superfast charging

As usual, the US falls behind. Hardly on the map.

This Danish Ultrafast Charging Station Could Transform Stop Off Points

The race is on along Europe's 'electric superhighway' from Norway to Italy to build super-fast charging stations. This September, the first of some 180 minimalist charging stations along the route is expected to open in Fredericia, Denmark, built by Danish e-mobility provider Clever in partnership with European electric utility E.On, and it's going to look very different from a conventional service station.   

Last year, BMW, Daimler, Ford, and Volkswagen also announced that they would be building 400 high-power charging stations in Germany, Norway, and Austria by 2020, as part of a joint venture called IONITY. 

Clever and E.On's charging stations will initially be able to charge a full 400km-range battery in 20-30 minutes, effectively as fast as IONITY's, and up to speed with Tesla's Superchargers. Charging times are expected to be slashed as technology improves: ABB, whose technology Clever is using,  recently unveiled details of its 350 kW charging points which will provide a range of  180-200 miles (322 kilometers) in just eight minutes.  Clever's EV charging sites will stand at every 75-112 miles (120-180 kilometers) with between two and six charge points at each.

COBE architects have designed for Clever a classic charging station, with more than a hint of Danish designer Arne Jacobson's groundbreaking Skovshoved Gas Station.

Forget garish colors and petrol fumes, and think of some of the more picturesque aires along France's Autoroute du Soleil. Clever's service stations will be an oasis in the middle of the highway, perfumed by the scent of thyme, rosemary, and lavender.

"We wanted to create a new archetype," says Marie Kristine Schmidt, CXO of Clever. "We wanted to convey that sense of freedom you have when you are in your car." 

The result is a 'green heart with digital offerings', as Schmidt calls it. "These electric charging stations will be much more than just somewhere to charge up and stretch your legs. They're going to be a sensory experience, something you don't usually expect when you set out on a long journey."

There will be play areas for children and places to stretch out. Clever's modular design means that a café/restaurant can be placed in “the green heart” very easily, but there no plans to open food outlets if the stations are close to existing ones. With the Northern European habit of taking along your coffee and lunch in your rucksack, that shouldn't be a problem.

The flagship project has received 10 million euros in funding from the European Commission, but Schmidt admits that more than this is going to be needed to complete all 180 electric service stations.

"Right now the market is in the early phase of the build-up," she says.  "Growth will be exponential but you need to make the decision to become part of it."

Sales of electric vehicles will reach 11 million by 2025 before racing to 30 million by 2030 as they become cheaper than petrol and diesel vehicles, up from just 1.1 million last year, according to Bloomberg. By 2040 the impact will be even more pronounced.

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Orlando Sentinel

There is trouble in Trump country, From the Orlando (FL) Sentinel editorial board.

Our Orlando Sentinel endorsement for president in 2020: Not Donald Trump | Editorial

Donald Trump is in Orlando to announce the kickoff of his re-election campaign.

We’re here to announce our endorsement for president in 2020, or, at least, who we’re not endorsing: Donald Trump.

Some readers will wonder how we could possibly eliminate a candidate so far before an election, and before knowing the identity of his opponent.

Because there’s no point pretending we would ever recommend that readers vote for Trump.

After 2½ years we’ve seen enough.

Enough of the chaos, the division, the schoolyard insults, the self-aggrandizement, the corruption, and especially the lies.

So many lies — from white lies to whoppers — told out of ignorance, laziness, recklessness, expediency or opportunity.

Trump’s capacity for lying isn’t the surprise here, though the frequency is.

It’s the tolerance so many Americans have for it.

There was a time when even a single lie — a phony college degree, a bogus work history — would doom a politician’s career.

Read the rest here.

do your duty!

If the Democrats cannot muster enough spine to impeach the most deserving person EVER, what will it take?

Democrats, Do Your Damned Duty!

Doing what is right on impeachment should not be a mere option

by Charles Blow

What the hell is it going to take, Democrats?!

What evidence and impetus would compel you to do the job the Constitution, patriotism and morality dictate?

What is it going to take to make you initiate an impeachment inquiry?

