Secular Sins

[caveman]

I have an idea for a bit of fun. I was thinking about what might constitute the most unethical things we get up to from an energy and general consumption point of view. I would call them Secular Sins. I propose that we start a list with contributions from all interested members and guests. When the contributions wither out we could have a vote on which are the top ten.
It might help us examine how we use and mis-use energy and perhaps change how we do things.

My opening contribution is to suggest that space heating with electricty is a serious secular sin.

[campbeji]

Hi Caveman,

How about this one, my sister has a thing about running her cold tap for ages, must be a good 4 or 5 mins just to make sure that her glass of water is cold and fresh. She must waste a couple of gallons every time, and thats 4 or 5 times a day.

[tomhill]

The open fire has to be in the top ten. 90% of the heat goes up the chimney along with all that soot and other muck.

[campbeji]

If this was a 'Guilty Pleasure' section I would volunteer myself with an open fire burning turf, there is just something special about it, brings back memories from childhood I guess. Mind you I don't have an open fire anymore so not something I get to enjoy very often.

Jim

[badasme]

Boiling more water in a kettle than is necessary for a cup of tea. I know many people who insist on filling the kettle to make a single cup of tea

[cye]

for me it has to be the dreaded electric tumble drier.

using grade 1 energy (electricity) to dry clothes has got to be up there in the top ten. instead, use a washing line, or if you really don't like the running in and out between rain showers, build a small lean-to roof or awning such as a carport made from corrugated plastic and string a washing line under it.

makes for less crumpled clothes too!

[caveman]

I'm having another go. Cars, but since the system we have made makes it very difficult to get along without them, I will confine my comments to really stupid cars. It has been estimated that there are about 500 person hours of work in a gallon of fuel and some people think nothing of wasting half of that to go out for the paper! SUVs are the epitome of this sort of stupidity. The 'U', standing for utility is clearly just some sort of fig leaf trying to cover the fact that they are quite useless. Also the title 'Sports Vechicle' might not have seemed an appropriate way to market 2 tons of steel and plastic with all the areodynamic properties of a brick.
I am only guessing, but I think the 'Sport' in the abbreviation SUV is the domination of other people and the 'Utility' of the SUV is closer to that of a castle than a means of transport. What an appalling waste of energy.
Oops! a wee rant popped out.
The only consolation is that the chickens of the future will have classy accommodation (although the aircon won't work)!
conor

[cye]

hi caveman

SUVs, well to be fair to the owners there is probably some justification for having bought them, e.g., they need to trailer heavy stuff from time-to-time and/or they have an occasional need for 4WD. However, average daily city and commuter use of one of these vehicles is wasteful and ill-conceived from an energy and sustainability perspective.

The problem would be solved by appropriate vehicle pooling community schemes whereby folks can drive an efficient vehicle on a daily basis yet still have access to a shared utility vehicle when they need it.

If it's just 4WD that's needed, this is an option that's already available with several makes of much more efficient cars.

Just a thought.

[caveman]

More often than not I see SUVs with nothing in tow, often without even the pretence of a towbar, and rarely with the skids of muck which would suggest off-road use. Owning one to tow a boat or a horsebox 3 or 4 times a year is not an excuse that is going to get past anyone who is concerned about energy consumption and damage to the ecosystyem.

What gets me so exercised about this is the hypocricy of our governments. They yap on about sustainability and eco this and green that but they do nothing to stop individuals who wish to behave in this way. Wealthy people buy vast quantities of fuel and burn it, largely for fun. We all know that this practice is doing untold damage to the environment but it brings in tax revenue so it is ok. To put it another way, our governments allows people to damage the environment in exchange for money. Well, I don't think the environment should be on sale like that. I don't think it is theirs to sell.
If I suggested that the most extravagant cars/SUVs should be phased out, I am sure someone would argue that is contrary to the freedom of choice we have come to expect in democratic society. My reply would be to say that we will have to change our views on what to expect as a member of a society. It is, in my opinion, no more a democratic choice to damage the ecosystem than it is to punch someone. If we understood that we are part of the ecosystem and not the owner of it, we might be a little better off.
Oh dear, another rant. sorry everyone.
conor

[campbeji]

Hi Guys,

I'm sure my view will not be the most popular :-) In fact it will probably be a little unpopular.

Certainly SUV's are known as being inefficent in fuel terms and from an environmental point of view they probably are not the best of things. However they do have some redeeming qualities, Safety being one of them, If I was in a collision with say a Ford Mondeo going at 50mph I'd much rather be in a gas guzzling SUV than say a very efficent motorbike or one of those little tin can cars that go 70mpg.

