From my comment left at PeakEnergy (http://peakenergy.blogspot.com)
What an amazing and simple design to solve many problems, so Bucky.
-begin rant-
My problem with Bucky and 1,000's of others who left simple answers to problems and nearly all the breadcrumbs to figure everything else out, is that they're forgotten by the masses when looking for answers to modern problems.
The old phrase "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." is all but forgotten
It is even more frustrating to me that "experts and mass media" in the energy fields seldom look to the past for answers and nearly ignore anything that isn't technical/sexy (see, sun solar lasers, hydrogen cars, carbon capture and solar roofs in winter climates as examples)
You and I have been doing the "blog" thing for over a decade, I have been doing the environment/energy thing for nearly 2 decades and it seems like as the internet influence and over abundance of information grew, peoples willingness to read up on history dwindled.
I agree there is simply too much out there for the general audience, but it's there.
Patents, reports, terabits of data and oh the wonderful books are an endless bounty of solutions to modern problems.
Over 100 years ago the majority or cars, factories & homes were powered by alternative energy, now it is at best 7% of entire mix. More troubling is that now mainstream media is on to it. Dragging the worst of the gimmicky, over teched, get rich quick green energy schemes to the surface of "what green energy is doing with our money"
Sure most of us can brush off the obvious errors that 60 minutes did here and does on a regular basis (see 60 minutes fake benghazi story) but this has already cause more credibility damage to the industry than Al Gore pulling up to climate talks in limo/private jet.
Proven, cost effective, simple energy programs have been killed by over-technical grandiose ideas built on the idea of bringing profits before people/prosperity in the form of investor driven grants & subsides to line pockets. Turning our food into fuel and our water and fields into dust (see current China / U.S. 1950's)
Wind, water and solar energy inventions brought "sustainable" prosperity to nearly all modern civilizations before fossil fuels and they are nearly all but forgotten by modern energy news stories.
Fossil fuels not only killed logical, sustainable human growth and consumption levels, it started killing our planet and our people.
What is the industry lesson here?
READ, listen, question, test, and apply what WORKS under current conditions. It is NOT rocket science, so stop trying to use rocket science to solve energy & environmental problems (rocket science is a very dirty, energy intensive field :-).
These are all proven and done:
60 mpg 8 passenger cars (Since 1930's)
200 mpg 2 passenger cars (Since 1980's)
Solar electric taxi's for cities (Since 1920)
Wind powered rail (shuttles) for people (Since 1930's)
Zero waste/zero landfill cities/communities (Always can)
Homes that are cheaper than cars that can weather any storm (Since 1940's)
Buildings/Industry powered by water, heated by earth and cooled by wind (Since 1800's)
Giant ships moving across vast oceans without using a drop of fuel (Since 1700's)
-end rant-
But this wasn't a negative rant. Solar is booming, wind grid stability/storage methods improving and if we focus on the low hanging fruits of waste to energy, geothermal, ocean, passive buildings and heat recovery energy, we can beat fossil fuel markets.
We have proven that we have energy/environmental solutions, enough wealth, food and water for everyone on the planet.
The problem: "you can lead a politician to a solution, but you can make him think" - Haase
Be well in 2014 BigGav and thanks for a decade of sharing your great ideas and historic information.
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