House of Solar

A great context check.

Top 5 Alarming World Poverty Statistics

5. More than 800 million people suffer from malnutrition.

4. The United States spends 0.16% of its budget on aid to poor countries, the second lowest percentage among all developed countries.

3. A worker in Bangladesh making garments for Disney would have to work 210 years in order to earn what Disney’s CEO gets paid in one hour.

2. 35,000 children a day die from diseases related to malnutrition, or 1 every 2 seconds.

1. Over three billion people (roughly half the world’s population) live on less than two dollars a day.

Top 5 Alarming United States Poverty Statistics

5. In 1968, the minimum wage was 86% of the living wage. By 1998, that figure had fallen to 64%.

4. On any given night, 750,000 Americans do not have shelter, or 1 in 400.

3. 40 million Americans do not have medical insurance, 0r 1 in 8.

2. 10 million Americans go hungry each day, 40% of them children.

1. In 1996, one in four Americans under 18 was living in poverty.

Top 10 Alarming United States Wealth Statistics

10. Since 1950, Americans have used up more resources than everyone who ever lived on earth before 1950.

9. In 2000, CEO’s earned 475 times what their average workers made.

8. 57% of those listed on the 1997 Forbes 400 started life as millionaires.

7. Americans spend more on trash bags than 90 other countries spend on everything.

6. 27% of people earning over $100,000 agree that “I cannot afford to buy everything I really need.”

5. On 15% of Americans report that they would be satisfied with a comfortable middle-class lifestyle.

4. The Unites States comprises 5% of the world’s population, yet accounts for 40% of its gasoline consumption.

3. The average size of a new home today is double what it was in the 1950’s.

2. The average American consumes 5 times more than a Mexican, 10 times more than a Chinese person, and 30 times more than someone from India.

1. If everyone in the world consumed at the same rate as Americans do, we would need six planet earths to meet the demand for resources.

I thought this was very interesting.

Sometimes I post things and team members comment that my post was not about solar energy. My goal is to share information about the world and how we can create a world we want to live in . I think out current state of living has been caused by lack of consciousness about our actions and our results. I we can become more intentional about our results we can change the world. If we can organize our own closets , we can change the world.

-Tim Padden
House of Solar
“If you want to go quickly , go alone. If you want to go far , go with others.”

Written by Philip Proefrock
Tuesday, 18 March 2008

Lots of people are getting excited about all the various technologies for using biofuels of one sort or another as a replacement for fossil fuels, and they may present a short-term option. But looking at the various kinds of energy production that are possible gives some insight into the best directions to promote in terms of developing long-term efficient energy production.

A study cited on EV World makes a comparison between different crop- and direct-production methods of generating energy in terms of miles per acre per year, with some eye-opening information.

At the bottom end of the scale is soybean biodiesel, which can provide only 2,400 miles per acre per year. Corn ethanol is more than six times as efficient, yielding 18,000 miles per acre per year. But because of the relatively slow rate of production from plant-based fuels, these options far fall below the productivity of directly produced energy.

The same acre can produce 10 times as much energy from wind as it can from corn ethanol, 180,000 miles per acre per year. But both corn ethanol and wind power pale in comparison with solar photovoltaic, which can produce more than 2 million miles worth of transport per acre per year.

This is not to completely dismiss biofuels out-of-hand. The cost of an acre’s worth of solar PV arrays is far more than 100 times more expensive than planting an acre of corn. Many biofuels can be produced on marginal lands that are ill-suited for solar. And cellulosic ethanol can even be produced from waste, effectively making it a zero land-use fuel. And presumably the comparisons are based on sites that are optimal for each mode of generation. A site that is highly suitable for harvesting wind energy may not be a good site for growing corn, and vice versa.

The infrastructure and the existing “car parc” (the entire fleet of all vehicles in the country) is also going to take decades to turn over to the point where a significant proportion of the vehicles on the road are electric vehicles. Both a mix of energy sources and regionally appropriate choices need to be part of a comprehensive energy plan. But this offers a useful comparison that suggests where the best allocation of resources should be focused in terms of long-range planning for our energy future. ————————

Biofuels versus Solar
Lutz’s identification of ‘electric’ car technology as the top priority program at GM may prove prescient if 2006 turns out to be the year world crude oil production peaked. Assuming we are in for a gradual, but steady decline in oil production over the coming decade, the focus on electric drive and related energy efficiency technologies will be critical in more ways than we may think.

With the declining availability of once vast reserves of ancient sunlight we’ve been pulling out of the ground at breakneck speeds, future generations are going to have to rely increasingly on the available sunlight that falls on the planet each day either in the form of biomass-based fuels (biodiesel and ethanol) or on electricity generated by the wind or directly from sunlight.

Five Star Consultants’ Ken Regelson recently did a study that examined these alternatives from the perspective of “yield in miles driven per acre of land per year.” The results are pretty amazing and fall in line with a similar study done in Germany and published in Photon International. See Drive Further on Sunlight.

