Problems, Predicaments, and Technology

One of my friends in the world of energy and resource decline is Mike Stasse. I have a considerable number of friends who have serious experience with solar PV systems, and Mike is one who has written a blog regarding his experiences. He constantly and consistently shares lots of information about ecological overshoot and the symptom predicaments which offshoot from it in the blog he writes, Damn the Matrix . Now, I have already previously shared much about the limitations, the overall environmental cost, the reasons why non-renewable "renewable" energy systems actually end up requiring MORE energy than if we simply began reducing overall energy use in the first place (civilizational inertia and Jevons Paradox), and the science proving all of this; however, Mike's information comes from personal, real world experience. Here is his latest saga regarding his (relatively) new solar system. As one can clearly see, the real world experience is a whole different scenario from

  I have mentioned Tom Murphy many times in this blog precisely because facts don't lie. If anyone wants to truly know where we are as a species on this planet, Tom can definitely tell you. Don't get me wrong, I can also tell you; but I'm not a physicist. Tom is one of the few individuals who has written a book about our predicaments and allowed free access to everyone.  Tom has done far more than that, however. He has a website which has been a staple within the energy community for many years. He talks about our situation in this video  and surprisingly thought the same way I did for many years regarding our future. He thought that we would develop various "renewable" technologies and that our future would be shiny and "green" so that BAU could continue unabated. I actually think a very large portion of society thinks the same way, and it is because they simply do not understand the laws of physics, thermodynamics, biology, and chemistry and how they

    If you believe that there are good reasons to say that hydrogen produced with nuclear energy should be deemed to be "pink," then there must be something that doesn't click right inside your brain. The people who propose this rainbow of colors for a colorless gas don't seem to realize that when you arrive to this level of silliness, there has to be something deeply wrong at the very basis of the idea. (Courtesy of this article )  I  have mentioned how non-renewable "renewables" don't actually reduce fossil fuel use AND how they require the fossil fuel platform for their very existence in several of my articles. This means that ANYTHING which depends upon that infrastructural layer also doesn't reduce fossil fuel use due to the ongoing building, maintenance, and decommissioning and disposal of the infrastructural layers of civilization which support these upper layers and said "anything" also requires the fossil fuel platform for its ex

  Nate Hagens recently produced a new video here  regarding myths and reality and it is very well done. The video goes into precise detail about many core myths and beliefs, and  I have the video queued up to the part about the myth of "technology solving it" for anyone who still thinks solar panels and wind turbines help reduce emissions in any way (spoiler alert; they actually INCREASE emissions). Once you've seen this part, I recommend going to the beginning and watching the entire video from the start. The entire video is excellent with regard to eliminating commonly held false beliefs generally encouraged by industry and governments in an effort to continue BAU (Business As Usual) and industrial civilization as long as possible. I actually wrote out a detailed critique of the video in the groups I manage, but think that this video deserves a much wider audience, which is why I wrote this post. The video is excellent in explaining why technology can not and will not

Happy Earth Day!! The above picture looking into Glacier National Park was taken last year and is among some of my favorite pictures of the trip.  I've mentioned the book Bright Green Lies several times and now that the movie documentary is out (today!), here is a discussion from filmmaker Julia Barnes on her new documentary. I really like how she points out the obvious hypocrisies within the environmental movement here, quote:  "If people are genuinely interested in protecting the natural world in the environmental movement, a film that points out the harmful industries of things like 'renewables' shouldn't be considered divisive. It should just be something that is information that they're going to take in and that's going to affect the way that they look at these issues, and if someone, if their allegiance is to these technologies above life on the planet, then they were never really an environmentalist to begin with and their allegiance is NOT with t

A new book is now available from Springer by author Alice Friedemann titled Life After Fossil Fuels - A Reality Check on Alternative Energy. The really great thing about this book is the fact that it explains so much about not only how society is powered today, what products are made from this energy, and what the future will look like, but also precisely WHY alternative energy from technological devices will fall way short of the mark with regard to powering society once fossil fuels become impossible to extract because the net energy they provide is equal to the amount of energy required to extract them (making them an energy sink rather than an energy source). Alice J. Friedemann is the creator of energyskeptic.com . Ms. Friedemann is perhaps best known for her book When Trucks Stop Running – Energy and the Future of Transportation published by Springer, and Peak Soil , which was edited by David Pimentel at Cornell, Tad Patzek at U.C. Berkeley, and Walter Youngquist (author of G

  The Koocanusa Bridge is the only bridge connecting the east and west sides of Lake Koocanusa in Montana and is Montana's highest (215 feet above the river) and longest bridge. A bridge too far? What will be the consequences of energy and resource decline on the healthcare industry? Will medicines be affected? Unfortunately, energy affects every one of us in very distinct ways. While these questions are very important ones indeed, energy and resource decline will affect far more than just the healthcare industry. It  will affect parts of our daily lives in almost every way imaginable. Agriculture and food and water security will be one important area of concern. Another area of great concern will be climate change and collapse , as collapse will reduce the level of energy available to deal with the increasing incidences of extreme weather events and natural disasters caused by climate change. Think about a piece of infrastructure - ANY infrastructure - how did that piece of i

At first glance, my thoughts regarding this topic are that I've actually probably covered most of it in my very first blog post here.  However, I decided to try a new twist by asking members of a group I run what they'd like me to write about, and this was the first idea mentioned. There are particular angles of this topic which I have also covered here  under the topic of denial and here  under the topic of optimism bias. It is very important to cover the topic of psychology, because most people are affected in one way or another by predetermined beliefs and feelings based upon their worldview, upbringing, and schooling. No two people are going to agree 100% on everything; but utilizing logic, critical thinking, and consensus can minimize disagreements to a rather large extent. Before I go any further, I need to point out that I am NOT pro-fossil fuels. For some reason, some people have gotten the misguided notion that I am some sort of fossil fuel shill, which couldn't be

  What is it that leads to denial of reality and then subsequently in many cases, optimism bias? Recently, I have noticed a rather large increase in the number of posts and/or comments which are not based on reality and demonstrate a large amount of ignorance on a large number of topics. Is it just me or is this happening across the spectrum of groups that are based upon climate change and/or energy and resource decline? So, based on my curiosity, I decided to make posts asking about this scenario. The answers I received confirmed, that indeed, the same lines of thought that I figured are also responsible for the denial of reality and optimism bias I continue seeing in increasing amounts. As for whether or not a large increase is happening, please offer up YOUR observation in the comments section below! Among the topics this covers are the overwhelming subjects often found in news articles regarding new technology focusing on artificial intelligence, batteries, non-renewable "ren