I have a lot of great ideas in my head but lately find myself either chicken-out to blog or just too lazy or busy or whatever.
Lately, I have been very interested in environmental causes. At first glance, you may not think I am of that type. I don't drive a Prius, or wear hippie clothes, or live in a solar house. But I am concern about how humans impact the environment, as well as ourselves in how we commute, build and construct, and grow/raise our foods. Actually, maybe I have always been conscience about the environment since college when I took a class in Alternative Energy and was an admin assistant at the North Carolina Solar Center.
I've Got the Power
I am not quite sure where to start but let's start with this article: Obama touts energy plans. The drive in the article about Obama is really to encourage people to start NOW; install them now. Although, I applaud Obama for encouraging others to use solar panels, it's not all that easy. In the mid-2000's, I learned that photovoltaic cells (aka solar panels) are only 30% efficient. That means, if the sun light hits at 100% on the cells, only 30% becomes useful electricity. Now, in just doing a quick search, the cells are now 45% efficient. Which is a great thing. But science and engineering still have a long way to go.
I think though Obama does have a point. The more people are interested, buying solar panels, and paying money, that money can be used to come up with more efficient panels... if the money is handled correctly. (Yes, that's the kicker.)
So, why are some people driven to look for alternative energy? Many of our power plants are fueled by coal and fossil fuel. This fuel, when burn, emits carbon dioxide and other gasses into the atmosphere. Although carbon dioxide is great for plants, the plants are not as plentiful as before (due to deforestation and farming) and cannot keep up with the load going into the air. The other gasses becomes trapped under the ozone layer creating a green house effect, while other gasses are slowly eating away the ozone layer. The other point is that the fuel is steadily running out. As there are more and more humans everyday, there are also more and more cars and other transportation that uses fuel.
Planes, Trains, and Automobiles
The circle, of course, keeps circling. Because of fuel slowly being used through transportation, I applaud the automobile industry in coming up with electric cars and making them affordable in recent years. However, I sort of have a pain in my heart when I have to tell this story. Since the early to mid 1800's (yes!), scientists and hobbyists alike tinker with electric cars, trying to make batteries last longer and be more efficient. Even Thomas Edison knew electric cars will go far! However, in the turn of the 1900's, gas powered cars made an entrance into the market, where Henry Ford made it even more affordable with making the car on the assembly line. Today, cars are plentiful every where in the world. We love the roar of the engine, and the sleek design of the car. But sadly, cars, especially older cars, emit the bad gasses creating the greenhouse that the world is experiencing today.
This is the Air I Breathe
I have touched a little bit on greenhouse gasses. Although, I have my own skepticism on how much is really released into the air, it does seem that there has been a lot of climate activities over the past 50 years. some parts of the world are experiencing severe drought, while other parts are constantly hammered by rain and monsoon. In my little neck of the world (Southeast U.S.), it actually has been very mild to very cold in the winter. Where it is hot and dry in one area, must be wet and cold in other areas of the world (the balance of thermodynamics).
I ask myself, "Is this really normal?" The answer is that, we really don't know. I am not a meteorologist or a climatologist but in our little bit of existence in this earth's history, it does seem to be an extreme compared to 200 years or 1000 years ago. Compare to the other major eras of earth's history, there has been major changes only when something drastic happens, like a great tectonic shift, or a meteor hits hurts.
The difference today in our human history is that we are contributing to the green house effect, not earth's molten hot lava spewing ashes into the atmosphere or a meteor that just hit earth.
Food for Thought... Take 2
This is somewhat of a continuation of my last blog on The Human Experience. It's already scary to think that our foods are altered by science. It's even scarier that even though there are a lot of carbon dioxide in the air from burning fuel, the plants that feed off of it will grow but will not have enough nutrients (see article). they will grow fast and tall but it will not have time to absorb nutrients from the ground and convert it to helpful nutrient (through photosynthesis). In fact, what is in our ground?
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| Credit to Buzz Feed Jen Lewis. This is not Jim Davis's original words to this comic. Her article is not even about the environment but I thought this was appropriate and to make a point. |
Water Water Everywhere...
Water is very plentiful on earth. But fresh water is a challenge to find. Somewhere I heard that by 2050, we will run out of fresh water from our fresh water resources. Yet, the ocean is plentiful... But with salt water. What a pity, us humans cannot process the salt in the water, or we would drink from the ocean.
But even ocean water is not all that safe. Since the time of people, we have been finding and using metals for weapons, aqueducts, tools, machines, behicles, paint, jewelry... and the list goes on. Metals is found everywhere and it has made impacts in our water resources, especially lead and mercury.
Being in the water industry, this is a challenge to treat water at any level. Engineers and environmentalists will usually survey water resources before making recommendations on what type of equipment is needed to treat either surface water or ground water for human consumption. What is in the water? Soil? Metals? Grit? It gets pretty nasty.
And sadly, the drinking water plant doesn't get rid of it all. What goes through the wastewater treatment plant (WWTP), the end results goes into the lakes, rivers, and streams. Miles down the river and streams, it then get sucked back into a drinking water treatment plant. A lot more people are using drugs, all kinds of drugs. Legal drugs and illegal drugs. The WWTP cannot handle it all. It's almost impossible for the WWTP to get rid of all the chemicals through daily sewage.
That's why there are "frankenfish", fishes altered by birth control in the water that didn't get targeted in the WWTP. The fishes cannot reproduce becasue they are no one or the other... Or they end up to be two genders. Other microbiological life are dying because of chlorination disinfection (in NC, you have to dechlorinate the effluent water!)
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Seriously, folks. I think I am going to a remote part of the earth, that hasn't been tampered with, and just live there.