Obviously, the most efficient way to move a vehicle when measured in use of land area is converting sunlight directly into electricity to run electric cars, everything else with the exception of biodiesel derived from algae, pales by comparison.

By Barry Cinnamon
Article Launched: 02/26/2008 01:32:34 AM PST

This week the House of Representatives will vote on the Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation Tax Act of 2008. This act would eliminate $18 billion in tax breaks for oil companies to help pay for extending renewable energy tax credits. If the House approves, we’ll see if Senate Republicans can vote for good energy and environmental policy – or just vote for Big Oil again.

We’ve been through this before. In December, at the urging of the White House, Senate Republicans voted along party lines to defeat a similar bill. This year, Republican opposition to this bill and favoritism to Big Oil are becoming themes of the presidential campaign.

The result is that solar power and other forms of renewable energy have become politicized, much to the detriment of everyone who uses electricity and cares about the environment.

We are fortunate to have leaders in California who understand both the need and the potential for the renewable energy industry. Sparked by the California Solar Initiative – Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “Million Solar Roofs” program – investments in clean tech and related technologies have exploded in California. On a local level, Mayor Chuck Reed’s “Green Vision” will create 25,000 new jobs in Silicon Valley as we move toward a future of 100 percent renewable power, alternative fuel vehicles and wastewater recycling.

So it looks like the next new thing is clean tech: silicon for solar cells as well as chips. But there’s a cloud on the horizon – the

federal government’s apparent hostility to any industry that has the potential to impede Big Oil. We’ve seen this with absurdly lame corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards, the Environmental Protection Agency’s refusal to allow California to regulate its own emissions and the outright obstruction of the Kyoto Protocol’s efforts. I’ve been a registered Republican for more than 20 years. This year I find it impossible to support a party that bends to the wishes of Big Oil. Their excuse is that the White House does not want to reduce incentives for finding new sources of oil and gas. We’ve obviously got an energy shortage, but let’s put these renewable energy incentives in perspective.

Renewable energy legislation that Republicans should pass moves $18 billion in tax incentives from Big Oil to the renewable energy industry over 10 years. In 2007 alone, the profits of the top five oil companies were more than $120 billion – at the current pace, they’d generate $1.2 trillion in profits during the same 10-year period.

Sound public policy is compromised when there is that much money at risk by incumbent industries. As a result, many people in the renewable energy industry are resigned to wait until the next president takes office for any substantive change in federal policy. But that delay will jeopardize thousands of Silicon Valley jobs, cost our local economy billions of dollars and, compared with the rest of the world, puts us just that much farther behind.

It’s an opportunity lost for the most obvious of reasons – Big Oil’s influence on our country’s energy and environmental policies. The impact is now being felt economically as higher energy prices create inflationary pressures. Our economy is going into a recession while our country writes continually bigger checks to foreign oil producers.

Big Oil does not need tax breaks while they’re earning record – some say windfall – profits. Senate and House Republicans need to wake up to the fact that their continued votes for Big Oil are embarrassing and politically suicidal. Our country’s energy policies are an economic and environmental dead end, and we cannot wait until next year to turn around. Let’s get an energy bill passed now that removes unnecessary support for Big Oil and accelerates the growth of clean, renewable power.

Powur of Citizenre – 10 Commandments of Advertising
Taken from the Associate Module 5
Rules of Advertising
______________________________

1.Thou shalt not use the Citizenre name in your advertising unless it
is an approved article or an approved resource created by the company
for your use.

2.Thou shalt not state that our solar units are FREE. This is a weak
posture. They are not free. Never try to “bait and switch” your
prospect. Trust is a delicate thing. You can say “No purchase
required” or “No equipment to purchase”–but our product is not free.
You can explain how our model is like providing the satellite to sell
the monthly programming… just don’t use the word free.

3.Thou shalt not imply employment or a job if you are advertising for
Ecopreneurs, and thou shalt not guarantee or promise an income.

4.Thou shalt not use our video on any website other than our corporate
site. The footage on our video has strict copyrights and any postings
on You Tube or Google video or any private sites could compromise our
use of that footage.

5.Thou shalt not use the names of our celebrity endorsers in your
advertising. Especially do not use the name of Morgan Freeman. It is
his voice on our video, but that clip was not recorded for
Citizenre.We were given the rights to use it.

6.Thou shalt always be professional and completely ethical when
communicating with prospects. Often the loudest skeptics become our
strongest advocates if you can answer all of their questions with
class. Even if you are not using the name of Citizenre in your ad,
your ad will still lead back to our site. The impression you make is
important.

7.Thou shalt never use any advertising that is misleading. Citizenre
does NOT sell electricity. That would make us a utility and put us
under a completely new set of regulations. We are the manufacturer and
renter (not lease) of an appliance that happens to produce
electricity. The customer actually produces their own power from the
system we rent them. Hence, we give power back to the people. Do not
state or imply that we sell electricity.

