A cool network...for electric cars

How cool would this be: A network of electric battery charging stations placed throughout a country. To power cars. Cars that you rent or purhcase at 6 cents a mile (compared to the average cost of 12 cents a mile to operate a conventional gasoline-powered car). No more worrying about whether your charge will last all day. You can always find a charging station.

It'd be cool if a state or country could start installing this kind of system. But...well....they already are. Japan, Denmark, even Hawaii. And the business plan has been written. Tom Friedman wrote about it today. Hold on to your lithium ions. It's gonna be a fascinating ride.

A dazzler if there ever was one

For the past several years I have been skeptical about the horrendous amounts of money--a good chunk of it taxpayer dollars--spent on sports stadiums. Our country's obsession with spectator sports not only costs billions upon billions in funding for facilities, but also untold dollars in health care costs used to treat diabetes and related conditions among the number of people who can't get off their fat asses and get some physical activity because they are sedentary 9 months out of the year watching football, basketball and baseball on TV.

In addition, it seems once a sparkling new arena is built, it doesn't last more than a couple decades. The Silver Dome in Detroit, RCA Dome in Indianapolis, Key Arena in Seattle, The MetroDome in the Twin Cities, are all coming down because they are not good enough for the franchise owners and they apparently are not worth refurbishing. Plus, icons such as Yankee Stadium, Busch Stadium and others are bulldozed because they cannot accommodate the wealthy club seat buyers.

To me, in times of disastrous health care economics, a severely underperforming education system, public infrastructure demise, and many other critical public investment needs, sports should be much lower on the investment totem pole.

However, being the objective observer I am, and realizing that a capital society gives the market what it wants, I do have to say the new Dallas Cowboys stadium under construction is a design marvel. No matter how necessary or unnecessary it may be, one cannot deny its place among the truly cool.

More conceptual images are here. (You'll need to scroll down a bit).

Bioeconomy: Learnings from a marching band contest

I'm sitting in the high school football stadium on a Saturday evening, waiting for my kids' marching band to take the field.

A kind older gentleman is sitting in front of us by himself, and we start up a typical conversation: "Where are you from, what instrument does your kid play," etc.

He then tells us he used to work at the Maytag plant in Newton, IA. Maytag was sold to Whirlpool several years ago, and one of the Midwest's mighty manufacturing centers had now all but disappeared, with jobs moved to other parts of the country and the world.

He then tells us about the classes he is taking at a community college. Biotechnology retraining classes offered to Maytag workers whose jobs were eliminated.

"We just grew some mouse tails this semester," he says. "And you know what? We're learning how you take smokestack emissions from a factory, shoot them into an algae pond, and watch the algae grow as they suck in the CO2. One day's worth of algae growth can produce 1000 gallons of biofuel."

"And yesterday I just cloned a carrot."

He was slightly giddy as he told us about his coursework and lab projects. This 60-some year old man who probably had spent the better part of 40 years building washers and dryers and should be on the cusp of serious retirement planning was now spending two years to get himself educated to take on the bold frontier of alternative energy and biotechnology.

"Cargill has 150 biotech production jobs at their corn processing complex in Eddyville, and they only have six candidates to fill them so far. They told me there is a job waiting for me when I'm done with my classwork."

I think I sense some bootstraps being pulled.

Modern beyond modern

With a name like Modernista, an advertising agency has to make sure it's cutting edge. This is the agency that did the Hummer ads (back when gas was $1.80 a gallon), with the kid who builds a Hummer-looking go-cart and goes off road to beat his friends in a race. All to the tune of The Who's "Happy Jack." It also does those Cadillac spots with the sultry babe asking if your car turns you on.

Years ago, Modernista had a wicked looking Web site that would probably still look amazing today, using the all the amazing flash tools. Now, it has what it calls a "siteless" Web site. Go to Modernista.com and at first you think you've typed in the wrong Web address. A small message--almost seeming to be an error message--pops up on a Wikipedia page, assuring you that you've reached the right company. It then directs you to its portfolios on Flickr, YouTube, Delicious, etc.

What will be next for this vanguard of the marketing world?

Bacteria as fuel?

One of my favorite global analysts, Fareed Zakaria, recently interviewed a Univ. of Maryland researcher on his pioneering efforts in alternative energy for conventional vehicles. His interview is viewable here.

Oh, I forgot to mention, that fuel-producing bacterium does its thing by eating CO2. How fast can we get it on the market??!! Whether it's this or hydrogen engine commercialization or large-scale solar, shouldn't there be a government-led investment policy effort to help accelerate market formation for these promising technologies? More than just seed money for entrepreneurs. We're talking infrastructure build-out on a national scale.

What if an oil boomlet happens?

If OPEC would slash prices, new wells come online, Iraq and Nigeria production gets back to full capacity, and gasoline in the the U.S. hits $2 a gallon, would the alternative energy movement dry up and blow away?

I sometimes wonder about that. Just as E-85 and biodiesel are starting to reach the next level, as GM and other car makers aim to dramatically increase their flexfuel vehicle roster, as battery and fuel cell technologies make quantum leaps, could it all go away?

According to Renewable Energy Focus, an Elsevier publication, $18.9 billion in new money for clean energy companies was raised in the public markets in 2007, up 80% from last year. In the private equity/venture capital space, $8.5 billion was raised, up 27% from the prior year.

