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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] Ethanol's Dirty Little Secrets ---

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  • From: "TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Ethanol's Dirty Little Secrets ---
  • Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 20:00:42 -0600


Unfortunately that's not the whole story. Looking a little deeper I see
official statements like "Biodiesel use in the military is just beginning
to take off". Code for almost nothing. The numbers sound impressive until
you look at the total petroleum fuel use in the military, private industry,
and state and local governments. Literally, a drop in the proverbial
bucket. So why is the military bragging so much about so little biodiesel?
You have military brass going on about how they care about the environment.
Can you say Public Relations?

Let's talk about wind farms. Nantucket is obviously the exception; where
else do they have that kind of political clout? Not in my neck of the
woods. But wind is a workable alternative, because they can look at wind
maps and place the plants where they get the most bang for the buck. And
unlike heat, electricity can be sent where it's needed.

Farmers can make a little biofuel for home use but that's a million miles
from saving our whole economy with oil substitutes. The military can have a
few units use 20% biodiesel, but why not 100%? Probably because they can't
get enough of it. It's a joke. BTW those Google figures and highly
misleading. When you plug in military and biodiesel you get everything
relating to either separately, and very little of it is about military use
of biodiesel.

So I stick by my point: nobody's coming to save us from ourselves. There's
no money to replace oil with alternative energy infrastructure. And nobody
will argue with that; nobody has because they can't. And if we ruin our
agricultural land by converting to fuel crops we deserve to fall as all
empires do. Nature bats last.

paul, tradingpost@riseup.net
---------------
The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all
our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to
foster its renewal is our only hope.
- Wendell Berry

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********

On 7/14/2006 at 6:31 PM Greg and April wrote:

>Actually the US military has started using biodiesel.
>
>Google military and biodiesel, you will get over 1.5 million hits.
>http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&as_qdr=all&q=%22+military+%22+%22+bi
odiesel+%22
>
>
>There are several cities that have started using biodiesel and other
>alternative fuels for their mass transit and city owned vehicles.
>
>At least one city ( as of last year ) started testing ethanol powered (
>fuel
>cell ) busses.
>
>
>As to why wind generation plants are not springing up like hot cakes?
>It
>actually quite simple, in places where it is very viable, people with
>money
>think that it will ruin the view, environmentalist are dragging any
>purposed
>windfarm through the court system, because a few birds might die, it might

>make to much noise, construction might disrupt the local wildlife, and
>other
>might happens like that.
>
>For the most part wind farms are like any other power project, people
>don't
>want them in their back yard, or they are afraid that it might kill some
>wild animal - directly or indirectly.
>
>There has been a big wind farm project off Nantucket planed ( 120
>turbines ), but, blue bloods with more money than they know what to do
>with,
>are fighting it, because they think it will ruin the view, while some
>environmentalist think it will upset the local fish.
>
>Google " Nantucket " and " wind farm ", and you will get over 120,000
hits:
>http://www.google.com/searchas_q=nantucket&num=10&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&;
as_epq=wind+farm&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_nlo=&a
s_nhi=&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=&as_rights=&safe=images
>
>
>It's not that it isn't happening, it's just that some people are fighting
>tooth and nail to keep it from happening, and in some cases, its just
>because they don't want to have to look at it.
>
>
>Greg H.
>







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