Your slow walking of this issue and your specious arguments about political calculations are pushing you dangerously close to a tragic, historic dereliction of duty, one that could do irreparable damage to the country and the Congress.

Robert Mueller on Wednesday finally made a public statement about his damning report of Russian meddling in the 2016 election, the Trump’s campaign’s connection to it, and President Trump’s own attempts to obstruct the investigation.

In addition to underscoring the point that Russians interfering in the election “deserves the attention of every American,” efforts that continued unabated and have never been sufficiently addressed by Trump, he made clear again:

“And as set forth in the report after that investigation, if we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so. We did not, however, make a determination as to whether the president did commit a crime.”

He made clear, contrary to Attorney General Bill Barr’s assessment, that he was prevented from making that determination based on the Justice Department’s policy against indicting a sitting president. As Mueller puts it, “the opinion says that the Constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing.”

Congress, that means you. Specifically, Democrats in control of the House, that means you!

There is no right time to wait to do what you know is right. There is only now.

This ridiculous windup of processing through subpoenas and court fights, scheduling testimony and hearings, are patrician formalities in the middle of a blood battle.

Stop telling the American people what Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Rolling Stone in February: “It’s a very disruptive process to put the country through, and it’s an opportunity cost in terms of time and resources. You don’t want to go down that path unless it is unavoidable.”

What the hell does that mean? Opportunity cost is an economics term referring to value of something that will be missed due to the making of another choice. It’s all calculation for the leadership, conscience be damned.

The country is already suffering through an unimaginable horror, and watching as a lawless president and a corrupt administration are being allowed to operate carte blanche due to Democrats’ squeamishness about their political prospects and compromised conservatives’ concerns about their own.

Politicians point to Trump’s stratospheric approval among Republicans and the middling approval for impeachment among the broader populations, without acknowledging that they aren’t simply laboring under those realities but helping to create them.

The fact that almost no prominent Republican politician will stand up against Trump and for right and rule of law means that in that universe, Trump’s narrative is the only narrative. Their silence is — or at least gives the appearance of — acquiescence and tacit approval.

The same goes for impeachment. The Democratic leadership in Congress simply won’t forcefully make a case for why it must begin now, for the health of the country. They want instead to have it appear that they have exhausted all options and were forced into the decision, if they ever arrive at that decision.

That is a coward’s way out. Democratic leadership, you are lying to the American people too. You are terribly disappointing all of the many people who organized and registered to vote and came out in droves in the midterms.

Republicans have their fangs bared and you have your tails tucked. You are an embarrassment. There is no polite way to fight. Fighting is nasty, instinctual and vicious. Good people don’t relish it, but goodness dies and ruin is left in its wake when good people don’t fight when fighting is required.

I am at my wits’ end with the fear. I live by a different creed: Never be afraid to do what’s right. And, I don’t believe that opening an impeachment inquiry helps Trump in 2020 and hurts Democrats.

To the contrary, I trust truth. I believe in the eternal power of truth to transform and to withstand the crucible.

Democrats need to stop worrying about how best to weaken Trump’s support among his base. It seems to me that the Democratic leadership is worrying more about Trump’s base than their own.

I want to be able to believe in equitable justice in this country. I want to believe that no person is above the law. I want to believe that wealth and power will not insulate those who possess them from a justice that would be enacted upon the poor and powerless with ruthless efficiency.

But, every time I want to believe that, America — its history and its present — asserts in booming clarity that that is not the case, that is not how or why the system was built.

Democrats have a chance, but more important, an obligation to assert in opposition that on occasion American justice can be blind. I would argue that there is an even more profound opportunity cost to not pursuing impeachment.

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Houstonification

We moved from Houston to South Padre Island in January of 2017. It was great to get away from the frequent odors, haze, and explosions from the myriad chemical plants east of Houston. It appears that the petrochemical industry now wants to spoil yet another segment of coastline. We should be moving full throttle towards renewables, but the regressive, corrupt Trump will have none of it. There is a lot of opposition here. Will it be enough?

The "Houstonification" of our coast

by Jim Chapman

Special to the Press

Unlike Port Arthur, Pasadena, Beaumont and Corpus Christi, the oil and gas industry has a light presence on our Cameron County coastline. We have been spared the heavy petrochemical industrialization that has blighted much of the Texas coast. But thanks to the “vision” of the Brownsville Navigation District (BND), that may drastically change. 

