DAAWGS!!!

February 22, 2010

Done with Carbon Footprint

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Dave @ 6:03 pm

Well, my efforts to track my gasoline usage have run out of gas… I just don’t have the desire to keep on writing down every trip I make, how, how far, etc…

I am comfortable that having tracked my usage for half a year, including some serious winter months, that I can get by on less than 2 gallons of gas a week.  This is better than my goal & probably puts me in a pretty good position for dealing with $10 per gallon gasoline that is likely coming in the years ahead.

So I’ll need to move on to other topics for this blog… I’m open to suggestions.

February 7, 2010

Carbon Footprint #12

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Dave @ 8:13 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.17 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 72 days

Number of trips made:  127  (covering 1,257 miles)

MPG: 126

Well, I’m still using less than half the gas that I set as a target… however my gas usage has jumped up quite a bit.  I had a meeting that required a suit & tie; some meetings that happened on short notice & then evening outings with my wife.  I’m doing pretty well staying with my bike even when it is raining, but car trips are coming more often than I would like.  Of course back a week or so, I did a ski trip to Mt. Hood (with 2 friends), but of course that hurt my mileage as well.

Oh well, I haven’t left my car behind, but it sure stays in the garage most of the time… and I’m still ahead of my goal and using just over a gallon of gas a week.  Not bad!

January 24, 2010

Carbon Footprint Update #11

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , , — Dave @ 4:48 pm

Well I’m entering my third month of tracking and I’m having to deal with some serious winter weather.  I’m using a car far more than during the better weather this fall, but I’m still using 1/3 the gas compared to the goal I set for myself.  So still feel pretty good about where things stand.

Regarding bike gear… winter in Portland means lots of darkness… the sun isn’t up until after 8am and it is down again by 4:30pm, then there is the constant overcast… so dark, dark, dark on almost any ride.  This makes your lights a very important part of your equipment.

For my headlight I use a Night Rider MiNewt… producing a daylight visible light.  Normally I use it in flashing mode (which turns heads because the light is powerful enough to make a clear flashing pattern on any street sign with any reflective material).  On very dark, low traffic streets I’ll switch the light to a constant beam both to provide good illumination for riding, but also because the flashing mode turns into a strobe light that drives me crazy if it is the only light source around.  Comes with rechargeable batteries and charger.  This light is expensive, but definitely worth every penny… however, it does mean that I don’t leave it on my bike when I have it parked.

For my taillight I use a pair of Planet Bike Superflash LED lights.  This is the most noticeable tail light I have found.  I use it in flash mode, where every fourth flash is super bright.  The light is small & cheap; plus batteries seem to last a long time.

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.12 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 59 days

Number of trips made:  104  (covering 1,175 miles)

MPG: 173

January 6, 2010

Carbon Footprint Update #10

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Dave @ 6:29 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.09 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 47 days

Number of trips made:  78

MPG: 223

If I was driving a 22 MPG vehicle for all of these trips my gas usage would be at nearly a gallon a day (0.9 gallons/day).

I’m still doing well, my MPG has dropped a bunch as I’m using the car more, but still 78% of my trips are done on a bike.

January 5, 2010

Carbon Footprint Update #9

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Dave @ 7:27 pm

Alright, I’m back in the saddle… bike saddle that is.

For the last 2+ months I’ve been making a Godzilla sized carbon footprint.  We flew half way around the world & then drove roughly the length of the US west coast before flying back home.  Since coming home, we’ve flown to Colorado for a ski trip, which included renting a van to cart all our skis around the mountains for 5 days.

But all of that I knew & bought into… the surprise has been how hard it is to return to my frugal carbon footprint… once I reached a state of being fat, dumb, and happy (driving a car, staying dry inside, quickly getting to my destination 15 miles away, etc), it was quite tough to actually return to using my bike for transportation.  Of course the fact that it is now cold and rainy most days in Portland does not help my motivation… but that is a cheap excuse.  So my fat carbon footprint continued through December simply because I was lazy and slothful.

I have restarted by carbon footprint log as of January 1st and I’ll post an update soon.  Today was a break through as I did some significant rides in light rain today.  I think I’m getting back my mental toughness… while I don’t expect to match my summer stats, I should still be able to keep my bike as my primary form of transportation.

More updates will be coming soon.

October 24, 2009

Carbon Footprint Update # 8

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Dave @ 6:20 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.06 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 41 days

Number of trips made:  67

MPG: 326

If I was driving a 22 MPG vehicle for all of these trips my gas usage would be at nearly a gallon a day (0.9 gallons/day).

