Sales of zero-emissions electric cars continue to tick up in California, driving the state on a vastly different trajectory than the rest of the country. Nearly 24% of all new cars sold here during the first three months of the year were zero-emissions electric vehicles, known as ZEVs, according to new data from the California Energy Commission. By comparison, just 7.5% of cars sold nationwide were ZEVs, according to the California New Car Dealers Association, which represents auto dealers.

In the last week, California surpassed both its zero-emissions truck sales and vehicle sales goals — two years ahead of schedule — and surpassed its goal of installing 10,000 fast EV chargers, more than a year ahead of schedule.

Another reason EV sales in California are outpacing sales in other parts of the country is people are keenly aware how the climate crisis uniquely impacts California. In recent decades, California has continued to face significant pollution and climate challenges. In fact, the state includes seven of the 10 worst areas for ozone pollution in the country and six of the 10 worst areas for small particulate matter, according to Newsom’s office. The state also faces increasing risks from record-setting fires, heat waves, storm surges, sea-level rise, water supply shortages and extreme heat. And these conditions are made worse by climate change.

Sorry if you encounter a paywall!

The union representing 48,000 graduate student teaching assistants, researchers and other student workers across the University of California’s 10 campuses have voted to strike and cause “maximum chaos,” alleging that their workers’ rights have been violated at several universities by actions against pro-Palestinian protests, union leaders announced Wednesday evening.

Though the vote gives the union permission to strike as soon as Wednesday night, it was unclear when or where the walkouts would occur. The union represents teaching assistants, tutors, researchers and postdoctoral scholars.

Rafael Jaime, the union’s co-president and a PhD candidate in UCLA’s English department, said the goal would be to “maximize chaos and confusion” at universities where the union alleges officials have violated workers’ rights over workplace conditions during student protests against the Israel-Hamas war.

“Our members have been beaten, concussed, pepper sprayed, both by counter-protesters and by police forces. As a union, it is our responsibility to stand beside them,” the union said in a statement. “In order to de-escalate the situation, UC must substantively engage with the concerns raised by the protesters — which focus on UC’s investments in companies and industries profiting off of the suffering in Gaza.”

The academic worker strike would be modeled after last year’s “stand up” strikes at against Ford, Stellantis and General Motors and similar to recent strikes at Southern California hotels. The walkouts would not target all campuses at once, Jaime said, but one by one based on how receptive administrations are to pro-Palestinian activists.

When growing up my parents taught me to stand up to bullies. (We're talking about verbal abuse and manipulation, not physical bullying.) Following that advice as a kid led to mixed results yet it's stuck with me into my adult years.

These days though, using this advice only seems to backfire. When I give them what they've given me, the bullies just get more angry and use that to justify their continued bullying. They see themselves as the victim.

Any suggestions that would be more helpful?

If a mobile (cell, handy) phone is part of your life, do your dreams include reference to it?

The other night I dreamed that I left mine in someone's car. That struck me as odd because it may have been the first time one of my dreams included such a reference - even though I'm constantly on my phone during waking hours.

“This will punish people who use less energy,” said Jenn Engstrom, the state director at consumer advocacy group CALPIRG. “This will encourage high consumption and it will increase bills for millions of Californians.”

Commissioner John Reynolds dismissed the concerns before he voted for the proposal. “The public discourse has been disappointing,” he said.

He agreed that under the change some customers’ total bills will go up, while others will see a decline. But the focus, he said, should be on the reduction in the rate per kilowatt hour, which is needed as the state tries to move more people away from fueling their cars and homes with fossil fuels to electricity, which is increasingly coming from wind and solar farms.

Sorry for the paywall (but kinda not sorry since the LA Times is worth subscribing to)...

With little debate two years ago, state lawmakers passed a complex energy bill that enabled a sweeping change in how most Californians are billed for electricity.

The legislation was what Pacific Gas & Electric had asked for from the state public utilities commission three months before: a transformation of electric rates so that households would pay a fixed charge each month in exchange for lower rates for each kilowatt hour they used.

Gov. Gavin Newsom submitted the bill as part of a massive 2022 budget revision. In four days, it was passed out of an Assembly committee hearing without discussion, approved by the full Assembly and Senate and signed by Newsom.

...But opponents say the legislation was a financial gift to PG&E, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric, and will cause millions of Californians who live in small homes or apartments that use little electricity to pay more, while residents in large homes that use a lot of electricity will save money.

"If you wanted to design a policy that would send the signal that conservation doesn’t count, this would be it,” said Ken Cook, president of the Environmental Working Group."

In January, Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin, Democrat from Thousand Oaks, proposed a bill named AB 1999 to reverse much of what Newsom’s bill had done.

The opposition was angered even more when Speaker Robert Rivas (D-Hollister) and other Assembly leaders stopped debate on Irwin’s bill late last month with a procedural move that shelved it for the legislative session.

Small metal object with clip on top. Clip spins around the object body and can be attracted to a magnet (so made of steel probably). Object body does not react to magnet (so made of brass maybe). Cone shaped tip seems to be made of some kind of plastic.

Found this in my back yard, probably from something I was working on, but it doesn't look familiar.

What is this thing? (Identification may help me fix something I don't know is broken!)

Yeah I know these are used for counting vehicles but can they also be used for detecting vehicle speed?

Description: two pneumatic hoses, affixed to a road. They lead to a box that's locked to a telephone pole. Location is southern California. On a minor artery road.

Doubtful that it's to survey if a new stop sign is needed since the next street is minor, dead ends into this one and already has a stop sign. The next intersection with another minor artery already has a stop sign.

Extremely doubtful that a traffic light is being considered since there isn't anywhere near the amount of traffic to justify one.

This is located on a slope. Many cars speed down here. That's why I'm wondering about speed sensing by this device.

Sorry if this is the wrong community or is redundant...

I'm looking for leads as to what's happening to plants in my greenhouse window. It started with my basils. Before I noticed, it spread to my mints. The leaves show these yellow spots, then they turn brown and die. Eventually the entire plant dies.

Any clues as to what I can do to treat/prevent this?

The NGINX access.log of my VPS is showing a curiosity.

Instead of a simple request like this...

"GET / HTTP/1.1"

...regular requests are coming in that look like this

"\x03\x00\x00\x13\x0E\xE0\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x01\x00\x08\x00\x03\x00\x00\x00"

Is this some kind of hack attempt?

Here's an example of a full line from the log...

15.204.204.182 - - [24/Apr/2024:15:59:47 +0000] "\x03\x00\x00\x13\x0E\xE0\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x01\x00\x08\x00\x03\x00\x00\x00" 400 166 "-" "-"

EDIT: For what it might be worth, most of these requests come in singularly, from different IP addresses. Once (that I've noticed) repeated attempts came in quickly from one specific IP.

Can I put an additional load before switches on a dedicated circuit?

The example circuit goes from the service panel to a two-way (SPDT) switch at the house back door. From there the circuit goes to another two-way switch out in the garage. The circuit then powers the garage lights.

The goal is to add additional lights on this circuit near the service panel so that the same switches would also control the new lights.

How wrong would it be to add this new load between the service panel and the first two-way switch? This would save the (huge) effort to run wire from the garage back to the house.