Is stealing electricity part of going green?

[1930fordpickup]

The shameful part is enough voters will look past this kind of behavior and re-elect people like this, to them its acceptable as long as hes their man.

Its sad, but a lot of people just don't respect rules, respect of others or common good behavior.

That is what happened in Detroit for decades . My point is that if under 20 dollars was good enough for the police to arrest than why do they not arrest for the bigger theft.

[Craig Irwin]

Remember, the Mayor is the cops boss, and everyone he has placed in power around him will still be there tomorrow if an arrest is made. Ever hear the line about "paybacks"?

Around here the Chief of police is the first appointment a new Mayor makes.

We can survive crooked politicians, but we won't survive over 50% of our voters not caring and returning them to office.

Edited December 8, 2013 by Craig Irwin

[1930fordpickup]

Great point Craig , and I do understand about the mayor being the boss , just tired of seeing a former great city ruined my this mentality .

[Craig Irwin]

Andy, back in the late 70's a friend of mine had finished a 57 Chevy he had fixed up. He was from Detroit, and he drove it to his Moms home to show her. He parked it out in the front and walked to the front door. When his Mom answered he turned to show her the car just in time to watch it drive away with a thief at the wheel. Detroit has been bad for quite a while.

[Ace-Garageguy]

So, what exactly is the difference between stealing electricity and stealing music?

Lots and lots and lots of folks seem to think it's just fine to rip music and avoid paying anything to the artists, producers, etc.

What gives?

Edited December 8, 2013 by Ace-Garageguy

[von Zipper]

I was born and raised in Detroit, spent the first 32 years of my life there so any of these stories don't surprise me a bit-

One of my favorite stories was when a friend of mine went on vacation and some crooks used an electric saw to cut the back out of his garage and took his Harley-the worse part was the crooks plugged their saw into my friends plug to run their saw, They cut his garage open, stole his bike AND used his own electricity to do it.

But the funniest thing I've heard in a long time is that the Mayor of Traverse City got busted in Traverse City, Michigan for D.U.I. on Oct.23 of this year, was arrested and charged, then a few weeks later he was re-elected by the people of Traverse City for a third term. Last week he pled guilty and was placed on 1-1/2 years probation. It just so happens to be his second offence BTW.

But I have to wonder how does a Mayor of a city like that over see the police and other city business when he's on 1-1/2 years of probation and enforce the laws fairly ?

How would it be for the other people that have to do community service to have to pick up garbage on the expressway dressed in those orange jump suits next to the Mayor ?

What do you think happened to the police officer that had the nerve to arrest the Mayor ?

http://www.theoaklandpress.com/government-and-politics/20131105/traverse-city-mayor-wins-3rd-term-after-guilty-plea-to-dui

The tribe has spoken......

[von Zipper]

Here's another example of the "short arm of the law"

http://www.9and10news.com/story/21843071/developing-news-lake-county-officer-accused-of-running-meth-lab

[southpier]

little johnny's teacher asked "what does your father do for a living?"

johnny replied "he makes toilet paper and light bulbs"

his teacher said "that's an interesting job, but how do you know that?"

to which he replied "every night when he comes home, that's what he has in his lunch box!"

[Tom Geiger]

little johnny's teacher asked "what does your father do for a living?"

johnny replied "he makes toilet paper and light bulbs"

his teacher said "that's an interesting job, but how do you know that?"

to which he replied "every night when he comes home, that's what he has in his lunch box!"

I once had to fire a guy from a good paying job for stealing coffee. As he was passing the guard house in the parking lot, he reached into his pocket for his keys and a few packets of company bought coffee fell out. Security saw it and he was fired on the spot. No worries on my end, as you can figure, he wasn't all that great an employee anyway!

[cartpix]

At first, I thought this person was a clueless fool, with a small feeling of entitlement. After reading the rest of the story, I feel this guy is a selfish dolt, with a HUGE sense of entitlement. I'm sure he also told the cop, that he pays his salary. His single contribution to the officer's pay, was probably used up, in the time it took for him to roll up & asses the situation. His blatant disregard for public & probably private property, is appalling. He must feel, since he is, single handed, saving the environment, he is owed that electricity. I mean, don't you know who he is? Arguing with the officer, make me wonder, why he wasn't arrested, on the spot, & his precious electric car impounded. Not the brightest light, in the harbor.

