• The International Union of Railways says a high-speed train can carry eight times as many passengers as an airplane over a given distance, using the same amount of energy and emitting a quarter of the carbon dioxide for each passenger. Rail Transport and Environment Facts & Figures

• The Maglev from Japan holds the world record for a train with a speed of 581 kilometers (361 miles) an hour recorded in 2003; it uses electromagnetic technology, where the train does not actually touch the rail. A French TGV high-speed train, V-150, owns the world speed record on rail at 574.8 kilometers (357 miles) an hour.

• GE (see their “ecomagination” push here) is the only company listed in the Dow Jones Industrial Index today that was also included in the original index in 1896.

• The human population on earth has grown more in the last 50 years than it did in the previous four million years.

• The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill (American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, H.R. 2454) is now 932 pages long. To thwart possible stall tactics by the Republican opposition, including reading of the entire bill, Rep. Waxman (D-CA) hired a speed reader.

- Justin Manger