Solar Now

The earth and inhabitants are no longer sustainable under the present energy system. Never mind politics, and never mind global warming. Just look around you. More cars, More buildings and parking lots, freeways and more people. Waste is everywhere, clogging and causing expensive disease control and cleanup. Plastic bags kill scarce fauna, and flora too, probably.

This places huge demands on everything and everybody. Millions of tons of waste go into the sky and return as rain, which washes back into lakes, streams, and oceans. Fish die. Birds that eat the fish die and insects grow out of control and vector diseases through aquatic and direct animal and human contact. No one dares talk about doing something about the population expolosion. The result is a constant carbon insult to the planet's eco system.

Cancer and new diseases like skin eating bacteria are more common. Pathogens usually dormant are now infecting food supplies. Diseases wipe out herds of cattle, hogs and sheep formerly destined for the dinner table.

So it doesn't matter what it is called, I first heard the term global warming, at university in 1982. The class was entitled, Environmental Administration, by Professsor Caldwell, who predicted everything that would happen to the environment by the year 2000. Sadly, he was all too correct.

In future articles I will explore how countries are gearing up to change dependence from carbon energy systems to renewable and clean energy systems. Solar, wind, geothermal, so called clean burning gas, and even food, such as corn, are considered. There is serious consideration about using grass and soy beans to drive engines even though a professor at Berkley has pointed out it would take all the foilage in the world to replace a year of gasoline usage.

Solar energy is a solution for mass uses of energy. It has gotten much cheaper and attractive as cells are built right into the roof. In some areas excess electricity is sold to the power company. New systems that store energy to be used later are in use. Soon the government in the US will give tax credits similar to drivers of Humvees, to solar users. Other countries like Germany and China are developing solar in a big way.

The notion of burning a food supply is silly, wasteful, and burns as much carbon to develop it as the oil it is supposed to replace. Not to mention the cost of transporting it, pipelines, trucks, and railcars. Cars have to be modified. Distribution points are not yet placed in necessary quantity. The cost of farming, fertilizers, pest control and damage from chemicals to the environment will be staggering. It is a boondoggle, designed to manage and funnel large sums of cash into the hands of a few wealthy and political astute.

There will be answsers because there is no choice. There isn't much time to work on the problems before oil runs out or the planet simply breaks down,once and for all. The sun could provide in a day enough energy to fuel all the needs of mankind for the next 500,000 years. Little has been done in research on solar energy and how to capture it efficiently. Surely there is a way.