Sunday, March 7, 2010

Friedman on fossil fuel finesse, boosts Bloom Box buzz

(Why have your own blog if you can't make up your own silly headlines? Five points extra credit to the student blogger on this trip who posts the best, or worst, headline of the trip!)

This blog post from the road, or to be exact, the bus.

Unity students have been reading the NYT columnist Tom Friedman lately. Mitch Thomashow, our fearless college president, has required his book for a few classes.

Here's his latest column.

In it he praises the founders of Bloom Energy and Calera Inc, a couple of smart-grid start-ups that I've been watching too.

But he also has an interesting riff on immigration to the US, a topic that has often been in my head since I got on that first transatlantic airplane all those years ago.

A related topic might be "why go back?" This might also apply as much to Americans of European descent of any generation as it does to first generation immigrants like myself.

Especially when air travel is so GHG-rich. We're going to have to indulge in the modern medieval indulgence of quite a few carbon offsets to put the carbon balance back in the black.

The best answer I have to this question, other than "I have to go back to see my Mum," is to learn. Although America is still probably the most technologically and socially innovative society on planet Earth, you have to give those Euros credit for some of their recent innovations. And older ones, such as public transportation that works.

We expect to examine both the new and the old up close and personal on this trip. Including public transport.

By the way, this bus is very nice. And the WiFi works. Recommended.

Also by the way, what if Kerouac had written On the Bus instead of On the Road as the quintessential American creed of its era?

What difference would that have made?

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