First there are the three liquified natural gas terminals, which while not permitted yet, they are still hoping to build. If built they will be far and away the largest sources of air pollution in the Rio Grande Valley, and will transform the wetlands, salt prairie and brush between Port Isabel and the Port of Brownsville into an industrial landscape instantly recognizable by anyone familiar with the upper Texas coast. Now, knocking at the door is Jupiter MLP, which if approved and built will include a “condensate” (light crude oil) refinery that will produce 170,000 barrels a day of gasoline, diesel and other hydrocarbons. Also, it will include 10 million barrels of hydrocarbon storage (27 tanks), three large marine loading berths for Panamex-sized tankers and barges, an offshore tanker terminal, a 650 mile 35 inch oil pipeline, and two 120-car oil trains passing through downtown Harlingen, San Benito and Olmito every day. 

In terms of air pollutants, Jupiter intends to emit 984 tons per year of nitric oxides, 218 tons per year of sulfur dioxide, 527 tons per year of carbon monoxide, and 91 tons per year of small (2.5 microns) particulate matter. Every April and May the Valley already has some of the highest particulate matter levels in the state, and this is the kind of air pollution that is particularly bad for people with asthma and other respiratory problems. When you add Jupiter’s proposed emissions to those of the LNG terminals, the results are staggering, dwarfing 300-fold the current largest stationary source of air pollution, the Silas Ray power plant. There will also be unmeasured and unregulated discharges of hydrogen sulfide and sulfuric acid mist. With the prevailing SSE wind, Los Fresnos will be downwind. 

Besides the air pollution, safety concerns and environmental degradation, there is an even more important reason these projects should never be built: global warming. The scientists know that even to meet the Paris Agreement goals by 2050, carbon emissions from energy and industry, which are still rising, will have to fall by half each decade. In the words of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), “rapid and profound near-term decarbonization” must begin now. Over three-quarters of all the carbon humanity has put into the atmosphere has accrued since the end of WWII, a single human lifetime. For the BND to push these fossil-fuel -intensive projects forward, which will have lifespans of 30 or more years, is to push us into a higher-carbon future, when the overwhelming scientific consensus is that we must do the opposite. The total greenhouse gas emissions of the three LNG projects plus Jupiter would be 15,151,054 tons per year. 

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is holding a public meeting on Jupiter’s air pollution permit, Permit 147681, and greenhouse gas permit GHGPSDTX172, on Tuesday, May 28, 7 pm at the Amigoland Event Center, 1010 Mexico Blvd, Brownsville. This will be the public’s only opportunity to speak on behalf of the air we all breathe. Comments can be spoken or written, or submitted electronically at http://www14. tceq.texas.gov/epic/ecomment/.

from the Port Isabel-South Padre Island Press

Jesus & Mo

Why are religious people so insane when it comes to conception? Maybe they are afraid some woman might abort the next Jesus? 

Abortion isn't even mentioned in the Bible, but I guaran-damn-tee you that every Alabama legislator that voted for this stupid bill thumps the Bible. Shit, "God" even killed pregnant women in the Bible. Lots of them. 

Religious men have seemingly forever been exerting power over women. It has to stop, and women should have ultimate authority as to what goes on with their bodies. I'm sure this will happen, someday. Probably not in my lifetime. And in the year 2400, when women have absolute rights and command starships, there will probably still be men crouching in secret, reading from their fading Bibles and plotting on how to regain power over women.

It's time for an atheist

Max Boot used to be a pretty hardcore conservative Republican, but compared to this latest crop of Republican sycophants and vultures, Boot is pretty liberal. And he's not kowtowing to Trump.

It's time for us to have an unapologetic atheist in the White House

by Max Boot

Among the 21 candidates seeking the Democratic nomination, virtually every ethnic, religious and sexual identity is represented. There’s a gay man, six women, three African Americans, a Chinese American, multiple Catholics and Protestants, even a Hindu. (Hindus are 0.7 percent of the population.) But there is one conspicuous absence: Not a single candidate publicly identifies as an atheist. That’s not to say they are all religious believers. But if they aren’t, they are keeping it to themselves.

