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Menlo Spark

@menlospark

Menlo Spark works to help Menlo Park achieve its goal of climate neutrality by 2030, and to help spread innovative climate policies throughout the Bay Area and more broadly.

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03.07.2024
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Latest posts by Menlo Spark @menlospark

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More US cities are allowing golf carts on the road, even if they aren't 100% street legal Across the United States, a quiet shift is taking place in how some local governments think about small, slow vehicles....

Climate silver buckshot solution, golf cart edition.

In addition to everything else mentioned below, golf carts on urban streets are smaller and safer for other people than cars/SUVs and add to the traffic-calming expectation needed on city streets.

electrek.co/2026/03/12/m...

12.03.2026 17:08 πŸ‘ 4 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
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Gas Prices Are Up, And So Are Searches For EVs: Edmunds The Iran conflict is driving up gas prices. Edmunds says that shoppers are looking to electrified models for relief.

insideevs.com/news/789704/...

One big difference from previous oil shocks is widespread availability of used EVs, hopefully that will help.

12.03.2026 14:47 πŸ‘ 16 πŸ” 3 πŸ’¬ 3 πŸ“Œ 0
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Calif. gas surges past $5 as Iran war jolts oil markets. When will relief come? Gas prices are climbing in California and across the country as the war worsens.

Big miss by not discussing driving EVs or other non-ICE transportation, here in the state with the highest EV penetration in the country. And especially the Bay Area.

Two-car households in particular could maximize use of the one EV.

www.sfgate.com/bayarea/arti...

10.03.2026 18:03 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

Norway is going to clean up. An oil exporter with extremely high EV usage and zero-carbon energy (hydro).

07.03.2026 23:02 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Well, there's always promoting EVs and public transit. Keep looking under those rocks and maybe you'll find these ideas.

www.politico.com/news/2026/03...

07.03.2026 23:00 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

The effect will also be differentiated. Before it was oil producers v the rest. Now, places with high renewable energy use and high EV penetration will be much less affected. Others will need to catch up.

05.03.2026 20:54 πŸ‘ 5 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
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The Renaissance (1485 to 1603) As England’s population rebounded after the Black Death, so too did its coal market. At the beginning Β of the Renaissance, most coalfields were still controlled by the church. Without medieval feud…

UK used large amounts of coal long before the Industrial Revolution:

riseofcoalinbritain.wordpress.com/the-renaissa...

05.03.2026 20:26 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

...so it's a big and unnecessary disadvantage to stop it, but maybe we can at least make some progress on solar during Trump.

Would be nice if they had some support for individual rooftop and community solar as well. Bring back the Green Tea Party.

04.03.2026 22:45 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

Solar is a sufficiently big business to be financially attractive to MAGA proponents. Again, I'll take it.

TBF, before the Inauguration some MAGA types said their energy policy was "everything but wind" (because Trump hates wind). This might be reverting to that idea.

Wind is quite valuable....

04.03.2026 22:45 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Briefly skimmed this - I didn't see any discussion of whether AVs reduce private vehicle parking needs and therefore increase urban density. Seems like it only looked at negative effects. Not sure what to think, but again all I did was skim.

04.03.2026 18:37 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Another new California e-bike bill was just introduced, now with broader support California lawmakers are once again turning their attention to electric two-wheelers, but this time the approach looks more targeted –...

Seems reasonable:

electrek.co/2026/02/24/a...

02.03.2026 18:27 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Rising carbon dioxide levels now detected in human blood Rising carbon dioxide levels are being detected within the human body, with new research warning a key blood marker for the gas could near its healthy limit within decades if current trends continue. ...

One more thing to worry about - rising CO2 affecting our blood pH levels.

I assume this is also affected by indoor CO2 which is easier to fix, but still emblematic of the problem (and one fix is to get rid of methane gas for heating, water, and cooking).

phys.org/news/2026-02...

28.02.2026 03:55 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 2 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

It's ridiculous. Complex legislation almost never should be done by voter initiative. Voter initiatives should be used to overcome powerful groups that use their money to stop legislative bills.

This is a powerful group instead using money to pull a fast one on the people.

27.02.2026 18:25 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

European EV sales are similar to California's.

25.02.2026 21:13 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
power outage vulnerability map for the U.S.

power outage vulnerability map for the U.S.

