I look forward to the arrival of Wired Magazine every month. For about the past year, many issues have had at least one article devoted to some type of topic that is relevant to alternative fuel sources. Their last issue ran two articles, one on American Homegrown energy:
The New Power Generation
and another on using cold ocean water for energy, AC, and agro
The Mad Genius From the Bottom of the Sea
They've also run extensive articles on Pebble-Bed Nuclear Reactors, Hybrid cars, etc.
So now, I have a question to ask the tech junkies of this forum.
Are the ideas presented in Wired actually viable? Or is this publication a little overly optimistic about the abilities of the technologies it presents?
PeakOil is You
Too much optimisim?
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Too much optimisim?
by ThinkGeek » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 15:06:51
"I believe totally in a capitalist system, I only wish that someone would try it."- Frank Lloyd Wright
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by Caoimhan » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 15:22:54
I answered "No", because Wired is doing the world a service. It is using its distribution and readership to help promote new ways of thinking, and awareness of alternative energies. If we can drum up more excitement about these new possibilities, then we can help people break out of their current paradigms and start thinking "renewable" and "domestic". That's a Good Thing(TM).
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by BiGG » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 15:42:16
I voted no also. We are moving away from dirty, filthy, environmentally unfriendly, very unhealthy, antiquated oil no matter if we are nearing the half-way point of known reserves or not and this website is a grand showcase of just how badly news regarding new emerging technology replacing oil is missing from the mainstream.
I see an exciting new world emerging everywhere I look and will be happy to see the end of the oil based economy.
I see an exciting new world emerging everywhere I look and will be happy to see the end of the oil based economy.
"The Stone Age did not end for lack of stone, and the Oil Age will end long before the world runs out of oil" ............ Former Saudi Arabian oil minister Sheikh Zaki Yamani,
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by ThinkGeek » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 15:46:00
I voted NO as well. In my opinion, the best tool we have for dealing with the coming effects of PO is that of Knowledge. The more people that know about these technologies, the better. When people know about, and understand PO, they can help to change things for the better. And, at the very least, Wired makes all of this stuff look cool.
"I believe totally in a capitalist system, I only wish that someone would try it."- Frank Lloyd Wright
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by ubercrap » Wed 08 Jun 2005, 01:01:30
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BiGG', 'I') voted no also. We are moving away from dirty, filthy, environmentally unfriendly, very unhealthy, antiquated oil no matter if we are nearing the half-way point of known reserves or not and this website is a grand showcase of just how badly news regarding new emerging technology replacing oil is missing from the mainstream.
I see an exciting new world emerging everywhere I look and will be happy to see the end of the oil based economy.
I see an exciting new world emerging everywhere I look and will be happy to see the end of the oil based economy.
I don't know exactly where you live, but where I live, "good ol' 'Murrica" , people drive their 1-ton dually pickups across the street from where I work to the city park to eat lunch. Sometimes they sit with the car idling and the A/C on, smoke and eat in their vehicles, then stop by the garbage can on the way out- the whole time never getting out of their cars- then drive back to work. This is right across the street- probably a two or three minute walk -and there are literally tables for hundreds of people to sit outside or under shelter, not to mention all the open space. I love cars as much as the next guy, but it is absolutely laughable to me that people are that attached to being in them every minute possible.
As far as the new emerging technology currently replacing fossil fuels on a recognizable scale, I haven't a clue what you are talking about. There are many technically viable, working things out there in proto-fetal development, but as far as I know, virtually everything is still heavily fossil fuel dependent- my cars still run on gasoline, my house is heated with natural gas, my water heater uses natural gas, I haven't seen a solar cell or passive solar on a house in years. In fact, we've been going in the exact opposite direction of what seems wise in the long run- cars have been getting bigger and more powerful again for the last decade. It's no real surprise for a production car or truck now to be in the 500 horsepower neighborhood. That kind of horsepower was previously only reserved for commercial trucks and racecars. Foreign companies don't even bother selling their most fuel efficient models in the U.S., even now, and they're not planning to, ever, as far as I know. Houses have been getting ludicrously bloated. Restrictions have been placed on how small of a house you can build in some places, and that minimum is still often twice the size of the average family home a century ago in the United States. I either walk or ride my bike to work now. People ask me all the time if I need a ride- sometimes people I don't even know (just because I look a bit respectable and they can't fathom why I would be walking anywhere on purpose). I have a 1300sq.ft. house and I tell people that it really is too big, wasteful, and expensive for me, and I am thinking of building something about half that size. They look at me like I have lost my mind. All these things use fossil fuels last time I checked, more than ever before, in fact. All we've done is squander increases in efficiency through technology and increasing wealth in the some of the worst ways imaginable to gobble up more and more fossil fuels.
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by Omnitir » Wed 08 Jun 2005, 05:04:25
Great post ubercrap. I agree completely; things (consumption, general human idiocy etc) are getting worse, not better.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I see an exciting new world emerging everywhere I look and will be happy to see the end of the oil based economy.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I see an exciting new world emerging everywhere I look and will be happy to see the end of the oil based economy.
BiGG, you must be looking awfully hard for the positive things and completely ignoring the overwhelming negative things to have such an opinion. It’s great that you look for the positive, but you need to realise that things simply aren’t as peachy as you would like to believe. I think the greater mass of humanity tends to think in a similar line that you do, in that everything will be okay, and because of that belief people keep right on consuming and destroying the planet and our future.
I think that if more people took notice of the devastation our way of life was causing, and payed attention to all the negative aspects of reality instead of blatantly ignoring the facts, then we may have a chance at the peachy future you see. But if everyone keeps believing in like you do BiGG, that everything will be fine, then they won’t change a thing, and the oil crash will be far more devastating then need be.
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