demand requirements on the grid.

r-20121118

s for allowing solar connections, and a week ago, the Lees completed their long journey through the energy bureaucracy: They had their rooftop unit in stalled. They're no longer worried about turning off the lights in empty ro oms.

But it was worth it.""

turning lights off in empty rooms.)

ect to sunlit rooms being brightly lit even when empty.

ushing CFLs, using bulb life as a cost advantage to overcome the initial ou tlay. I blow *maybe* one incandescent bulb a year (I have one in the garag e that does it) because I do shut off lights when we're watching TV and whe n I leave the room and usually have none on in the room to begin with. Non e are on more than an hour a day.

Probably not. Krw may be a hominid, but he doesn't show any sign of being s apient.

win ;-)

supposed to last longer if you don't turn them on and off too frequently - keeping them on for about 20 minutes was once calculated to be optimal for some specific electricity price.

idies so they can leave their lights on.

install solar panels mostly want to emit less CO2 - the subsidies (where th ey exist) do encourage them to go to the trouble of getting the panels and getting them fitted, and - once you are using renewable power - it does red uce the guilt about leaving the lights on in empty rooms, but text-chopping this sequence of motivations down to a desire to get subsidies for leaving lights on in empty rooms does throw out a great deal of relevant informati on.

many resources should be wasted on that?

That depends on how worried you are about the rising CO2 level in the atmos phere, and how knowledgeable you about the unfortunate consequences of lett ing it get higher.

Since James Arthur has been brain-washed into a state where he can't think about these issues, there's no point in debating the matter with him.

When the devil is in the "extraneous" detail, the service can be more vicio us than it looks - what you don't see can hurt you.

uch the polar opposite of informing other people.

Whereas James Arthur goes in for politically motivated snipping.

resources, ravaged the planet, and inconvenienced others for nothing.

If the lights are being lit with renewably generated electricity it doesn't save any carbon at all. The solar panels won't last any longer if don't dr aw current from them, so leaving the lights on isn't actually ravaging the planet or inconveniencing anybody, though it may distress the economical el ements in James Ebeneezer Scrooge Arthur's soul.

Right, We should all walk to work. The bicycle is an excessively technologi cal solution.

So make it happed or develop your presentation or both.

?-)

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bring

we

going

factor

run

or

cities,

Two Words:

We'll see.

?-)

I've been kinda, sorta, almost, mostly on vacation for a week. I didn't go anywhere or do anything thrilling. Just no computahs and lots of cleanup, reading, tinkering, cloud watching, and thinking what I'll do with the million dollars from winning the Google inverter prize. Today is my first day back to work and the phone has been ringing almost continuously. However, I go for a massage in a few minutes. We'll soon see if I can remember whatever I promised on the phone this morning.

Well, England and France have been connected by HVDC since the 1960s without either of them going up in smoke :))

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