Does your vote count? Mine does not. Why? Because I live in the wrong voting district.
Are you a disenfranchised voter? I am . . .
- disenfranchised
- A transitive verb, Date: 1664
To deprive of a franchise, of a legal right, or of some privilege or immunity;
Especially : to deprive of the right to vote
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It is time for real change in our voting system!
Global Warming &
The Looming Energy Crisis
The planet Earth has had its ups and downs and climatic changes.
Some are natural, some caused by man. Are we the cause of global warming? Maybe.
But it is hard to prove with such small forces at work over geologic time and only recent scientific measurments.
However, during the age before the dinosaurs when the Earth was much flatter AND warmer, plant life captured billions of tons of CO2 and geologic cycles burried it deep in the Earth to become coal and oil.
At the end of this period the Earth had less CO2 and a cooler climate.
If you dig up and burn all the coal, pump and burn all the oil, the CO2 will be put back into the atmosphere.
Simple physics says increasing CO2 WILL increase the temperature globally.
It doesn't matter if WE increase the CO2 levels, or if its volcanic activity or even termites and cow farts. The level is going up.
No, you cannot put this genie back in the bottle.
The terrain and plant life of the planet are different and are only a moderating effect on CO2 levels.
Even the oceans are different.
YES, we need the rain forests but we also need the great temperate forests that once covered much more of North America, Europe and Asia than they do now.
So, forget the blame game. It does no one any good. CO2 restrictions. . good luck getting China and India on board with that.
They will want to burn their share to build their infrastructures and wealth just like we did. The same with Eastern Russia and others. . .
Regardless of global warming the demand for fossil fuels is skyrockering. Other energy sources MUST be invested in NOW.
The problem with natural gas, hydrogen, propane and other portable fuels is that they have a LOT less energy compared to an equivalent amount of gasoline of desiel fuel.
Changing to those fuels means larger fuel tanks and stopping to refuel more often. Electric vehicles will not replace trucks.
For long haul freight to be carried without petroleum fuels will mean electric rail roads. This is a HUGE change in infrastructure.
Over the past 60 years our rail roads have been steadily declining, tracks abandonded and torn up for scrap.
This trend must be reversed and with new technology.
Commuter trails, passenger trains, car trains, freight trains . . . must be made convienient and economical.
Routes must have stations that are as common as post offices.
So while we are converting personal transportation to alternate fuels we also must have a grand plan to replace the majority of heavy long haul trucks.
Modern efficient electric rail is the way to go.
Electricity needs to be primarily solar generated. Solar farms can be widely distributed.
Small farms and housetop units can be just as efficient and competetive as large megawatt farms.
The greater the distribution the greater the security. Distribution lines will be shorter and nodes less susceptible to sabotage.
the technology it here now. All we have to do is commit to it on a large scale.
Systems must be available to put on every roof top and every utilility must agree to interconnection and fair compensation.
Some states have pilot "banking on the grid" systems that need to be made nation wide permanent programs with incentives.
Nuclear Power is back on the board. . and it should not be. I know. I've worked in the industry.
Properly run and maintained the type of nuclear plants built by the U.S. are as safe or safer than any other large scale form of energy production.
But the plants are not properly run or maintained.
In the 1960's when most of our nuclear power plants were built their plant managers were all engineers who had been part of the construction of the plant.
This was largely Admiral Rickover's doing. For the first 20 to 30 years of operation engineers managed every nuclear power plant in the U.S.
Over time these men had to retire and they were largely replaced with "managing engineers" or MBA's neither of who cared as much about or understood plant safety nearly as well as their predicessors who were real nuts and bolts engineers.
the bean counters cared more for investors dividends and the bottom line than for plant safety.
The late Issac Azimov predicted this in the 1940's in his original Foundation Series.
The technologists that had build the great power stations had gone and those operating them them had sunk to doing things by rout and religion.
Nuclear waste is also a serious issue that has not gone away.
Instead of one safe secure long term storage facility we have over 100 overfilled fuel storage bays in plants all over the country that were designed only for short term storage between refuelings.
Today all the used fuel from every plant is piling up in the water covered canal that was designed for fuel transfere and temporary storage.
Every plant has had their waste fuel storage racks redesigned and rebuilt to hold more but that is a short term solution.
Under the current conditions almost every nuclear plant in the U.S. will have to be shut down in the next decade due to lack of space for waste fuel.
After they are shut down they will have to be maintained at very great expense as a high security waste product installation.
So at the peak of the energy crisis and 10 to 20 years short of any NEW nuclear plants coming on line we are going to lose the ones we have.
Bigger is not better in some cases, its just cheaper.
With every generation of new nuclear reactor design the push has been for bigger anb bigger plants. It is simple math.
Increase the size of something by 2 and you increase its area by 4 and volume by 8. Capacity goes up by a much large number.
Bigger means more bang for the buck. But it also means much bigger engineering and safety problems.
Bigger reactors mean bigger parts that are harder to design and manufacture properly.
The horendous Space Shuttle disaster was largely due to pushing the size envelope to the limits of curent predictive powers and capacity to make accurate measurements.
When large plants fail they fail big. When a large plant goes off line its greaer capacity also means a greater loss that must be made up.
When there are leaks they are bigger, when there are disasters they are more disasterous.
And often when something is too big it is just too big for human control.
Besides energy policy there are going to be massive changes in where people can and cannot live.
Mildly arid locations may become uninhabitable and places once too cold may become the new temperate zone. . .
These changes will not appear to be logical as the climate of many locations is moderated by upwind land masses, ocean currents, the jet stream.
While some cold places may get warmer others may get colder. . .
Rain patterns will change and new areas may become farmable and others remain the same.
The ONE thing that scientists are sure about that makes logical sense is that global warming means more energy in the atmosphere.
We will have bigger more powerful storms. More frequent tornadoes and generally windier conditions.
There will obviously be higher highs but there will also be lower lows.
The result may be massive population movements.
People will be on the move from places that are no longer habitable to those that are.
The obvious trouble will occur where international boundaries are involved.
Imagine the small strip of Canada that is currently habitable becoming uninhabitable. Would the U.S. accept 50 million Canadian Immigrants?
Imagine other not so friendly borders.
Times of change could be centuries OR they can be mere decades. . . Slow changes are easy to adapt to.
Rapid change is disastrous and very possible.
Studies of Great Lake silt deposits show that during the last great ice age glaciation and retreats happened in as little as 20 years.
A fraction of a human lifetime. All of Canada and the North Central U.S. would become uninhabitable in that short time.
Currently the polar ice melt is far in advance of predictions and accelerating.
This is going to open new trade routes between China and Europe.
It will also open thousands of miles of Canadian and Russian shoreline to the world at large.
Both countries will need to spend more money on patrol ships if for nothing else but emergency services to coastal shipping.
Rising Seas may or may not be a problem.
Extra water in the Oceans is not equally distributed and tends to move to the bulge at the equator.
However, if the rising sea models are correct many coastal cites have to be protected or abandoned.
In rich countries sea walls around major cities and pumps will hold the sea at bay but in poor countries large low lying areas will have to be abandoned.
This is more social upheaval due to climatic change.
Leaders that are sensitive to the issues but not overly reactionary are needed. We can no longer afford the George Bush's of the world who's public statement was,
"So its going to be a little hotter. Get over it!
Nore do we need the Al Gore's that want to stop burning all fossil fuels and retreat from reality.
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