[at-l] Possibilities

Sat Aug 5 21:43:42 CDT 2006

Wind helps, solar helps, passive solaR especially HELPS. Passive solar in a new house with access to the southern sky is virtually free with proper house design. But, realistically, coal is going to remain the primary source of electricity for quite a bit longer.

Weary 

> ------------Original Message------------
> From: Jan Leitschuh <janl2 at mindspring.com>
> To: "Bob C" <ellen at clinic.net>, at-l at mailman.backcountry.net
> Date: Sat, Aug-5-2006 9:28 PM
> Subject: Re: [at-l] Possibilities
>
> 
> >marginal and unsustailable palliatives.
> 
> Marginal?
> Hmmm... I'm visiting on a real-world Wisconsin farm right now that not 
> only produces all the electricity it needs but more than enough to put 
> back in the grid and power two-and-a-half more households.
> Why is that unsustainable?
> My brother has electric motors and is converting his backhoe to 
> electric.
> 
> It's not widespread - but it could be.
> And it's certainly sustainable.
> 
> We have light bulbs because some hard-headed guy said "I know there 
> MUST be a way..."
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> >From: Bob C <ellen at clinic.net>
> >Sent: Aug 5, 2006 8:55 PM
> >To: Jan Leitschuh <janl2 at mindspring.com>, at-l at mailman.backcountry.net
> >Subject: Re: [at-l] Possibilities
> >
> >Keep in mind that electricity in this country is mostly generated by 
> coal -- the most polluting fuel, and made more polluting by our current 
> administration's refusal to enforce clean air laws. . Hybrids make us 
> less vunerable to Middle East black mail, but are only marginally useful 
> in curtailing global warming.
> >
> >There are ways to eliminate much of the pollution generated by coal, 
> but it is expensive and no one has seriously tried it in the real 
> industrial world. There are solutions. But they require an administration and 
> Congress committed to enforcing existing laws and enacting new laws.
> >
> >What I am hearing so far is not committment to prevent a global 
> disaster, but marginal and unsustailable palliatives.
> >
> >Weary
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> ------------Original Message------------
> >> From: Jan Leitschuh <janl2 at mindspring.com>
> >> To: at-l at mailman.backcountry.net
> >> Date: Sat, Aug-5-2006 1:53 PM
> >> Subject: [at-l] Possibilities
> >>
> >> 
> >> Comments from the radical rag...Newsweek?
> >> ;-)
> >> 
> >> Without degrading into negativity, and in light of the fact that 
> we're 
> >> all in this together, 
> >> is it possible to discuss the possibility that there are better 
> ways?
> >> 
> >> By the way, consider last year's prediction of "oil to hit $75 this 
> >> decade" when there are now predictions of $100 a gallon this winter.
> >> 
> >> >"There is little wonder why many suspect a hidden agenda
> >> >behind global warming alarm when its proponents tend to stay
> >> >vague about serious solutions to the problem, or frame it in
> >> >terms of class envy." thinks TXIIS.
> >> 
> >> 
> >> 
> >> Imagine: 500 Miles Per Gallon
> >> By Fareed Zakaria
> >> 
> >> Newsweek 
> >> March 7, 2005 
> >> Section: Fareed Zakaria 
> >> Edition: U.S. Edition 
> >> Page: 27
> >> Write the author at comments at fareedzakaria.com 
> >> 
> >> The most important statement made last week came not from Vladimir 
> >> Putin or George W. Bush but from Ali Naimi, Saudi Arabia's shrewd 
> oil 
> >> minister. Naimi predicted that crude prices would stay between $40 
> and $50 
> >> throughout 2005. For the last two years OPEC's official target price 
> has 
> >> been $25. Naimi's statement signals that Saudi Arabia now believes 
> that 
> >> current high prices are not a momentary thing. An Asian oil-industry 
> 
> >> executive told me that he expects oil to hit $75 this decade. We are 
> 
> >> actually very close to a solution to the petroleum problem. 
> Tomorrow, 
> >> President Bush could make the following speech: "We are all 
> concerned that 
> >> the industrialized world, and increasingly the developing world, 
> draw 
> >> too much of their energy from one product, petroleum, which comes 
> >> disproportionately from one volatile region, the Middle East. This 
> dependence 
> >> has significant political and environmental dangers for all of us. 
> But 
> >> there is now a solution, one that the United States will pursue a
> >>  ctively. 
