Kyle Mcallister wrote:
1. We have to find and utilize an alternative to fossil fuels for automobiles. Hybrids are fine, for now, but overpriced for the average Joe.
I disagree. They cost only about $3,000 more than regular cars, and the gap would be a smaller if millions of these cars were manufactured. Some Honda Civics that cost more than the base-model Prius, which costs $22,000. Plus the government gives you a rebate, which just about covers the extra $3,000.
2. We need to begin massive programs for construction of wind farms, direct solar-to-electricity generator farms, solar and geothermal (heat pump) heating systems for homes, and later on orbital solar photovoltaic arrays. . . .
Yup. But the first and largest investment should be in conservation, because that is the most cost-effective, and also in plug-in hybrid cars, because the biggest crisis is in oil fuel, and most oil is used to power automobiles. By "cost-effective" I mean that a dollar spent on better insulation in the home or compact fluorescent light bulbs will save more energy than a dollar spent on wind farms. Once we close the efficiency gap with nation such as Italy and Japan, from that point on improvements in efficiency will become more expensive, and it will be better to shift the bulk of the money to wind farms, PV, nuclear power plants and so on.
Will this cost a fortune? Yes. Can we afford it? We must. And yes, we can, if we can finance Gulf War II. Nuclear should be used to fill in the gaps, but we should strive to make the gaps as small as possible.
3. The entire design ideology behind the manufacture of personal automobiles must change, whether we want it to or not. These are hard times, and in hard times, hard decisions must be made. The only way to get a viable non (or very low) polluting vehicle utilizing an alternative fuel source to be available to the majority of the people in short order is to make it dirt cheap. NO power windows, power seats, Bose sound systems, electronic crap, etc. Make it all mechanical, analog, simple.
This seems like a bad idea for the modern age. Henry Ford embraced this marketing philosophy. It worked splendidly from 1906 until the mid-1920s, but after that companies such as General Motors took away market share and became the industry leaders by offering complicated features and ever-changing models. If that is what the bulk of American public wants, that is what automobile manufacturers must provide. Of course they should also offer some simple, dirt cheap models. And they do. (Or they did 10 years ago.) That describes my $9,000 Geo Metro to a "T." manual shift, roll down windows, no radio, no frills -- just basic transportation. What we need is something like a plug-in hybrid version of the Geo Metro, for $12,000 instead of $9,000, with a $3000 tax rebate to cover the difference.
Also, we can eliminate the very costly and ridiculously overcomplex emissions control systems from these vehicles, or at least highly simplify them.
Absolutely. An all-electric car is the best way to accomplish this. That is what the Japanese manufacturers are bringing to the market very soon. The range will be only 200 km but that will satisfy many applications, because the time required to recharge has been shortened.
I would even suggest eliminating the antilock brake systems. Why? It will make it that much simpler and cheaper. Less safe? Not if you are a good driver.
But most people are not good drivers, so this is a bad idea. The extra cost of the antilock systems is probably more than paid for by the reduction in the cost of accidents. This would make the equipment cheaper but the overall cost of driving automobiles more expensive. My insurance agent told me that nowadays most of the cost of accidents is the hospital bill, not the damage to equipment. (That is why my Geo Metro, which is now officially worth nothing, costs almost as much to insure as the Prius.)
You have to remember that the cost of a machine includes not only the hardware itself, but also the social cost and the day-to-day cost of using the equipment. Take a cheap computer costing $600. The screen may be small, making it annoying to work with, which causes expensive delays an extra work. The CPU may be too slow to use voice input, so the keyboard may give you carpal tunnel syndrome. Because of these problems, the machine may end up costing you tens of thousands of dollars. You may be able to avoid these problems with a $2,500 computer, like mine, which is equipped with two side-by-side large screens. You spend an extra $1,900 up front, but you avoid paying ~$40,000 or losing your job because of carpal tunnel syndrome.
4. Insurance companies will most likely want to tack on a hefty set of extra penalties for the car I just listed above. This cannot be allowed.
It must be allowed. In a free society, we cannot force the insurance companies to lose money and make stupid, costly decisions. If additional expensive equipment and automobiles makes the total cost of owning the automobiles cheaper, then we must allow insurance companies to charge less.
On the other hand, some aspects of automobile insurance should be held up to public scrutiny, and perhaps regulated. For example, insurance companies charge SUV owners somewhat less, because they pay somewhat less for damage they inflict on other cars, they often kill the passengers in these other cars, rather than wounding them, and funerals are cheaper than hospital bills. (I am not kidding.) This is not the responsibility of the insurance companies, but it certainly is an issue that should be dealt with by the Congress, by automobile manufacturers, and by class-action lawsuits brought by people whose family members have been killed by SUVs.
5. Cease production of the big engined SUVs. Lets see the minivan make a comeback for those larger families.
I would love to see this happen, but it can only be the result of free-market forces, not legislative fiat. Free market forces might include expensive gasoline, and class-action lawsuits against automobile companies because they knowingly manufacture SUVs that kill thousands of extra people every year (mainly the passengers in the cars that these SUVs hit in accidents).
6. Get around the naysayers like Park. I don't personally know that much about LENR/CANR, but what I have seen leads me to believe that, with so many people seeing something, that there is something going on. . . .
I wish I knew how to get around people like Park! But if we must have enemies, people like him are the best enemies we could wish for, because they make us look good.
Lastly, and to Jed in particular: I don't hold a position on the idea of global warming. I think that there is insufficient evidence that it is happening, or that if it is that it is being caused by our actions. HOWEVER; I do believe that we should move away from pollutive and limited fuel sources as quickly as possible, just as if there really were an imminent threat of environmental collapse. . . .
I agree completely, for the same reasons. I too do not feel that I understand the scientific issues enough to assert that global warming is caused by carbon dioxide. On the other hand I am pretty sure that global warming is occurring. The evidence for that seems strong and easy to understand. Whether it is being caused by humans or natural forces I cannot judge. So I have to go with the scientific consensus. This is a safe choice, because the scientific consensus is usually correct.
The scientific consensus is certainly correct in the case of cold fusion. There is confusion about this issue, by the way. It was echoed here recently when someone a message saying we cannot we cannot trust a large group of scientists who reach a consensus. Of course a large group *might* be wrong, but we can be pretty safe going along with it when we do not understand the technical issues. Only one group of scientists has made a serious effort to evaluate cold fusion: the people who wrote the 3,000 papers listed at LENR-CANR.org. By a huge majority they have concluded that cold fusion is a real, nuclear effect. Of course thousands of other scientists have disparaged cold fusion and claimed it is not real, but they have not written any papers and they know nothing about the subject, so their views have no merit. They may work as scientists during the day, but when they talk about cold fusion they stop acting as scientists. Their opinions should carry no more weight than the opinion of some blowhard eating breakfast at the Waffle House. A "scientific consensus" only includes people who have done their homework, not everyone who happens to have a PhD.
Me myself, this little minicrisis has scared me, and I think it should scare everyone.
I wish it would. This is the kind of wake-up call we need. Unfortunately, my impression is that we have pushed the national snooze-button, and most people are going back to sleep.
Sorry this was so lengthy, and I hope it has made some sense...I am rather sick right now with a sinus infection, so for all I know, this was the least coherent post I've ever made.
On the contrary. Good posting! Good job! But you should punch that snooze button and get some sleep. Also I recommend washing the sinuses with warm salt water. Use 1 teaspoon of salt per cup of water. Just snuff it in. That technique was recommended to me by a WWII-era doctor, who was posted to China, where he treated Chiang Kai-shek, among other patients.
- Jed
