The world's smallest working train set... it's the size of a fingernail

By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE

Measuring a tiny eighth of an inch by quarter of an inch, this carefully crafted piece of engineering is the world's smallest working train model.

The five-carriage train, which is 35,200 times smaller than a real train, nips around an oval route even taking in a ride through a tunnel on its three-quarter inch track.

Created by New Jersey train enthusiast David Smith, the miniscule model was built using nothing more fancy than a craft knife and a steady hand.

Powered by a standard two-inch-long rotating motor head and carved out of moldable plastic, the model train cost David just over £6 to make.

'The motor can be bought from K-Mart or any hobby store in America,' says David.

'There is a slight optical illusion with this train model though.

'There are no tracks and the train and carriages are carved out of plastic stuck atop the motor.

'This gives the impression of a train following the oval track.

'But, still, it is impressively small.'

With James River Branch still under construction, David has yet to install the tiny model train inside the model shop in his model village.

'To get a sense of scale you have to remember that the River Branch project is being built to the scale of 1-220,' says David.

'It has taken up two-and-a half-years of my life and is going to be very impressive once it is finished.'

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Joshua Bell Raises Funds in Warsaw

Virtuoso violinist performs at charity concert

Joshua Bell, the American-born violin prodigy who has performed with some of the best orchestras in the world, appeared in Warsaw yesterday evening at a charity concert. The packed performance at the Warsaw Opera House was staged to raise funds for the planned Museum of the History of Polish Jews.

Bell performed Johannes Brahms' music during the concert, which raised several hundred thousand dollars for the museum. He was accompanied by the Opera House orchestra, which was directed by Israeli conductor Gabriel Chmura. The steep ticket prices (the most expensive tickets ever sold in Poland - 350 euro within Poland, 500 euro for other European nationalities, $1,500 in the U.S.) did not deter attendance, and the orchestra performed in front of a full house.

The museum had sought funding for years, but construction began on the Jewish Museum just three months ago. Construction of the museum is due for completion in March 2012, and the ambitious project will guide visitors through the thousand-year heritage of the country's once sizeable Jewish population, most of whom perished or fled Poland during the Second World War.

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Automakers focus on affordable electric cars

David R. Baker, Chronicle Staff Writer

There's more than one path to the electric car.

There's the road taken by Tesla Motors, which sells a $109,000 electric sports car to people willing to pay a premium for being on the cutting edge.

Then there's Ford Motor Co. Its first mass-marketed, all-electric car? A battery-powered Focus.

The company plans to start selling its electric Focus in 2011. And although Ford hasn't said how much it will cost, the price won't be in Tesla territory.

In order for electric cars finally to win public acceptance, they'll need to be affordable, said Nancy Gioia, who this month was named Ford's director of electrification efforts.

"This is not about making a small niche," she said. "It's about affordable transportation for the masses. Electric transportation is still expensive."

Gioia and other Ford executives held a forum in San Francisco on Thursday on their efforts to ramp up production of hybrids, plug-in hybrids and battery-electric vehicles. By 2020, those vehicles will account for 10 to 25 percent of Ford's fleet, she said.

Whereas Tesla, based in San Carlos, plans to penetrate the market from the top down, starting with expensive cars and introducing successively less-expensive models, Ford is building from the bottom up.

Van in the works

The Dearborn, Mich., automaker will start selling a battery-powered small commercial van, the Transit Connect, next year, followed by the electric Focus in 2011. Ford also is redesigning its platforms - the basic framework of a car, used for multiple models - to accommodate electrics, plug-in hybrids and traditional gasoline vehicles.

Other automakers are developing electric cars and advanced hybrids that avoid the upper price ranges, even though they won't be as cheap as comparably sized, gasoline-fueled cars.

Nissan, for example, has its electric LEAF hatchback, planned for mass production in late 2010. Nissan has not announced the price, but it is rumored to be in the vicinity of $30,000. General Motors has set a goal of selling its Chevy Volt, an advanced hybrid, for less than $30,000, but has warned that the first versions could be closer to $40,000.

Closer to affordable

"It's great, because there's a lot of people who can't afford a Tesla ... but they might be able to afford the Focus," said Sherry Boschert, vice president of the Plug In America advocacy group. She added, however, "We won't really know until we find out the price."

Price isn't the only barrier to electric cars.

Ford's forum on Thursday covered many of the potential problems. The nation's electrical grid will need to be upgraded as plug-ins spread. An electric car, while it is recharging, places about as much load on the grid as does a house, Gioia said.

Electricity demand usually peaks in the late afternoon. But if people recharge their cars as soon as they get home in the evening, peak demand will be extended by several hours, Mark Duvall, with the Electric Power Research Institute, told the forum. That could tax electric distribution equipment, such as transformers, wearing them out.

Yet California's existing electricity infrastructure already could accommodate at least 4 million plug-in hybrids, provided they recharged at night, said Duvall, director of the institute's electric transportation program.

"Going in and strengthening the system to accommodate electric vehicles, that's a pretty easy thing to do," he said.

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Tour of California returns to Santa Cruz

By GENEVIEVE BOOKWALTER

SANTA CRUZ -- Lance Armstrong and the Amgen Tour of California will roll through Surf City again next year, and supporters hope the new May date will draw twice the number of spectators as this year's event when 15,000 people watched top cyclists whiz across the finish line on a rainy February day.

