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April 12, 2006
Iran and alternative power
The US is about to launch a 'tactical' nuclear strike on Iran. Check the internet - especially anything by Seymour Hersh (yep, the same guy who was told to shut up when he started talking about torture in Abu Ghraib...)
'Tactical' in the sense that they *believe* that Iran may be five years from developing their nuclear arms technology to the point where they will be able to start producing / testing weapons.
Five years.
A lot can happen in five years. Think what five years of diplomacy could bring. Think of it this way - the US has spent the last five years turning Iran from a centrist, pro-democracy, pre-secular society into a society that has eschewed the tenets of so-called western democracy and elected a hard liner essentially turning their secular society into one driven by fundamentalism.
All this means that we can expect the US to cause huge pain, suffering, death and of course oil shortages. As a result of an unprovoked attack the middle East will blockade transport of oil or just stop selling it to the US and probably the rest of the 'western' world.
Where next then?
Alternate energy
We should have been pouring 10's of percents of GNP into research for alternate energy since the 70's. We havent, and we wont likely anytime soon.
Bleak outlook: we're fucked. Party's over. Welcome to the middle ages.
Positive outlook: community based efforts can make a difference. The myth of the hydrogen economy has to be busted and we must embrace ubiquitous use of solar energy (each home with a solar panel and a solar heat exchanger for heating water) and wind turbines of some description coupled to a bank of batteries somewhere in the house.
Basically, we are all going to have to look after ourselves, but we need help to get there. Government / EU funding of research into producing retrofittable kits to produce energy for a home - enough to reduce demand on the national grid. Car sharing, electric buses like they have in Canada, reduction of public consumption of electricty (think street lights etc. - cant be turned off but consume LOTS of electricity).
If we dont cut down our reliance on fossil fuels and find a viable alternative we wont have a future.
Posted by dottie at April 12, 2006 2:46 PM