Coal for Power - A Devil's Bargain-38-HowToReverseGlobalWarming.info

Apr 09

Solving the CO₂ Problem --- Page Four of Five Pages

Coal for Power -- A Devil's Bargain

CO2-1 Solving the CO2 Problem

CO2-2 Biochar - Carbon Sequestering

CO2-3 Carbon Capture

CO2-4 Burning Coal for Power - A Devil's Bargain <-- You
Are Here

CO2-5 A Return to Sanity

Page Content

Coal for Power -- A Devil's Bargain

The Tobacco Industry

Mother Nature

CO2 and Temperature

The Carbon / Oxygen Cycle

The Decision Makers

Bet to Pot Ratio

Selling Sunshine

Global-Level Mass Suicide

The Bottom Line

Coal for Power -- A Devil's Bargain

Burning coal to produce electric power is insanity at it's finest. It's also a bargain that matches perfectly with the idea of making a pact with the Devil. You have probably heard numerous fictional accounts of people who make deals with the Devil. Essentially, the story line is that the person temporarily gets his wishes, he gets his ways and reaps the benefits of his bargain, but later down the line, he must pay for his pleasure by experiencing incredible pain and suffering at the hands of the Devil. Obtaining electricity by way of coal-burning, electric-power-producing plants is a real life story that is exactly the same as making a pact with the Devil -- small benefits now followed by massive destruction and incredible suffering later.

If you think that the tobacco industry is insane wait until you have a closer look at what the coal-burning electric power companies are actually doing. Here it is in one sentence:

The coal-burning electric power companies are raping nature's Carbon Sinks and poisoning the atmosphere at a level that, if it's allowed to continue, will kill billions of humans and cause the extinction of at least half of the life forms on the entire planet.

If you still think that Global Warming is a fantasy of the foolish or a hippie, tree-hugger's fairytale, we invite you to examine the evidence for yourself. A summary is included below. We also invite you to take a short exploratory journey with our childhood friend, Chicken Little. Was Chicken Little Right?

First, we'll tell you about the tobacco industry so that you can make a comparison between it and the coal-burning electric power industry. Next we'll offer some rules that Mother Nature imposes on all of us, and then we'll share a little-known truth about the fossil-fuel burning, electric-power-producing companies.

The Tobacco Industry

As you well know, the tobacco industry intentionally sells products that kill it's customers. In the United states alone, approximately 435,00 of its customers die every year from tobacco use. You will also notice that even though their product is more addictive than heroin most tobacco users can kick the habit. In other words, there is a level of choice. The users can get away from tobacco.

Mother Nature

You've almost certainly noticed that the entire universe functions on an exacting set of rules, such as the law of gravity. The laws apply to all without exception. They cannot be bought off with money or with prayers. You can overpower one law with another, such as the law of aerodynamics can temporarily counterbalance the law of gravity, but the laws, themselves, are still in effect.

Reference: The Vibrating Universe

http://www.lifecoach4vip.com/trp72b-vibrating-universe.html#11 ²

Reference: The Three Immutable Universal Laws

http://www.lifecoach4vip.com/m030-universal-laws.html

Reference: The Seven Principles of Hermes.

http://www.lifecoach4vip.com/m033-hermetic-principles.html

CO2 and Air Temperature Are Related

With regard to the Earth's average, atmospheric temperature and the amount of CO2 in the air, there is also a unbending law that applies -- a rise the the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere causes a corresponding rise in the atmospheric temperature. Here's another irrefutable law -- relatively minor shifts in the Earth's air temperature causes major changes in the environment and those change dramatically affect all the life forms that live on Earth.

The Carbon / Oxygen Cycle:

There is also a clear and precise relationship between the carbon, oxygen, and life on Earth. The life processes of plants and animals is constantly combining and then separating carbon and oxygen. Here's a brief highlight of the process:

Through the process called photosynthesis, trees and other plants capture the suns energy and use it to break down carbon dioxide into carbon and oxygen. A portion of the oxygen is used by the plants in their life process called "respiration," but the plants produce more oxygen than the use. They hold the carbon in the form of biomass and release the excess oxygen back into the atmosphere. When biomass such as a piece of wood decomposes or is burned in a fire, the captured sun energy is released in the form of heat, and the carbon is converted back into carbon dioxide. When animals, including humans, breath in air, they/we take a portion of the oxygen into our bodies and expel unwanted carbon dioxide. The process is called respiration. It also releases heat, using essentially the same oxidation process that occurs in a fire. That's why your body is warm.

The Decision Makers

Understanding the reality of burning coal to produce electricity requires a simple, basic understating of the biology and chemistry of plant and animal life. You might note that those making most of the world's major decisions are corporate executives and government lawyers, neither of which, as a class, know cow dung from apple butter about either biology or chemistry.

Most government and corporate decisions are based on ego, money, and/or short-term profit. Everything is on the sacrificial alter in worship of The Great God Money.

