permaculture

[Claudia Joseph <permie@earthlink.net>]

Bart, Thank you for the relevant summary.  How about waste  
digesters?  They are closer to the permaculture goal of using waste  
as a resource. - Claudia


On May 25, 2006, at 1:15 PM, Bart Anderson wrote:

> > > LONDON (Reuters) - Fields of swaying giant grass and patchwork  
> > > patterns
> of willow plantations could become common sights as Britain turns  
> to crops
> for heating and electricity to tackle the effects of global warming.
>
> Articles like this appear regularly, with the inevitable message:
>
> "XXX  might, just might, be the solution to global warming and the  
> energy
> crisis"
>
> where XXX is:
>
> breeder reactors
> nuclear fusion
> corn ethanol
> elephant grass
> coal sequestration
> hydrogen
> thin-film photovoltaics
> palm oil
> jatropha curcas tree (for bio-diesel)
>
> Almost never do the articles mention the underlying reality -- the  
> sheer
> magnitude of our energy use cannot be sustained.   The scale is  
> just too
> big.
>
> Other key truths that are missing:
> 1. The energy returned on energy invested (EROEI) for many of the  
> proposed
> processes is low.  You don't get much net energy out.
> 2. New energy sources take tremendous amounts of capital and long  
> periods of
> time to be put into place (decades).
> 3. New schemes usually have a political lobby behind them,  
> propagandizaing
> and distorting the science.
> 4. Energy sources ALWAYS have side effects - pollution, CO2,  
> radioactive
> wastes.
>
> In the case of ethanol and bio-diesel, some of the side effects are:
> 1. Expansion of areas under cultivation (for example, rainforests  
> cut down
> for palm plantations)
> 2. Degradation of farmland due to intensive cultivation and removal of
> biomass from the local cycle.
> 3. Raising the price of food crops.
>
> The relevant permaculture principle is the imperative to minimize the
> import/export of materials.
>
> The problem with the barrage of new schemes is that they distract from
> the ultimate solution --reducing energy use.
>
>
>
>
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