The Survival of Humankind, and Improving the World, Society, and Yourself!
Yet who can the world trust to be idealistic and moral enough to help all of humanity and the environment, and at the same time, be practical enough to make extremely difficult decisions that can and will harm a great deal of people?
Humanitism is a philosophy for the continued survival and perpetuation of the human race. Humanitists (people who believe in humanitism) do not have the luxury of trying again after failing. Humanitists must be more vigilant than environmentalists, because we will not have a second chance at survival.
The survival of humanity is more important than the well being of our environment; however the environment is necessary for humanity to survive. That does not give the right for big businesses to continue doing whatever they want with only minimal or no consideration for the environment, so long as our surroundings support human life. We need to protect the environment for the continued survival and future well being of humanity. Keep in mind that without the human race, there would be no one and no need to protect the environment. Therefore, humanitism is more important than environmentalism.
It seems that in the past 50 years the human race has pursued the money train, that such desire for financial gain has caused society to ignore and abandon honesty, values, morality and candidness etc.
The race to financial gain has caused our leaders and the executives of the corporate world to disregard laws, ethics and the caring for each other and humanity as a whole. Deception, fraud and outright theft are their new motto all for the sake of financial gain, personal ego, fame and success.
It seems that for the sake of success and profit people will step on anybody, family friends, co-workers and anyone who stands in their way or take advantage of anyone that could help them achieve what they want.
That is not to say that honest and compassionate people who care do not exist, where honesty and integrity is a way of life for them, but they are a very small minority.
As we begin the year 2011, we should all look at the past and decide with determination that everyone will from now on contribute to the betterment of humanity, society and mankind.
We should all learn to live with each other and respect each other for the sustainability of mankind. Humanity should strive for harmony, tranquility and peace
by: YJ Draiman, Energy/Utility/Telecom, Auditor
PS
The human survival instinct prods us to outlast afflictions and, if circumstances permit, to reach old age. Nothing, of course, could be more quintessentially natural than aging.
Why all the media Hype over Alternative Renewable Energy?
ReplyDeleteThe hoopla and the hype about Alternative Energy industry as a whole are due to several factors.
Obviously the new cost of the old standard; OIL.
We as Americans never do anything until made to. IE: Voting.
This can be summed up very simply.
Because of the Dynamic shift from a production society, post WWII in the US to a service or market Economy by the end of the 90's.
The 90's was the internet boom….
The 2000 to 2006 the Real Estate boom….
Now we have Real Recession and Inflation, the economy going two different directions at the same time. Stagflation.
So it is quite evident the next boom to get America back on tract is the
Alternative Energy boom.
It's what makes America Great.
It is these bubbles, or as Greenspan would put it the Frothiness that becomes
THE AMERICAN ALTERNATIVE RENEWABLE SUSTAINABLE ECONOMY.
We will rebound and this Alternative Energy Industry will make it so.
God Bless America…….
Beaming 10 MW from space seems difficult for 10B$ or any cost, however 1MW for 1B$ is possible based on work I was recently involved with at Boeing. The project goal was a very large space based RADAR array. While the array size was classified, the structure supporting it was 8m x 300m; we showed a model at a recent DARPATech. Its not trivial to package a structure the length of three football fields in a rocket fairing. The structure design was based on an inflatable technology developed by L'Garde; their web site probably still has a few photos. The Boeing Kent Space Center guys built, packaged and deployed a 4m x 12m scale model using the L'Garde material. The satellite platform is the Boeing 702 currently capable of ~20kw but our solar panel engineers leapt at the opportunity to design panels capable of 100kw with todays technology to power the RADAR payload. If we tweak the L'Garde truss up to 3000 m^2, use 33% cell technology we have our 1MW array ( 3000 m^2 x 1 kw / m^2 x 33% = 1MW). Actually, we'll need a bit more area or efficiency to overcome the I^2 R losses and microwave power amplifier and antenna inefficiencies. Boeing would be pleased to sell 20kw communications satellites delivered to orbit for roughly 300M$. The additional solar cells and inflatable structure would cost more but 1B$ is certainly an achievable cost target which should include some funding for receiving the energy on the ground, steam turbines, generation etc.. My point is that while beaming 1 MW is within todays capability needing only design and test, 10 MW needs new packaging technology but the power cost ratio is the same so lets assume the cost of beaming power from space is roughly known and we just need a few visionary investors to proceed. Lets think about the financial facts. Our energy beamed from space costs 1B$ for 1MW and the satellite life will be 10 years (613,000 hours). Thats 10^9$ for 6.13x10^8 kilo-Watt-hours ~$1.60/KW-hour. More than todays cost but with fossil energy doubling every few years, it will be competitive within our lifetime. The next analysis needed is comparison with terrestrial based solar power generation which has the drawbacks of only working ~8 hours a day and therefore suffers the inefficiency of storage etc. This needs some research on storage technology and land cost in the desert but in spite of my nostalgia for 40 years in the aerospace biz, I expect to be selling my Boeing and Lockheed stock and buying in the Mohave and Sahara.
ReplyDeleteWe must leave the fossil century behind to reach the golden age of renewable energy
ReplyDeleteThe past two years have been thrilling and frustrating in equal measure. We have begun to glimpse the green holy grail: reliable renewable electricity. Studies by people as diverse as the German government and the Centre for Alternative Technology have shown how, by diversifying the sources of green energy, by managing demand and using some cunning methods of storage, renewables could supply 80% or even 100% of our electricity without any loss in the continuity of power supplies.
But while this work has been causing ripples among scientists and green campaigners, the government has appeared stuck in the fossil century. As recently as October last year, the business secretary, John Hutton, was secretly lobbying to abandon Britain's target for renewable power supplies.
I have not yet been allowed to see the consultation paper, but the details obtained by the Guardian suggest that the government has at last begun to take renewables seriously. Some of its proposals appear to be radical, innovative and bold. It shows how its target of producing 35% of electricity from green power by 2020 might be met by greatly boosting wind, biomass and solar energy. The document will propose a synergy between large-scale renewables and electric cars, which can be charged at night when wind power might otherwise be wasted.
Most radically, and controversially, it suggests forcing people to insulate their homes and to fit renewable devices when they build extensions. The paper suggests that oil-fired central heating might eventually be banned.
The brief summary I have seen raises as many questions as it answers.
Is the government really proposing the mass installation of micro-wind turbines? If so, it will be wasting our money. While solar thermal panels (producing hot water), wood pellet boilers and heat pumps offer good value, micro-electricity doesn't.
Why is the government proposing to use biomass for generating power, when it would be much better deployed producing heat? Does it support the German government's proposal to build a European supergrid, using high-voltage direct current lines? I hope so: our renewable resources could then be used as part of a much bolder scheme for balancing supply and demand.
But by far the most important question is this: we now have an idea of what the government will be commissioning, but what will it be decommissioning? Cutting carbon pollution is as much about what you don't do, as what you do.
The paper proposes that the flights we take will keep growing: by 2020, it says, they will account for 11% of the country's energy use. If so, then airport expansion, because of the other greenhouse gases flying produces, will cancel all the savings the government proposes, twice over.
Will the government drop its plans to build new coal-fired power stations? It would be profoundly ironic if it bans oil-fired central heating in people's homes while approving new coal plants tens of thousands of times bigger.
And will it produce a supply-side policy for tackling climate change? At the moment it proposes to maximise the extraction of fossil fuels and minimise their use: these positions are plainly incompatible. Gordon Brown will appear in Jeddah tomorrow to demand that the Saudis raise oil production, just as the consultation paper demands that we reduce consumption. The government cannot pursue both policies and claim to be meeting its commitments on climate change.