Hello Readers! I want to mention an incredibly worrisome article in the Seattle Times. It's about how ordinary electronics we all take for granted, like MP3 players, mobile phones and flat screen TVs, are threatening to significantly increase energy consumption in the world over the next few decades. If new green sources of energy aren't perfected soon, it could mean a ticking time bomb for the world environment.The Paris-based UN affiliated International Energy Agency estimates that new electronic gadgets will triple their energy consumption by 2030 to 1,700 terawatt hours, which - incredibly - is the equivalent of today's home electricity consumption of the United States and Japan combined. That is a phenomenal increase in the amount of energy required to maintain our modern civilization.
"The world would have to build around 200 new nuclear power plants just to power all the TVs, iPods, PCs and other home electronics expected to be plugged in by 2030, when the global electric bill to power them will rise to $200 billion a year," the IEA said.
The IEA says the world will have to do more to regulate the energy consumption of electronic devices, or create new forms of green energy. There is no alternative if we intend to avoid dramatic global climate change.
If nothing changes, cascading man-made C02 levels could lead us to become a less habitable world. Scientists are very worried about our future, so we should be too.
Unfortunately, that task is difficult do the fact that electronics make up such a vast amount of the world economy. Governments and private enterprise will be resistant and slow to act. That fact alone puts our future at risk.
This is another good example of why modern governments must be progressive and proactive when it comes to issues that threaten the globe, like the need to find green energy sources. This is another reason why we need progressive politics, and leave the regressive, unscientific politics of the past behind us.
We need new thinking on every issue, whether it's health care, war, disease or climate change. It's critical that mankind harness green energy. Republicans need to understand that we have no alternative. There is no going back to the old ways. Mankind's future depends on our ability to evolve, change and adapt to these new challenges.
Thursday's Political Rant - Michael
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13 comments:
We need environmentally-friendly energy sources in any case. Billions of people in Asia and Latin America are imrpoving their standard of living, and that means increased energy consumption. Any reductions in carbon-dioxide output or energy use that the now-developed countries could achieve in the next 20 years will be utterly swamped by this, as most of the Third World "catches up" economically and technologically. We need to bring better energy sources online and develop technology to scrub carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or otherwise balance the warming effect.
Just for fun this time, I'm going to go out on a limb and try to guess what Republicans are going to say about critical issues like this one.
I think it's their answer to everything - "allow the free market to create the solution!"
What is my/our response? NO!!! It's not that kind of problem you one-trick pony party!
Look, I love capitalism, but unregulated markets helped create this crisis. They alone will do nothing to solve it. Only governments, along with thinkers/scientists/international coordinated efforts, will help us find a solution. Oh yes, and free marketers should be standing by to help if necessary.
Free markets are great, but they're not the solution to everything. Republicans need to set Reagan aside and look for new ways to solve big problems like green energy.
America didn't become the most powerful economy in the world on free markets alone. It was free markets coupled with progressives spending government money to build infrastructure. Governments are good at creating systems and finding solutions to big problems.
That is why the Republicans are wrong to oppose President Obama's green energy initiatives and other attempts to solve big threats to our economic future. It's both shortsighted and dangerous for the GOP to ignore what's happening. That is why we will continue to see them as the PARTY IN DENIAL until they WAKE UP and help us find solutions to problems threatening the world!
Until Republicans start offering real solutions to real problems like this one, which Americans are reading about all the time now, they will continue to suffer the consequences. MB
Actually, I think one Republican we know of will say something slightly different about it: "Allow the fucking free market to fucking create the fucking solution!" Except he'll misspell the really hard words. Like "the".
Seriously, I think this is the deeper reason why a lot of them keep insisting that anthropogenic global warming either isn't happening or isn't harmful. Like the health hazards of second-hand cigarette smoke (another established fact many libertarians refuse to believe), this particular problem is simply not very amenable to a purely market solution. So it has to be wished away.
First we can start with you two twits shutting your pie holes, between the two of you, you blow off enough hot air to raise the temp by at least 1/2 a degree.
That's my solution to global warming.
Boh why are you wanting on the Republicans to come up with real solutions to this so called problem of global warming, Obammy and that dip-shit T-Boone Pickens’s were going to create millions of jobs with their grandiose idea of all of these fucking wind mills to power the country, what happened with that?
I forgot to say I do believe T-Boone pulled the plug on Obammy after he figured out his scheme of these wind mills was nothing more than a scheme to get elected.
I’m still getting a charge out of watching the Botox roll down Pelosi’s face after she threw the CIA under the bus or tried to.
More and more often the term "pollutant" is used in political circle to describe carbon dioxide as if it weren't produced by all living things — including plants. Supposedly, we must "limit" the production of this greenhouse gas in order to "save the planet"? But let's look at some data that seems to have been overlooked.
Water vapor is by far the greatest contributor to the greenhouse effect, accounting for about 95 percent of the total amount of greenhouse gases. (Does that make water vapor a far more dangerous "pollutant" than carbon dioxide that will need to be dealt with later?) Ignoring minor greenhouse gases that comprise less than 1 percent of the total, carbon dioxide makes up the remaining 5 percent. But how much of this carbon dioxide is anthropogenic — that is, caused by man's activities? About 3.2 percenet.
We are told again and again that burning coal, driving cars, breathing, and other carbon-dioxide- producing activities are going to bring us to some "tipping point" where the the total greenhouse-gas "pollution" becomes too great for the planet to survive. Yet, as already stated, only 3.2 percent of the 5 perceent contribution of carbon dioxide to the total amount of greenhouse gases is caused by man. That is less than 0.2 percent of the total amount of greenhouse gases. What this means is that even a doubling of the amount of manmade carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would result in an overall increase of only 0.4 percent in the total amount of greenhouse gases. Yet we are supposed to believe that a such a tiny increase is going to cause global warming leading to the death of civilization as we know it.
Damn you're thinking small GR (what's new)! I'm looking for us ALL to come up with solutions - I'm simply encouraging vocal reluctant Republicans like yourself to join the movement. The problem is MUCH BIGGER than T-Boone Pickens or Barack Obama. It involves our entire world. So, stop being negative and join the effort. MB
Oh yes, and STOP DENYING THE FACTS!!
Here are some facts you cannot deny Kalifornia is going down the shitter and the sooner the better.
Looks like Panetta threw Pelosi under the bus
WASHINGTON (AP) — The head of the CIA defended the agency Friday against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's charge that she was misled in 2002 about the use of waterboarding, but he said it ultimately is up to Congress to decide where the truth lies.
"Let me be clear. It is not our policy or practice to mislead Congress," CIA Director Leon Panetta wrote in a message to agency employees that was released to the public. "That is against our laws and our values." Referring to Pelosi's remarks, he said, "The political debate over interrogation reached a new decibel level yesterday."
Panetta's rebuttal was far more muted that a counterattack the Republicans unleashed against Pelosi.
Boh Al gore loves people like you, it is idiots like yourself that will make this man the first Carbon Billionaire.
Oh yes, and STOP DENYING THE FACTS!!
Michael, this goofball's grasp of science is on such a level that his idea of birth control is probably to spray the bedroom with stork repellant. Expecting him to understand the greenhouse effect is hopeless.
I agree Infidel, GR is hopeless. Every now and then he seems like he's going to make some sense, but then he whacks out again. I think he's a lost cause. Oh well, on to the next subject.
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