Another Key Issue

From December 28 blog posting: 

Energy Policy Needed – A Key Issue of ecology, geopolitics, economics, more

            Get off the oil standard

            Invent new, sustainable forms of energy

            Create entire new industries based on alternative energies

            The ecology of clean energy 

Continuing our discussion of Key Issues originally posted in my December 28, 2011 blog, I will continue my position from before regarding the need for a long-term energy policy for our nation. 

The world has grown increasingly smaller with education and technology. We fly places in a few hours that once took weeks to reach. We talk to people in every corner of the world, not on land lines, but on tiny portable devices we easily slip into our pockets. We communicate with people in many different ways person to person, frequently, when we want, not just when we need to. And for pennies. Pennies. Cheap beyond our imagination of 20 years ago.  

We are able to do so in part because we are able to find minerals, chemicals, and raw resources we need to manufacture things, and to investigate study and invent new things. Much of this activity comes from innovative energy sources. Raw materials that take energy to find and to extract, raw materials that are energy in themselves; we searched high and low for them. Worldwide. And we bought what we found.

As world societies – cultures, economies, etc. – became aware of what we were doing, market prices soared and competitors appeared on the scene to acquire the same raw materials. A bidding ‘war’ ensued, and very soon thereafter, skirmishes to get and control the raw materials developed. Even armed conflicts followed. 

Energy and what it enables to be created, is important. It defines power. It defines influence, education, research, innovation and a score of other ‘-isms’ and ‘-ists’ which are all needed to compete and succeed in the world. 

In addition to the geopolitical problem engendered in energy, here are a few more issues of importance:

·         Use of energy sources has created challenges to the environment; oil, air and soil pollution have happened. It is even thought to control much of the earth’s warming phenomenon (atmospheric pollution?)

·         Nuclear power generation created the problem of nuclear waste disposal

·         Hydroelectric power created the problem of destroyed valleys and mountains, rivers and streams and the ecology supported by those features now reshaped and contained for electric generation

·         Coal burning for energy creates many problems: obvious pollution of the air and atmosphere; pollution of water supplies; pollution of soil from tailings; land subsidence from vacated spaces in underground mines

·         Managing the negative effects of current energy production

·         Invention of new technology and energy methods: whole new materials, new science of generation, elimination of nuclear waste by natural means, discovering new physics of energy creation, clean energy, too!

·         Need to create whole new industries dedicated to energy solutions 

And all of this – and more – can come only if we make the decision to remove ourselves from the oil standard. 

Once freed by that decision, we can move on. To the future. To lesser geopolitical pressures. To less contamination and pollution of our environment. Of healthier times. Of more portability of energy. Of cheaper energy. Of renewable energe. 

We can do this. Why haven’t we?  

So many reasons. Chief among them are:

• Current energy industry doesn’t want to lose what it already has
• Current energy use creates reliance on continuing the reliance: think of autos; how much investment has been placed in the internal combustion engine. Will we replace that with a new technology of propulsion? Electric motors? Magnetic power plants? Something new in physics that will propel our vehicles in the far future?
• Competing interests in economics mostly, and politics secondarily, keep us glued to the same paths of endeavor; but is it the right path for all time? What are we missing? Something better?
• Short term satisfaction and sense of security of the usual, normal?

Surviving challenges is one dimension of life. Envisioning the long term future is another way of living, a whole new dimension of living. On the edge. Creating the new future. Daring to explore and discover and implement new ways of living; hopefully better ways of living.  

Being all we can be. A simple statement but packed with layers of meaning. Because being more of what we can be as we wend our way to the future is exciting, is fulfilling. It empowers others to be more than what they are at this very moment. It helps us see the possible. We begin to see what we are capable of doing. Great things. 

Great things. Are we ready to find them? Do them?  

Do we have the will to live well?

February 5, 2012