Re: Wind Power
From: Tim O'Flaherty (pinwheels_Fudge__at_gwi.net)
Date: 09/05/04
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Date: Sun, 5 Sep 2004 07:24:58 -0400
"Fred B. McGalliard" <frederick.b.mcgalliard@boeing.com> wrote in message
news:I3FFCF.Mqo@news.boeing.com...
>
> "Tim O'Flaherty" <pinwheels_Fudge_@gwi.net> wrote in message
> news:mMqdnZujg_US26rcRVn-sw@gwi.net...
> ...
> > The issue that concerns me is
> > continued and very possibly vastly expanded production of spent nuke
fuel.
> > I don't see any option as being proven safe and safe is how I would
define
> > acceptable.
>
> Is coal safe as a fuel source? Yes and no, (or perhaps hell yes and no
> F***ing way). The hard part is to quantify the risks reasonably well and
> compare them to the benefits.
I agree. Adding to the difficulty is the fact that risks and
benefits are not evenly distributed over the entire environment/population
or over time. Decisions have historically been made based on what is good
for *us* here and now with little regard for effects on others in other
places and future times. Currently, for seemingly trivial benefits or
benefits that accrue only to a select few (not surprisingly those who are
making the decisions), we are squandering our resources and trashing our
bioloical infrastructure.
>This is not a question of "is it safe" but
> exactly how safe and in what ways is it risky
And who is bearing the lions share of that risk. The appearance of
*yellow ribbon* decals on humvees and other fuel pigs is truly galling.
compared to both the relative
> benefits and to alternative solutions (including of course the ludite
> solution of no power at all).
I think that is unfair to the Luddites. They weren't in favor of no
power . They were against the unrestrained introduction of technology that
rendered them powerless through reduced wages and large scale unemployment.
Their case is a perfect example of differential benefits. For those
communities adversely affected it would be hard to argue that introduction
of power looms was always for the greater good.
from:http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/PRluddites.htm
["Wheat prices soared in 1812. Unable to feed their families, workers became
desperate. There were food riots in Manchester, Oldham, Ashton, Rochdale,
Stockport and Macclesfield. On 20th April several thousand men attacked
Burton's Mill at Middleton near Manchester. Emanuel Burton, who knew that
his policy of buying power-looms had upset local handloom weavers, had
recruited armed guards and three members of the crowd were killed by
musket-fire. The following day the men returned and after failing to
break-in to the mill, they burnt down Emanuel Burton's house. The military
arrived and another seven men were killed".]
this is not to say that all outcomes were similar, from:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1828looms.html
[. . . the operative weavers on machine yarns, both as cottagers and small
farmers, even with three times their former rents, they might be truly said
to be placed in a higher state of "wealth, peace, and godliness," by the
great demand for, and high price of, their labour, than they had ever before
experienced. Their dwellings and small gardens clean and neat, - all the
family well clad, - the men with each a watch in his pocket, and the women
dressed to their own fancy, - the church crowded to excess every Sunday, -
every house well furnished with a clock in elegant mahogany or fancy case, -
handsome tea services in Staffordshire ware, with silver or plated
sugar-tongs and spoons, - Birmingham, Potteries, and Sheffield wares for
necessary use and ornament, wherever a corner cupboard or shelf could be
placed to shew them off, - many cottage families had their cow, paying so
much for the summer's grass, and about a statute acre of land laid out for
them in some croft or corner, which they dressed up as a meadow for hay in
the winter]
It should be noted that that was an account by a mill owner.
In so much as they were opposed to the concentration of power and
wealth they are defensible. However there were no other options available
that could compete and so their cause was doomed. We do have other options
and the first and easiest is reducing waste. Unfortunately all that waste
makes money for a powerful few. Simply excavating one of our landfills and
sorting and classifying all the items found there by need and utility, by
lifespan and by the value of resources consumed in it's lifecycle would give
us a referance regarding what to stop doing. Defining "resources consumed"
would be a bit dicy though. Simple *free* market assumptions assign little
or no value to environmental costs, particularly when these costs are
imposed on other times and places.
Windpower is attacked because it represents a threat to the
centralization of power and energy resources. Technologies such as the
redox battery share that fate because they too tend to make a more widely
distributed power system a functional possibility.
Regards,
Tim O
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