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Writers needed. Help search for and post interesting news and/or press releases.
Vice President Biden Commends Department of Education for Accelerating Recovery Act Funds
"Last week, the President asked me to work with the Cabinet to find ways to accelerate our already stepped-up Recovery Act efforts. I’m pleased to announce today that the Department of Education will be making over $2.5 billion in Recovery Act funds available to states in the coming days to support state education budgets, thereby helping states in fiscal distress. These Recovery Act funds will enable states to move quickly to protect critical jobs and will help states cope with their immediate budgetary challenges. I applaud Secretary Arne Duncan and his team for moving so quickly, and will continue to press the Cabinet to find ways to accelerate the pace of Recovery Act spending."
As news headlines this morning have been focusing on school districts around the country that are facing bankruptcy and closure, this seems as if help will be available to keep those schools open and functioning. Education is right up there at the top of my list of important rights all Americans should have, along with health care, and protections such as police and fire departments. Not a big supporter of the automobile and financial industry bailouts, I fully support this extra spending to support our schools.
Will save billions for consumers, business while helping to create new jobs and strengthen American competitiveness
WASHINGTON – Building on the action by the U.S. House of Representatives in passing historic legislation that will pave the way for the transition to a clean energy economy, President Barack Obama and U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu today announced aggressive actions to promote energy efficiency and save American consumers billions of dollars per year. Today’s announcement underscores how the clean energy revolution not only makes environmental sense, but it also makes economic sense – creating jobs and saving money.
"One of the fastest, easiest, and cheapest ways to make our economy stronger and cleaner is to make our economy more energy efficient," said President Obama. "That’s why we made energy efficiency investments a focal point of the Recovery Act. And that’s why today’s announcements are so important. By bringing more energy efficient technologies to American homes and businesses, we won’t just significantly reduce our energy demand; we’ll put more money back in the pockets of hardworking Americans."
"When it comes to saving money and growing our economy, energy efficiency isn’t just low hanging fruit; it’s fruit laying on the ground," said Secretary Chu. "The most prosperous, competitive economies of the 21st century will be those that use energy efficiently. It’s time for America to lead the way."
More Energy Efficient Lighting
Today’s announcement includes major changes to energy conservation standards for numerous household and commercial lamps and lighting equipment. Seven percent of all energy consumed in the U.S. is for lighting.
The final rule has numerous benefits, including:
- Avoiding the emission of up to 594 million tons of CO2 from 2012 through 2042 – roughly equivalent to removing 166 million cars from the road for a year;
- Saving consumers $1 to $4 billion annually from 2012 through 2042;
- Saving enough electricity from 2012 through 2042 to power every home in the U.S. for up to 10 months;
- Eliminating the need for up to 7.3 gigawatts of new generating capacity by 2042 – equivalent to as many as 14 500MW coal-fired power plants;
- Decreasing the electricity used in GSFLs by 15%, saving consumers up to $8.66 per lamp over its lifetime; decreasing electricity used by IRLs by 25%, saving consumers $7.95 per lamp over its lifetime.
In February 2009, President Obama tasked the Department of Energy with quickening the pace of energy conservation standards for appliances, while continuing to meet legal and statutory deadlines. Today’s announcement – which takes effect in 2012 – focuses on General Service Fluorescent Lamps (GSFL), which are commonly found in residential and commercial buildings, and Incandescent Reflector Lamps (IRL), which are commonly used in recessed and track lighting. These fluorescent and incandescent lamps represent approximately 38 and 7 percent of total lighting energy use respectively.
The final rule, as issued by the Secretary of Energy on June 26, 2009, can be viewed and downloaded from the Office Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s website at: www.eere.energy.gov/buildings/appliance_standards/residential/incandescent_lamps.html.
Building Efficiency Initiative
President Obama and Secretary Chu today announced a $346 million investment from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to expand and accelerate the development, deployment, and use of energy efficient technologies in all major types of commercial buildings as well as new and existing homes.
Residential and commercial buildings consume 40 percent of the energy and represent 40 percent of the carbon emissions in the United States. Building efficiency represents one of the easiest, most immediate and most cost effective ways to reduce carbon emissions while creating new jobs. With the application of new and existing technologies, buildings can be made up to 80 percent more efficient or even become "net zero" energy buildings with the incorporation of on-site renewable generation.
Today's buildings consume more energy than any other sector of the U.S. economy, including transportation and industry. In addition, almost three-quarters of our nation's 81 million buildings were built before 1979. Some were designed and constructed for limited service, and many will eventually require either significant retrofits or replacement.
Innovations in energy-efficient building envelopes, equipment, lighting, daylighting, and windows, in conjunction with advances in passive solar, photovoltaic, fuel cells, advanced sensors and controls and combined heating, cooling, and power, have the potential to dramatically transform today's buildings. These technologies—coupled with a whole building design approach that optimizes the interactions among building systems and components—will enable tomorrow's buildings to use considerably less energy, while also helping to reduce emissions and increase energy security.
This funding includes:
Advanced Building Systems Research ($100 million). These projects will address research focused on the systems design, integration, and control of both new and existing buildings. Buildings need to be designed, built, operated, and maintained as an integrated system in order to achieve the potential of energy efficient and eventually net zero-energy buildings. These projects will move beyond component-only driven research and address the interactions in buildings as a whole, in order to progress development of integrated, high performance buildings and achieve net zero- energy buildings.
