Comments for Why Renewable Energy Matters

1Green Thumb said...
Great article, very interesting.. I have just really begun to start following the alternative energy revolution. I think technology has finally caught up and we should be harnessing all of these green energies before it is too late. Perhaps, it already is.. Time will tell.
8/9/06, 3:40 PM
 taran said...
You make some great points here. In reading articles about peak oil and de-industrialization, I am frequently bothered by writers who assume we must replace current levels of energy consumption. Much of the energy we now use can be curtailed with relatively easy and painless design changes. In fact, it is possible to drastically reduce consumption with virtually no decline in one's standard of living. But this is impossible as long as we continue to buy into the suburban car culture that has defined development in the United States since the Second World War.

As a case in point, one of my close friends has an off the grid house in the mountains of NM and another in Tucson where he works for much of the year. He reports that his energy and water consumption at his house in Tucson is roughly twelve times what it is at the NM place. His house in Tucson has been designed to consume energy (as has the city of Tucson more generally), whereas the house in NM was built to conserve energy and water as much as possible.
8/10/06, 11:36 AM