Jeff

[Tom Geiger]

After reading the rest of the story, I feel this guy is a selfish dolt

And that's the way these stupid Internet news stories usually go. The gay waitress who didn't get a tip turned out to have made up the whole story. I watch the news less and less.

With this guy previously being told not to use the tennis courts without permission, he should have simply been charged with trespassing. Easy enough, not the silly debate the electricity bit has generated.

[Danno]

When I was in uniform, I always made it a point to have a brand new nickel in my pocket.

Anytime I was handling one of society's finest who gave me the "I pay your salary" line, I would just pull out the nickel and offer it to him. He'd say, "What's that?" I would explain to him that about 500,000 other people also paid my salary and when you calculated my salary divided by all 500,000 it came out to his contribution being less than a nickel.

Then I'd tell him (or her) that I no longer worked for him/her, and I would go ahead with whatever necessary action he/she didn't like. And I always offered to let him/her keep the change.

Amazing how many jerks it shut up.

[Mike Kucaba]

What I find odd, is that a person could spend lots of time and money building a large scale, scratch built car, and only get half the comments that this thread has.............

That's the REAL tragedy here,

[sjordan2]

Also on that same Atlanta TV news website, I found that the guy readily admitted that he made a habit of recharging his car wherever and whenever he found an outlet he could plug into. Apparently who was actually paying for "his" power was of no concern to him.

That's certainly of interest, and I'm sure it's not uncommon. But I'd just add this -- this ain't Canada, where malls and other public places make electricity available in parking spots for people to plug in their engine block heaters in environments reaching 40 below, which I've seen over 30 years ago. Electric cars in the USA are something like a thirsty man crawling across the desert, who may need to take water from a farmer's well. Water and electricity are where you find it. We still don't have the infrastructure to deal with electric cars.

Edited December 8, 2013 by sjordan2

[Harry P.]

We still don't have the infrastructure to deal with electric cars.

Correct.

Which is something to consider before buying an electric car. To assume that everyone else will be responsible for cheerfully keeping your eco-mobile charged up at their expense, which apparently is what this guy thinks, might turn out to be a bad assumption.

[hpiguy]

I love reading posts with people justifying theft.

It's always good for a laugh. And I know who to keep an eye on around my stuff if I ever meet them.

[hpiguy]

And now from the local Atlanta news website... the rest of the story:

Wednesday evening, Chamblee City Manager and Police Chief Marc Johnson issued the following statement:

We received a 911 call advising that someone was plugged into the power outlet behind the middle school. The responding officer located the vehicle in the rear of the building at the kitchen loading dock up against the wall with a cord run to an outlet. The officer spent some time trying to determine whose vehicle it was. It was unlocked and he eventually began looking through the interior after verifying it did not belong to the school system.

The officer, his marked patrol vehicle and the electric vehicle were all in clear view of the tennis courts. Eventually, a man on the courts told the officer that the man playing tennis with him owned the vehicle. The officer went to the courts and interviewed the vehicle owner. The officer's initial incident report gives a good indication of how difficult and argumentative the individual was to deal with. He made no attempt to apologize or simply say oops and he wouldn't do it again. Instead he continued being argumentative, acknowledged he did not have permission and then accused the officer of having damaged his car door. The officer told him that was not true and that the vehicle and existing damage was already on his police vehicle's video camera from when he drove up.

Given the uncooperative attitude and accusations of damage to his vehicle, the officer chose to document the incident on an incident report. The report was listed as misdemeanor theft by taking. The officer had no way of knowing how much power had been consumed, how much it cost nor how long it had been charging.

The report made its way to Sgt Ford's desk for a follow up investigation. He contacted the middle school and inquired of several administrative personnel whether the individual had permission to use power. He was advised no. Sgt. Ford showed a photo to the school resource officer who recognized Mr. Kamooneh. Sgt Ford was further advised that Mr. Kamooneh had previously been advised he was not allowed on the school tennis courts without permission from the school . This was apparently due to his interfering with the use of the tennis courts previously during school hours.

Based upon the totality of these circumstances and without any expert advice on the amount of electricity that may have been used, Sgt Ford signed a theft warrant. The warrant was turned over to the DeKalb Sheriffs Dept for service because the individual lived in Decatur, not Chamblee. This is why he was arrested at a later time.

[Fabrux]

But the funniest thing I've heard in a long time is that the Mayor of Traverse City got busted in Traverse City, Michigan for D.U.I. on Oct.23 of this year, was arrested and charged, then a few weeks later he was re-elected by the people of Traverse City for a third term. Last week he pled guilty and was placed on 1-1/2 years probation. It just so happens to be his second offence BTW.

