Re: [Marxism] Cuba's Energy Revolution

[Eli Stephens <elishastephens@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

DWalters wrote:

"While Cuba's reaction to the cut off of Russian oil was an amazing example of 
self-reliance, it was also a human disaster for all Cubans."

I do hope that was a poorly written sentence. "Cuba's reaction to the cut off" 
was what kept Cubans alive, it was the cut off which was the "human disaster," 
not Cuba's reaction.

'Energy didn't only effect agriculture, it effects *everything*. And the lack 
of it, forced on any people, should not be glorified."

I don't think anyone, neither myself nor the Cubans nor the author of the 
article in question, is "glorifying" the forced lack of energy. What IS worthy 
of "glorification" is the *saving* of energy, and what is to be "deglorified" 
is the unnecessary wasting of energy.

"I thought Fidel's quote in the article [about energy conservation] is notably 
ironic."

Hardly. His statement about conserving energy is an insightful and praiseworthy 
comment, regardless of whether Cuba finds oil or not. Because whether it does 
or not, it will still be a finite resource, and one to be used wisely, and no 
matter how much oil Cuba has, every dollar they save by energy conservation is 
one more dollar they have to spend on food, medicine, computers, or whatever 
else they need.

"reliance on oil, in old, inefficient power plants, is probably Cuba's biggest 
problem to tackle."

One of the things noted in the article is this: "In 2006, Cuba installed 1854 
diesel and fuel oil micro-electrical
plants across the country, representing over 3000 MW of decentralized
power in 110 municipalities."


Eli Stephens
 Left I on the News
 http://lefti.blogspot.com


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