The problems with hydrogen as a fuel
Letter-writer Terry Rudd (Jan. 22 Open Forum) stated that Colorado Voices columnist Tess Riley did an excellent job of listing all the right reasons to home-school (“Why I home-school my children,” Jan. 15) and applauded parents who adhere to the rigor to do the job right. However, Rudd wrote that Riley is “naive to believe that she can honestly protect her children from the ‘big bad world’ by keeping them out of it.”
Isn’t it our job as parents to protect our innocent, impressionable children until they are prepared to face the big bad world? Then isn’t Rudd’s position that because we can’t protect our children from the big bad world forever, we might as well expose them to it as soon as possible to get them used to it? I think I’ll allow my children to be children a little while longer. Won’t you?
Molly Murata, Greeley
State of the Union and alternative energy
Caring and knowledgeable people have been telling the Bush administration for five years that we are in an addiction mode on oil and that it is beginning to ruin our economy and our pocketbooks. Their answer was – paraphrasing Dick Cheney – conservation and alterative fuels are just wishful thinking and not viable.
Now President Bush comes up with the pushing-alternatives plan and acts as if it’s a brand new concept. Give us a break! Had Bush/Cheney used more sound judgment and long-term planning in 2001, our country would now be well on the way to solving our oil addiction problem and the resultant Mideast issues. Instead, we have companies like Exxon chalking up huge profits at the expense of the working people and small businesses of America and we are importing more oil than we ever have in history.
John Ruckman, Lakewood
…
Isn’t it ironic that President Bush stressed development of alternative renewable energy sources during the State of the Union speech after Congress severely cut the budget for the National Renewable Energy Lab in Boulder last month? The administration does not have policy – it just presents what people want to hear with no true action behind the sound bites.
Sandy Gill, Thornton
The problems with hydrogen as a fuel
Hydrogen-fueled vehicles sound like a dream, but would cause a nightmare, and automakers should know this. Fuel cells are extremely costly, and hydrogen leaked during fueling would seriously damage the atmosphere. To achieve good driving range, cars would require extremely high-pressure fuel tanks. Perhaps an appropriate name for such vehicles would be Hindenburg.
Worst of all, there is no infrastructure for distributing or storing hydrogen, and the only plausible way to create it is by electrolysis of water, using electricity generated in coal-fired or nuclear power plants, with all their inherent drawbacks.
There are much better alternatives. Nikola Tesla said, “Electric power is everywhere present in unlimited quantities and can drive the world’s machinery without the need of coal, oil, gas or any other of the common fuels.” As proof, he modified a Pierce Arrow automobile in 1931 to be completely self- powered and driven electrically by the energy that surrounds us all. Similar vehicles have been demonstrated recently at The Tilley Foundation in Lebanon, Tenn., and there is at least one patented device, the Motionless Electromagnetic Generator, that can convert such energy for household use, but it is not yet available commercially.
Jim Bower, Evergreen
Justice Samuel Alito
Re: “Alito joins Supreme Court after divided Senate vote,” Feb. 1 news story.
Now that the Supreme Court is stacked with backward-thinking men who believe that, as a woman, I don’t have a right to privacy or the ability to make my own decisions about my right to choice, I think it is safe to say my right to own property and to vote are in jeopardy. When will we see a man’s right to a vasectomy become a hot political issue?
Ginger Thayer, Highlands Ranch
Prairie Dog Day
Each Feb. 2, Groundhog Day, we celebrate the antics of Punxsutawney Phil. The burrowing rodent pops up each year to check out his shadow and let us know if we’re in for another six weeks of winter. Let’s give Phil’s Western cousins their due by making Feb. 2 Prairie Dog Day in Denver and Colorado. Too often when a prairie dog sees a shadow in Colorado, it is the shadow of a bulldozer or exterminator destroying a prairie dog colony and all the wildlife that lives there. Three prairie dog species live in Colorado. They are all imperiled and deserve listing under the Endangered Species Act. Prairie dogs get a bad rap sometimes, but they are essential keystone species of the grasslands. A host of other animals depends on them for food and their burrows for shelter. This Groundhog Day, please think about the vital importance of prairie dogs to Colorado’s wildlife and wild spaces and support prairie dog conservation.
Lauren McCain, Denver
The writer is the deserts and grasslands program coordinator for Forest Guardians, which works to preserve and restore native wildlands and wildlife in the American Southwest.
Working for peanuts
Re: “Wanted: Dirt-cheap manager; no benefits,” Jan. 29 guest commentary.
I agree wholeheartedly with F.R. Pamp, though he just doesn’t go far enough. Almost nobody makes a living wage in the Arkansas Valley. Thirteen dollars an hour is more than most working people make, much less benefits. Employers take advantage of the fact that work is scarce here by paying peanuts, even if their market is national or global. That’s why most of the working people need at least two workers in the family, or two jobs, to survive.
James M. Hodgers, Buena Vista
Why Hickenlooper couldn’t be governor
The Democrats have a wonderful declared gubernatorial candidate, former Denver District Attorney Bill Ritter, who is highly experienced and well qualified; but that is not what the state Democratic leaders want. They are pushing the Denver mayor into the race for one reason: Ritter is pro-life and Democrats cannot abide anyone who is not committed to the killing of the unborn.
The Democratic leaders fail to take into account the fact that the Denver mayor would bring to the nomination extreme baggage, in that in his former life as a bar owner, he probably employed so many illegal immigrants that even he cannot account for all of them. That gives great insight into Hickenlooper’s attitude toward law enforcement, the security of the people of Colorado, and his regard for the U.S. Constitution. Does anyone seriously believe that such a person could be elected governor of Colorado?
Mary Anne Little, Denver
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