> we might be discussing whether or not technology will save > us. I did make a technological argument: I argued that there is enough renewable energy and that it can be scaled up quickly enough if we can overcome the resistance of the fossil fuel industries and their friends and the deeply entrenched regulatory and infrastructural framework which favors centralized generation and fossil fuels. This is a big if, I personally don't see this on the horizon right now here in the US. But the general wisdom in the US is not to take renewables seriously; they are considered a hobby or wishful thinking which cannot hold up to reality, i.e., fossil and nuclear are the only games in town. Europeans know better, my emails are an attempt to make some of that knowledge available in the English language.
Note that the argument "renewables can be scaled up quickly enough to fill our basic needs, ie we won't have to freeze in the dark if we phase out nuclear and fossil fuels and switch to renewables now" is not the same as the argument: "if we have 100% renewable electricity in 2050 or even 2030 then the climate change damage will be tolerable." I am pessimistic about climate change and ocean acidification and loss of species etc. I think besides switching to renewables we will need serious and extremely expensive attempts of "soft" geoengineering, namely, find ways to get the CO2 out of the atmosphere again. But I am not willing to cede the ground without a fight, and rehabilitating renewable energy in the eyes of the public in the US is an important component of this fight. What to do politically? I think we have to work hard to achieve a merger of the labor movement with the environmental movement. Hans _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