> >> 
> >> "It is now possible to build cars that are powered by a combination 
> of 
> >> electricity and alcohol-based fuels, with petroleum as only one 
> element 
> >> among many. My administration is going to put in place a series of 
> >> policies that will ensure that in four years, the average new 
> American car 
> >> will get 300 miles per gallon of petroleum. And I fully expect in 
> this 
> >> period to see cars in the United States that get 500 miles per 
> gallon. 
> >> This revolution in energy use will reduce dramatically our 
> dependence 
> >> on foreign oil and achieve pathbreaking reductions in carbon-dioxide 
> 
> >> emissions, far below the targets mentioned in the Kyoto accords." 
> >> 
> >> Ever since September 11, 2001, there have been many calls for 
> Manhattan 
> >> Projects and Marshall Plans for research on energy efficiency and 
> >> alternate fuels. Beneath the din lies a little-noticed reality--the 
> solution 
> >> is already with us. Over the last five years, technology has matured 
> in 
> >> various fields, most importantly in semiconductors, to make possible 
> 
> >> cars that are as convenient and cheap as current ones, except that 
> they 
> >> run on a combination of electricity and fuel. Hybrid technology is 
> the 
> >> answer to the petroleum problem. 
> >> 
> >> You can already buy a hybrid car that runs on a battery and 
> petroleum. 
> >> The next step is "plug-in" hybrids, with powerful batteries that are 
> 
> >> recharged at night like laptops, cell phones and iPods. Ford, Honda 
> and 
> >> Toyota already make simple hybrids. Daimler Chrysler is introducing 
> a 
> >> plug-in version soon. In many states in the American Middle West you 
> can 
> >> buy a car that can use any petroleum, or ethanol, or methanol--in 
> any 
> >> combination. Ford, for example, makes a number of its models with 
> >> "flexible-fuel tanks." (Forty percent of Brazil's new cars have 
> flexible-fuel 
> >> tanks.) Put all this technology together and you get the car of the 
> >> future, a plug-in hybrid with a flexible-fuel tank. 
> >> 
> >> Here's the math (thanks to Gal Luft, a tireless--and 
> >> independent--advocate of energy security). The current crop of 
> hybrid cars get around 50 
> >> miles per gallon. Make it a plug-in and you can get 75 miles. 
> Replace 
> >> the conventional fuel tank with a flexible-fuel tank that can run on 
> a 
> >> combination of 15 percent petroleum and 85 percent ethanol or 
> methanol, 
> >> and you get between 400 and 500 miles per gallon of gasoline. (You 
> >> don't get 500 miles per gallon of fuel, but the crucial task is to 
> lessen 
> >> the use of petroleum. And ethanol and methanol are much cheaper than 
> 
> >> gasoline, so fuel costs would drop dramatically.) 
> >> 
> >> If things are already moving, why does the government need to do 
> >> anything? Because this is not a pure free market. Large 
> companies--in the oil 
> >> and automotive industry--have vested interests in not changing much. 
> 
> >> There are transition costs--gas stations will need to be fitted to 
> pump 
> >> methanol and ethanol (at a cost of $20,000 to $60,000 per station). 
> New 
> >> technologies will empower new industries, few of which have lobbies 
> in 
> >> Washington. 
> >> 
> >> Besides, the idea that the government should have nothing to do with 
> 
> >> this problem is bizarre. It was military funding and spending that 
> >> produced much of the technology that makes hybrids possible. (The 
> military is 
> >> actually leading the hybrid trend. All new naval surface ships are 
> now 
> >> electric-powered, as are big diesel locomotives and mining trucks.) 
> And 
> >> the West's reliance on foreign oil is not cost-free. Luft estimates 
> >> that a government plan that could accelerate the move to a hybrid 
> >> transport system would cost $12 billion dollars. That is what we 
> spend in Iraq 
> >> in about three months. 
> >> 
> >> Smart government intervention would include a combination of 
> targeted 
> >> mandates, incentives and spending. And it does not have to all 
> happen at 
> >> the federal level. New York City, for example, could require that 
> all 
> >> its new taxis be hybrids with flexible-fuel tanks. Now that's a 
> >> Manhattan Project for the 21st century. 
> >> 
> >> 
> >> 
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