On the day we visited the site, there were floods in India, China and Brazil, wildfires in Canada and Spain, environmental pollution on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in Montana, and car accidents all over the place. Clicking “details” brings up more information on some events.

We have two desktop computers, three laptops, two video cameras, a digital camera, two cell phones, a scanner, three TVs, eight remote controls, three DVRs, a Google TV box, a Kindle, an iPad, a dozen or so external drives and coming soon, an iPod Touch. That puts us only about average according to the Consumer Electronics Association. They say the average U.S. household has about 24 electronic gadgets.

(What Bob wants to know and is not made clear in the information release is what do they count as electronic devices? Do they count microwave ovens? How about stereos, clock-radios, digital watches? What about fluorescent light bulbs, which all have electronic circuitry built into the base to control the voltage.)

About two million tons worth of the more obvious electronic gadgets are discarded each year, and less than 20 percent are recycled, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. The rest end up in landfills, where toxic materials such as lead, mercury and beryllium can leak. We’re doing our bit by keeping our junk in the closet. Only the next ice age will bury it.

The site has Earth-friendly episodes from “Sid the Science Kid,” “Curious George,” “Martha Speaks,” “Arthur” and others.

It also has tips and tricks, such as “how to throw a green party,” “planting herbs in painted pots” and “build the Cat in the Hat bird feeder.”

The robotic sailboat “Protei” has garnered $18,463 toward its construction goal, but most of these dollars came from other sources. Visitors to Kickstarter have contributed $3,250 so far. Contributions start at $1, and for $10,000 you can have your name emblazoned on the sailboat. Unfortunately, there are no rewards in stock or cash.

– Another idea site is Quirky.com, but we’ve been disappointed in it so far. You pay to submit an invention idea, and if enough people commit to buying the product, it gets produced—theoretically. We committed to buying an innovative mouse pad and were told it would be produced, but it never was. On the plus side, they don’t charge you if it’s not produced.

Their latest gizmo is “Switch,” a modular pocket knife, which has been made. The knife has 18 attachments that you mix and match. It’s $79, at Quirky.com.

– Ahhha.com (a lot of h’s) is a brand new site that doesn’t charge you for submitting an idea.  However, the ideas submitted so far look weak. The founders say Ahhha will help you design a new product, make it, market and distribute it. They say they also plan to award prizes to contributors. That looks tough, because it’s hard to see how the site makes any money.

Chart courtesy of Ars Technica

How do we get enough food and water for 9 billion people, the expected world population for 2050? A recent UK conference had a few interesting ideas.

Restorative aquaculture is a new way to send nutrients from the crops to the fish farms. It makes use of saltwater without desalination.  (Desalination plants are a big problem: It leaves tons of leftover salt with no where to go.)

Dr. Nina Fedoroff, a scientist quoted in today’s Ars Technica post says we need to stop romanticizing the small farmer. Big companies, like Nestlé, are using small farm techniques that help the environment, and the small farmers benefit from having steady work.

Trying to grow temperate crops in the desert is a problem. California is semi-desert, but grows rice. Saudi Arabia used 88 percent of its water trying to grow wheat. When its wheat production collapsed in 2008, it switched to other crops, but the aquafiers are expected to run dry within 25-30 years.

Last year was the first year there were more urban dwellers than rural, said Sir John Beddington, the UK’s Chief Science Advisor. But fewer farmers mean better farming, as productivity shoots up. Note in the accompanying chart that in all but one case, rising prices continue to rise.

This episode was the densest of the lot, but perhaps the most rewarding. There was plenty of science, interspersed with fun stuff. We saw talk show host Jay Leno’s antique car collection and took a spin on a 1909 Baker electric car. Back then, Leno said, there were charging stations all over New York City.  But the cars only went 22 miles per hour, tops. Average speed in New York City today: 12 miles per hour.

Besides his antique cars, Leno has been driving a hydrogen car for two years, and so have some drivers who signed up for General Motor’s “Project Driveway,” to test hydrogen sports utility vehicles. The catch with hydrogen is that it likes to be free; it takes enormous pressure to compress it into a gas tank. What’s a light atom to do?

Scientist Richard Wool of the University of Delaware is experimenting with hydrogen and chicken feathers. It turns out that the hydrogen atoms will lodge tightly together in the feathery fluff, after the feathers have been heated to create “nano pores,” little caves for the hydrogen atoms.

