Al Gore, our former Vice President and Nobel Prize
recipient, has done more than any other human being to warn
the world of an impending, global, ecological crisis.
On November 9, 2008 he published an OP-ED article in the
New York Times explaining his five-part plan for avoiding
this major disaster. He introduces his plan by saying "It
is a plan that would simultaneously move us towards
solutions to the climate crisis and the economic crisis -
and create millions of jobs that cannot be outsourced."
Let us review his five points. His first suggestion is
that we build more solar plants and more wind farms. OK.
His second proposal is the installation of an improved,
national power grid. Especially well taken is his point
that new high-voltage, low-loss underground lines need to
be installed and be made part of a redesigned, national
grid. OK.
His third recommendation is to help America's automobile
industry. This is ok for preserving jobs. However, his
suggestion to depend increasingly on electrically powered
cars is premature, excessively expensive, and will only
marginally reduce petroleum imports for many years. It
will not reduce carbon dioxide emissions for the next
couple of decades.
His fourth proposition aims at improving insulation of
buildings and homes. Reducing energy losses is ok as long
as they can be economically justified.
Unfortunately, the fifth element of his plan misses the
mark by a wide margin. Earlier in his article, Mr. Gore
correctly states ".... thinking anew requires discarding an
outdated and flawed definition of the problem we face."
Therefore, let us define the problem concisely. The world
is facing not one but several, distinct crises.
The climate crisis or ecological crisis is caused by the
escalating emission of carbon dioxide into our atmosphere.
As a result, global temperatures are rising and will lead
to severe global overheating as early as 2050. There is
only one, single way to stop this destructive, irreversible
lunacy; we must end the burning of all fossil fuels.
A coming energy crisis announced itself, when skyrocketing
petroleum prices in July 2008 peaked at close to $150 per
barrel. Transportation of people, foods, commodities, and
goods is entirely dependent on plentiful and affordable
liquid fuels. The transportation sector consists of an
immense fleet of automobiles, trucks, trains, ships, and
aircraft. A multitude of very expensive oil refineries and
an enormous, worldwide fuel distribution system support
this sector and will cost tens of trillions of dollars to
replace.
It will be foolish to scrap these wonderfully effective
systems and replace or weaken them by mandating that
automobiles must be powered by electricity or compressed
natural gas. Instead, we must learn to produce renewable
fuels and petroleum substitutes. If we do not realize that
the world cannot function without renewable liquid fuels,
we will incite a third, an economic crisis, which may
destroy world economies and civilizations.
A fourth crisis will develop when a construction boom tries
to install energy conversion equipment to prevent the
ecological and energy crises from happening. Suitable
technologies, materials, manufacturing facilities,
fabricating skills, engineering services, investment
capital, and time will be in very short supply.
Right now, only the USA has the scientific, technological,
manufacturing, and institutional capabilities to attempt a
potentially successful rescue attempt. Such an attempt
cannot be organized by the private sector.
The US must defend its role as leading world power
successfully by making three major, national changes; it
must become independent of petroleum imports, it must stop
carbon dioxide emissions, and it must proceed with an
implementation plan that will achieve these targets in
forty years. Only by achieving these three objectives can
we arrest climate change, can we avoid worldwide economic
collapse due to lack of motor fuels, and can we reclaim our
leadership role.
The most difficult and exacting challenge of such a plan we
have not mentioned, yet.
Any long-term plan must be workable for centuries! We
cannot afford to install and pay for short-lived solutions.
The missing piece of the puzzle in Mr. Gore's proposal is
the complete absence of renewable fuels. Without the
production of renewable fuels and particularly of liquid
transportation fuels from renewable biomass this plan and
other previously proposed plans will fail! They are
incapable of powering world economies for centuries!
We must learn to grow large amounts of high energy yield
biomass on arid, barren, or fallow lands in two broad bands
on both sides of the equator.
In this region, the tropics and subtropics, the flow of sun
energy reaching the ground is the highest. Water resources
will be lacking in most locations. However, we have
learned how to build desalination plants. What we do not
know yet, is how to design highly efficient, industrial
type biofuel plantations that can produce very large
amounts of renewable energy without competing with food
production.
We also have to learn how nature converted biomass into
petroleum and other fossil fuels.
As soon as we understand how to convert biomass into
petroleum substitutes or into other fuels, we will have
solved the world's remaining energy supply problems and we
can continue the use of our automobiles and airplanes.
Best of all, we will be able to pay for the renewable fuels
that are going to power our transportation fleets.
Mr. Gore, we need your support for publicizing and
promoting the conversion of renewable biomass into
plentiful, affordable petroleum substitutes and other novel
fuels!
----------------------------------------------------
Dr. Hemsath recently published the book: CLIMATE CHANGE -
GOLD RUSH OR DISASTER? For 50 years he has worked as
scientist, process engineer, Corporate Vice President of
R&D, Company President, CEO, and Inventor. He holds more
than 60 US Patents. He is working on a new book: "THE
SOLUTION FOR ENDING GLOBAL WARMING AND CLIMATE CHANGE". Go
to http://www.thermalexpert.com
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