8.Thou shalt not promote our service or opportunity on any
“questionable” websites. This includes, but is not limited to,
websites that promote pornography, gambling, or anything that some
people might find offensive or that could tarnish our stellar image.
Also, you can not post on Ebay (or any auction site) or any site where
you are breaking their policies. Don’t try to cheat your way to
success. Be smart.

9.Thou shalt not represent yourself as an employee or agent of
Citizenre. If you use the name Citizenre on your answering machine,
you MUST use the words Independent Ecopreneur or Independent Associate
or Independent Direct Seller.

10.Thou shalt follow the Policies and Procedures and represent
Citizenre in an ethical and professional manner at all times. You will
be the initial point of contact many people will have with our mission–
make a great impression. You are the first line of enthusiasm and your
energy creates the Powur of Citizenre. You make a difference.

Check out www.Greendrinks.org

If you are looking for a way to Grow your business /meet and greet others that share an environmental interest . This just might be the place to do it .

I hear this all the time so I made a page just for you .

Click on the link below . It shows you the artwork that will post and gives you the code to put in your web page.

http://www.houseofsolar.com/pics/

Tim Padden
House of Solar

JUST LIKE THIS- Click to test

Now is the time to get out and promote yourself on the Web looking for customers and associates. When the announcement is made your advertisement will become one of thousands but today it can be front and center.

If you would like to learn more about how to do this send me an email and I will put together a Conference call to walk you through being effective with inexpensive advertising.

How_to_Place_Google_Ad

Google online PPT 

-Tim Padden

House of Solar

By Solar Nation

January 4, 2008On the energy and environmental front, anyone following the presidential primaries today can make some fairly safe predictions about our sustainable future without even picking a winner from the thirteen major candidates. In its 2008 Voters’ Guide, the League of Conservation Voters has compared and tabulated the energy policies of all the presidential hopefuls (see tables below). The League doesn’t over-editorialize, but it’s clear from even an unbiased reading of their positions that the country will go in a diametrically different direction in 2009 depending largely on the party of the 44th president.

To compare the competing Democrats, one would think they were vying to establish which of them is the greenest one of all. And while this could be construed as one-upmanship at this point in the race, it’s also a good indication of how seriously each of them takes ‘green’ issues. They have all published detailed, thoughtful plans on how they would deal with the issues of energy independence and climate change, and what’s most encouraging about them is the extent to which they see the twin issues as interdependent. Here’s a simplified summary of their positions:

For the most part, Republicans also talk up a storm on energy independence, but somehow miss the connection to climate change mitigation. This leads them to interpret our energy future mostly in terms of new nuclear power plants, old coal, clean coal, liquid coal and business-as-usual in Detroit and the oil states. Examining their positions on the same seven issues listed above, we see a wider spectrum of responses, ranging from mildly supportive to insouciant to frighteningly hostile:

As can be seen, Governor Huckabee and Senator McCain lift themselves somewhat above their competitors with support for fuel efficiency and carbon emission limits, but with these exceptions noted, the Republican candidates seem to be sharing a generally reactionary platform. Candidate Ron Paul’s position on energy is perhaps scarier than most, as he does not appear to have given much thought to the seven major issues measured; on fuel efficiency and coal plants he has shown himself no friend to clean energy or the environment, while on the other five issues he hasn’t recorded any position whatsoever.

Giuliani’s and Thompson’s records show opposition to virtually everything beneficial to the environment, and support for continued use of coal in any form. And the campaign promise of the former governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney, to bring large-scale clean energy technology to market, clashes with his public opposition to the nation’s largest proposed offshore wind project off the coast of the Bay State.

Overall, the impression given by the campaign literature of GOP hopefuls is that the energy/environmental debate has not been worthy of serious thought, nor has it featured in their spoken rhetoric as much as immigration, healthcare or the Iraq war. Compared with some of the Democratic candidates’ meticulously crafted plans with their targets, pricetags and deadlines, the Republican contenders seem to be paying lip service to an issue they know does not excite the general public. And so far as government support for clean energies such as solar is concerned, most of them mention it only as afterthoughts to ideas for increased use of coal, drilling in the ANWR and building more nuclear plants, measures that may offset some fossil fuel imports but will exacerbate environmental problems already approaching crisis levels.

So in this exercise in crystal ball gazing, you could probably get just as accurate a result with a two-dollar snowglobe. With Huckabee and McCain, and to a greater extent with the six Democrats, there is a sense of recognition of the comparative importance of the energy issue. It’s the recognition that whereas we can survive not finding a perfect solution to some of the more emotionally charged issues in politics today, we can’t survive a failure to address effectively—and on a national scale—the interrelated issues of energy and environment.

It’s also difficult to escape the conclusion that, in the event of a candidate in the mold of Giuliani, Paul, Romney or Thompson being sworn in next January, the brotherly relationship between the oil & gas industry and Government that characterized the Bush Administration will become, if anything, measurably cozier.