Thursday, December 06, 2007

Our One True Source


There is a new story in Mother Earth News about how solar energy is the ultimate long term solution to meeting the needs of our world.

I must confess, except for a few corporate nuke types, I had no idea that anyone could imagine anything else. Here is the comment I just made on The Energy Blog where I found the story.

"Solar is so clearly the solution I marvel that it is not evident to all.

Advanced third and fourth generation PV is now occuring. Nanosolar, has developed a printable semiconductor and a printable conductor.

Solar printing will develop so that our giant office towers will someday be retrofitted with photon to electron surfaces that will effectively make them giant solar collectors.

Sooner than we might imagine, every suitable surface that humankind builds will be coated with these Power Inks and Power Paints.

In the meantime, we can build central station solar plants that provide long term energy at rates around 10 cents/KWH.

If advanced ultra caps are developed, we will be able to create a solid state utility grid that is reliable, renewable, and affordable."

Just as the industrialists of the late 1800's could not imagine the car and the way it changed everything, it seems that most so called thinkers of the day cannot imagine a world without them. Their thinking seems to be frozen in our present infrastructure.

A world where giant buildings are producing energy with their glazings, where roads are coated with power paints, and cars have morphed into something entirely different seems to have escaped their collective imaginations.

From this lack of imagination comes the need to secure more oil supplies, build more nuclear facilities, and continue the remarkably silly consumer society that we have today. (watch the story of stuff)

What occurs to me though is this. Just as the First World War (it was about German /Ottoman Empire control of the newly discovered mideast oil supplies) started with horses pulling cannons into place, but ended with airplanes dogfighting in the skies, so too may this even greater change in the way the world runs itself bring about an even greater conflict.

Cars, consumerism, and the throw-away world we know today has had a remarkably short hold on this earth and our culture when you consider the fullness of history.

Community, local reliance for both food and energy, and an ethic of saving, reusing, and preserving has a much longer pedigree in the history of the human experience.

You cannot stop a river with a spoon,

and we cannot stop the change in climate with facelifts.

We must lift our minds and our spirits,

and look up,

to our one true source of energy.

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2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

thank you for articulating the obvious.

dan

11:01 AM  
Blogger oZ said...

thanks Dan, I made a few changes to the post in the early afternoon for readability and clarity.

12:26 PM  

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