The priorities we set as a society, as judged by how we organize our economy, favor short-term consumption, and neither long-term nor short-term improvement in the quality of life for all. I believe, as many others do, that we have an infinite capacity to solve problems, but we do not have infinite time. Nature will allow us to consume ourselves out of existence if we do not act correctly and quickly.
Is humanity smarter than a protozoan?
"In short, a biological species as dominant as ours, largely free of competitors and still with large stocks of natural capital to burn through, should be expected to hit limits and suffer catastrophes. And it won’t be pretty..."
We have countless examples of situations where our "ingenuity" brought unintended consequences. This one in particular might spell our undoing, or possibly a catastrophic reduction in our population and quality of life.
Scientists discover what's killing the bees and it's worse than you thought
"When researchers collected pollen from hives on the east coast pollinating cranberry, watermelon and other crops and fed it to healthy bees, those bees showed a significant decline in their ability to resist infection by a parasite called Nosema ceranae. The parasite has been implicated in Colony Collapse Disorder though scientists took pains to point out that their findings do not directly link the pesticides to CCD. The pollen was contaminated on average with nine different pesticides and fungicides though scientists discovered 21 agricultural chemicals in one sample. Scientists identified eight ag chemicals associated with increased risk of infection by the parasite.
Most disturbing, bees that ate pollen contaminated with fungicides were three times as likely to be infected by the parasite. Widely used, fungicides had been thought to be harmless for bees as they’re designed to kill fungus, not insects, on crops like apples."
When making hard choices on where to invest our capital, the energy industry has learned that the money to fix aging coal and nuclear plants is not forthcoming. This will force many to close, providing an opportunity for renewables to grab market share, but also creating hardship on those communities directly affected. We need a better plan for transitioning from an energy economy dominated by extraction and the infrastructure based on the promise of "limitless energy" to an economy based on low-entropy energy transfer providing equal service with higher quality of life. If we do not manage this transition, it will cause much pain.
Californians consider a future without a nuclear plant for a neighbor
"But the effects of the plant’s closing are already reverberating. By September, Southern California Edison will reduce its staff at the plant to 600 employees from 1,500. Electricity prices have increased since the plant, which is about halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego and powered 1.4 million homes, went offline last year.
Last week, when the power went out at Lily Tally’s home in San Clemente, she worried that erratic electricity service — especially in the summer, when demand for power is highest — would become more common. She said she and her husband were now planning to put solar panels on their house."
The last decade has brought us a prime example that our economy does not require energy use, and particularly the use of polluting sources of energy, in order to improve quality of life. What we once thought a result of the economic downturn, now proves to start prior to that. Even Americans, the most car-hungry population in the world, are starting to learn that we can have a high quality of life without driving everywhere.
Americans are falling out of love with their cars, and the tipping point was 2004
"As the chart shows, the year 2004 was the US peak for absolute distances driven, and for miles traveled per licensed driver, per household and per registered vehicle. Absolute miles driven in US-registered light vehicles declined by 5% from 2006 through 2011, to 2.6 trillion miles from 2.7 trillion miles. The distance per licensed driver fell to 12,492 miles in 2011 from 13,711 in 2004, an 8.9% decline. Households as a whole were driving 9.4% fewer miles in 2011 as compared with 2004.
Sivak attributes the decline, among other factors, to increased urbanization, greater use of public transportation, and changed driving habits. Look for at least one knock-on trend—the no-car garage."
As the electric vehicle moves into the marketplace, and batteries begin to come from more benign materials, we have the opportunity to create a sharing-society-based transportation system that relies on driverless, electric vehicles shared by a community and among other communities to provide the transportation service at all levels without the risk and cost of individual ownership. This will allow for faster transitions to new technology, improved local ecosystems, and more resources allocated to life-improving technology
EV sales skyrocketing
"Joann Zhou, an analyst at Argonne National Lab, says that a simple trend analysis would indicate that EVs are on track for growth that significantly outpaces hybrid vehicles. She does this by looking at vehicle sales since introduction. For instance, the Prius was released in 1999, and the first U.S. plug-in vehicles were released at the end of 2010. By counting 31 months forward for each, we can see that EVs are outselling hybrids by a factor of more than two to one. That’s great news for the future of electrification."
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