Residential Buildings Development and Deployment ($70 million). Expanded work in Residential Buildings will increase homeowner energy savings by supporting energy efficient retrofits and new homes while raising consumer awareness of the benefits of increased health, safety, and durability of energy efficiency. The projects will provide technical support to train workers and create jobs, developing a new workforce equipped to improve the Nation’s homes and will permit a major initiative to provide builders with technical assistance and training through states, utilities, and existing programs to increase the market share of new homes achieving substantial whole house energy savings. To address existing homes, DOE will work with municipalities with a variety of housing types and vintages as well as subdivisions with similar housing stock to encourage a large number of energy efficiency retrofits.
Commercial Buildings Initiative ($53.5 million). These Recovery Act funds will be used to accelerate and expand partnerships with major companies that design, build, own, manage, or operate large fleets of buildings and that commit to achieving exemplary energy performance. This funding will be used to expand the number of these partnerships from 23 to about 75 through a competitive process beginning in September, 2009.
Buildings and Appliance Market Transformation ($72.5 million). In order to achieve energy savings, and ultimately lead to zero energy buildings, the marketplace must be conditioned to accept the necessary advanced technologies and activities and ensure that the current technologies are performing as intended via current energy efficiency standards. Key activities include expanding ENERGY STAR to accelerate development of energy efficient products and expand the ENERGY STAR brand into new areas; preparing the design, construction, and enforcement community to implement commercial building energy codes that require a 30 percent improvement in energy efficiency over the 2004 code in 2010; and accelerating and expanding DOE’s Appliance Standards program to evaluate innovative technologies and develop new test procedures that are more representative of today's energy use and equipment.
Solid State Lighting Research and Development ($50 million). The objective of the solid state lighting activities is to advance state-of-the-art of solid-state lighting (SSL) technology and to move those advancements more rapidly to market through a coordinated development of advanced manufacturing techniques. This project will both aid in the development and reduce the first cost of high performance lighting products. Continuing advances can accelerate progress towards creating a U.S.-led market for high efficiency light sources that save more energy, reduce costs, and have less environmental impact than other conventional light sources.
For information on these and other Funding Opportunities under the Recovery Act, visit: www.energy.gov/recovery/funding.htm.
President and First Lady to Join Hundreds of Congressional Family Members for ‘United We Serve’ Service Project at Fort McNair
WASHINGTON, DC – On Thursday, June 25th, the President and First Lady will join hundreds of Congressional family members and five national nonprofit organizations to prepare 15,000 backpacks with books, healthy snacks, Frisbees and other items for the children of servicemen and women. The service event is part of United We Serve, President Obama’s call to all Americans to engage in service projects and create meaningful impact in their towns and communities. The United We Serve summer service initiative began June 22nd and runs through the National Day of Service and Remembrance on September 11th. The initiative is being led by the Corporation for National and Community Service, the federal agency dedicated to fostering service in communities across the country.
The service event will take place at 10:00 AM EDT on Thursday at Fort McNair, prior to the annual Congressional picnic.
MORE INFORMATION
President Obama Announces More Key Administration Posts
WASHINGTON, DC – The president announced his intent to nominate the following individuals for key administration posts yesterday: Rafael Borras, Under Secretary for Management , Department of Homeland Security; James L. Hudson, Director of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development; Brenda Dann-Messier, Assistant Secretary for Vocational and Adult Education, Department of Education; Dr. Kerri-Ann Jones, Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, Department of State; Bryan H. Samuels, Commissioner of the Administration on Children, Youth and Families, Health and Human Services; and Christopher A. Hart, Member, National Transportation Safety Board
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I read an article posted by another orbler about aliens on the moon. Intrigued, I read the linked article, and many of the links to that. Then I decided to research the information on my own. Here is a bit of what I found:
YouTube interview with Buzz Aldrin - the former astronaut explains the "UFO" seen by the Apollo 11 crew. He states that it technically was an Unidentified Flying Object, but only because they couldn't identify which part of their equipment it was, claiming to be 99.9% certain that it was man (meaning HUMAN) made - a part of their equipment that was discarded as part of their maneuvers
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I recently posted here about a company selling tiny land plots in all 50 states in the US. Now, I've come across one that sells slightly larger (1 square foot) plots on an island in Scotland. Not only does this make you a landowner - it also makes you a titled Laird (lord) or Lady!
That's right, folks, for just $50 you can become a titled Scottish Lord. Apparantly, the title simply means landowner. Therefore, by purchasing a 1 square foot plot of land, you officially become a Laird or Lady
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Want your own piece of land - for only $4? Then this interesting tidbit is just for you.
(New York, NY) So, you want to be a “cheese head?” Been rooting for Brett Farve all these years from your living room couch in New York, California or any state other than the home state of the Green Bay Packers football team? Well your prayers have been answered by a NYC based company, American Acres, Inc., whose website, www.OwnaPieceofAmerica.us is selling land in Marquette County, Wisconsin for $3.95. Sure, it’s only a one square inch in size, but you will have your name on a legal, full-sized deed…and that’s big
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141 Posts dating from December 2006
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DeAnne
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