There are some things on Earth that are finite. There are others that are effectively infinitely renewable.
Sunlight, wind and tides will continue all the time we have the sun and moon. All the time there is sun there will be trees and other plants. Throughout the solar system there are giddying amounts of metals as diverse as titanium, aluminium and iron.
But in the whole solar system there is only one place we know of that contains coal, gas or oil - Earth.
There are also three main focuses for the green movement:
1) Reducing CO2 emmissions which cause Global Warming
2) Stopping wastage of metals and glass which have finite terrestrial sources
3) Stopping the human encroachment on animal/plant habitats
On CO2
The US is the world’s greatest polluter creating 25% of all the world’s CO2 emmissions. But China’s rapidly catching up. China’s gift to Earth right now is sulphur dioxide (SO2) in quantities previously unseen. 75% of China’s power comes from coal-fired power stations. It is not something that the Chinese can correct in anything like a reasonable period of time. And yet the governments of the West are wasting as much effort as they can in trying to reduce the relatively small amounts of pollution created by the other 5 billion people.
This is not the same argument used by people walking down a high street at night who comment that there’s no point saving power when the shops are illuminated all night (there is); this is far more fundamental. The sun provides us with enough energy that we do not need to burn fossilised organic matter. It is the sun’s energy which causes heat transfer in the oceans which trigger winds. It is the sun’s energy that we trap in solar cells. It is the sun which gives life to all plants on earth.
On metallic resources
It will soon be economically viable to mine asteroids for metals used in manufacturing. Our paltry recycling efforts, while helpful in reducing land-fill, will not help us avoid ‘running out’ on Earth.
So our planet, and surrounding bodies, can keep us stocked with everything except coal, oil and gas. What’s the answer?
Nuclear power, solar power, wind power and tidal/river damming are the three main ways of making entirely CO2-free power. But nuclear leaves behind waste that we’re not yet excellent at disposing of. Solar and Wind power are expensive and unreliable (weather is not consistent in most parts of the world for long enough). Tidal and non-tidal rivers have, in the majority of cases, already been dammed. In those places where this is still an option there is untold damage to the local habitats for local wildlife.
Now I’m an advocate of nuclear power. It is safe and we can store the nuclear waste. But there’s a better solution: 100% burning biomass.
The problem with burning wood is that it kicks out so much pollution. But President Bush is looking at methods of complete-burning wood in a new pollution-free power station. And in the meantime the US is converting fossil-fuel power stations to burn biomass.
The CO2 cycle starts with trees (and other plants that photosynthesise). Trees absorb CO2 (one part carbon to two parts oxygen) and release O2 (the two parts of oxygen - it is two parts because oxygen is stable when it is bonded with another oxygen atom).
The tree then either dies and decomposes or is chopped down and is burnt.
Then one of two things happens:
1) The carbon is sequestered in the ground and, over an extremely long period of time and compression is converted into coal, oil or gas.
2) The carbon is released into the air to be absorbed by other trees.
Long ago there was more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and this was sequestered in the oil, gas and coal we are currently burning. This means we are creating a net growth in the amount of CO2 ‘in circulation’.
By burning trees and replacing them in sustainable forests we are contributing nothing to the net amount of carbon in the atmosphere. This makes it green, reliable and cheap.
What we must do
We must plant massive fast-growing forests that can be used, when the power plants are built, as fuel. We must commission power stations that burn all the particulates released during normal burning of wood (though we shouldn’t be too concerned about releasing CO2 as this is not previously sequestered carbon). Once we, in the West, have proven the technology we can export the process to China who, because of the number of power stations she has, will stand most to gain from this.
In the future
The ESA (European Space Agency) and NASA have already mooted the idea of mining asteroids for valuable metals. We may see a time when spacecraft are regularly travelling to relatively close extraterrestrial bodies to extract resources.
Whole tracts of land will be given over to growing forests to burn in modern, clean power stations.
Cars will be powered using power from one of several sources (probably not hydrogen in my opinion - electrically charged cars are far more likely).
The free power provided by trees will create a need for more land and land reclamation will be progressed further using lessons learned in New Orleans following Katrina as well as in the construction projects off the coast of Dubai.
[Technorati: China, Green, Environment, News and Politics, Politics, US, United States, Future, Futurology ]
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