Posted by wastedenergy on March 26, 2010
Just wanted to let avid readers know I’ll be on vacation during the next few days and may or may not have time to add updates during that time. Regularly scheduled programming will return April 1. If you find yourself browsing here for whatever reason during the intervening time, I’ll bet there are items you haven’t gotten around to reading (or commenting on) yet, so why not take the time to do so?
Cheers,
WE
Posted in Basics and Site Administration | Leave a Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 25, 2010
Ever heard the expression “you can’t drill your way out of a hole?” Now you have. And the logic is not just for oil anymore; we can apply it equally well to any fluid that sits in concentrated underground pockets, just waiting to be tapped. How about the stuff we all depend on for an activity as essential as bare survival? You know, the good stuff we use to wash down that nice big meal, to clean out our orifices, to flush, that stuff we don’t think about at all until it’s gone? What’s the market for water look like these days; if we drill deep enough, can we get all the way through to China? So we can spy on their military and learn more about how they’ve been seeding clouds in the atmosphere? And hopefully one day figure out how to conserve and replenish the most essential resource we have by developing responses to drought and depletion that are a little bit more sophisticated than the “pray for rain” approach adopted by Georgia’s Governor Sonny Perdue?
What do you have to say about our finite water supply? Here’s what our “leaders” seem to be saying about it today: “I’d tap that!”
Posted in Agriculture and Food, Water and Soil | Tagged: boreholes, soda, water | Leave a Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 24, 2010
Do you suppose we might be falling off it? Could that be why Aramco seems to be forgetting about those “extra” wells they misplaced out in Ghawar, why Shell’s reserves estimates mysteriously fell a few years ago, or why the IEA is now revising its own estimate downward by roughly a third or so?
Don’t look down, folks…
Nope, not a chance…
Posted in Energy Consumption | Tagged: peak oil | Leave a Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 24, 2010
You probably know by now that looking at pictures of waste combustors is one of the activities that puts my mind most at ease. So should you care to join me today in my perfect zen and know that floaty feeling that comes with having your spirit cleansed in holy fire, come along children, come along. These are just a few of the choice photos pulled from the Archives for which I am privileged enough to serve as lore keeper…
Montgomery County, Maryland, aka Home Sweet Home. Magna Cum Laude, Class of 1995.
Posted in Energy Production, Solid Waste | Tagged: waste-to-energy | Leave a Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 23, 2010
If you’ve been following this blog from its humble beginnings (either around not quite a month ago, or the beginning of time, depending on how you measure it), then you have a good sense by now of some of the things Americans like to both import and export. So it should be no surprise, whether you are reading it here for the first time or the thousandth, that America’s number one export good today is something we have become really really good at stacking: paper! Bales upon boxes upon stacks upon more bales of it, more and more every day! And as usual, whether it is our stacks of bills or our stacks of paper waste, the Chinese have readily relegated themselves to the dirty task of sorting through it all.
Remember, we’re going to need covers on ALL those TPS reports from now on…
Anyone else up for a smoke break?
Posted in Air, Energy Consumption, Solid Waste | Tagged: paper, recycling | 1 Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 23, 2010
In my hour of darkness she is standing right in front of me, speaking words of wisdom.
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Posted by wastedenergy on March 22, 2010
If you were twelve years old, you might be forgiven for having your head in the clouds a little bit. And that might help to explain why one of the stock answers I get when talking to kids about their trash, upon asking “where do you think it will go when you grow up?” is very often something along the lines of “we’ll just send it into space!” To someone who at least tries to be a “professional” in the field, it’s a cute response the first four or five times you hear it. After a while, though, you start to wonder whether they really are putting something in those kids’ Froot Loops these days. After all, it’s not of terribly much use talking about embodied energy and escape velocities when the mind you are trying to reach is still very fully and actively engaged by the challenge of figuring out the escape velocity of a finger from one’s own nasal cavity, or possibly the ear of the girl sitting in front of him.
So why, then, does it seem like most of the adults in the room seem to have even less of a clue about where it is they’d like the stuff to end up?
Not even the kinda place to dump your trash. In fact, it’s cold as hell.
Posted in Energy Consumption, Solid Waste | Tagged: space colonization, stupid | Leave a Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 22, 2010
So, with Health Care finally cleared out of the way, we can finally get around to all being healthy, to to mention having a healthy discussion of the next item on the table: Energy, right? Nope, no powering up on sugary sweets until you finish your dinner! And as my last hurrah and swan song to Health Care, before this issue is finally dead and gone and we can stop talking about it forever, I’d like to revisit one of my favorite topics of all time. That is, of course: food additives!
You say tomato? I say, “what is THAT freak?!?!?”
Posted in Agriculture and Food | Tagged: food additives, pizza | 1 Comment »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 20, 2010
Should you be one of those who feels any degree of harm to nature is acceptable lest it provide at least some marginal benefit to humans, the following images might serve as a warning of what happens when that idea is taken to its logical conclusion. Below the fold are some of what you might call “graphic images.” In other words, they convey the depth of madness of a civilization enthralled of its own power and unchained from the hinges of ancient wisdom. Each photograph is labeled with the activity and location to the best information available.
Posted in Air, Solid Waste, Water and Soil | Tagged: pollution | 13 Comments »
Posted by wastedenergy on March 19, 2010
Waste-to-Energy is making a comeback here in this Amerique du Nord. And no, I don’t mean the kind where you bury your trash, wait for it to turn into methane gas, then capture and burn bits and pieces of it. That kind never went away. The kind I’m talking about is where you actually care how much energy you are getting out of your trash, not just the right to say “we’re making some energy.” In other words, the kind where you burn the stuff. It’s coming back. After a fifteen year hiatus on construction of new plants, which were halted to soothe the false fears of environmentalists at the same time that existing plants were upgrading to meet the most stringent air quality requirements in existence for any type of facility, half a dozen or so cities and counties around the United States and Canada that operate waste-to-energy plants are expanding or have already expanded their facilities. And a lone phoenix is even rising from the ashes to build the first entirely new clean combustion facility on the Continent since I was but a wee child…
Rise from the ashes!
Posted in Energy Production, Solid Waste, Urban Planning | Tagged: waste-to-energy | Leave a Comment »