Vilas Pol, a scientist at Argonne National Laboratory, is turning cheap plastic bags into batteries. First he cuts them into small pieces. Then he puts them into a reactor, adds a pinch of cobalt acetate and cooks them for three hours at 1400 degrees Fahrenheit. What comes out is carbon nanotubes, 1/50,000 the thickness of human hair. These conduct electricity ten times better than metals and store five times as much energy.  To make batteries, Pol adds lithium to the carbon nanotubes and uses layers of plastic spacers. He says his rechargeable lithium batteries will power cell phones in a year.

Watch the video or read about the show here.

Here’s how it works: You’re at home and it’s 15 degrees outside. You don’t want to get into a cold car, so you whip out your smart phone and warm your car to 68 degrees. Since the car is still plugged in, you’re not draining the battery. In summer, on a 100 degree day, you tell the car to be cool when you step in. It’s all done by way of an app provided by Airbiquity, the same company responsible for the OnStar system and Ford Sync, a service that provides hands-free calling, directions and emergency assistance.

The Airbiquity app does other things for electric vehicle owners. It removes what’s called “range anxiety,” the fear that you’ll run out of juice before you reach your destination.  The Leaf will only go about 100 miles on a single charge, so the Airbiquity system  tells you first thing in the morning how much of a charge you have.  It also sends you a text message if you haven’t plugged in your car at night, and lets you know where the charging stations are.

The Nissan Leaf in this video is about a mile from where the author of this post grew up.

The Leaf knows who’s in the car by identifying your phone. Your profile comes up and it shows buttons for the radio stations you want. A different driver steps in and their phone is discovered, along with their preferences. Make changes to your profile and your interface looks different the next time you step in.

Although 20,000 people have signed up for a Leaf, they’re rolling out slowly. You can see them now in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Phoenix and Nashville. They cost around $26,000 after the tax savings.

A charging station is only twice the size of a cereal box. If you plug into a 110/120 volt outlet, a charge takes about 20 hours. It takes seven hours with the $2000 charging dock recommended by Nissan and about 30 minutes for the charging stations being made available to businesses. Already, stores like Target and some shopping malls are starting to put in charging stations so that electric vehicle owners will have an incentive to shop there.

From an environmental standpoint, the existence of a lot of cars plugged into outlets in a company’s parking lot is like a mini power plant that saves power companies from having to build more facilities to handle peak demand. Most vehicles are parked an average of 95 percent of the time, so their batteries could be used to let electricity flow from the car to the power lines and back, with a value to the utilities of up to $4,000 per year per car. Researchers at the University of Delaware are trying it out now.

Experts are predicting 300,000 electric vehicles on the road within three years. More info at nissanusa.com and airbiquity.com. Airbiquity is in talks with Tesla Motors and nearly every manufacturer building or considering an electric vehicle.

February 2011 Update: Only 87 Leafs have been sold to date, though there’s a massive amount of back-orders. More here.

Initially, she was too timid to test drive this super car, but on consulting with Bob, decided it would be chicken not to. Sitting in the driver’s seat felt like the Grand Prix. This is about as low-slung and sporty as it gets.

Because traffic was heavy near the Tesla dealership, Joy asked the salesman to do the initial driving. After careening around the show room like a stunt car driver, he raced onto the highway like a shot. It felt like going straight up. On a quieter road, Joy took the wheel and spun around the bay.

A few surprises: When you take your foot off the accelerator, the car automatically slows down. You rarely use the brake. This takes getting used to, but it feels extremely safe. When Joy test drove a BMW convertible,  the car essentially drove her. With the Tesla, she felt confident quickly. When you begin, a video screen shows you the world behind you, and you can plug in an iPod or iPhone for music through the car’s speakers.

You push the “D” button to drive. The electric car starts up soundlessly though sound has been added for safety reasons. Some people stepped in front of them without realizing a car was coming.  The engine noise is the same as is heard in the latest Batman movie, “Dark Knight,” when Batman revs the batmobile.

We had to ask the price. ($109,000 after tax rebates.) The Tesla salesman claimed the car was basically free because you don’t pay for gas, there’s almost no maintenance, and it keeps its value. A couple he knew who bought a Tesla six months ago  got nearly their original price, give or take a thousand or two. The Tesla needs little maintenance because it lacks a transmission, muffler, and other parts that typically require  repairs. Unlike the Prius or the Chevy Volt, it’s not a hybrid, but 100 percent electric.

We’d consider getting one but we only have 34,000 miles on our 10 year-old Honda minivan.