Tha point is that those who go to great lengths to deny climaate change are like the stupid teenager who doesnt care who has to clean up the mess from the party or whether he trashes the house as long as he gets to get wasted the night before.
Its really as self centered and selfish as that

I disagree with you…..If I am that teenager….then my bad attitude is due to the parents denying me the basics of child-hood….warmth, food and nice clothes…..I know that my parents are liars and follow the’ do as I say not as I do’ philosophy….my only sane recourse is to provide for myself…..

.ok mcgyver is it going to be me and you who run the world cleanly and non-polluting with energy going to the chosen few ?.....

First, Sandy, yes fracking could cause some seismic instability, but the other major problems are contamination of the ground water and long-term continuing addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere from the burning of the natural gas retrieved.

Second, the U.S. was making quite a bit of progress toward efficient solar cells based on government funded research programs to a number of universities.  As soon as George Bush, the younger, got into office all of those projects were pulled from the universities and redistributed to petroleum companies.  It’s amazing how fast they died.

Third, don’t kid yourself, solar and wind are exceedingly successful at competing with carbon based energy sources in Europe and even Hawaii.  I don’t blame the petroleum companies for consistently bad-mouthing these energy sources since they are direct competitors, however, I’m sure that within twenty years we’ll be getting almost all our energy from solar, wind, and nuclear.  We’ll still continue extracting oil but only as a raw material for plastics and other organic compounds.

Occam

sine dues - 24 November 2012 07:59 AM

mcgyver- At least oil and gas live up to the promise of energy provider. Alternative energy is just that…..an alternative to energy. You can sound off all you like about solar, wind, tidal…but they all fall short….and it is not because we haven’t ‘invested’ enough….it is because they don’t work. Energy density is not there….the math is simple….the politics complex !

RobertW (another poster on this forum) would not agree with you.  He is confident that within 5 years it will be clear that solar power is going to an exponentially developing alternative that will revolutionize our energy usages.  He thinks that this will be due primarily to its superior affordability, without the need for subsidies, as compared to our carbon based energy resources.

I am dubious about his zealous optimism, but I am not sure that he is wrong.  There are inventions and innovations occurring that could lend credence to his perspective.

Thank you Occam for answering my post.  When I was in high school science had not left the bible.  I understand the ground water problem and we lived on well water up at the top of Topanga and if we missed a water delivery one could smell that stuff.  Years later I bought a house on lower Topangq Canyon and it had been connected to the water company years before.. It had a huge water cistern that we turned into a small pool.  It was 18 feet by 9 feet and we put some cinder block steps and a pool cleaner system.  When we took the top off the cistern my exterminator suggested I get some hungry cats before the critters started to breed.  The previous owners kept the water level high renough so the pool would not break open.  We managed to set off every possible specires of animal who had never seen the sun and were albinoes.  We ran into every pet shop in the West Valley and brought home a load of cats.  I could not kill those poor critters. 

I had 3 dogs but they stayed under the beds until the critters were gone.  Chihuahuas are dogs in name only.

sine dues - 23 November 2012 08:10 AM

dansmith62, the green companies fail because they can only survive with massive subsidies…...when the taxpayer gets fed up…..they fall flat on their faces.

The opposite is true. The fossil fuel industry would fail without the massive subsidies our grandchildren will have to pay to deal with all the damage created by overusing our atmosphere. Today’s selfish taxpayers get fed up, because they don’t care about the massive burden they are creating for future taxpayers. They are only interested in the present, not the future.

macgyver - 23 November 2012 10:37 AM

I hate to nit pick an old post but this isn’t really possible. Fusion reactions are by their nature self limited. Unless they occur in a massive body like the sun, they require the precision controlled input of large amounts of energy to continue running so its not really possible to have an Out-of-control reaction. If the complex machinery that would keep a controlled fusion reaction working were to break down in some way the whole thing would just come to a stop.

Maybe I’m wrong then.  *shrugs*  I’m no physicist.  So then the main problem is simply figuring out how to get more energy out of the reaction than we have to put into it to get and keep it going.  Okay then.  Let’s get on that.  Should be simple.

Dead Monky - 26 November 2012 08:51 AM

macgyver - 23 November 2012 10:37 AM

I hate to nit pick an old post but this isn’t really possible. Fusion reactions are by their nature self limited. Unless they occur in a massive body like the sun, they require the precision controlled input of large amounts of energy to continue running so its not really possible to have an Out-of-control reaction. If the complex machinery that would keep a controlled fusion reaction working were to break down in some way the whole thing would just come to a stop.

Maybe I’m wrong then.  *shrugs*  I’m no physicist.  So then the main problem is simply figuring out how to get more energy out of the reaction than we have to put into it to get and keep it going.  Okay then.  Let’s get on that.  Should be simple.

I scanned an article about some folks working on some sort of magnetic lining that may have some promise in housing a fusion reaction, but the experiment to see if it may be viable, is, I think, a year off.  Others seem to think pursuing cold fusion is the better way to proceed.

Still with the cold fusion?  That’s been a cul-de-sac of fraud, false hopes, and pseudoscience for thirty years.  You’d think people would have given up on it by now.

Dead Monky - 27 November 2012 08:28 AM

Still with the cold fusion?  That’s been a cul-de-sac of fraud, false hopes, and pseudoscience for thirty years.  You’d think people would have given up on it by now.

I know. But, hey it’s big science, so shut up.

Dead Monky - 27 November 2012 08:28 AM

Still with the cold fusion?  That’s been a cul-de-sac of fraud, false hopes, and pseudoscience for thirty years.  You’d think people would have given up on it by now.

Yeah, lately I’m pinning my hopes more on what we already know works, like wind and solar, with the hope that they will become vastly more affordable, and the problems of providing continuous power, over time, can be effectively solved.