Record heat waves, melting glaciers, epic droughts - - the climate is changing faster than we once thought possible, which means our response will have to be much more creative and comprehensive than we may have imagined. Just a few years ago, it would have been unthinkable to suggest slashing greenhouse gases in half by 2020, but what if we have to do it? Does the technology exist? Is there enough money and political will power on earth to commercialize those technologies fast enough?
I’ll let you in on two secrets that could be very profitable for smart entrepreneurs and investors. We could end our fossil fuel addiction within 20 years - - and make a lot of money in the process - - with two basic strategies.
First, no matter what we use for energy, we can double its productivity in less than a decade. The average American uses about 12,000 kilowatts of electricity per person per year. The average Californian uses just over half of that. If you’ve been in the Golden State lately, you know that efficiency is not because we have scrapped our big screen TVs, Jacuzzi tubs, or air conditioners in the desert. It’s because state regulators spent the last few years setting appliance and building efficiency standards and rewarding utilities for energy conservation programs. Every state could do the same.
Second, cutting greenhouse gases is a matter of harnessing renewable energy, like solar and wind, instead of burning fossil fuels like coal and oil. There’s enough energy in the sunlight that falls on the earth every hour to power all human energy needs for a year. Add wind, biomass, tidal flows, and other renewables - - clearly we have the clean sources of energy to end our fossil fuel addiction and to shut off the planetary crock pot we’ve created. We can also convert that clean energy into transportation fuels like waste-to-ethanol and hydrogen.
So how do we turn down the global thermostat and turn up the profits? I’d like to hear your ideas for where the game-changing innovations and killer aps will come from that can accomplish both. Next week, I’ll give you my top five.
Terry Tamminen • terry.tamminen@gmail.com • www.terrytamminen.com • www.pegasusinvestors.com
Related Stories: | Topics:, Climatology, Environmental Issues and Protection, Nature and the Environment, Earth Science, Global Climate Change |
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Recent Comments | 6 Total
January 19, 2008 at 1:47am by zak
The growing popularity of feces treatment plants that "compost" feces to release methane gas which can be used to power up cities. The leftovers from this process can then been sold to farmers as high quality fertilizer. Thus the cycle is complete with no waste products at all.
I keep reading about this type of sewage treatment springing up everywhere: Europe, Africa, the Midwest, Los Angeles.
Human or animal feces can be used for this process. 6 billion + people and how many cows and dogs, etc. We could easily be off the oil standard.
January 20, 2008 at 1:26pm by Stephen A.
I don't know anyone who doesn't want a cleaner planet Earth. And these concepts are wonderful, if costly.
But I have a great idea. Why don't we ask the scientists to clarify something for us first, before spending billions of dollars on reducing carbon emissions and completely changing our economy. Let's ask them a simple question: By what PERCENTAGE is mankind changing the temperatures on the planet?
The shocking answer is: THEY DO NOT KNOW, and likely never will. And if they don't know by how much we should be cutting our emissions, then how can we effectively "turn down the thermostat?" (If such is even possible. There is no "one temperature" for Earth, BTW. That is a myth.)
Frankly, the idea that man is changing our environment in some way is a no-brainer. Who would deny tha we're having an impact? Smog is evidence of that. But to blame ALL of these climate changes on mankind - changes that have been occurring without us for literally hundreds of millions of years - is hubris.
January 20, 2008 at 10:29pm by Blubird Sattermind
Greenpeace, Sierra Club, and more are the idiots who got us here by there uninformed and generlly idiotic rhetoric against Nuclear Power. Meanwhile Japan, France and other nations are doing fine. The nuclear power a family of four needs for 20 years creates no more waste than would fill a shot glass, with a half life of only 50 years. This is all possible using replenished fuel rods. The ignorant, selfloathing hippies in America would have us all sleeping in tents they could. Dumb ripks.
January 21, 2008 at 9:13am by Herb Wexler
If people choose to walk instead of drive a few times a week we can tackle two problems at once-energy & healthcare.
January 21, 2008 at 9:52am by Adam Daniel Mezei
Our Czech president doesn't seem to think that man has much to do with any of this...just catch a glimpse of his latest demagoguery over at YouTube. Enter the following search terms... Vaclav Klaus UN speech.
How 'bout them apples?
January 21, 2008 at 7:37pm by David
I think the easiet place to start is by thinking about the re-use of existing materials and the way you re-use them. Furniture, clothes, tires....Keep It Simple Stupid (as my biz teachers always told me)