February 3, 2006
February 2, 2006
Capitalism or habitable planet -- can't have both
Robert Newman writes in today's Guardian (U.K.):
There is no meaningful response to climate change without massive social change. A cap on this and a quota on the other won't do it. Tinker at the edges as we may, we cannot sustain earth's life-support systems within the present economic system.tags: environment, environmentalism, ecoanarchism
Capitalism is not sustainable by its very nature. It is predicated on infinitely expanding markets, faster consumption and bigger production in a finite planet. And yet this ideological model remains the central organising principle of our lives, and as long as it continues to be so it will automatically undo (with its invisible hand) every single green initiative anybody cares to come up with.
Much discussion of energy, with never a word about power, leads to the fallacy of a low-impact, green capitalism somehow put at the service of environmentalism. In reality, power concentrates around wealth. Private ownership of trade and industry means that the decisive political force in the world is private power. The corporation will outflank every puny law and regulation that seeks to constrain its profitability. It therefore stands in the way of the functioning democracy needed to tackle climate change. Only by breaking up corporate power and bringing it under social control will we be able to overcome the global environmental crisis.
... We have lived in an era of cheap, abundant energy. There never has and never will again be consumption like we have known. The petroleum interval, this one-off historical blip, this freakish bonanza, has led us to believe that the impossible is possible, that people in northern industrial cities can have suntans in winter and eat apples in summer. But much as the petroleum bubble has got us out of the habit of accepting the existence of zero-sum physical realities, it's wise to remember that they never went away. You can either have capitalism or a habitable planet. One or the other, not both.
January 30, 2006
Hi, neighbor!
What puny trees!
(Tug Hill Plateau, N.Y.)
Click here for another view.
tags: wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism
Enron -- father of modern windpower
On the occasion of the Enron trials beginning today, it seems apt to bring up the fact that Enron pioneered large-scale wind energy on the grid in the U.S. They bought Zond Wind Systems, which after Enron's fire sale was bought by General Electric. Key to Enron's success was deregulation of the electricity market, so that it could more easily be manipulated by developers and brokers such as Enron without having to worry about the whole expensive package of energy delivery, i.e., infrastructure maintenance.
They also transformed wind power from an experimental alternative in tune with the environment into an industry that mocks environmental concerns.
And it worked, as long as people believed in it. But when California was subject to rolling blackouts which turned out to be caused by Enron's efforts to jack up prices, the project became suspect.
The line of defense for the Enron team today is that they did not know everything was collapsing around them, that the lies they told investors and auditors were not lies, because they really believed everything was great (which it still was, I suppose, for them).
Their heirs in the wind power development business do them proud. The larger public -- and worse, major environmental groups -- still believe, without any evidence to back up the industry's claims and seemingly oblivious to the impact on land and life.
tags: wind power, wind energy
They also transformed wind power from an experimental alternative in tune with the environment into an industry that mocks environmental concerns.
And it worked, as long as people believed in it. But when California was subject to rolling blackouts which turned out to be caused by Enron's efforts to jack up prices, the project became suspect.
The line of defense for the Enron team today is that they did not know everything was collapsing around them, that the lies they told investors and auditors were not lies, because they really believed everything was great (which it still was, I suppose, for them).
Their heirs in the wind power development business do them proud. The larger public -- and worse, major environmental groups -- still believe, without any evidence to back up the industry's claims and seemingly oblivious to the impact on land and life.
tags: wind power, wind energy
January 29, 2006
Yes, folks, modern wind turbines kill birds
I just noticed that comments from Californa campaigner Darryl Mueller on Shea Gunther's supercilious blog have not been deleted. Anything I post to the lad's blog is instantly deleted, of course, since I insisted on seeing the records to back up his claim that "a kilowatt-hour of wind energy means one less kilowatt-hour of conventional fuel burned."
In the face of Herr Gunther's denial that wind turbines kill birds anywhere else than Altamont Pass, I nonetheless posted a reference to one of the recent stories in the U.K. about the very rare white-tailed eagles killed in Smola, Norway, as well as the disruption of their breeding: "Wind farms condemned as eagles fall prey to turbines," The Times, Jan. 28, 2006. (Also see the earlier post on this site, noting 8 more dead eagles found that weren't mentioned in the U.K. reports.)
In his other efforts to distinguish Altamont, he emphasizes how slow the blades turn on new turbines, ignoring the fact that the blades are so long that they're turning at about 170 mph on most models.
He also laughs at birds and bats who aren't "smart enough" to avoid flying into the giant spinning blades, confusing willful violence with natural selection. I suppose he laughs when children are hit by cars?
tags: wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism, animal rights
In the face of Herr Gunther's denial that wind turbines kill birds anywhere else than Altamont Pass, I nonetheless posted a reference to one of the recent stories in the U.K. about the very rare white-tailed eagles killed in Smola, Norway, as well as the disruption of their breeding: "Wind farms condemned as eagles fall prey to turbines," The Times, Jan. 28, 2006. (Also see the earlier post on this site, noting 8 more dead eagles found that weren't mentioned in the U.K. reports.)
