Monthly Archives: Saturday May 29th, 2010

We’re getting married!

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My girlfriend Annelies and I are getting married on June, 25th, 2010. We’ve been together for more than ten years and we both thought that the time is right. It’s all fine that I sit here behind my computer, writing about longterm stuff (Peak Oil, climate change, etc.) but every once in a while you have to do something long term yourself – and this is it.

We’re working on the preparations (have been for a while now), nearly all the big things have been taken care of, but with things like these there are a million small things that need to be organised. We’re on schedule, and it’s great fun to work together on something this big and this important.

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National Measuring Month Solar Electricity 2010

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Siderea

Siderea

Most returning visitors of this website will know that I love measuring, numbers and graphs. I project this love onto our solar panels as well. That’s only partly for fun, because although creating nice graphs is fun it’s also important to make sure that your solar panels work well. One of the big advantages of solar panels – the fact that they work without any noise, emissions, etc. – is also a small disadvantage: when something breaks or doesn’t work as it should that doesn’t really show. Measuring regularly will make sure that any irregularities will show up quickly.

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Frisian Solar Challenge 2010

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Een boot op zonnestroom

Van 4 tot 10 juli 2010 wordt The Frisian Solar Challenge () (“World Cup For Solar Powered Boats”) is being held from July 4th to 10th, 2010, following the route of the Elfstedentocht (). Just like two years ago () there are three classes in which the teams can compete: the Top class and two Challenge classes.

Although most teams () come from the Netherlands, there are entries from Belgium, Germany, Poland and even Brazil and the United States.

I considered going to Friesland two years ago to partly or fully witness this event, but I only heard of it very late so I missed it. Now that I have more time I’d love to go there and see it, if only the final day, but unfortunately I have something else to do in that period.

House insulation is really on its way now

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Cavity wall insulation

I was seriously considering it last year, but nasty thing around work kept me occupied and so it didn’t happen: insulation. The past heating season makes me wish I had done it last summer, but that’s water under the bridge now.

Last week a consultant of  Koston () visited me, he took a good look at our house and he left a quotation for insulating our house. I had asked for advice about three kinds of insulation:

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Solar Impulse made its third test flight

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Today the solar-powered electric airplane Solar Impulse () made its third test flight:

It’s clear that this project depends heavily on good PR, these flight movies are works of art. If I’m not mistaken this was the first flight where the streamlined cockpit canopy was mounted, and this flight was used fly this airplane a bit more aggressive than before to further test its flight characteristics.

According to the commentary the team expects to be able to fly a complete day-night-day cycle (where the plane flies on solar energy during the daytime, simultaneously charging it batteries, and flying on its batteries by night) within one or two months.