Santa Cruz will host the finish line on May 18 for the third stage of the fifth annual race. That stage will begin in San Francisco.

Andrew Messick, president of AEG Sports, which puts on the event, said Thursday he anticipates the route will include three ascents into the Santa Cruz Mountains and possibly finish in front of the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. The route for the stage is not finalized.

This year, the local stage included two ascents. Levi Leipheimer of Santa Rosa, the race's overall winner, took his lead in Bonny Doon. Both Leipheimer and seven-time Tour de France winner Armstrong on Thursday committed to riding the Tour of California again next year.

That excited Jim Gentes, founder of Scotts Valley helmet maker Giro and a volunteer with the race.

"This is a chance for America to see Armstrong while he's still racing, on our soil," Gentes said.

Meanwhile, local race sponsors said they are on track to raise the $245,000 they committed to bring the Tour of California to town. City leaders said earlier this year they could not afford to kick in the money necessary to host the race and told local promoters they must help pay for

So far, said Aptos resident Steve Jonsson, local director of sponsorship, said they have raised $160,000.

"We are well on our way," Jonsson said. "We expect not to cost the city anything."

To help save Santa Cruz money on hotel rooms last February, athletes and race officials drove over the hill after the Front Street finish and spent the night there because the next stage began in San Jose the following morning.

Next year, said Tina Shull, a city spokeswoman, sponsors will help pay for hotel rooms in Santa Cruz, which in turn should contribute more money to the local economy as guests go out for dinner and take in the sights before the next day's start in San Jose.

Jonsson said the Boardwalk is the 2010 "title sponsor" for the stage finish and its financial commitment gave supporters the confidence to promise the city they could fund it.

Boardwalk spokesman Kris Reyes said details are still being worked out on the exact amount that Seaside Co. will chip in, and whether the finish line will be in front of the 102-year-old amusement park.

"We're very excited to be involved with Amgen this year. We think it's a wonderful event that showcases all the great things about Santa Cruz," Reyes said.

Matt Twisselman, who lobbied for years to bring the race through town, said organizers were so impressed with Santa Cruz's Stage 2 finish on Front Street this year that they decided to return.

"We did a fantastic job," Twisselman said. "We hope to build on that."

The Amgen Tour of California will cover 750 miles over eight days, with cyclists traveling between two cities on most days.

The race shifted to May 16-23 this year to take advantage of better weather and route riders up Sierra Nevada peaks, which in previous years were snow-capped for the February event, organizers said.

Along with Leipheimer and Armstrong, cyclists Dave Zabriskie and George Hincapie are expected to ride, along with Watsonville twins Ben and Andy Jacques-Maynes.

Santa Cruz Mayor Cynthia Mathews said the city was "delighted to be bringing this event back."

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Entrepeneur says he strikes oil with our garbage

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Like the alchemists who once tried to turn lead into gold, a green entrepreneur says he has found a cost-effective method for turning plastic trash into oil.

During a recent visit to his new demonstration plant in Maryland, Envion CEO Michael Han describes his process: Waste plastic is shredded and melted and then processed in a way that separates the petroleum from the rest of the ingredients.

At one end of the machinery, shredded plastic trash is dumped in a hopper and goes up a conveyor belt into a "reactor." At the other end is a spaghetti of pipes and valves and tanks.

Han turns open a spigot on one of the pipes and produces a liquid the color of apple juice. It smells kind of like diesel, and Han claims it's ready to be processed for any number of uses: fueling cars, diesel generators or even jets.

But not all of the ingredients in plastic can be refined into petroleum. All the chemicals that were added when the plastic was produced must be separated out and collected in a sediment tank.

That could be a problem, says Kert Davies, a researcher with the environmental group Greenpeace. He has not visited the plant, but after reading Envion's literature, he asked, "what happens to the additives and the metals and the other things?"

Envion is hoping to find asphalt makers who can use the sludge as an ingredient for paving after the metals are filtered out. Otherwise, it can be dried by microwaving and the dust sent to a landfill.

"Then you end up with a different problem," Davies said. "Is that going to a hazardous waste landfill?"

But Han says that it's not hazardous, and most important, that the process releases no gas into the air.

"You don't smell anything burning," he said. "We don't incinerate. We simply melt."

Han set up his demonstration at the Montgomery County dump in Maryland. Amid bales of crushed yogurt containers and plastic bottles, there seems to be little risk that he will run out of trash to feed into his machine.

Envion is pitching the technology to sanitation departments, promising it will cut down on their trash volume by consuming up to 10,000 tons of plastic per year while producing some revenue as well.

The plant could produce up to 60,000 barrels of oil a year, Han says, and although some of that oil is used to keep the machinery running, the rest can be sold to an oil company for profit.

The plant cost $4 million to build, but Han says it can produce oil for as little as $10 a barrel at a time when oil is selling for more than $70 a barrel.

Davies said that "finding new oil to burn is not the goal. The goal should be to burn less oil."

But Han said, "if there's a way that we can solve the problem of accumulation of waste plastic in our country and at the same time turn it into a byproduct that is cost effective, then I think it's a win-win

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