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The West Coast Hippie Project – Introduction
I’m sure most of the people reading this article have heard plenty of talk about our environment and the coming energy crisis and how we need to look into alternative energies to help us through it all.
So then, what exactly is "alternative energy"? As the term suggests, it’s energy we get from other than the usual sources. Energy, of course, is what we use to move things, heat things, cool things – in a nutshell, if we need to change something, we’ll need energy to do it. As a society we’ve become quite spoiled - in the winter we use energy to keep warm, in the summer we use energy to stay cool. We always use energy to drive around, to have a warm shower, a warm meal, a cool fridge, to keep you entertained…. You get the picture.
Currently, the way we are obtaining our energy to keep us all comfortable and happy is getting us into a little bit of trouble, and all of our individual little bits of trouble are adding up to a planet in trouble. I’m sure by now everyone has heard of global warming and of its effects, so I won’t go into the details here (I have more details in the Global Warming section of our links page).
Alternative energy is a different way for us to keep doing the things we’re doing. Let’s be honest - not too many of us are willing to give up our lifestyles, even if it endangers the lives of our children (us humans are funny that way), so the other option is to look at how we can get our energy without the mess. That can include the obvious ones, such as using solar panels and windmills instead of coal-fired electric plants, using electric cars instead of (increasingly expensive) gasoline, and we will also explore some of the less obvious alternatives. I will be discussing all of these in details, complete with some real-life examples. My website will contain an archive of all of these articles, along with useful links, detailed plans with pictures, and of course videos of the projects and experiments as they are being performed and constructed.
In my next article I will discuss something that is dear to all of our hearts right now – gasoline prices. I’ll discuss what we can do, and what, if any, alternatives are available to us today, and in the near future.
Stay tuned, this is going to be a fun ride. For now, please turn off that unused light bulb – think of the children!
Stay Happy!
- Nico, The West Coast Hippie.
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www.westcoasthippie.com
Nico teWinkel, B.Sc., has a passion for alternative energies. He shares his research and provides ideas that can help anyone live a greener life.
© 2007 The West Coast Hippie