This investment level will expect long-term returns. And when investment luminaries from Richard Branson to the senior team at Google are placing large investments on alternative energy as well, it seems there's no turning back.

Could it replicate the telecom meltdown earlier in the decade? If rampant overcapacity is taking shape right now, sure.

But it seems clean energy is displacing legacy coal and petrol based systems, albeit at a very measured pace, and not adding vacant capacity.

The clean energy train has left the station.

Unkulhschidt: Gas wasters

More and more, I find myself getting depressed when I'm sitting in my car at stoplights. Not because it takes the light forever to turn green. It's because I'm constantly amazed at the number of vehicles that arrive at the intersection going nearly 50 m.p.h. and only start thinking about slowing down when they're 20 feet from the stoplight.

And jackrabbit starts. Drivers who have to accelerate from a stop as though they're late for their own wedding. Jackrabbit starts, especially with large trucks and SUVs which are plentiful where I live, can burn as much as 40% more gas than gradual starts. Of course there are dozens more driving tips that can help increase gas mileage. Going 65 instead of 75 can improve fuel efficiency by up to 25%.

The depressing thing is, if this country ever faces a true gas shortage again, like it did in the late 70s, I'm not sure we have the mentality and collective will to successfully deal with it.
If U.S. motorists could decrease gas consumption by just a few percentage points, gas prices might come down dramatically. According to an MSNBC column last year, U.S gasoline demand fell 7 percent between August 2006 and January 2007. Gas prices accordingly fell 28%.

I just sense that the great majority of American drivers think energy efficiency is a passing fancy, and won't be much of an issue in the long run. We're a NASCAR country. Cylinder numbers and engine displacement still rule. CAFE is, well...what's CAFE?

Is there a public information campaign in someone's mental file cabinet that could change driving habits among the everyday Jeff Gordons? Especially a campaign that directs the messaging to drivers while they are in the car?

Seizing the moment at Davidson

(Written in April 2008) Basketball fans and many non-fans now have heard of Davidson College. Not only because of its dramatic success in the NCAA basketball tournament or their all-galaxy star, Stephen Curry.

Many people are talking just as fervently about Davidson's board of trustees and the amazing deed they performed for their entire student body.

The trustees offered to host any and all Davidson students who wanted to attend Davidson's game(s) in the NCAA's Sweet 16 tournament during the March 28 weekend in Detroit. The offer included round-trip buses to Detroit, hotel and meal expenses. All paid for by the college.

More than 300 of Davidson's 1,700 students accepted the offer. When the Wildcats stunned Wisconsin in the Friday night game, the school came up with more buses to transport another 250 to Sunday's showdown with Kansas.

How many freshman applications do you think Davidson will receive for the 2008 fall term? And for many terms after that?

The lesson: doing extraordinary things for your primary community--students, residents, patients, shareholders, employees--especially at a time of heightened visibility and with right-minded, sincere values and intentions at the fore--is the essence of reputation building and, subsequently, brand identity.

It is a PR pro's dream. Action before announcements. Innovation and implementation before bloviation. Sincere, transparent goodwill before good headlines.

It isn't cheap: Davidson had to shell out several hundred thousand dollars. But will it pay off in future student recruitment, alumni loyalty, faculty attraction and heightened admiration among academic peers? There's no need to even state the answer.

A 'Frank' discussion from one of journalism's greats

The tip: Whenever a big-time literary figure is in the neighborhood and speaking for free, you must go see him. It is a communication pro’s duty! It’s great EHE (enjoyable horizon expansion) that’s difficult to get on a two-dimensional flat screen.

I spent a brisk, sunny Saturday morning recently in the tiny town of Adel, Iowa.

I attended a free lecture held in a local church off the town square to hear none other than the great Frank Deford speak about sports, culture and education.

Deford is, perhaps, the dean of national sports writers. How the hamlet of Adel got him to appear here I do not know. But it was a coup, part of the Iowa Book Festival.

Deford talked about the influence of big-time sports and how it continually shapes the larger society. According to him, there are more sports management majors in American colleges and universities than there are engineering majors. That is a problem.

The Beijing Summer Olympics was also a hot topic. Deford thinks the Olympics is on a decline and will never achieve the luster it once had. The hosting competition is too politicized, the price tag is now beyond enormous, and the Games consist of so many sports that people otherwise do not watch or care about . “When was the last time you went to a major track and field event?” he asked. (Little did he probably know that high school track in Iowa, along with the Drake Relays, is one of the biggest crowd pleasers around.)

It is true. Spectator sports today do not reflect major sports of decades past. In the 1930s and 40s, the big three sports were baseball, football and boxing. Horse racing was a close 4th. Still, perhaps the Olympics will flourish because it features what are normally esoteric sports that the masses enjoy…just for a two-week period. Many baseball fans probably enjoy a gymnastics diversion once every four years.

What’s his favorite sports movie (beyond Everybody’s All American, based on the book he wrote)? Chariots of Fire and Breaking Away.

The tall, lanky Deford was in strong voice and extremely accommodating and amiable to the small-town crowd. His book signing was a study in graciousness and class, signing up to six books for a single fan, with no huffiness or irritation and plenty of friendly chit chat. Way to go, Adel!