Our own team member Shane went to the HybridFest in Madison, Wisconsin, last weekend and he's got lots of coverage already posted and still more to come, but he wasn't the only one there. ABG friend Matt Kelly of the NextGear and Amanda Congdon of ABC were also there and they have some video online. He's got an interview with hypermiler Bill Kinney above and an interview with Francis Vogel from Clean Cities, Wisconsin after the jump. Amanda has a general report on the event that you can find here.

[Source: ABC and NextGear]

Last fall we followed Amanda Congdon's trek across America in a Ford Escape Hybrid and her videoblogging along the way. Once she landed in California, she snagged a deal to video blog for ABC News and also develop a show for HBO. In her latest video segment she visits a dairy farm in Vermont that's powered by dung.

Mark and Amanda St. Pierre began generating power at the Pleasant Valley Farm at the end of November, and have signed a deal to sell back power to the local utility since they only need about 1/4 of the power they generate for the farm. The video shows how they collect all the cow dung, put it in a digester and collect the methane. The methane is used to power generators and produce the electricity. The rest of the waste is pressed, with the solid part being used as bedding for the cows and the liquid going into a lagoon for further processing. The 1,500 cows on the farm produce 40 million pounds of milk and soon 3.5 million kW-hours of electricity annually. This is a prime example of the kind of decentralized energy supply that I discussed in my essay on the end of the energy monoculture last week.

[Source: ABC News]

A couple of years back fans of the GM EV1 electric car got very upset when GM decided to take back all the cars that they had leased. Someone even made a movie about it. There was a big uproar over the fact that the EV1s were the be crushed. However, not all of the cars were in fact destroyed. Some did survive. One then resides in the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, MI. On another edition of AmandaAcrossAmerica from Madison, WI, Amanda Congdon discovers the second life of another EV1. GM removed the controllers from some of the cars and donated them to universities for research work.

One of the schools that received an EV1 was the University of Wisconsin - Madison. The engineering school there has completely refurbished the EV1. Glenn Bower and his students have replaced the power-train and batteries, developed new control software, and calibrated the vehicle. They use the car for giving students practical experience in electric and hybrid vehicle development. In addition the engineering department at the school is working with Ballard on testing their new control systems that will be applied to fuel cell vehicles in development at Chrysler and Ford. Check out the video at AmandaAcrossAmerica.com.

[Source: AmandaAcrossAmerica.com]

On another recent episode of AmandaAcrossAmerica, Amanda Congdon interviewed Mayor Dave Cieslewicz of Madison, WI. During the interview the mayor discussed the efforts that Madison and many other cities around the country have taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Since the federal government is currently ignoring the problem, local municipalities are taking the initiative by changing things at a local level. Last year Mayor Greg Nickels of Seattle started trying to get local municipalities to sign on to the Kyoto protocol and Madison was the fifth city to do so. There are now over 300 cities and towns supporting the initiative.

Madison has provided a fleet of bicycles for city employees to get around town on. When employees need to go somewhere, they can just check out a bike and go. This can work really well in a city like Madison that has a fairly contained downtown area where cyclists can get around without too much difficulty, at least in warmer weather months. The mayor even has a dedicated bike to get around on.

The city has also allocated funds to purchase diesel electric hybrid buses for use by the Metro Transit System. Madison will be taking delivery of the first five buses in early 2007. They have also reached an agreement the University of Wisconsin-Madison to use three of the first five buses on routes around the campus area in the central part of town. The hybrid buses are expected to provide a 35% improvement in fuel economy and a reduction in carbon monoxide emissions from 3 grams per mile for diesel to 0.1 gram per mile for the hybrid.

[Source: AmandaAcrossAmerica]

As part of AutoBlogGreen's continuing coverage of Amanda Congdon's coast to coast journey across America, I wanted to let you know about her crew's latest episode. As mentioned in ABG's interview with Amanda, they visited the Nation BioDiesel Board in Jefferson City, Missouri. The National Biodiesel Board is the national trade group for the biodiesel industry. Among other things they coordinate research and development for biodiesel nationally.

While visiting the NBB, Amanda talked to Donnell Rehagen - Chief Operating Officer of the organization. Donnell talks a bit about the differences between petroleum and biodiesel, the economics of biodiesel and talks about the non-toxicity of biodiesel. He also mentions that actress Darryl Hannah demonstrated the non-toxicity by actually drinking some biodiesel. Amanda and Donnell also check out his Mercedes running on biodiesel. You can check out the video here or subscribe to the whole video blog series for free here.

[Source: AmandaAcrossAmerica.com]

Currently Amanda Congdon and her compatriots Mario Librandi, Rob Librandi and Emily Golub are nearing the end of their second week of a five-week journey across America in a Ford Escape Hybrid. AutoBlogGreen had a chance to talk to Amanda as they meandered from Greensboro, North Carolina into Tennessee.

AutoblogGreen: What was the goal of this trip and what prompted you to do this project?

Amanda Congdon: We knew that we wanted to videoblog across country, and we're very environmentally conscious, so it seemed perfect to partner with an environmental organization like the Natural Resources Defence Council and EnvironmentalCountdown. The goals of the trip are to raise awareness about the environment and about "citizens" or as Jeff Jarvis was saying "network journalism". Those are the two things we're focusing on when we meet with people along the way.

Read the rest of the interview after the jump.

In 2005 Amanda Congdon became an internet superstar when she and her erstwhile former partner started up a daily video blog called Rocketboom. Their daily five "news" show quickly got enormously popular in large part due to Amanda's attractive looks and entertaining presentation style. Amanda's resume includes theater and television acting as well as comedy and a degree from Northwestern University. A couple of months ago the rocket blew up and Amanda and Andrew went their separate ways. After a quiet summer Amanda is back!

Earlier this week, she and her compatriots embarked on a new journey. They are taking a five-week trip driving across America in a Ford Escape Hybrid and filming the interesting people, places and events they encounter along the way. The website environmentalcountdown.org is sponsoring the project. EnvironmentalCountdown will soon be launching their full site where people can submit videos about they are doing in their communities to help the environment.

I've sent an interview request in to Amanda, so hopefully she'll be joining us here on ABG soon to fill us in some more on what she is doing and why. In the meantime you can follow Amanda's adventures at AmandaAcrossAmerica.

[Source: Amanda Across America]