This is a little old, but I ran across it on Jon Taplin's blog recently and I think it does a good job of making an important point—fossil fuel, as an industry, isn't self supporting. No matter where we get our energy from, we're propping up production with tax dollars.
Couple things to keep in mind with this graph:
Not all fossil fuel subsidies are evil. (Frankly, I think we can drop the fossil fuels part and say "not all subsidies are evil", but I digress.) The Environmental Law Institute—who compiled the research and created this graphic—points out a great example: The Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program. That's calculated under subsidies to fossil fuels. It's by no means a big part of fossil fuel subsidies, but it's there.
This accounting doesn't include all spending. For instance, there are programs that, arguably, spend money as a direct result of the fossil fuel industry, but that aren't technically subsidies. The Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, say, or, more controversially, money spent on military campaigns at least partially influenced by a desire to stabilize/defend/friendly-fy oil-producing countries.
Read the full paper this graph is based on. See the full graph with footnotes.
The following infographic from CreditLoan.com offers a sobering look at how much it can cost to own a home. It also compares renting to buying, and your costs in each case. For the original article, please visit: Is It Better To Buy Or Rent?
Take your time; think about it. Owning a home is a long-term deal.
Oil spill image inspired by WWII-era posters
J.P. Townley sent me this image, which he based on World War II-era posters reminding people on the home front to conserve fuel for the war effort. At his website you can download a PDF of the modern version and see the historic piece that inspired it.
Now, all we need is a "When you ride alone, you ride with Tony Hayward!" poster:
Bose and Dolby to receive prestigious IEEE awards
Two of the biggest names in sound are going to get two of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)'s highest honors next week. Ray Dolby and Maxwell Bose will respectively receive the IEEE Edison Medal and the IEEE/Royal Society of Edinburgh Wolfson James Clerk Maxwell Award at an awards ceremony on June 26.
The Edison Medal is akin to the Nobel Prize for Technology. Since its creation in 1904 it's been awarded to inventors and engineers like Alexander Graham Bell, William Pickering, and Vladimir Zworykin, pioneers in telephony, space exploration, and television technology. Dolby is receiving the medal for the work he's done over the last 50 years in noise reduction technology, starting with the algorithm he created in 1960 to reduce hissing on analog recordings. Since 1965, Dolby Labs has been one of the biggest names in sound engineering.
The Wolfson James Clerk Maxwell Award isn't nearly as old as the Edison Medal, but it's still a prestigious award. It was established in 2006 as a way of recognizing people or groups whose work has significantly advanced electronics or electrical engineering. Amar G. Bose, chairman and technical director of the Bose Corporation, will receive the award for his work in consumer electronics and engineering education. Over his career, he's researched everything from sound technology to automotive suspensions, and he spent over 45 years teaching engineering at MIT.
The awards ceremony will be televised live over IEEE.tv on June 26.
— Will Greenwald
... very proud to bask in the glow.
Many Thanks to Dr. Bose for all his energy and hard work!
Thanks as well to Will over at Sound+Vision Magazine for the excellent post.
Explore Survey Questions
Overview
More than half (57%) of adult internet users say they have used a search engine to look up their name and see what information was available about them online, up from 47% who did so in 2006. Young adults, far from being indifferent about their digital footprints, are the most active online reputation managers in several dimensions. For example, more than two-thirds (71%) of social networking users ages 18-29 have changed the privacy settings on their profile to limit what they share with others online.
From the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project.
I'm surprised at that the numbers are lower than I would expect.
Please check out and support MoveToAmend.org in our efforts to remove corporate personhood and return freedom of speech to the human citizens of this country. The Supreme Court's decision in and against Citizens United is a travesty of justice.
The artist Frank Frazetta, whose luscious oil paintings for science fiction and fantasy
paperback covers were usually better than the stories themselves, died today.
He was 82 and one of my favorite artists. Comics Beat has more.
And Do not miss the documentary: Amazing life and story and life! The mold is broken.
I don't smoke Green Tea, I embrace nuts, I be a baby, and I eat my floss daily! Oh, yeah, and don't forget: I drink outgoing holidays, burp. Exsqueeze me.
Thanks, "How to live to 100" and GDS Publishing
"Google facts and figures" by Royal Pingdom
WOW! Staggers the mind. 2009 profits of $6.5B - Billion!
There's a lot of space junk orbiting the Earth, and graphic artist Michael Paukner knows exactly how to show it to us. Click on the graphic in the gallery below to see the full-sized version of this illuminating diagram showing data from the UCS (Union of Concerned Scientists) Satellite Database.
At first, we yanks might be disappointed to see that Russia has more satellites orbiting the earth than the United States. But Amurrca, as some like to call it, however dysfunctional it is on the planet Earth, has more orbiting functional satellites than any other country. Hooray for us!
