Votes for Renewables
 

The GE Ecomagination contest is almost closed for voting, running to the end of September. There are some good proposals there, and a lot of amusing ones. If you care to sign up to vote, I'd recommend
Hydrothermal Generation and Mining:
Hydrothermal Vents as a Constant, Uninterrupted Source of Multi-GW Energy : View Idea

Small, high-efficiency generator using any hot source, such as exhaust. (40% at 700C, all metal.)
High efficiency power generation device using any fuel or heat source : View Idea

Cheaper tidal generators, etc, - one I just wanted to get out there, because it bugs me to see conventional windmills being stuck on the ocean bottom.http://challenge.ecomagination.com/c...D-F7DC0B898A24

Unfortunately, this is a clear illustration of crowdsourcing gone awry. It looks like they needed to be more selective about whom to admit to the crowd, and the self-promoting "cheerbots" appear to be pushing random ideas, instead of good ideas, to the top.

I can't remember the last time I saw so many folks interested in vertical axis wind turbines.

...I believe the BEST (and quickest) results could be achieved by simply replacing Congress (wink,wink).

Yes, the site is badly designed and overloaded, and most of the entries don't even qualify, let alone work in a useful way. I hope some of the members here will help to raise the level of response. Given the nature of large corporations, the whole thing could easily do more harm than good, but some more informed and intelligent dialogue could help.
I used to wonder why the best promoters never seemed to be teamed up with the best inventors. It turns out that the last thing a salesman wants to hear from his peers is "Well, Anyone could sell that!" They want to succeed on their own merits, and can show off by promoting a fraud. The hordes of optimists who navigate through life without doing their sums make it easy.

That reminds of a commercial I heard earlier. Something along the lines of "We can work together to fix the problem by blaming someone else!" Congress in this case. :D

It's not like our political system has structural problems that lead to small wealthy groups fooling voters into acting against their own interests based on moral "issues" that are either going to be moot in a couple decades or never "solved", all while they effectively bribe the politicians those voters elect. So yeah, here's to a new congress, same as the old congress (exept w/ less publicity because everyone knows new people will "fix" stuff and junk)! :thumbup: