Re: RE: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: RE: My looniness

[Ken Hanly <khanly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Of course I was not serious about cutting down old growth forests. My point is
that if your main concern is global warming then the argument makes sense. In
fact I meant it as a warning not to consider just one environmental factor,
global warming. The same is true about being fixated on running out of fossil
fuels. There are tons ( ;) ) of coal reserves but we surely do not want to use
them and we could expand nuclear power dramatically but again
this solves one crisis only to create another. I agree with you, on the whole
about dams, but
dams such as we have in Manitoba are not going to silt up anytime soon.
Certainly monster projects like the Three Gorges dam in China create such
disruption not only in the natural but the people environment that they are not
justified. But you simply ignore the benefits of dams. The Diefenbaker dam in
Saskatchewan, created a large recreational area, improved fishing, provides
water for irrigation-making a potato industry possible in Saskatchewan, allows
for superior flood control, as well as producing power. Also there is probably
considerable potential for more micro hydro projects. Alone of course these are
not a solution but along with numerous other alternatives they may be.
    It is highly unlikely that one alternative to fossil fuel will be found to
solve the crisis but this is what you seem to demand. There are a large number
of alternatives that collectively may
help alleviate the crisis. Even so I don't see how capitalism could even begin
to solve the crisis without a huge increase in regulation and decrease in
consumption. The first seems inimical to the present free market ideology and
the second to increase in profits by increase in sales. You would need strict
regulation but also price rigging that would sustain profits with decreases in
consumption. Regulation that ensures profits is hardly new but it certainly
might cause strong social reaction as energy costs deprive masses of people of
the life-style to which they are accustomed.
    I had no idea that someone actually predicted a catastrophe from global
warming of the methane hydrates, I meant it as an example of the sort of
unlikely scenario some environmentalists might pounce upon.
    What I find annoying about your posts is your absolute certainty about the
fossil fuel crisis. Of course given a sufficient length of time we will run out
of them but I don't see the problem is all that urgent compared to others,
including as others have pointed out, global warming. You do not talk much about
distributive issues. Surely an argument could be made that distribution of
resources that results in many of the worlds population slowly starving to death
in abject poverty is as significant a crisis as global warming or  the energy
crisis. Your argument  reminds me a little of  conservatives who argue that in
order to deal with the social safety net we must first deal with the debt
problem since if we do not reduce the debt there will be no safety net at all.
The debt wall concept was used to unjustifiably justify all kinds of reactionary
measures.
    Your response to fossil fuel alternatives is to say that they are not.
Period. End of discussion. I am no expert in these matters but I have talked to
some people, such as my son, who works on  modelling, global warming etc. for
the Saskatchewan government. He claims scientists are divided and many claim
that one can just not make any strong knowledg claims on these matters. You
certainly do.
    Cheers, Ken Hanly

Mark Jones wrote:

> Ken, dams *do* consume vast quantities of carbon in their construction, as
> many as 12 gallons of oil per tonne of cement (the manufacture of which is
> uitself a leading source of GHG). The world's major hydropower resources
> have already been largely exploited. Some dams have a long service life,
> which helps payback the iunitial energy investment and possibly justifies
> the immense ecological damage and harm to communities which all major dams
> always involve. Many dams silt up after a few years and cease to provide
> power; they never pay back. But they leave disrupted ecosystems, ruined
> wetlands and water basins, salinated soil and wrecked communities. But the
> bottom line is that hydropower is marginal and absolutely irrelevant to the
> problem caused by the end of Big Oil. Some theoreticians propose building
> huge propellors in mid-Atlantic to be driven by the Gulf Stream; that's how
> desperate people are. They better be quick, in case the Gulf Stream stops
> flowing altogether because of global warming.
>
> By 'hydragas crystal' you mean methane hydrates locked under arctic ice
> sheets presumably. They are like cold fusion and other forms of perpetual
> motion machines. They will never be exploited. The reasons why have been
> laborious documented by myself (and I've been to the Soviet arctic icefields
> myself and know what it theoretically involved) and many others. As you say,
> if such hydrates ever were released it would be as a result of the melting
> away of the ice sheets. The amounts of methane spontaneously released into
> the atmosphere might, according to former Greenpeace man Jeremy Legget,
> trigger the feared runaway global warming which would turn this planet into
> Venus, hot enough to boil lead on.
>
> Geothermal is not a solution. Nor is biomass. Even if current proposals to
> grow prairie grass for biomass were widely implemented the energy economics
> would not solve the problem. Americans will have to learn to catch the bus
> and ride a bicycle.
>
> BTW, it doesn't surprise me but it does sadden me to hear people start
> saying things like "old growth forests are the worst trees from the point of
> view of > global warming.> We should cut them all down". Keep going, you'll
> get a job in the Dubya environmental team. Of course the same people who now
> proudly point to the reforestation of New England which happened in the past
> 50 years as evidence of capitalism's enviornmentally-benign impact
> (forgetting that the price the world has paid is the enormous quantity of
> fossil carbon trhe US threw into the atmopshere instead) will immediatelt
> start telling us what a bad thing from all sorts of *environmental* points
> of view, old growth forests are and how we need to cut them all down as
> quick as possible to get the ethanol to keep our SUV's going...
>
> Mark Jones
> http://www.egroups.com/group/CrashList
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > [mailto:owner-pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Ken Hanly
> > Sent: 30 June 2000 07:43
> > To: pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > Subject: [PEN-L:21009] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: RE: My looniness
> >
> >
> > I live in Manitoba. THe bulk of my electricity comes from hydro.
> > There are two
> > supplementary coal-fired plants that usually do not operate. Quebec
> > electricity comes almost entirely from hydro, although some of it
> > is imported
> > from Labrador at cheap prices and then exported to New England
> > states at much
> > higher prices.. Hydro power plants do not burn fossil fuels.
> > Ontario as well
> > as France has considerable nuclear power.. I do not know how much
> > electrical
> > power is  produced worldwide through hydro but it must be substantial. In
> > Denmark over 10 percent of power is from wind. There is no reason why this
> > cannot be increased.
> >     Global warming is likely to become more of the "in" crisis long before
> > fossil fuels run out.
> > In fact it could be argued that the sooner fossil fuels run out
> > the better. By
> > the way there are huge deposits of hydragas crystals that could
> > be developed
> > as a source of natural gas. Geothermal power is also an underdeveloped
> > resource in most areas. If oil prices go to 30 or 40 dollars a barrel
> > geothermal power would be economic even in areas such as Saskatchewan.
> > Scrub and quick-growing wood is also actually a good source of
> > heat plus the
> > junk grows back very quickly releasing oxygen and using carbon dioxide. In
> > Sweden garbage is a source of heat for some urban centers. By the by, old
> > growth forests are the worst trees from the point of view of
> > global warming.
> > We should cut them all down
> > and replant with quick growing trash trees that we could cut for pulp :)
> >     The problem with global warming is that it is difficult if
> > not impossible
> > to know if it is a long term trend or what its effects will be.
> > Even if there
> > is global warming the effects are mixed and there are certainly
> > no foolproof
> > models that would assure one of any unimaginable economic
> > results, just that
> > there will be considerable changes with winners and losers. Of course you
> > could argue from a precautionary principle that action should be taken now
> > because changes may be abrupt, irreversible and disastrous. With global
> > warming the hydragas crystals on the floor of the Arctic Ocean
> > may warm and
> > become instable producing one huge natural gas fart that destabilizes the
> > whole north of the Great White North and who knows what will happen then.
> >    Cheers, Ken Hanly
> >
> > Brad De Long wrote:
> >
> > > >I don't understand. Is the YES meant to imply that electricity
> > production
> > > >depends ultimately upon fossil fuels?
> > >
> > > Unless you live in the Pacific Northwest or France, the bulk of your
> > > electricity comes from power plants that burn fossil fuels...
> >
> >