almost zero emissions - part 1

how many times a day do you put a kettle or a pot filled with water over your gas stove just to boil it, if its at least once a day maybe you should consider goind green and getting yourself and electric kettle.

Why would an electric kettle be greener?, well simply put in almost all electric circuits there is always a loss of eficiency in wich electric energy is wasted as heat, (think incadescent light bulbs) however in and electric kettle the whole pourpose of the circuit is *exactly* to create heat, therefore you get close to 100% eficiency if the heating element is placed properly so that the heat flows upwards into the water.

For those of you who are already thinking of living off-grid and generate your own electricity through solar or wind power, this should come as a no brainer.

However if you live in a city or still connect to the power grid, a more detalied explanation is in order, basicly your average home gas burning stove isn't very efficient at all, a portion of the gas doesn't get combusted at all, while the heat distribuition although well enginereed is far from perfect, and of course it depends on the container tour using to place the water on, every flicker of flame that goes around the side of it is wasted energy and gas, especially if you just want to get a cup of boiling water for coffe or tea, a cup of instant soup, ramem the list goes on. However if the same amount of gas goes into a turbine in electric power plant the energy efficiency goes through the roof compared to your kitchen stove, the average gas stove has a 30% efficiency, while the average gas powered electric generator turbine has an average 46% efficency , a standard turbine can reach 60% and in a cogeneration configuration they can reach 90% plus eficiency levels, also by shifting the source of greehouse gases to a centralized power plant its easir to filter the co2 through algae tanks to generate biodiesel, and biotethanol.

In conclusion its a perfect win-win situation, you save money by not spending more energy, you get to lower your greenhouse gases footprint, (and even if you are a global warming skeptic you'll apreciate the value of the last advantage) , you get to reduce the consumption of fossil fuels, wich in a time like this considering the situation over in the middle east where most of these fuels come from, im sure you can apreciate the benefit of this )

All in all its a low cost way to turn an everyday action into a win-win situation. remenber "waste not, want not"

This will the first chapter in a series of articles of how to make your everyday life greener and cheaper, one little step at a time. The first chapters will focus on were you can save in your kitchen with minimum effort and then I'll move on to bigger savings and efforts, all one step at a time.

I hope you enjoyed this article and I'm looking forward to your comments.