[TheForge] Hellooooooo!

[Demon Buddha]

I'm not sure we're talking about the end of the world, if that is what 
you are referring to, but some unpleasant changes seem inevitable.  But 
you may be right, we may wheedle our way out of that as well.  People 
are very clever and adaptable, so who can tell for sure?  But unless the 
theories of limitless non-biomass petroleum are correct, we are in for 
some significant changes, and they may come in our lifetime.  In fact, 
that would seem likely as China comes online, sucking up every resource 
it can get its hands on, including petroleum.  I'm not sure how nice the 
coming 20 to 30 years are going to be.  Hopefully, some genius will find 
an answer and allow us all to go on with our orgy of mindless consumption.

Darrell wrote:
> The "END" has been near for the last 100 years. Every time it gets really
> close, someone invents a new "END" stretcher that moves it down the time
> line.
> Not that many years ago the "END" involved the depth of horse manure in the
> streets of New York.
> Alternative fuels, the way it is being done currently, uses more energy to
> produce than it is worth.

	Most of the alternate energy programs appear to be shams.  Fuel cells, 
solar... feh.  They are a long way from being viable.  I'm not even sure 
that they can be made viable.

> We do have the technology to build small nuclear reactors that are safe (we
> use them to power submarines and aircraft carriers) that could produce
> alternative fuels as a byproduct of electricity generation. The problem 
> with
> the current nuclear power plants is that they are so big and expensive to
> build that they never pay for themselves before they have to be shut down.
	
	As the world discovered, nuclear technology doesn't scale well at all. 
  As for safe, sure... in terms of operation, but the wastes are still a 
serious problem.  The uranium isn't a great problem per se, but the 
byproducts such as plutonium are.  Hanford is still a major problem with 
wastes leaking directly into the Columbia river.  I'm not sure if it is 
true, but I heard the Columbia is the most radioactive river in North 
America.  Doesn't seem to stop people from swimming in it, though. :)