Marcus Peabody 18/6/09 08:48 Page 20
Marcus Peabody
The Perse Upper School
Hills Road, Cambridge, CB2 8QF
Marcus Peabody
How do we satisfy our need for energy and sustain the environment? for products in widescale use could save energy on a huge scale. In
This is perhaps the most pertinent question of our times – the cause some cases this advancement will be driven by politics and money: in
that will define our generation. The environmental and technological June 2008, US presidential candidate John McCain offered US$300
world is awash with ideas, but which of these will exist fleetingly before million for the production of a high-capacity, low-cost car battery.
being replaced by new concepts touted as final solutions? Which ones McCain’s bounty on a better car battery has a specific focus that may
will gain credibility, capture the public imagination and become a be too limited to produce long-term environmental relief. What he has
mainstay in our lives? What forms will the fight for our environmental demonstrated, as has Al Gore, is the power of politics to draw attention
future take? to the ecological problems that we face and to influence the solutions.
As for the construction of wind turbines on the Fox Islands, the project
The green energy movement is well under way. After the appeals of has many advantages for that community, but its situation may be
public figures such as Nobel Peace Prize laureate Al Gore and the unique. It would be impractical in villages in less economically
dogged declaration of countless scientists, the potential for an developed countries (LEDCs), where the availability of capital and
environmental crisis is now acknowledged by all. As a popularised scientific knowledge would limit similar developments.
cause, there is a popular solution as a matter of course: ‘We must turn
to renewable energy’. However, what constitutes ‘renewable energy’? If technology will not provide our energy in a sustainable manner,
Surely photovoltaic cells, the manufacture and disposal of which could it be possible to change our lifestyle to use the energy available
produce a stream of toxic waste products, cannot be renewable. How to us in a sustainable manner? Something as simple a switching off
sustainable is the Three Gorges Dam in China, which, while providing lights may go some way towards stabilising the environment. A
nearly carbon-free energy, is shortening its own lifetime by silting up movement to work from home via the Internet has cut down on the
the reservoir upstream and depriving the agriculture and fisheries burning of fossil fuels due to commuting. More substantially, a
industries downstream of alluvial nutrients. The resolution as I see it is company based in New Mexico has developed revolutionary building
far simpler, despite seeming a contradiction in terms: in order to techniques that make houses operate almost completely
satisfy our need for energy sustainability, we must lessen our independently of normal infrastructure. ‘Earthships’ are autonomous
dependence on energy. dwellings that are built from recycled materials and harness energy
available from the environment. Most importantly, they are able to do
Saving energy is no new idea. Individuals have long tried to beat the all of this without significantly altering the lifestyles of the inhabitants.
rising costs of heat and light in the home through the use of loft The Earthships cost about the same as a normal house and they are
insulation and energy-saving light bulbs. Many people believe that the constructed with incredibly high insulation properties. This allows the
problems of climate change will not be overcome on this micro-scale. building to maintain comfortable temperatures throughout extreme
However, the same goal of achieving increased efficiency can cold and heat without expending energy to regulate the internal
undoubtedly save energy in a larger system. With every transition of climate. Water is recycled, and large windows allow the use of natural
energy in a network, energy is lost. A community in the state of Maine, light. The principal flaw with these solutions is one of scale: the
US, plans to streamline the supply of power to their homes and proportion of the population willing to modify their lifestyles enough
businesses, thus saving power and therefore cost. The Fox Islands in to make a difference is simply not large enough. With regard to the
Penobscot Bay traditionally imported electricity from the mainland via Earthships, despite their presence in Europe and the US, it is unlikely
undersea cables. Now they plan to build three wind turbines (all that that they will gain enough popularity for widespread use. I also think
would be needed to power the entire population) on the south-west they would not be practical in densely populated areas, where the
coast of one of the islands. After the initial investment to finance the large area of land and optimal aspect needed for each house could not
construction, electricity would be cleaner and cheaper for the always be achieved.
inhabitants, as well as creating new jobs and, hopefully, inspiring
similar communities to adopt similar schemes. Most importantly, the No matter how efficient our homes become, there will always be the
islands would have total energy security and self-sustainability. need for electricity production to drive many forms of industry. There
are many ways to produce electricity, some well established and some
The drive for increased efficiency can also be driven on a larger scale. emerging. It has become clear that whatever method we use, we must
The scientific and technological development of modern replacements begin to lessen the use of fossil fuels, partly to protect the environment
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