Earlier this week I posted about an idea I had which led to some research about living ‘off the grid’ via renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, and hydro.

My initial conclusions were that it was prohibitively expensive, and varied widely based on local natural resources, tax breaks, real estate costs, etc.

Well, after reading the chaper on ‘off the grid’ living in The Renewable Energy Handbook, my opinion hasnt changed.

In the book, there is only example of an ‘off the grid’ household which committed to maintaining a ‘common’ energy lifestyle. However, even these folks required the use of a diesel generator (ok its 30% BIOdiesel) - even after spending $31,000 on their system (!). There were some concessions on the home design as well which weren’t appealing to me - its basically a greenhouse built up against a berm.

The other examples were a summer cabin style home with minimal power usage and a family which was dealing with a very inconvenient-looking refrigerator and no dishwasher (you can pry my dishwasher away from my cold, dead hands!).

One of the major issues I keep bumping up against is power *storage*. The sun don’t shine at night, so you have to *store* the energy collected during the day - which means big, ugly, deep-cycle batteries.

Another thing that bugs me is that the author isn’t very objective about the installations - he is encouraging and optimistic. For example, he will show a picture of a solar array and caption it as producing X watts of power ‘when the sun shines’, while the quote from the owner clearly states that figure is only the best-case scenario under optimal seasonal weather conditions.

Left: The Pyongyang subway system in North Korea is nearly 400 feet underground. All photos by Eric Lafforgue on flickr. Photos taken with the Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III 21.1MP Digital SLR Camera

While browsing train and subway photos on flickr recently, I stumbled across this photograph of the Pyongyang subway by professional photographer Eric Lafforgue.

Like the tunnel in the photo, his photostream led me down a deep rabbit hole of consistently outstanding photographs of this mysterious country.

My favorite photo is not of the concrete, lifeless irony of Pyongyang streets, nor the beautifully haunting military portraits. My favorite photo is of three women leaving an evening mass dance.

Although, like most North Koreans, they exhibit a look of apprehension at the foreign photographer, I like to think they are secretly happy in this photo. While we are so used to seeing images of the spectacle of the mass games, this photo reminds us that the individual participants are not just pawns in Kim’s cultish games, but living, beautiful, individual human beings - so much more interesting individually than as part of the whole.

There are other photos in the set which show North Koreans simply enjoying themselves, which adds a touch of humanity to North Korea which is rarely seen. I recommend you view them all - and especially read the photographer’s excellent annotation for each.

PS His website is also outstanding!

I have to admit, it kind of bothers me that the M8 railcars are not built in the USA, but I have to hand it to the Japanese, they make damn good trains (note to Japan: please send the ‘bullet’ ones next time).

I stumbled across these pictures of the Kawasaki factory in Japan where the cars are being built, and though you might enjoy them.

This photo is especially interesting. It shows the interior of one of the cars under construction. As there are two rows of 3-seaters, it is unlikely that this is the interior prototype which has been touring - it must be a production car.

It seems to me that the red seats have already been built and are actively being installed on the trains - which means despite the MTA’s request for comments to make final changes to the interior, I seriously doubt they will able to do much about the seats, including the color, which has probably been the most controversial feature from the people I have spoken with who have seen the prototype.

I guess as far as MTA is concerned, you can have any color you want as long as its red.

Wired has a photographic gallery of the world’s ‘most impressive’ subways. NYC makes the list for scale and 24/7 availability.

Out of the list, I have ridden the NYC, Paris Metro, and London Underground. The Paris Metro is my favorite, because every time you step out of the subway onto the street, all you can think is “Holy Crap I’m in PARIS!”

One of my favorite trains is the London Heathrow Express, which isn’t technically part of the underground. Its a sleek train with a soothing interior which travels nonstop from Paddington Station to Heathrow in record time. Getting from downtown London to Heathrow is about 100x easier and faster than getting through Heathrow to your gate.

My favorite part of the Heathrow Express is that they have these little video screens - I don’t remember what they show, some Heathrow information maybe and some ads - but the audio and volume of the content is specifically very low-key and unobtrusive. Thoughtful.

One major advantages of the rise in gas prices you have probably heard about is the increase in use of mass transit. One of the biggest winners in this game are bus lines, which have seen their first increase in ridership in 50 years!

As this transportation market re-emerges from its slumber, new businesses are cashing in by providing an improved riding experience.

One of these players is the Bolt Bus, which features sleek, brand-new buses which commute non-stop between major cities. Previously these routes were only run by bargain bus lines like Fung-Wah and Lucky Star, and catered to lower-income riders.

These new buses are beautiful, and feature bigger seats, real flush toilets, and even wireless internet access.

Checking the site just now, I found $10 and $15 fares between NYC and Boston - although Bolt Bus has this marketing gimmick where one seat on every bus is always just a dollar.

Not a bad deal, considering I spent $20 in gas this weekend driving from the NY border to Hartford and back! Curiously, on the way home, I saw a Bolt Bus.

Read more on Bolt Bus at Time

(note: multiple B2’s take off in this video, the one that crashes takes off around 1:40 into the video)

B2 Stealth Bomber Crashes - Watch more free videos

Now that the cost of the Iraq war has reached well over half TRILLION dollars, its nice to know that our tax dollars can still go up in smoke right from the safety of our own airbases.

In this video, a B2 Stealth Bomber has trouble getting off the ground on takeoff, and the pilots judiciously eject before it crashes into the ground.

The B2 Bomber, like the Stealth Fighter, and new F-22 Raptor, are fly-by-wire aircraft. Their aerodynamics are too complex for a human to be able to fly them by adjusting the flight surfaces manually, so a computer must take the input from the pilot’s joystick and figure out how to get the plane to do what he wants.