More to the peak oil story

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post entitled "The Unspoken Reality of 'Peak Oil'", in which I tried to convey the scale of the problem we face. "My main motto never changes, the era of low oil prices is over," said Dr. Fatih Birol who is the Chief Economist for the International Energy Agency (IEA). Now we have even more confirmation that peak oil has arrived. Today, the IEA released their 2009 version of the annual World Energy Outlook, in which they attempt to forecast supply and demand through 2030. And once again, the IEA continues to forecast that there will be plenty of supply, if only we can muster the needed capital investments. Unfortunately, the needed capital investments are enormous:

The capital required to meet projected energy demand through to 2030 in the Reference Scenario is huge, amounting in cumulative terms to $26 trillion (in year-2008 dollars) — equal to $1.1 trillion (or 1.4% of global gross domestic product [GDP]) per year on average. (p.43)
As if that weren't bad enough, the release of the report has been almost completely overshadowed by yesterday's Guardian which has alarming allegations from two different whistleblowers within the IEA

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Fundamentalism, Fox, and … Scientology?

I was recently chatting with a friend who has been a Scientologist for several decades. He was attacking the White House for its conspiracy with other networks to censor and muzzle Fox News. He later sent me this screed on the Campaign for Liberty blog under the Subject "Fox News is Right". The CfL is one of the political arms of Scientology. Check out their mission and board if you want. The introduction to the post is (in part, go read it yourself):

Why is America under such a vicious and prolonged [internal] attack against its basic beliefs? Why are some Americans attacking the hand that feeds them? Why tear down a working system? None of the attacks make sense. It is as though we are living in a looking glass world. I am looking backwards and it seems left is right and wrong is right and right is wrong. Politically correct speak replaced plain speak and the silent Christian majority are called domestic terrorists.

Okay, I paused at this point and replied (in part):

Lost me at "silent Christian majority". An iconic building in every neighborhood, billboards every mile, ads every hour on radio and TV channels not already owned outright by Christian networks, and their creed printed on money and embedded in children's daily oath to the flag does not fit my definition of "silent".

I didn't mention the wholesome Christian activities of blockading health clinics, continuous protests with gory signs on streets and campuses, bombing clinics and shooting doctors. But the actual point of the article is that the KGB is alive and well and still trying to take over America via a conspiracy with the Psychiatric Industrial Complex. They have (the article claims) powerful mind control methods that are being used on the public. If so, I asked in reply, how did we ever manage to get rid of CheneyBush? Today, my friend sent me (among other Scientology political pieces) a YouTube video attacking Obama's plan to sign the latest international emissions control treaty. It took a while of watching to figure this out, among the doomsayer speech of One World Government, global warming denialism, and the demise of America and such. Many of the positive comments to the video seem to be from garden variety End Days Christians, but the platform is quite visibly Scientology. The point of all this is, Why are the Scientologists aligning with Fox and Christian Fundamentalists? For recruitment? For political palatability? To hijack a powerful propaganda machine? Read and listen to what they actually say, and get back to me.

Continue ReadingFundamentalism, Fox, and … Scientology?

Radioactive coal

This just in, from Scientific American:

[T]he waste produced by coal plants is actually more radioactive than that generated by their nuclear counterparts. In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy.

At issue is coal's content of uranium and thorium, both radioactive elements. They occur in such trace amounts in natural, or "whole," coal that they aren't a problem. But when coal is burned into fly ash, uranium and thorium are concentrated at up to 10 times their original levels. Fly ash uranium sometimes leaches into the soil and water surrounding a coal plant, affecting cropland and, in turn, food . . . [E]stimated radiation doses ingested by people living near the coal plants were equal to or higher than doses for people living around the nuclear facilities.

Not that the risk of radiation from either coal plants or nuclear power plants appears to be significant for those living nearby.

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The twelve countries with the highest quality of life

The twelve countries with the highest quality of life do not include the United States. We come in at number 13, which means that we''re not doing badly as a whole. But we're not doing as well as we should be doing, assuming (as many conservatives insist without reference to any metric) that there is no greater country than the United States. We were beaten in the rankings by many "socialist" countries, such as Norway, Canada, Sweden and France. The U.N.'s measurement system is the Human Development Index, a complex objective formula, not a subjective determination. Some of the many dozens of factors that go into the HDI include the following:

  • Adult illiteracy rate
  • Asylum seekers by country of asylum
  • Average annual change in consumer price index (%)
  • Children underweight for age (% under age 5)
  • Combined gross enrolment ratio in education (%)
  • Earned income (estimated), ratio of female to male
  • Female adult literacy rate (% aged 15 and above)
  • Female estimated earned income (PPP US$)
  • Female life expectancy at birth (years)
  • GDI rank
  • GDP per capita (PPP US$)
  • Government expenditure on health as a percentage of total government expenditure
  • Government expenditure on health per capita (PPP US$)
  • Healthy life expectancy at birth (years)
  • Human development index value
  • Human poverty index (HPI-1) rank
Consider, also, this recent news from the Commonwealth Fund:

Although the United States now spends $2.4 trillion a year on medical care — vastly more per capita than comparable countries — the nation ranks near the bottom on premature deaths caused by illnesses such as diabetes, epilepsy, stroke, influenza, ulcers and pneumonia

Continue ReadingThe twelve countries with the highest quality of life