Tag Archives: fossil fuels
Solar Energy – a Special Case
The term solar energy means not only the direct radiant energy of the sun, but also its stored forms – plants, animals, fossil fuels.
The sun’s radiant energy is not a resource, but the result of throughput of a resource – that being the sun’s matter. … Read more
Global Warming – A Red Herring?
The Australian Government has recently announced revised, reduced targets for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. There has been some objection to this but it should not really be surprising.
Governments around the world have shown that they just don’t get it. … Read more
Digression – Resource Consumption, Jobs, and Hands Off
Is increasing throughput always bad?
Not necessarily. Many times in these postings, the reduction of throughput is stated or implied to be a benefit. But this only applies to present-day conditions when so many resources are being depleted because they are throughput faster than they can be renewed. … Read more
Non-renewable Resources – Leave Them in the Ground?
The principle of consuming resources at a rate no faster than their rate of renewal appears to be untenable in the case of resources whose renewal rate is almost zero, as is true of fossil fuels, gas, oil, and coal, also fissile uranium and thorium. … Read more
The Throughput Chain
The throughput chain comprises several “links”, different processes that follow one another but do not all necessarily take place at the same rate. The processes commonly are: the extraction or controlling of wealth; its rendering or structuring into saleable goods and services; the sale of those goods and services; and their subsequent degradation into waste matter from which wealth may be renewed. … Read more
Concepts and Terms – What is ‘wealth’?
The world economy isn’t working as well as it should and could. Some countries that enjoyed for some years near full employment, low interest rates, and a bearable rate of price increases, with fast-rising material living standards, all achieved without anything like current high levels of government and private debt, do so no longer. … Read more
The Tyranny of Vested Interests
In 1964, the ship Alkimos was wrecked on a reef off the coast of Western Australia at a time when our largest city, Perth’s, suburban sprawl had not reached that far. The ship was Greek but had a varied and colourful history, including on-board murders and criminal activity, under different names and flags. … Read more
Visual and Noise Pollution
In terms of physically damaging, poisoning, or depleting the earth’s living environment, there are no such things as visual or noise pollution.
These are red herrings in the sense that, for example, people who object to the noise of rock music, traffic, or children at play, or object to the replacement of an ornamental old building by a stark new one, feel entitled to attach their cause to the environmental cause (feeling licensed by the use of the word “pollution” in describing what they object to), thereby distracting attention from issues of real importance to the living environment and diverting energy that should go into resolving those issues in the environment’s favour. … Read more