Sustainability
The sellers of male enhancement products make a big deal out of sustainability.
Men know sustainability is good.
It also features highly in environmental and “green” literature. In fact, any connection between sustainability and environmental friendliness is almost by accident. Because something is environmentally good does not mean that it is sustainable. The reverse is also true.
Wikipedia says, “Sustainability, in general terms, is the ability to maintain balance of a certain process or state in any system. It is now most frequently used in connection with biological and human systems.”
A garden is sustainable if cultivation can be continued indefinitely, without degradation of the local environment or resources. If the garden is irrigated, the local water table cannot be completely depleted by the withdrawal of water. If the water table drops to a lower level and stays there, then the irrigation is sustainable. If the runoff of nutrients into the local stream causes an increase in plant growth, that’s ok, as long as the fish survive as a food source and the stream doesn’t become a source of parasites or disease.
Generally, a process is sustainable if the environment can supply what we need and assimilate the wastes generated. The sustainable harvest of a forest is the quantity of wood that can be taken out of the forest indefinitely. If the soil becomes depleted or erodes away, then the harvest is not sustainable.
The key notion is balance. A sustainable fishery is one in which the fish stock doesn’t become depleted, but maintains itself at a certain level of predation. Take too many fish and the stock cannot reproduce fast enough. As the stock shrinks, the rate at which young are produced goes down and the number of fish crashes. Reduce the rate of predation and a lower level of harvest will be sustainable. Stop fishing and allow the stock to recover, and a larger harvest becomes sustainable. The key is to find the point of maximum harvest, where the rate of reproduction balances the take.
Nuclear power plants are not thought of as green in any way. They are large and obviously unnatural, producing plumes of steam or rivers of hot water, and relatively small quantities of radioactive waste. Compare them with combustion based electrical plants or hydroelectric dams or windmills or solar cell farms, and the picture changes.
Combustion produces large quantities of CO2 and, particularly coal, ash. This is a main source of global warming, and is not sustainable. We’re not going to run out of coal, but we will ruin the environment, sooner or later. Combustion, at present levels, is not sustainable.
There are only so many rivers we can dam and use to produce electricity. Sooner or later, the reservoirs fill with sediment and the output of the plant cannot be sustained. The resource is limited, the lifetime finite and the damage to fish stocks intolerable.
Solar only works roughly half the time and wind power is not reliable. By definition, the output is not sustained. They require combustion plants be built as back-ups.
Nuclear is looking better all the time. The heat they produce can, in fact, be harvested and put to good use. They can be built where we need them, reducing transmission line loses, and, once built, they produce no CO2. The spent fuel rods can be re-processed and re-used, with little input of fresh uranium. The new designs on the books are inherently safe. Chernobyl and Three Mile Island have become impossible. The biggest drawback, the radioactive waste, can be safely stored, in spite of what some radicals say.
Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, has realized that nuclear power is the best choice, and an indefinitely sustainable source of electricity. Many long time Greenpeace members are coming to realize that dogmatic opposition to nuclear power has led North America into an unsustainable reliance on coal fired stations and stalled further development of nuclear reactors. If the scientists are right, they have brought us to the edge of irreversible damage to the environment, in the name of saving the earth.
I am tempted to say that Walmart has done more to save the planet by putting 130 million compact fluorescent bulbs into homes than anything Greenpeace has accomplished in the last 50 years. Walmart’s bulbs, when all are in use, save about 7 megawatts over the incandescent bulbs they replace.
Professor Bob
May 2nd, 2009 at 8:59 am
“Sustainability” has become the favourite buzzword of left wing politicians and environmental groups. They all seem to be concerned with “sustaining” everything BUT the national economy, and also seem to have NO idea how it works!
Damned near every project suggested by environmentally concerned activists or pols, means loss of massive numbers of jobs, and they have no answer to that.
From forestry, to fishing, mining, seal hunts, home heating and auto fuel, provision of electrical power,they all cry “sustainability”, and then prove they have no bloody idea what the hell they’ve just said.
Before we can concentrate on sustaining anything, we have to start at the other end of the equation, and find the solution to providing jobs and all of the above, BEFORE we shut down or curtail current production of damned near anything.
CFl bulbs are useless for lighting, pollute landfills with mercury, are made in China, notorious for it’s lack of manufacturing integrity, and are comparatively expensive. Like windmill and solar power, they seemed like a good idea at the time.
I hate the damned things, tried them, and bought a couple of cases of Edison’s from Costco, just as people are now buying bottled water in pallet loads due to another anticipated ban.
Next Summer, look for a ban on propane barbecues, as they increase our carbon footprint drastically, and could prevent 15 million tons of pollutants escaping into the atmosphere every long weekend.
After the success of that campaign, elimination of golf courses, football fields, hockey rinks, stadiums, large buildings,etc., should be next on the agenda for the people who want to create the perfect world, by going back in time 200 years, though none of them could survive in that world.
Sustainability by all means, but with planning and thought to the consequences, not just political reaction to strident activism.
There are no simple solutions to mass scale problems, and reactionary idiots have become more of a disaster to the planet than the original nuisance ever could have been.
In my humble opinion, most of the champions of “sustainability” belong in the same group as the purveyors of “male enhancement” drugs and devices.
May 2nd, 2009 at 9:40 am
dmorris
You’re not refering to politically correct pinheads, are you??
If it ain’t practical, then it won’t work.
Truthfully, check out the SciAm link.
CFL are not perfect, but the next generation should be better. The amount of mercury in a standard flourescent tube is much higher. The stores that sell mecury containing devices should take them back. I’m not sure how to stop folks from chucking them in the garbage. A deposit, maybe??
That 7 megawatts I mentioned, if generated in coal plants, would release much larger quantities of mercury vapour, spreading it accross the land.
For many, many reasons, coal plants are the enemy.
Prof Bob
May 2nd, 2009 at 9:45 am
Opps,
Here is the link.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=top-10-myths-about-sustainability/
Prof Bob
May 3rd, 2009 at 6:37 am
Again, there is the whoring after votes, and then there is the use of reason to solve problems. Whores use emotionally based reasoning to generate support for their programs which also fill their pockets.
This article is an example of using reason to solve problems. I cannot disagree with anything you say, Professor Bob. However, this solution will not create any overseer jobs for bolshevik new age plantation workers in scarborough.