Posts
Mat Redsell has dedicated himself to living a fully sustainable lifestyle. Of course, he's cheating by making use of equipment built by the current, industrial society, but he doesn't have much choice in that. His effort is pretty impressive and he is learning a lot. His conclusion is that a totally sustainable lifestyle must necessarily be more austere and less wealthy than our current, petroleum based lifestyle.
Of course, his justification is seriously flawed. He states, correctly, that oil and coal are finite resources and will run out someday. His mistake, though, is to assume that the end of oil and coal means an end to our energy-rich lifestyle. Other sources of energy are out there, from fission and fusion to satellite based solar to things we may not even know of, yet. As existing energy supplies begin to run out, the costs will go up. This will spur innovation and lead to the development of replacements.
In fifty years, I expect my kids will be flying to work or living in orbit or something similar and his will be looking up from their family garden as they harvest tomatoes or from the creek where they are beating their laundry against rocks...
Technorati: Environmentalism
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Well this is Mat Redsell and yes I have a fossil fueled subsidized sustainable place. BUT I do not relay on any fossil fuels directly. I am off grid and produce my own sunflower oil and biodiesel. My transportation is usually by bicycle. And i do know that there will be no technology out there or to be invented that will clome close to energy contained in fossil fuels. So my energy comes from the sun and I recycle machinery to help in the food production and energy production. -mat
I realize now that my last paragraph was kind of snarky and I didn't really mean to denigrate what you are doing. It's pretty impressive. I think that, as a society, we can learn from experiments like yours but I don't necessarily think we should emulate it in large numbers.
And my comment about flying cars and living in orbit came before the current financial crisis... so maybe none of us will be living in orbit or flying to work (unless we live in China...).
Post a Comment