Bet to Pot Ratio

If nothing else has brought home to you the seriousness of
Global Climate Change, examining The Bet to Pot Ratio surely will.

There are no guarantees in life. Every action produces an outcome with consequences, and there are no upfront guarantees as to exactly what will come into one's physical reality as a result of one's actions. The analysis called The Bet to Pot Ratio can assist us in making wise choices.

In the art of gambling there is a tool to assist people in making wise bets and avoiding foolish bets. It's called the bet to pot ratio. We'll describe the concept and then apply it to the question: "Is burning coal to produce electricity a wise choice or a foolish bet?"

In this analytical process, five factors are considered. Each factor interplays with the other four. This analysis is designed to give the gambler a better understanding of what he is about to do or not do. The five factors to consider are:

1) What is the context in which the bet is being made?

2) What can be won"? What are the benefits of winning?

3) What is the probability of winning?

4) What can be lost? What are the consequences of losing?

5) What is the probability of losing?

From this analysis, the three possible conclusions are:

This is a wise choice. Go for it.

This is a losers bet. Stay away from it.

The results are in the middle. This analysis gives no clear answer about what to do or not do.

The Question to be analyzed:

"Is burning coal to produce electricity a wise choice or a foolish bet?"

1) What is the context in which the bet is being made?

For comparison purposes, lets go back to the choice to use or not use tobacco.

Smoking or not smoking is a personal choice, and the consequences are personal.

In sharp contrast, the choice to burn coal to produce electricity in not a personal decision and the consequence affect every living thing on the entire planet. One cannot escape the consequences of someone else's decision to burn coal and pollute the atmosphere.

What are the consequences of Business As Usual?

The mining of coal is environmentally devastating. **rgw5

Much of the existing power is misused. About fifty percent of all human productivity including its electricity is directed to creating, using, or defending against, the tools of war and violence.

Much of the existing power is wasted. Humans are using electric power to process produce mountains of trash. Of the fifty percent, of non-military, electric power use, a significant portion of the products produced are destroyed by the tools of war and violence, and another major portion is used to to manufacture and sell products that are designed and built so that they will fall apart or become dysfunctional, and become trash after only a certain pre-determined number of uses. ^**es6

Another significant portion is wasted by advertiser attempting to sell these all-but-useless products. For example, imagine the amount of electricity that is consumed in lighting advertising billboards.

2) What can be won"? What are the benefits of burning coal to produce electricity?

At best, the benefits are temporary, short-term pleasures for only a portion of the humans presently alive on planet Earth. One could claim that the benefits are long-term because of the products produced. Unfortunately, that argument falls flat when one looks at what is being produced. See the section above: Business as Usual.¹

The Bottom Line -- At best, the benefits are temporary, unequally distributed, and billions receive zero benefits from the burning coal for electricity. When one turns off the switch and the light goes out, there is noting left but bill, and the piper will be paid.

3) What is the probability of winning?

That depends upon the way one defined winning.

If winning is a temporary, short-term pleasures for only a portion of the human population, then burning coal to produce electricity is a winner.

If a long-term, stable, human society in healthy Earth environment is your measure of wining, then the probability of winning is Zero!

4) What can be lost? What are the consequences of continuing to burning coal to produce electricity?

Runaway Global Warming -- Global Climate Change ²

The Result Will Be:

The Earth’s temperature will rise about eighteen degrees Fahrenheit causing most large life forms on the entire planet to become extinct. The temperature has already risen by two degrees. With another degree of temperature rise, (two degrees at the most) Global Warming will become unstoppable.

The ocean level will rise by several feet forcing millions (perhaps even billions) of people out of their homes. **rgw2 ¹ (100 million people live within three feet of sea level. Ocean-level-rise is already beginning to show up.)

Millions of square miles of the world's most beautiful and productive land will be under water. Major cities like London, Venice, New York, Washington, New Orleans will be mostly under water, as will much of Florida and Louisiana.

Glaciers and mountain snow caps will disappear completely leaving an estimated twenty to to thirty percent of the world’s population without fresh water in the dry season. Entire ecosystems (trees, plants, animals, fish, insects, etc.) that these mountain, glacial waters support will also die. (This melting process is already happening all over the world, and the rate of snow-cap melt is increasing every year)

Billions of people will die of environmental exposure, from disease, from starvation, or from human violence.

Dozens of other highly destructive environmental changes will occur. Many changes are already well under way such as those causing the unusual and severe weather patterns. Each change is amplifying the effects of the other changes. Their combined effect, if allowed to continue, will soon overpower all opposition. The consequences, already devastating, deadly, will soon become irreversible!

4) What is the probability of losing this bet?

The Probability of Losing is about 99 %

Many people will say the above description and the seriousness of Global Warming is exaggerated and/or that we have plenty of time in which to resolve this problem. The evidence overwhelms both of these excuses for not taking action, now.

