When Are We Going to Benefit From Alternative Energy?

The urgency for the development and use of alternative energy has never been greater than right now. Our health, as well as the health of our planet, depends on it.

When the automobile was in its infancy it was powered by steam. Almost immediately, people knew the horseless carriage had a much greater potential for safety and reliability than was currently available. There was much demand to create a vehicle that was more reliable without spewing water vapor everywhere. And the possibility of explosion from the highly pressurized boiler was always present.

The gasoline engine answered the power and reliability issues as well as eliminating the chance of explosion but it spewed an ‘invisible’ new substance that would soon threaten our lives in an entirely new way.

Today, we have the same urgency for the development and use of alternative energy but we now have the added imperative to protect our planet.

The application of alternative energy is at a virtual standstill. We have become mired in our dependence on fossil fuel. Alternative energy development is being hobbled to the point of stagnation by a population who refuses to accept the dire need to move beyond a rapidly depleting resource. New unconventional methods must be utilized. Our planet is awash with enough energy to support all of humanity’s energy needs for an eternity. I am of course speaking of sun light, wind and water.

Several renewable energy strategies are in development throughout the world to take advantage of these resources but the question remains are they being used to their full potential.

We run into interference from those who gain the most by impeding its development: oil companies and politicians who refuse to believe in a future powered by anything other than fossil-fuel and the exploitation of it. The fear of embarking on new technologies needs to be overcome. We have been told by scientists that the world is heating up based partly on our reckless and unfettered use of carbon-based materials. The polar icecaps are indeed melting, whether it is caused by mankind or is part of a natural cycle is of little consequence when the shape of our physical world is changing and people are suffering from extended droughts. When we are trying to keep cool during increasingly hotter summer months, and while we try to keep warm in ever decreasing temperatures during winter, does the cause of global climate changes really matter?

Our entire transportation system still depends on air-polluting fossil-fuel. Our vehicles are subjected to annual testing to keep emissions below a level that is still too high but are not lowered to satisfy the profit margins of automobile manufacturers.

Our homes and businesses still use electricity that comes from air-polluting, water-fouling coal that is extracted using earth-destroying techniques. A small percentage of electricity is generated via nuclear power that produces a hazardous substance that if placed in the wrong hands could spell the end to life as we know it.

One of the alternatives to oil production is bio-fuel. Its production takes up farm land that is better used to feed the world’s hungry. The majority of the worlds poor live in foreign countries, but some of the world’s poor live right here in the U.S. where obesity is becoming a major health problem. And not all of them are living on the streets. It is criminal to allow starving people in the richest nation on earth. The only way they are fed is through donations from those of us who are also struggling to get by while farmers are paid to either not grow food, grow food for livestock that feeds fewer people than grains and vegetables would, or to grow crops to fuel our machinery.

The ability to economically produce high-quality cheap oil is nearing its end. All of the easily accessible oil has been discovered and extracted. Remaining oil reserves are off-shore, far from markets in smaller fields and of lesser quality.

The urgency to utilize renewable energy sources is exceedingly great for both our health and our safety. We at the local level can only participate in this transformation if we are given the tools to do so. This problem is much larger than the individual and therefore the solution must be addressed higher up the economic ladder.

Wind turbines are being developed for homes. Companies are developing or improving access to solar energy for our homes and cars. Hydrogen powered cars are slowly hitting the market. These are examples of what needs to be accomplished on a much greater scale. As these new techs become more accessible and more affordable, the consumer will begin to see fossil fuel applications as no longer available and therefore the transformation to a cleaner lifestyle can seriously begin to take effect. Pollution will begin to decrease. Struggles over non-renewable resources will begin to become a thing of the past. Likewise, there will be a decrease in ecological disasters such as what recently took place in Tennessee. Oil spills will become a thing of the past, and so on.

When are we going to witness this brave new world? When governments and industry embrace faith in the sustainability of renewable energy and start supplying us with what we need to finally shrug off the yoke of fossil fuel dependency. Only then will we start breathing easier.