But I have to wonder how does a Mayor of a city like that over see the police and other city business when he's on 1-1/2 years of probation and enforce the laws fairly ?

How would it be for the other people that have to do community service to have to pick up garbage on the expressway dressed in those orange jump suits next to the Mayor ?

What do you think happened to the police officer that had the nerve to arrest the Mayor ?

http://www.theoaklandpress.com/government-and-politics/20131105/traverse-city-mayor-wins-3rd-term-after-guilty-plea-to-dui

The tribe has spoken......

Two words: Rob Ford.

[niteowl7710]

Two words: Rob Ford.

The problem with Rob Ford - well there a myriad of problems WITH Rob Ford - seems to lie in the fact that by Toronto law there's no way to recall or otherwise get rid of him unless he's convicted of a crime, unless he voluntarily resigns.

[hpiguy]

The problem with Rob Ford - well there a myriad of problems WITH Rob Ford - seems to lie in the fact that by Toronto law there's no way to recall or otherwise get rid of him unless he's convicted of a crime, unless he voluntarily resigns.

This is like our previous sherriff.

He showed up for work less than 2 hours the past year and less than a few weeks the year prior. There was nothing that could be done until he resigned in shame. If he wanted to stay, we'd have had to wait until he was booted in the next election.

[sjordan2]

Boy, has this thread taken a U-turn. Unless someone knows if Rob Ford has been sniffing electricity from a school using a thermal straw.

[Harry P.]

Watch the Rob Ford stuff. We're not supposed to talk politics here, remember?

[Mike Kucaba]

What will happen when the technology advances where the electric car becomes a self generating "Solar Generator". The theory is that the car will almost always be fully charged and when plugged into the "grid" will actually feedback to the grid. Will be people be asking electric car owners to "plug in here"

[Ace-Garageguy]

What will happen when the technology advances where the electric car becomes a self generating "Solar Generator". The theory is that the car will almost always be fully charged and when plugged into the "grid" will actually feedback to the grid. Will be people be asking electric car owners to "plug in here"

You won't have to worry about that happening any time soon. There simply isn't enough "energy density" in sunlight to power a useful vehicle in real-time...from the size of photovoltaic array that can be installed on a car.

As vehicle weight comes down (which is made difficult by all the crash-standards requiring MUCH more weight than solar-powered experimental vehicles carry), and solar cell efficiency increases (which is happening slowly), you'll see an increase in vehicle range as a byproduct of it being able to PARTIALLY recharge itself from solar cells as it sits parked, but a fully-solar vehicle, especially one that generates EXCESS power, is a long way away...if it's even possible. The solar powered "sun-racers" are fly-weight, carbon-fiber exotics with no practical application whatsoever.

There's a lot of pie-in-the-sky hype, but much of it seems to overlook basic physics and the immutable laws of energy conversion. There really is no free energy lunch.

The most intelligent use of solar to power a vehicle will be residential rooftop-mounted PV arrays that use electricity made from sunlight to crack household waste-water into free hydrogen, and oxygen. Hydrogen generated this way can be burned in IC engines or fuel-cell vehicles. Pilot programs have proven the viability of the numbers. It works, and overcomes the storage problem that PV-generated electricity faces. Rooftop PV arrays CAN feed excess power generated back into the grid during daylight hours.

Charging electric vehicles overnight from the grid will help even out the power-demand cycles experienced by electricity-generating utilities, but will ultimately demand MORE electrical-generating capacity.

PV arrays mounted on posts or parking deck and office roofs have the potential to recharge vehicles between trips, but it's a lot of infrastructure to come up with.

Frankly, I don't see hybrid or all-electric vehicles being able to generate enough EXCESS power to feed it back into the grid. Vehicles need all the energy stored onboard to make them go, and there's nothing left over to sell back (although one POSSIBLE scenario would take power generated by an onboard solar array, AFTER THE VEHICLE'S onboard BATTERIES WERE TOPPED UP, and feed the continuing energy stream back into the grid...while parked, between trips).

Edited December 9, 2013 by Ace-Garageguy

[charlie8575]

Regarding wireless electrical transmission brought up earlier, this appears to be the company taking the lead in a lot of it. They've done enough work that Toyota is buying use rights to some of their work.

http://witricity.com/

Charlie Larkin