My bike remains my primary transportation vehicle even as we enter the rainy season.  I carpooled to Friday’s soccer match… rain & darkness is too much for me.

October 13, 2009

Carbon Footprint Update #7

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Dave @ 1:47 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.06 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 34 days

Number of trips made:  58

MPG: 337

If I was driving a 22 MPG vehicle for all of these trips my gas usage would be at nearly a gallon a day (0.96 gallons/day).

Well this weekend saw some heavy car use… 2 evening social events and then on Sunday we drove to the gorge for a hike.  It is these day trips that will really bring my gas consumption up close to my ceiling of 3 gallons a week.  If I carpool on all of those outings I should be OK.  But I guess that is how it should be… I’m using my gas to get to remote locations, that in most cases it wouldn’t make much sense to serve with public transportation, plus I’m using up the full day & so the extra time added for public transportation schedules would make it a very long day.

September 26, 2009

Carbon Footprint Update #5

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , , — Dave @ 1:50 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.02 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 21 days

Number of trips made:  37

MPG: 1248

Well a few more days without any car usage… but rain is in the forecast, so we’ll see what happens next week.  The last few days saw my first real night rides.  The first was a ride home from downtown around 7:30 after a social event.  Then yesterday I went to a UP soccer match that started at 7pm so I did the 12 mile ride home around 9:30pm.  Both times my ride went very smoothly.  I have 3 key pieces of gear for night riding.  First, my screaming yellow wind breaker from Pearl Izumi… really helps you stand out.  Second, my Night Rider Minewt LED front light.  By far the brightest bike light I have ever seen.  I ride with the light in flash mode if there is any significant traffic just to call attention to me.  The light is bright enough that on the dark residential streets I switch it to steady on mode and it does a good job of illuminating the road ahead of me.  Third, in the rear I use Planet Bike super flash LED light… actually I’ve gone to using a pair of these flashing lights to give me the best chance of being seen.  The flashing sequence with a very bright strobe LED is the best rear light I’ve found.

I’m glad to have my first night rides in the bag… always builds confidence to have some success.

Also, on my ride to UP I was riding with bike commuters heading home from downtown out North Williams Ave.  This is not a bike boulevard, but it has a nice bike lane & is a major bike commuter route.  I was amazed by the number of bikers… there was a solid line of bikes in the lane for several blocks ahead of me.  At traffic lights, there would be 20 bikes waiting by the time it turned green.  There is no doubt that these kinds of numbers help car drivers become more aware of bikes & to make it easier for someone to venture out on their bike for the first time.

September 22, 2009

Carbon Footprint Update #4

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , , — Dave @ 7:10 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.02 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 19 days

Number of trips made:  34

Well, I finally used the car… three times actually.  These were evening social events and the combination of darkness and needing to be somewhat dressed up were enough to prod us into using the car.  My usage to date translates into 1,105 MPG.  Right now I’m running 20X below my target.  After 30 days I should have a better trend, at least for good weather time periods.  My longest trip has been 55 miles (all distances are round trip), with my median trip being 5 miles.  Most of my trips are in the 3-5 mile range… the gym, groceries, post office, etc.  The next most frequent is in the 10-12 mile range which gets me downtown or to IHAD offices.  Then I have the rare cases of longer trips.

So far so good.  I’m definitely working harder at not using a car because I am posting the results on this blog… nothing like going public to kick in my competitive spirit to do well.

I’m currently working on a proposal to add more bike parking in the Hillsdale town center… fun to work with some like minded folks all trying to make our community a better and more sustainable place.

September 13, 2009

Carbon Footprint Update #3

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , — Dave @ 7:35 pm

Updated  Carbon Footprint Meter:

Goal: 0.43 gallons of gas/day.  (3 gallons/week)

Average actual usage:  0.0 gallons of gas/day

Number of days tracked: 10 days

Number of trips made:  14

I’ve managed to continue to stay out of cars… and the last few days also had a new high point as my wife and I biked downtown for a social event… a book signing by the husband of one of my wife’s friends.  We were a bit under dressed but it worked out great.  We also got home before it became too dark.  I have a sense that social settings and darkness are going to be the primary reasons I end up using a car.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we just returned from a road trip down to Ashland… that was not included in the carbon footprint meter because it was a multi-day trip.  Over the 4 day weekend we drove 620 miles in our Prius.  Splitting the gas between the 2 of us, that still has my gas share at 6.6 gallons… a little over 2 weeks allocation.  This just makes the point about how much more limited personal car travel would be if you really had to reduce your total personal gas usage to the 3 gallons per week level.

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