I am arguing the long term and you are arguing the short term.
Maybe because I have to live in the here and now, not some amorphous future utopia that defies basic economic logic.
And every economically viable alternative energy proposal seems to find some special interest group that manages to block it... Their answer is always to "conserve, conserve, and preserve (caribou, wilderness, coastlines.. etc). Or it's a NIMBY (not in my backyard) attitude..
We have a viable alternative energy program underway, and I'm all for it.. Hydrogen. However, until someone tells me where we're going derive the cheap and available electricity, as well as the expanded transmission capacity, needed to produce hydrogen in volume, it will remain a mere fantasy. Everyone wants the benefit, but no one wants to face any inconvenience.
No nuclear power, despite the new pebble bed and reprocessing technology that make nuclear power both relatively safe and affordable (more so than you're average refinery).
I don't support sending eighteen year olds to die if we do not address the long term problem.
No duh... I don't support it either.. Which is why I get so ticked off at some folks who seem hell-bent on subverting public support for the mission our troops are one in Iraq. I mean... the majority of experts truly believed that Saddam was harboring WMDs. Saddam actually encouraged such a belief, and surreptiously pursued forbidden WMD R&D to boot. So who cares if we haven't found stockpiles yet... Can we be actually blamed for having been, thus far, mistaken when Saddam was so hell bent on perpetuating that belief?
So get over it people.. We're in Iraq and we have to make a choice. Do we just leave the Iraqi people to certain civil war and more "top-dog" politics? Or do we have an obligation to make sure that the blood that has been shed by all, will not be shed in vain?
$100 billion would have been better spent on R&D and incentives for the development of solar cells
Or the production of 100 pebble bed nuclear reactors.
aps.org
web.mit.edu
As for solar, have you ever contemplated the amount of material required to produce a comparable electricity production facility to a nuclear plant? Have you thought about the geographic "footprint" required to array all of those structures? Have you thought about the fact that, at its best, solar has a 12 hour energy production cycle (related to available sunlight)?
Passive solar, or solar designed to augment individual power usage is a great idea. But it will never be sufficient to supplant our need for fossil fuels.
And likewise with windpower (never mind the likely impact on wildlife migration routes, or despoiling some very scenic mountain and valley areas with huge windmills).
So maybe some folks out there need to really rethink their position that alternative energy sources are "greener" than fossil fuels. And maybe they need to think about the cost/benefit of constantly blocking the construction of modern and safe nuclear power program and the role it could play in making this country energy independent.
But in the meantime, the reality of our short term situation will continue to slap us around until we pay attention.
As for risking our 18 year olds, I guess you (and many others) are going to have to ask yourselves whether you are more willing to risk them now, as they attempt to create some initial step towards regional change in the mid-east, or wait until this world is involved in a far greater conflagration (and likely world depression) after the Islamic Militants have managed to successfully dominate and control the nations of the region.
Hawk |