A nice map from a 2024 paper showing which counties have the highest vulnerability to their power grid, based on power outage data from 2014-2023. It rated the counties holding Los Angeles/Riverside/San Bernardino, Houston, Miami, Fort Lauderdale, and Detroit as ones facing "extreme" risk.

25.02.2026 19:58 πŸ‘ 30 πŸ” 16 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

I've wondered whether they'll use the fact that they're being sued to argue that the endangerment finding still exists and therefore the legal field is occupied, while also trying to get rid of the finding.

Might be harder though for the states being sued to say the feds must keep endangerment.

25.02.2026 21:09 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

Their case is actually made weaker by the Trump Administration's abandonment of climate regulation. Kind of hard to argue the legal field has been fully occupied by the feds when the "occupier" has deserted.

24.02.2026 20:27 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
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Bowhead whale - Wikipedia

Bowheads can live over 200 years (although not the same species as this one).

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowhead...

24.02.2026 18:08 πŸ‘ 5 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Not Menlo Spark's typical thing, but too cool to pass up. Whale song from 1949.

And whales may play an important role in carbon sequestration....

24.02.2026 18:05 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Assemblymember Berman Introduces Legislation to Electrify California Homes The Home Energy Choice Act gives Californians the option to electrify their homes with money that would otherwise be spent on old gas service lines

Thank you @asmmarcberman.bsky.social for introducing #AB2313, which will give Californians the option to electrify their homes with money that would otherwise be spent replacing old gas service lines!
earthjustice.org/press/2026/a...

19.02.2026 22:16 πŸ‘ 9 πŸ” 7 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 1
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Por su jardin:

20.02.2026 06:23 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Time to garden!

20.02.2026 06:23 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
I've seen a lot of discussion about what to do with EV batteries that have degraded to the point where they're no longer good for driving (recycle v. utility storage), but I haven't seen any discussion of what to do with an EV battery that's still useful and has outlived its car.You're not just going to stick it into a typical new EV. I suppose some could replace degraded batteries in used EVs, but I'm not sure how big that market will be in the long run. They could just sell at a slight premium for utility storage, but I'm not sure that's the highest use.Maybe we need a new market segment of new, cheap EVs made with used/reconditioned batteries.

EV batteries are lasting longer that EVs themselves. In my mind this raises a new "good problem" of what to do with these batteries that aren't new but still good enough to run EVs.

www.openweb.com/share/39tq69...

19.02.2026 18:25 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Why did Zillow remove climate data from its home listings? The home search site is pointing users elsewhere for climate risk info, a move it says aligns with β€œvarying” MLS rules. But what those rules are is not clear.

Great to see this, given that Zillow removed similar info under pressure from Realtors Associations, which are attempting to conceal future climate risks from the clients that individual Realtors represent.

www.realestatenews.com/2025/12/01/w...

10.02.2026 19:07 πŸ‘ 5 πŸ” 6 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Today we’re launching Open Climate Risk, a fully open option for U.S. building-level climate risk data. It’s unique because it allows you to see not only risk scores, starting with wildfire, but also the complete underlying dataset, methods, and codebase. carbonplan.org/research/cli...

10.02.2026 16:54 πŸ‘ 317 πŸ” 141 πŸ’¬ 10 πŸ“Œ 30

Not as anti-CCS as Mark, but there are serious concerns, especially with other emissions not captured. Blue hydrogen has lots of problems.

10.02.2026 18:52 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

Seems like it was generally a good idea.

No escalator in your solar lease payments though? Mine has one, although lower than utility price increases.

05.02.2026 23:05 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Each regional total also seems off. Maybe I'm missing something.

04.02.2026 14:53 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Nice visualization that it's not power generation that's a problem.

This graph seems strange though, the regional totals (white circles) don't look to me like they add up to the national total:

04.02.2026 14:49 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 2 πŸ“Œ 0
U.S. wholesale day-ahead electricity prices rose in 2025 with higher natural gas prices - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

Dark red line along the bottom of graph is CA, the place some misinformed folks say has expensive elec due to all its wind, solar, and batteries. (Counting RA cost doesn't chg the story) Our high rates pay for response to what climate change is already doing: wildfires.
www.eia.gov/todayinenerg...

04.02.2026 04:03 πŸ‘ 190 πŸ” 51 πŸ’¬ 7 πŸ“Œ 1