> > On 1/7/07, Nick McClure <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > OK, but how? We need to heat our homes and power our lights.
This isn't an issue of cold homes and no lights - that's just a straw man. We know how to cut back, dammit. We just don't. +) Replace your lightbulbs with compact fluorescents. They use a third to a quarter less power are just as bright (usually brighter) and last 8-10 times longer. They do sometimes take a few seconds to warm up but overall you save significant cash and resources. +) Speaking of lights we can also just turn them off more of course. Replacing outdoor lighting with motion-sensitive lighting or solar area lighting instead of leaving it on all night can save quite a bit. +) Drive less. Most trips are less than a mile and most can be accomplished in the same amount of time with a bike. +) Drive smarter. If you have to drive work and can't carpool use an appropriate vehicle. +) Heat less. Dropping your average winter heat by a degree or two will save you enough to buy better insulation so that the actual heating costs are lower but the temperature's just as you like it. There are of course thousands of other ways to cut resource usage without affecting (or barely affecting) your lifestyle. Most help only a very little, but of course in aggregate they do add up. You can also say, obviously, that you don't want to do any of them. You may say, and rightly so, that you make good money and want to spend it on gas guzzlers and hot-house temperatures. That's your right, but that should be a decision made not an ignorant belief that there's no other way possible. Of course there's only so much that any single person can do. For deeper change there will need to be systemic and infrastructural change. But again, we do know how to do that, we just don't. +) Most businesses, especially manufacturing, have untapped potentials. Recycling or distributing waste heat from factories has been put to great use in many places. Heated water from cooling system can be used for many things instead of just dumped in rivers. +) A surprisingly large amount of electricity (upwards of 5%) is used by devices that are turned off. This "stand by power" allows device to "wake up" with a remote or keep its clock on. Any device with a transformer (a power brick) uses nearly as much power when off as when on. Fixing this problem requires technical solutions well within our reach. +) In the same vein education and incentives needs to occur (along with some technological advances) about stand by and off-hour usage. Many companies (my own included) suggest that employees leave their computers on overnight in case updates need to occur. Many also use power hungry 3-D screen savers instead of sleep options. This kind of behavior accounts for perhaps another 5% or greater energy usage. +) While retrofitting homes for renewable energy is definitely expensive including such things in the original cost of construction may add only marginally to new home costs and will drive costs down. There are well-known things like solar cells in roof panels and windmills but also less common (but more universal) things like geo-thermal ground-source HVAC and grey water reclamation. (Of course businesses can also take advantage of these technologies - and more effectively in many cases than single homes.) +) There are, and have been for decades, under-used sources of alternative energy. Yes, initial costs are very high (but shrinking) but total cost of ownership is dropping all the time. Solar energy has always been the holy grail but has always been very expensive. However advances have been dropping that price steadily for solid state devices and options like solar-induced Stirling engines are improving efficiency tremendously. +) Energy storage is a huge issue that needs to be addressed as we move forward. Right now power grids are "always on" - it's incredibly difficult to store grid-quality energy (right now the best way to "store energy" is to stock-pile fossil fuels). In any case we DO know how to do this stuff. Some of it is expensive but much of it (especially the personal stuff) is actually either free or will save money in the long run. It's not an economic issue at that level, it's an inertial one - we're set in our ways and don't want to change. It's fairly easy for an average household to cut its energy consumption by 5% with no money and essentially changes in behavior and upwards of 10-15% with moderate changes in behavior. For many businesses relatively small policy changes (like turning off desktop computers at night) can save as much. We just have to do it. Jim Davis ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Create robust enterprise, web RIAs. Upgrade & integrate Adobe Coldfusion MX7 with Flex 2 http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;56760587;14748456;a?http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/flex2/?sdid=LVNU Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:223950 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