Yes, even, Bernie Sanders. Although raised Jewish, Sanders has acknowledged that he is “not actively involved in organized religion.” But asked about his faith during the 2016 campaign, he equivocated: “It’s a guiding principle in my life, absolutely. You know, everyone practices religion in a different way. To me, I would not be here tonight, I would not be running for president of the United States if I did not have very strong religious and spiritual feelings.” So a candidate who doesn’t mind calling himself a “socialist” refuses to say that he is a secular humanist — if, in fact, that’s what he is.

The reticence is understandable given that animus against atheists is one of the last prejudices still acceptable in polite society. A 2015 Gallup poll found that more respondents would refuse to vote for an atheist for president (40 percent) than for a Muslim (38 percent), gay (24 percent) or Jewish (7 percent) candidate. Other surveys have shown that Americans don’t want atheists marrying their children or teaching them. Eight state constitutions even prohibit nonbelievers from holding public office.

Yet people who profess no religious identity (“nones”) are one of the largest and fastest-growing demographic groups in the United States. According to the Pew Research Center, 22.8 percent of Americans are “nones,” slightly fewer than the number of evangelical Protestants (25.4 percent) and slightly more than Catholics (20.8 percent). No other religious identification comes close. Of course, not all “nones” are atheists; Pew found that 27 percent of them believe in God. But not everyone affiliated with a religious faith believes in God. I am, for example, part of the 17 percent of American Jews who don’t believe in God. I identify with Judaism ethnically and culturally, but I’m not religiously observant.

Conventional public opinion surveys are thus misleading when they find that only 3 percent of Americans are atheists. A University of Kentucky study suggests that as many as 26 percent of Americans are actually nonbelievers.

Atheists are looked down upon because of the erroneous assumption that you can’t be good without God. An international survey showed that people are likely to assume that a serial killer is an atheist. This is despite all of the terrible acts, such as the Easter Sunday suicide bombings in Sri Lanka, carried out by religious zealots. And it’s not just Muslim extremists who are culpable. The gunman who is accused of attacking a Poway, Calif., synagogue was a conservative Presbyterian who blamed Jews for the death of Jesus. No doubt the Catholic priests who sexually abused children also considered themselves to be paragons of faith.

There are too many examples of evil committed in the name of God to assume that people act morally because they are afraid of divine punishment. More likely, people are social animals who develop moral codes so they can live at peace with their neighbors. That’s why almost all societies, whether religious or not, have similar taboos against murder, robbery, rape and other sins.

Most of China’s 1.4 billion people have no religious affiliation, and fewer than 7 percent are monotheists. Is there any reason to believe that China is a less moral place than the United States, where 70.6 percentprofess to be Christians? Or that Europeans act worse than Americans because only 27 percent of thembelieve in the God described in the Bible, compared with 56 percent of Americans? In fact, by many measures, such as crime rates and social welfare, Europe is actually a more moral place.

The outsize political role of pastors in U.S. politics has sometimes been good and sometimes bad; both segregationists and civil rights activists cited the Bible. Today, the consequences are often simply perverse. Some evangelicals condemn Pete Buttigieg, a Christian combat veteran, for being gay, yet insist that God selected Donald Trump — a thrice-married adulterer and serial liar whose life has been devoted to the pursuit of mammon — as president.

Trump shows how immorally a supposed Christian can behave. Winston Churchill is the flip side of the coin, showing how righteously a nonbeliever can act. Churchill was a nominal Anglican but he had no belief in God. “In the absence of Christian faith, therefore,” writes biographer Andrew Roberts, “the British Empire became in a sense Churchill’s creed.”

If atheism was good enough for Britain’s greatest prime minister, it should be good enough for a U.S. president. We’ve had closeted freethinkers as president but never one who was out and proud. Thomas Jefferson, a deist who rejected the divinity of Christ, bridled when he was called an atheist by his opponents. Given how many taboos we have already shattered — making it easy to imagine a female president who is of Jamaican and Indian descent — I look forward to the day when we will finally have an unapologetic atheist in the Oval Office. But probably not in 2021.

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