Homestead mailing list

[Tom <tom AT honeychrome.com>]

I live in upstate NY and have been subscribed to this list for at  
least a year, maybe a couple years- sometimes I forget which list is  
which.  I'm quite sure that I have posted here before.

What am I trying to say?  I'm saying that we've overshot the resource  
and renewable energy carrying capacity of the planet as far as human  
population and the highly consumptive 'western' lifestyle as we know  
it.  We are headed for a much lower energy future and the descent can  
be gradual or precipitous.  Likely the latter if we keep squandering  
energy and resources on science-fiction fantasies (that will in the  
short term make a few people rich but ultimately have little  
effect).  I'm saying that there is no answer, or even a combination  
of answers that comes anywhere close to allowing us collectively to  
maintain the energy-intensive lifestyles we're used to.  The longer  
we put off confronting this reality and grasping at science-fiction  
'alternative' fantasies the harsher descent will be.

Technically there isn't anything wrong with discontinued turbine  
models, just that they are not at the cutting edge of efficiency and  
buying them from Denmark or wherever certainly doesn't help  
unemployed americans.  If tax funds that I contribute to are used to  
subsidize these projects I'd like to see real benefits from them  
beyond an upward wealth transfer to corporate entities and it seems  
like the turbines ought to be the most up-to-date and efficient ones  
available.

The controversy around upstate NY industrial wind development seems  
to have calmed down in the last year- maybe the easy pickings for the  
energy corps have all been taken or opposition has become more  
sophisticated and the companies are targeting other locations.  A lot  
of the information I read was in local papers, from locals, etc.   
Probably online too, but I'll have to search it out.

That the 'oil age will not end because we ran out of oil' follows  
'the stone age did not end because we ran out of stones' is a non  
sequitur to which I'd respond that world history has more  
civilizations that have failed due to over-extention and over  
exploitation of resources than civilizations that have survived.  I'm  
sure the Mayans believed 'We'll come up with something!' (or the  
priests will or the gods will save us, etc.) as they were running out  
of trees for fuel and their limited soil was eroding away.  Are we  
different?

Homestead related?  First of all, I didn't start the thread.   
Secondly, it seems to me that 'homesteading' as an endeavor is at  
least partly about striving for self-sufficiency, living with some  
understanding of and direct relationship to one's environment and its  
cycles, etc., and I would argue that a degree of skepticism toward,  
and even rejection of large-scale, centralized corporate schemes is a  
natural outgrowth of the ethos.  Homesteaders are probably better  
positioned to deal with what lies ahead than most.  And while I agree  
that the medical 'study' regarding living in proximity to an  
industrial-scale turbine cited in the original, thread-starting post  
seems dubious, the industrial wind development racket is equally  
dubious.  Just look at the history and track record of the energy  
industry from Carnegie and his coal, through Standard Oil, to Enron,  
Exxon, BP and all the rest.  It is a history of deceit, manipulation  
and exploitation and personally I don't see any reason to expect that  
trend to cease because they are adding renewables to the portfolio.

Tom