For someone who considers himself politically apathetic, I sure seem to be dipping into books with political implications lately (Legacy of Ashes, Fiasco). This morning I listened to a podcast of NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross (my favorite radio voice). She was interviewing Michael Klare, author of Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet. (You can listen on your computer or hear the podcast here.)
Klare says that although we hear a lot about our dependence on oil from the Middle East, Russia and Venezuela are also major players, all of which is creating a huge international mess. What's even more troubling is China, who, according to Klare, has only one major source of energy: coal. (If you're not sure what happens when you burn tons and tons of coal, ask Al Gore.)
I really have no justification for this belief (other than being a dreamer), but I have to think that eventually someone is going to come up with a viable alternative energy source that will severely diminish (if not eliminate) our dependence on oil. I have a good friend who is a scientist in D.C. who assures me that large amounts of time, energy and manpower are working on the problem. I just hope it's not too far off and that the cure isn't worse than the disease.
3 comments:
For me, the supreme irony about alternative energy is that its best ally, for now, is high oil prices that make things like solar power more economically feasible than they were when oil was $20 a barrel. Thomas Friedman advocated a space-race style investment in alternative energy in The World Is Flat, but that would require lots of money and patience, something of which politicians are physically and evolutionarily bereft--just look at the lot of panderers that want to be president.
And I can't help but wonder what's going to happen to many of the Middle Eastern countries (whose only revenue comes from oil) when an alternative energy source is found. Look out!
Piggybacking on what John said, I feel like the answer is out there but there are too many people (many currently in the Oval Office) who are far too beholden to corporate oil interests to make it happen. And it would take time and money and patience.
I think the supreme example of getting things done is the atom bomb. The US government basically built a town in the desert, populated it with the best scientists they could get their hands on, then shipped in good food, night life, and gave them a virtually unlimited budget for research. Add a couple of years, and the rest is history.
I have to think that alternate sources of energy have as much research on them today as nuclear weapons did back then, but there isn't a war (or space race) to push this issue, and there's a very large oil lobby that a) funds politicians and b) is against it.
And you may want to Netflix Who Killed the Electric Car?.
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