Gas Bandit's Political Thread V: The Vampire Likes Bats
- Thread starter GasBandit
- Start date
GasBandit
Staff member
It moves on to other sectors after that.
I'm sorry, I know not of what you speak. We don't have conspiracy theories involving fluoride.
GasBandit
Staff member
No, just involving perfectly harmless gasses that plants need to live and grow.
I don't buy into the carbon dioxide being bad schtick, but it doesn't discount my concerns of carbon monoxide and chemicals used for fracking and other environmentally damaging actions by companies.
GasBandit
Staff member
So you're a climate change denier too, eh?
Nope. The pollution from the chemicals released into the air have an damaging effect on the overall temperature rising of the earths climate. It's minimal, though. There are more pressing matters than a couple degree change in the environment, such as population vs. resources, the destruction of our oceans and clean water supplies, and the eventual decline of the cheap and easy energy resources spoken of in that video above.
It's sort of like worrying about the paint chipping on the house while the house is on fire.
If you say so. I think by fixing the problems with chemical pollution, especially toxic chemicals in the air, the temperature will right itself. It's a question of fixing the problem itself, not offering a cure for the symptom.
GasBandit
Staff member
So do you like Nuclear?
I like nuclear in places where it doesn't sit on fault lines or other areas which are environmentally unsound. I also like when it can be broken down and not turned into weapons or runs a security risk. I'd much prefer more money be put into developing solar (especially storing solar energy). I think wind would be good on coasts but runs the same risk as off shore oil rigs- hurricanes are a bitch.
GasBandit
Staff member
We've got a loooooooong way to go before the technology is there for either of those come close to being able to give us what fossil fuels do. Even geothermal is further along.
As much as I hate to admit it... Alberta, Canada is well suited for nuclear power. No hurricanes, no earthquakes, plenty of remote locations with lots of water.
Yes, but in less than 10 years we put a man on the moon. I think we can do the same for energy.
GasBandit
Staff member
Heh, we put a man on the moon by violently igniting the most horrendous toxins we could get our hands on, which left cape canaveral a 100 year, billion dollar cleanup.
Basically, until we can install Mr. Fusion in our cars, the choices are fossil fuels, and western civilization. We can pick one or the other.
The thing that confuses me about alternative energy, is that the big oil companies themselves don't seem to be putting much, if any, R&D money into the various technologies. Isn't that a good idea, from a corporate product diversification standpoint, whether or not their main source of income is doing incredibly well and/or is going to run out any time soon? Eventually, someone is going to make a big breakthrough on solar energy storage, or wave generated energy, or wind power, even if it does take 10 years (or more) from where our current tech level is to get there. Wouldn't it be better for Shell, Chevron, and BP to have an iron in that fire when the breakthrough comes, than to be spending so much time fighting against it? Or are they actually researching the technologies but trying to dissuade anyone else from doing so, so that they can own the majority of the technology and maintain their grip on the world energy profits?
That's the thing about corporations- the short term is king. These aren't family owned businesses and the people who would be hurt most are the people with their money in the stock market.
GasBandit
Staff member
According to all their wikipedia pages, they are researching those alternatives - billions of dollars worth. Nothing has borne fruit yet. At some point you have to wonder if maybe "unicorn farts" isn't the most apropos comparison to solar and wind energy, especially as the most personally enriching ventures in that area are in defrauding taxpayers and producing no results.
GasBandit
Staff member
Interesting blog reading: Big Oil will dominate renewable energy sector
Yeah, I get that. There's only so much money you should be able to throw at something without achieving any results before your shareholders lynch you. And, a part of me wonders if it's economically feasible for a large population (especially one as electricity hungry* as modern America) to exist on solely non-fossil fuel based power generation, even if it is feasible to do it on a household by household basis. Just because something works for one person doesn't mean it's going to work for 1,000,000 people. If everything scaled that way, MS Access would be the perfect database solution for any company, and Oracle wouldn't exist.
*Though actually, I would think that the major factor in limiting the usefulness of alternative energy as a main supplier of electricity would be not the overall demand, but the burstiness of that demand. It's not like California and Texas have daily brownouts and rolling blackouts year-round, but during the hottest parts of summer, when everyone is running their a/c on max, you do hear about them. Likewise, heating oil prices tend to spike during the coldest months, because that's when demand is highest.
The idea of the per-house solution is that every house is contributing to the grid, even if they aren't using power. You need to remember that most houses use very little power for about 8-10 hours a day. This gives those houses time to add to the stockpile to the grid. The only real issue is that there really hasn't been any large scale real world testing to see how such a system could handle spike demands over a long period of time. Until there is, solar and wind don't have the data to show their practicality.
GasBandit
Staff member
So it seems "Forward" (the new motto of the Obama 2012 reelection campaign) is also the name of a number of historical socialist newspapers. This was documented on Wikipedia prior to the campaign... but now it's been deleted.
That should be mentioned in the wikipedia article on it.
GasBandit
Staff member
There's reason to believe it might have been obama himself, as "forward" was part of his mentor's gig - Frank Marshall Davis, Pinko extraordinaire.
Also, Obama campaign official wistfully quotes Marx on his personal blog.
GasBandit
Staff member
I've noticed there are a lot of pinkos in Wisconsin.
You're here a lot, eh?
GasBandit
Staff member
Maybe all the conservatives there just don't know how to use the internet and hide in their basements whenever the national media comes around.
Or maybe you see what you want?
That's an argument that can always be turned around on you, in any situation.
"You" being anyone.
True, but in this case I think I'm safe. You can 'argue' it all you want, but the finger pointing of Communism reeks of McCarthyism, and considering this state unleashed that menace on society, I'll be damned if I am going to stay quiet when people make such a stupid, baseless accusation.