No smoking...

I read some time ago a very thought-provoking article about energy by Andrew Rivkin, who worked for the NT Times and signed on with the Obama administration. It's main theme was energy return on investment (EROI), which shrinks as sources of a given resource are more difficult to find. When it is more expensive to find the material, extract it, and make it usable, the investment is no longer worth the profit. So, while cost is among the most prohibitive factors in adopting new technologies and stemming our consumption of carbon-based fuels, we should make the latter more expensive. Hasn't the time come that we should pay to make up the difference for the environment's sake? Is it unlikely that the free market will lead soon enough to large-scale alternative sources?

The investment needed to make many types of renewable energy feasible, such as hydropower or even solar, is high. Versus energy gained from sources like coal and petroleum, large-scale implementation is still many years away. Fortunately, the cost is going down, and the market has begun to see large investments into renewable sources without much government regulation. Neutralizing the carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere, or using carbon credits to limit the use of carbon-based sources is possible through both government and consumer action.

But while various governments have decided to step in and stem smoking among individuals, both through funding large-scale campaigns, legislating non-smoking public places, and regulation at the FDA, they don't regulate to the same degree energy consumption of carbon-based fuels. Since climate change and carbon dioxide in our skies and oceans will effect everyone, why not? Arguably, it will have a greater impact on humans than the damage tobacco has over the years. Environmental changes will be collective and things we've seen already--flooding of coastal communities, greater melanoma rates, asthma rates, and a smaller number of earth's creatures--rather than with individuals that we know and care about.

We're at a turning point. We can either recognize our error and start to act differently--largely with our pocketbooks--or continue to degrade our planet. As a smoker, I am wont to speak about a habit of mine, in which I realize the health-problems but give barely lip-service to the scientific evidence (which is more certain than with the human role in global climate change). And yet, I perpetuate a life-threatening habit. It’s what I am used to, I say; smoking makes me comfortable. While we can't give up energy altogether, we can limit our use to stem damage now. Energy consumption systemic phenomena which involves many people, countries, economies as well as the environment, and is of course something that will continue as we develop. But if Americans could change the way they consume energy to better the climate, quitting smoking should be easy.

"When your cold, don't expect sympathy from someone who is warm"
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

If you like it...

But if I had put a ring on her finger,
she would have told me the love was too small.

Such is love for people too big for this world,
the irony fantastically runs so deep.

Timeless songs never die, by their nature,
they fit no matter the circumstance.


10/04/2009