Wind power only part of the solution

…But all of those efforts — from wind power to biodiesel to high-tech light bulbs — aren’t enough to preserve what James Howard Kunstler calls our “happy motoring culture.”

Kunstler, a New York author and frequent speaker at environmental conferences, said he sees more similarities than differences between the “greenies” and the giant corporations, land developers and others they oppose.


What they have in common is a belief — a delusion, Kunstler says — that the current way of life can be maintained; the only difference is that “green yuppies” think they’ll have to pull up to the filling station and put something other than gasoline in their fuel tanks.

“Dependence on foreign oil isn’t the problem,” Kunstler said. “Dependence on a living arrangement that depends on foreign oil is the problem.”

Kunstler, who envisioned the post-oil world in his 2005 book “The Long Emergency,” said that even when talking with people at environmental conferences, he often runs into the “I just bought a Prius, give me a medal” way of thinking, along with college students who support biodiesel so they can continue to drive their SUVs into the mountains to go snowboarding.

Salina Journal (Kansas)