In his other efforts to distinguish Altamont, he emphasizes how slow the blades turn on new turbines, ignoring the fact that the blades are so long that they're turning at about 170 mph on most models.
He also laughs at birds and bats who aren't "smart enough" to avoid flying into the giant spinning blades, confusing willful violence with natural selection. I suppose he laughs when children are hit by cars?
tags: wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism, animal rights
Whole Foods and the union
As Whole Foods, the 180-store natural foods grocer, now pretends to be using wind energy (and everyone seems to believe them), it is probably an appropriate time to bring up the fact that they hate unions, i.e., they hate that their workers might be able to look to another organization to defend their rights instead of simply submitting on the beneficent paternalism of the Whole Foods executives.
In 2002, the employees of the Whole Foods in Madison, Wis., successfully organized with United Food and Commercial Workers. The primary organizers were fired for sharing a botched latte instead of throwing it out. Founder and CEO John Mackey then toured the country to tell his employees how much they would lose if they unionize. He also threatened to pull advertising from magazines that ran ads for union drives.
A web site by the Madison workers keeps the union drive alive: www.wholeworkersunite.org.
Some interesting comments can be found in a discussion at Vegan Porn.
tags: wind power, wind energy, anarchism, anarchosyndicalism
In 2002, the employees of the Whole Foods in Madison, Wis., successfully organized with United Food and Commercial Workers. The primary organizers were fired for sharing a botched latte instead of throwing it out. Founder and CEO John Mackey then toured the country to tell his employees how much they would lose if they unionize. He also threatened to pull advertising from magazines that ran ads for union drives.
A web site by the Madison workers keeps the union drive alive: www.wholeworkersunite.org.
Some interesting comments can be found in a discussion at Vegan Porn.
tags: wind power, wind energy, anarchism, anarchosyndicalism
Fight for a better world than this
Today's Progressive Review contains three stories about the pathetic thuggery of our government. The first comes from Georgia, where the ACLU released files showing extensive spying by the FBI, Homeland Security, and other agencies on citizens who express opinions that differ from the government's -- even in the matter of diet. Vegans picketing outside a ham store were watched by an undercover Homeland Security detective. One of the protesters noticed him, however, and came over and wrote down his license plate number (a wise precaution with such stalking). The detective demanded the paper, which was refused, and the protester was taken to jail.
The ACLU is also fighting the "ideological exclusion" provision in the Patriot Act that denies visas to foreign scholars that the government doesn't like (or fears).
And then there's the secret "no-fly list," which prevents journalists, activists, politicians, and many other people, even babies and toddlers, from boarding planes. It is said that there are 80,000 names on the list. There is no way to find out if you're on it until you try to board your flight. There's no way to find out why you're on the list and no way to get your name removed. Senator Ted Kennedy and Representative John Lewis found that they were listed and had to make several phone calls to get themselves off. Most of us, however, lack their connections.
A four-year-old was stopped, and the braindead processors held him until higher-ups from the transportation security administration cleared him. He had to go through the same process again on the return flight.
French journalist Bernard-Henri Lévy recently toured the country, calling himeself a new Alexis de Tocqueville. It was de Tocqueville (Democracy in America, 1835) who coined the term "tyranny of the majority," but Lévy was determined not to see it. Another useful idiot for this bitter, scared, thuggish America is, for example, "eco-entrepreneur" Shea Gunther, proud to be "100% American" as he calls for debate and then censors all of it. There is a better America, but it is the enemy of the one we have.
Go saoraid!
tags: anarchism, ecoanarchism, anarchosyndicalism, animal rights, vegetarianism
The ACLU is also fighting the "ideological exclusion" provision in the Patriot Act that denies visas to foreign scholars that the government doesn't like (or fears).
And then there's the secret "no-fly list," which prevents journalists, activists, politicians, and many other people, even babies and toddlers, from boarding planes. It is said that there are 80,000 names on the list. There is no way to find out if you're on it until you try to board your flight. There's no way to find out why you're on the list and no way to get your name removed. Senator Ted Kennedy and Representative John Lewis found that they were listed and had to make several phone calls to get themselves off. Most of us, however, lack their connections.
A four-year-old was stopped, and the braindead processors held him until higher-ups from the transportation security administration cleared him. He had to go through the same process again on the return flight.
French journalist Bernard-Henri Lévy recently toured the country, calling himeself a new Alexis de Tocqueville. It was de Tocqueville (Democracy in America, 1835) who coined the term "tyranny of the majority," but Lévy was determined not to see it. Another useful idiot for this bitter, scared, thuggish America is, for example, "eco-entrepreneur" Shea Gunther, proud to be "100% American" as he calls for debate and then censors all of it. There is a better America, but it is the enemy of the one we have.
Go saoraid!
tags: anarchism, ecoanarchism, anarchosyndicalism, animal rights, vegetarianism
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