Cape Cod wind farm ruled to proceed !

bingo!

 

Increased efficiency is good, but note that the world must have economic development. Even at twice today's efficiency a world of nine billion people with a modern standard of living will use about eight times as much power as we use today. The only way to *reduce* Earth's total power usage would be through social collapse and/or mass death.

 

Photo from the Boston Globe, artist rendering of the wind turbines, what's visible from the shoreline.

 

Ok, Mr. Sunshine - dig out your Uzi's and go to work!

"Economic development" is actually a bigger threat to the environment than population - because even if population levels level out as "low" as 8 billion, the rising middle class worldwide (which is slowing population growth) will place much greater demands on the system.

I totally agree that we have to do both (conserve and increase clean production) - my point is that this project only does one of those things. And a lot of people seem to think that's enough...

It's the same fallacy I am seeing across the board in the green movement - that some of us doing a few small things will change the world. Bullsh*t! EVERYONE is going to have to do LOTS of BIG things - and the longer we put off acknowledging that, the worse things will get and the harder it will be to turn things around.

 

Bingo!

This is project is a half-solution, at best.

 

i am probably restating info (cant remember if i put it on this thread or another...Heck, i cant even remember if it was this FORUM or another...)

but there is now a movement towards very high density population centers with a design towards self sufficiency. these are designed to use much less resources per person than conventional intercity designs. look at it like a "bubble metropolis" design where units accommodate say 20-50,000 people fully utilizing a vertical design along with mass transit people moving systems that would eliminate cars within the bubble living area.

granted this a concept (Tokyo for obvious reasons is on the forefront of this idea) and the money involved would be huge, but when considering cost, lets look at the alternatives. if you dont have a sustainable environment, what r you saving your money for??

 

No one project is going to be a "full solution" on its own.
The full solution will be made up of many projects and individual action.

The company proposing this wind project is an renewable energy generation company, their part of the solution is renewable energy generation, not insulating homes, that would fall under "individual action".

 

Unfortunately, a lot of people didn't learn enough in kindergarten. We need to get out our Play-doh again. You can't push in one place without a reaction elsewhere. You need to push everywhere at once. Here what we need to do is reduce population growth, increase global wealth, decrease power needs for a middle class lifestyle, increase power generation, clean up the environment, reduce carbon transfer from the earth to the atmosphere... etc. There are no simple answers because the questions are very complex.

Okay, off my soapbox. Yes, individual action isn't enough but it appears to be all that I can do- I didn't have much to say about whether Senator Inhofe was re-elected in 2008.

 

it only took 14 years

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