The Dark Planets Conjecture

Why haven’t we detected any evidence of alien intelligences yet? The wallpaper on one of my computers is the composite picture NASA published in 2000 of the entire earth at night. The amount of light visible from space is at once beautiful and intriguing, and it makes me wonder how much energy we waste by unintentionally beaming it into space, whether it is light, infrared radiation (heat), or radio waves. Looking back through human history, it is clear that, as a species, we used comparatively little of our planet’s resources before the industrial revolution, and I suspect the view from space back then showed very little human-made light, if any. Then I contemplate the probability that, in the absence of any great new energy-producing technology (fusion?), we will run down our available fossil fuel sources over the coming decades, driving the price up to the point where fewer and fewer people and organizations can afford to use and waste energy as we do today. In another century or two we may be conserving energy to such an extent that we will have to stop our light, heat, and radio waves from dissipating into space, and the planet may return to the way it appeared before the industrial revolution. This brings up some interesting questions about our universe.

Incremental Change Towards Sustainability and How I Maintain My Lawn

Lawns are a relatively recent historical phenomenon.  Lawns didn’t exist except around the palaces of the world (think Versailles) until the 19th century (link), and even then only in the more affluent places like Great Britain.  In North America, though there were some modern lawns in the early 18th century, a good grass seed wasn’t found until around 1930, and due to the more extreme weather lawns had nowhere near the smooth appearance of those in the UK.  While lawnmowers appeared in the 1880’s, the North American lawn didn’t come into its own until homeowners had both hoses and sprinklers for use in the hot summers, and gas-powered rotary lawn mowers, and until the American Garden Club gave lawns a lot of publicity.  With a manual push-type lawnmower people could only keep a relatively small lawn, but powered mowers and irrigation made it possible for many to have huge lawns, especially in the prosperity-driven move to owning huge “McMansions” that occurred at the end of the 20th century.  So how will things change from here on?

Disposing of the Disposable Society, Part 6 – Repair Versus Replacement

Replacement seems wasteful compared with repair, but is it really?  As we strive to make our stuff last ten times as long in the interest of sustainability and cost savings, will repair shops experience a resurgence?  Over the decades my unscientific eye has detected a significant decrease in the numbers of shoe repair shops, TV and appliance repair shops, and tailors, to name a few.  At first thought it would appear that we will be looking for repairs from time to time to avoid the cost (and ecological impact) of replacement.  Are repairs destined to generally remain too uneconomical to pursue?  How can we be more frugal and decrease our waste stream of discarded products?

Technological Development Isn’t the Only Thing Accelerating

Can improvements in technology keep up with increasing global demand? As I look around at various discussions of the current world situation I read lots of interesting thoughts and ideas around our rapidly advancing technology. Some see the rate of technological advancement as being on a continuous exponential upswing that will result in fabulous new classes of products, free or nearly free energy, and answers to practically all of our currently-anticipated global troubles within a decade or two. Others see a rocky road of regional energy and food shortages, promising technologies taking too long too implement, and much worse. I tend to be somewhere in the middle of it all, and working to raise consciousness so that the rocky road will be less so, and the technologies will have time to arrive. The problem is that, while technological development is accelerating, world problems are, too, and population seems to be the perennial behind-the-scenes story. The real race I see is between conservation (to buy time), scientific developments, the will to implement new technologies, and increasing human numbers and per capita demand. The unfortunate fact is that demand is accelerating faster than population as the world “globalizes” and modernizes.

The Future of Toilet Paper

Aren’t You Glad Toilet Paper is Derived from a Renewable Resource? Toilet paper shortages are a difficult thing to think about … so I won’t think about it … no, I can’t help it.

Energy Sources in a Sustainable World

In the future sustainable world, it is probable that per capita fossil fuel consumption will have to be very nearly zero. The use of fossil fuel resources will be restricted by cost and availability to only the most critical and high value applications. Total population, and how well we control and reduce it worldwide, will be the biggest factor in how hard the changes are, getting there, but technological advances must be significant as well. While the total use will eventually decline to a few drops of petroleum per day (or week, or month), the goal will need to be zero, and from the standpoint of long term planning we need to start pursuing that goal now. Even with the most restrictive conservation measures, we will still need a lot of energy per person. If, as I’ve read, the average person in North America today uses 16 times the world average of energy per person, and more and more people in the developing world are striving to at least approach the way we live in NA, we have a huge challenge to overcome.  (More arithmetic later …)  How will we live, and where will our energy come from in a world no longer using petroleum and coal for power?