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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Whether we consider coal-mine deaths, or deaths above ground (30,000 - 60,000 in the U.S. annually, depending on which study you read), non-renewable energy takes a stunning toll on humanity. To be sure, going without power would be an even greater killer, since electricity runs most of the life-sustaining and enhancing equipment we take for granted. This boon of energy comes at a huge cost, however, and it does not have to be an either/or choice. Renewable energy has been technically feasible for decades, but a national energy policy which rewards and supports fossil energy producers keeps it from being realized.
The worst travesty is that for all the coal we mine, most of the energy produced is wasted. Over 65% thermal conversion loss occurs (Source: EIA Annual Energy Review 2006) in thermal power plants. There's got to be a better way.
There are so many alternative choices, it's staggering. Wind, which is coming on strong, tidal power, solar (100 by 100 miles of solar collectors could supply enough energy for the entire country, according to Sandia National Labs), and the biggest source of all: the hot rock underneath our feet. The USGS has a downloadable document about geothermal energy which states the following:
Even if only 1 percent of the thermal energy contained within the uppermost 10 kilometers of our planet could be tapped, this amount would be 500 times that contained in all oil and gas resources of the world.
I mentioned respiratory deaths earlier, but we haven't even considered the deaths and massive expenditures required to keep U.S. oil imports flowing. North American natural gas has peaked, and soon we will be importing that too, if the business-as-usual crowd has their way. Now that we have C02 to consider in the equation, it is nothing short of criminal to keep consuming coal and other fossil fuels. There is only one reason it's happening, and it's the same motivation which underlies the equally deadly global arms trade--money.
But there are fortunes to be made in renewable energy as well. Big fortunes. All it takes is a government with the political will to slap down the entrenched kleptocrats in the fossil industries. Let's call a halt to the murderous and wasteful U.S. energy policy. Our planet and our lives literally depend on it.
Coal mining isn't even a top ten most dangerous job.
http://www.careerbuilder.com/JobSeeker/careerbytes/CBArticle.aspx?articleID=421&cbRecursionCnt=1&cbsid=0dc4a1f77b6f4848b0abf5810ee415f0-240454175-TP-4
Can we finally put to rest the notion that Americans won't do dirty, sweaty, anonymous, unsung jobs?
@ChillyDog : It's not on the Careerbuilder.com list as one of the ten most dangerous jobs, but it ought to be.
http://cdc.gov/niosh/mining/statistics/tables/FatalRate.html
The 10th most dangerous job listed is cab driver (24.2 deaths per 100,000 workers). The NIOSH stats list 24.7 per 100,000 for mining. Certain types of mining jobs are far more dangerous than that average would indicate.
Plus, to get personal, any job in the top thirty is probably way more dangerous than whatever you do for a living.
@everyone else : According to the AFL-CIO site, with fewer regulators trying to keep watch over more mines, and with the most experienced miners retiring, mining fatalities are probably going to be increasing again after decades of steady reduction. Beyond that, we're pushing people to work faster to service ever-expanding energy needs. Mistakes happen when you rush.
I agree, renewables could save many lives.
And the hotel and tourist industry rose up. Even though you'd have to be be above the 30th floor to see that far over the horizon. They tried wind farms and environmentalists rose up against windmills hurting swans. They tried nuclear. Next up, solar. I'm sure they'll find some rare turtle underneath the area they need to use, or the skin cancer institute will find that sun = cancer. And so on.
The problem is not fossil versus renewable energy. It's that Americans demand a zero risk zero impact highly profitable low cost alternative to oil. Keep waiting on that let me know how that turns out.
We are a nation of rampant consumption. As long as non-renewables like coal and oil remain relatively cheap due to government subsidies and short-term ease, Americans will continue to crank their A.C. down while watching their three television sets about trapped coal miners and still not connect the dots.
Until U.S. citizens start to understand what is at stake - the planet and life-as-we-know-it - you can count on Congress doing nothing new. Why should they? Things are working out well for them. They get to live a life of power and perks on the dime of big industries like coal, while American's continue to re-elect them based on red herring issues.
We need the type of drastic action on the part of the people that only comes about in desperate times. Perhaps a few more American cities being wiped out by hurricanes would do the trick. Unfortunately, by then, it might be too late.
I'll be watching you on Discovery Channel.
I worked as a judge's law clerk in Kentucky for a period of time. I handled administrative cases by the State against bankrupt coal companies who had failed to reclaim the land that they destroyed after they mined all of the coal on that land. It appeared to me that the following cycle existed: Before a company could get permits to surface mine (which destroys entire mountains), it needed to submit a plan about how it would restore the environment destroyed by mining once all the coal has been mined. The company also needed to post a bond with the State to cover the cost of the reclaimation. The problem was that the plans would vastly underestimate the real clean-up cost, and the bond would only cover a protion of the unrealistically low cost estimate. The entities that pulled all of the coal from a given site often dissolved once all the coal was pulled out of the site and revenue dried up, and no entity remained to pay for the clean up of the destroyed land. The State then had the burden of implementing the clean-up plan with insufficient bond money. In my view, this cycle led to complete devestation of huge tracts of land in the State. In the rush for more and more coal to feed our greedy need for energy, no one ever seems to focus on these issues. Perhaps things have changed in Kentucky, as I have not lived in the State for quite a long time. But the harm done in the past was sufficiently horrible all on its own.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Salon headlines in your mailbox