Reference 1: The Doubters Corner ²

Reference 2: The Rate and Severity of Change ²

The Bottom Line:

"Is burning coal to produce electricity a wise choice or a foolish bet?"

Like any other pact with the Devil, there are obviously some short term benefits, however, if we examine the long term factors, here's what the evidence indicates:

The Win: There is almost nothing to win.

Probability of Winning: The probability of winning is zero

The Loss: What can be lost is astronomical. The lives of billions of human and trillions of other life forms are being put at risk.

The probability of Losing: 99% We are already loosing this bet, big time, so the only question is: How severe will the loses be?

Is this a bet you want to make?

Well, guess what? Governments (like China and India) and corporate executives (like Jim Rogers, CEO of Duke Energy Corp.) are making this bet right now.

If ignorance doesn't kill most of human kind, apathy surely will.

Now that you are no longer ignorant, you are at choice:
Apathy? or Action?

Selling Sunshine

The fossil-fuel burning power companies are, in essence, using stored sunlight to produce electricity. In the process of extracting the sun's energy, they release vast amounts (billions of tons) of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. In a recent interview aired of the CBS television network, 60-Minutes (26 April 2008) Jim Rogers, CEO of Duke Energy Corp., acknowledged that his company dumps 100 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. You can watch the interview on the web at: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4969902n. We recommend that you do so. There are hundreds of coal burning power plants in the U.S. China is adding new coal burning power plants at the rate of one per week. Jim Rogers, CEO of Duke Energy Corp. is right now, 2009, building two new plants right here is the United States.

Global-Level Mass Suicide

The long-term affect of dumping all this carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is global-level, mass suicide. Unlike the tobacco company's peddling of death, there is no way any of us can escape the consequences of the Global Climate Changes ² that the coal-burning electric power companies are in the process of producing.

The justification for their behavior is that the economy will collapse without their electricity. Perhaps someone should inform them of a few simply facts -- If they kill all their customers, the economy will simply cease to exist. Second, killing all their customers will drastically reduce their profits. Third, burning coal to produce electricity has to stop, regardless of how that affects the economy. And one other thing to consider -- killing your own grandchildren for profit is not recommended in The Book of Common Sense.

The Bottom Line

.Carbon Sink ...

1) A "Carbon Sink" is Mother Nature's way of storing excess carbon. It's a natural reservoir for carbon that would otherwise be released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. Coal and oil deposits all around the world are massive, natural carbon sinks.

2) The process called biochar, ² is the best technique yet devised to take excess carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. The process is designed to be a human-created carbon sink. It will take years to develop and will cost billion of dollars to set up systems around the world that can actually do this with enough magnitude to make any difference.

3) In the mean time, we are still desperately in need of reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Humans are on a collision course with Runaway Global Warming ² and the resultant, highly-destructive Global Climate Changes. We have very little time left (about five year, a maximum of tent years) within which we must make major changes or face dire, deadly, irreversible consequences.

4) Coal-burning electric power companies are taking billions of tons of carbon out of nature's natural carbon sinks and dumping that carbon back into the atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide. Duke Energy Corp., (mentioned above) is jut one of many power companies. For just one of its many power plant, (Basin Electric Power Company in North Dakota) it takes 19,000 tons of carbon out of natures carbon sink every single day, seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year and dumps that carbon back into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. There are hundreds of coal-burning power plants in the U.S. alone, collectively dumping billions of tons (that Billions with a B) of CO2 into the atmosphere.

Burning coal to produce electric power is insanity at it's finest. It's also a bargain that matches perfectly with the idea of making a pact with the Devil.

Looking for Alternatives

Are there any alternatives? Yes! You'll find them on page five of this exposé.

CO2-5 A Return to Sanity

Notes and References

**rgw2 **rgw2 Estimates of the actual see level rise range from three feet to about forty feet. There is enough water frozen in the polar ice caps, in Greenland, Iceland in the mountain glaciers to raise the ocean level by 200 feet. Even if the rise is only the minimum prediction, ( three feet) that will displace the 100 million people who live within three feet of sea level.

^**msc1 **msc1 In it's gaseous form, a ton of CO2 is about 500 cubic meters, that's enough to fill an Olympic-size swimming pool.

**rgw5**rgw5 Raping the environment for coal has caused, by far, the greatest environmental destruction that any industry on entire planet has ever produced. Also, in terms of human exploitation, and the destruction of human life, coal mining has been and still the most human destructive, industrial activity ever devised by man.

For an objective analysis of the devastation from strip mining for coal, please visit the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's website (NASA) at:

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/MountaintopRemoval/

^**es6 **es6 "The Story of Stuff" This twenty-minute video is an an eye-opener on why through needless, inefficient, and wasteful production of all-but-useless material goods, humanity is facing economic and environmental disaster.

Review: http://www.EconomicSanity101.com/story-of-stuff.html#83

Video: http://www.StoryOfStuff.com