Elasticity, Albuquerque Style
From my colleague Lloyd Jojola, further evidence that rising gasoline prices are changing behavior:
ABQ Ride reported today that there were 1,000,126 passenger boardings in August 2008, the first time ridership has exceeded 1 million for a single month.
On Drilling
In the Bulletin of th Atomic Scientists, of all places, Kurt Zenz House makes an articulate argument for why expanded domestic oil drilling is both a good idea and matters very little:
What we’re watching is the thread of a decent argument–that when oil prices are very high, the United States should expand oil exploration and extraction–get hijacked and oversold by liars and fools who cannot perform basic arithmetic. Indeed, it appears that expanding domestic oil and gas exploration may become the signature issue of the 2008 presidential campaign. Voters are so obsessed with high gasoline prices–and apparently so mathematically challenged–that the slogan, “Drill here, drill now,” has come to both symbolize presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain’s campaign and to concisely sum up the absurd belief that if we only did so, the United States would be back on track. Indeed, McCain himself–a man for whom I have a great respect–appears to be playing the role of the newest apostle of the domestic drilling cult; and it’s cliché that no one preaches as feverishly as the recently converted.
T. Boone Pickens
I’ve been tasked to do some a story for the Journal on T. Boone Pickens’ energy ideas. Y’all are smart about this sort of thing. Open thread: what are the central issues?
Some Stuff I Wrote Elsewhere
- on the unsurprising fact that we use less water when it rains (unsurprising but nevertheless a demonstration that we’re paying attention, and not just blindly watering our bermuda grass)
- T. Boone is bringing his wind-powered carnival to Albuquerque next week
The Times-Picayune
No power, no printing presses, but they keep on publishing. There is no more heroic news organization than the New Orleans Times-Picayune.
Should I Turn That Light Off?
In this week’s energy tip, Al Zelicoff answers the question that won’t go away: Is it better to turn the light off if I’m only going to be out of the room for a few minutes?
Tyler Cowen on Climate Models
Make of climate models what you may, there is lots of evidence that a) biodiversity is being hammered, and b) climate change will bring desertification, drought, and possibly coastal flooding to many parts of the world, among other dilemmas. I don’t have a lot of faith in the exact predictive powers of climate models, or for that matter economic models, but uncertainty about outcomes should make us worry more not less. Uncertainty usually has two tails, not just one.
Free Iris
It took about 10 minutes from the time Lissa put up the “free iris” sign this morning until the first neighbor drove up to grab a bag.
The iris bed has gotten a little out of control, and Lissa and I skipped our Saturday morning walk to work on it. She scored some cheap fountain grass at Home Depot, so she ask for my help in clearing some space among the iris for them.
Mostly, I played with her new camera and sat on the front porch with the laptop, making excuses about my knee and trying to spot the woodpecker we kept hearing in the locust tree, but the fiction of working together is pleasant.
The sunflowers are still out, and we’ve been getting little goldfinches – the only bird small enough to really eat them. The first clumps of yellow are appearing on the cottonwood across the street, and the wind has a cool edge even though it’s a sweating hot morning (the few times I actually leaned into a shovel to help confirmed this fact).
Last Sunday we went to the last Isotopes home game of the season, a warm Sunday evening that cooled off more quickly than a summer night should, but which was still warm enough to feel like baseball weather.
The free iris season is one of the best indicators of fall at our house, and I do love the fall.
How I Use Twitter
Watching my young friend Kelsey’s feed for the Gustav evacuation order. (So far, so good.)
update: evacuation order has been issued.