Kansas Residential Appliance Replacement Program

Here’s a statewide initiative that can be of significant value to Haysville homeowners and renters:

The Kansas Housing Resources Corporation is a state agency with the express objective of enhancing Kansas communities through the creation of increased housing opportunities. They do so, as they explain, “using a variety of strategies and approaches, including increasing homeownership opportunities, leveraging the construction of more affordable rental housing, preserving existing housing through rehabilitation, promoting energy efficiency improvements for owner-occupied and rental housing, providing affordable housing through rent assistance to low-income families and senior citizens, and creating housing opportunities for previously underserved persons and communities.”

Among the many programs the KHRC offers is a new initiative, the Kansas Residential Appliance Replacement Program — “a new statewide initiative that provides vouchers for replacement of inefficient appliances with new Energy Star models. Appliances must be at least 10 years old, and the program is available to Kansas homeowners and renters.” The goal is to “provide homeowners and renters the opportunity to replace old, inefficient and unsafe appliances with new, energy-efficient and environmentally-friendly models” as well as to “reduce residential energy consumption, lower household energy bills and provide environmental benefits.”

Eligibility for the program is based upon income. “Income limits are based on 75 percent of Kansas’ current median income, which are: 1 Person — $27,247; 2 Persons — $35,630; 3 Persons — $44,014; 4 Persons — $52,397”.

For answers to frequently asked questions about the program, see Frequently Asked Questions. For a listing of pre-approved retailers, see Pre-Approved Retailer Listing

The Kansas Residential Appliance Replacement Program is by no means the only potentially useful program available from KHRC. They also offer a First Time Home Buyer’s Program, an Emergency Repair Program and numerous others. For the details on these programs, visit the website noted above, or check their Kansas Housing Resources Guide, a twenty-page document intended to explain and help you determine eligibility for a host of programs related to the KHRC’s objectives.

The Quiet Sun: Update

Today's Sun - April 21, 2009 (Spaceweather.com)

Earlier this month, we discussed the current most quiescent solar minimum in a century. Today, the BBC News offers an update with ‘Quiet Sun’ Baffling Astronomers. Professor Mike Lockwood of Southampton University indicates that “if you look carefully at the observations, it’s pretty clear that the underlying level of the Sun peaked at about 1985 and what we are seeing is a continuation of a downward trend (in solar activity) that’s been going on for a couple of decades. If the Sun’s dimming were to have a cooling effect, we’d have seen it by now.”

And as Spaceweather.com reports today, “breaking a string of 25 consecutive spotless days, a new sunspot is forming near the sun’s northwestern limb. The magnetic polarity of the spot identifies it as a member of new Solar Cycle 24.” This is the seventh sunspot of the new cycle. (Spaceweather.com explains the calculation of sunspot numbers here.)

[If you haven’t yet seen it, here’s an absolutely fantastic five-minute Youtube video on solar satellitesSOHO and TRACE Solar Discoveries from NASA.]

Interstellar Message in a Bottle

Here is another interesting little slide show from New Scientist encapsulating the messages sent outward bound from the solar system aboard Pioneer 10 and 11 and Voyager 1 and 2.

Pinocchio

The New York Review of Books for April 30th includes an interesting and informative review of Carlo Collodi’s classic, The Adventures of Pinocchio, newly translated from the Italian by Geoffrey Brock:

“The celebrated and sugary Disney film adaptation (1940), by which most people outside Italy have come to know Pinocchio’s story, announces itself as an example of how, if sincerely desired, even the greatest of wishes can come true: a reassuring message. Nothing could be further from the acid spirit of Collodi’s ‘Story of a Puppet.’ The question with a puppet is: Who will manipulate him? When the puppet turns out to have a stubborn and stupid will of his own, that question becomes: Whom will he allow himself to be manipulated by?”

The Remotest Place on Earth

The remotest place on Earth? The Tibetan Plateau. At least, that’s so according to a series of maps from the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre and the World Bank. An interesting exposition of the maps and underlying techniques and assumptions is available in a series of ten slides from New Scientist. (Tristan da Cunha doesn’t look all that accessible, either.)

. . . and Continues . . .

28th Annual Library Read-A-Thon Continues

. . . and Continues . . .

28th Annual Library Read-A-Thon Continues

. . . and Continues . . .

28th Annual Library Read-A-Thon Continues

. . . Read-A-Thon Continues

28th Annual Library Read-A-Thon Continues

. . . and Continues

28th Annual Library Read-A-Thon Continues

Read-A-Thon Continues

Life Persists

Life is more persistent, more diverse and more pervasive than we have ever imagined.