OK the average SUV owner is only going to tow something a couple of times a year if ever, but have you ever seen the mess you get when a towed caraven gets out of control. I once helped pull two guys out of a big old landrover from a ditch with a huge trailer sitting on top of it (they had lost control). They had gone through a hedge and down a 6ft drop closely followed by said trailer. No one was hurt (the passenge looked like he was about to have a heart attack though), their land Rover was a bit dented and scratched but thats it, I think if they had been driving a smaller car I would have been calling the ambulane instead of a tow truck, very scary.

As for being allowed to drive SUV's by the government, or for that matter having the Government tell me what I can and can't do, well lets say I think it is not their place to tell us to do anything, they have their noses in way to much as it is. Anyway the Government only has to ways to stop us from doing anything, Legislation and taxes. Do you want a law to be brought into play that says what sort of car you can have, or how many miles you can drive per day, maybe a tracker can be fitted to your car to check your speed and location, all things that have been discussed at one time or another. The problem is that all of these restrictions are just that restrictions to keep us in check. As for the tax thing, they have introduced a reduction in Road Tax for more efficent vehicles, bit of a laugh really.

If the Government is to get involved it should be to facilitate the research and introduction of new green energy and fuel sources, what if they were to provide a financial incentive for changing to an electric car, or even to a more efficent fossil fuel car. There are far more positive things they can do rather than stopping us from doing stuff.

Don't get me wrong I'm not saying that SUV's are a good thing as such, rather that all cars are bad to a certain degree, and most drivers make it even worse. I wonder what percentage of drivers can drive their car, whether it is a SUV or a Prius, within say 80% of it's most efficent mpg, most people are way to heavy on the accelerator and the brake.

So I'd vote for bad (inattentive) drivers over SUV's

OK How's that for a rant :-)

Jim

[cye]

well this has turned into a lively discussion!

if jim lived in the next street and we knew and trusted one another, and there were a few like-minded folk in the area too, we could all drive efficient vehicles for the normal commute and shopping run, and we could all drive the 4wd tow vehicle when we needed to tow something. why such arrangements are rare is because there is big a problem with modern society, there is a dreadful dearth of community members working together and a awful lack of community trust.

Personally, I would much prefer co-operative community arrangements to legislation. I am resigned to the fact that governments are largely impotent when it comes to anything long-term such as environmental and community-building matters, and that once the government starts to dabble in these areas they inevitably waste huge amounts of our money whilst at the same time burdening us with red tape.

And back to secular sins, I feel that one of the greatest sins of all from an energy and sustainability perspective, one that is at the root of all the others, is the problem with modern society and local communities. If we build local community trust, collaborate, help one another, rely less on outsiders and be more self-sufficient, addressing many of these other energy and sustainability sins will happen naturally. Another cardinal sin is the economic model which most first world governments follow blindly, one where GDP (consumption) is the number one target, but that is something for another thread!

[campbeji]

Hi Cye,

I feel that I agree with you in this, Governments bye and large are poor at running and achieving things, they just can't seem to think in terms longer than the next election, so planning for a future that is a geration or more away is just incompatible with their though processes. Not to say that they are 'bad' at everything, things like defence, health etc they are not to bad at, not perfect, not too bad.

OK how about this for a sin, and I'm not sure I can express this properly, but the inefficency of our energy systems and designs.

For example, taking the recent subject of cars, the amount of energy from the petrol in an average car that is actually used to move the passengers forward (the whole point of driving) is about 0.33% that a third of a percent, the rest is wasted in moving the vehicle, drive train inneficences, heat, cooling, poor engine efficency etc.

In the electricity used in the home, something like 10% of the generated energy is lost just sending it down the wires to us.

In my opinion we need to build local community energy producing facilities, wheter it is small scale hydro, wind, solar, pv, combined heat and power etc. Not only does it need to be local it needs to be owned by the locals. This means if say a small town were able to produce 50% of their own energy they will be able to keep 50% of their energy costs within their local community and not be sending it off to the Middle East or where ever. If the Government were to provide a fund for long term loans to communities for the capital investment needed for these projects then we would end up with communities that were greener and also wealthier.

The problem with the whole idea is the infrastructure for it just isn't in place, and since so many people are expecting the solution to the problem to come down from on high rather from the community, there is just no motivation to create it.

Jim

[caveman]

I am not talking about the hard working 4wds of the farms and yards or the truck that has to cross land to do a job. They are one of the few vehicles types that could not be replaced with a micro car, and do as good or better job. They get a pass for the meantime, they might even get ration vouchers! I am talking about the huge slobs SUVs, 'The Rolex of the road' type of thing. These things might manage 10mpg in town and less than 18mpg overall. Smaller SUVs towing a caravan or boat travel fewer miles per gallon. The amount of oil available for this sort of fun is diminishing rapidly and the damage to the environment is putting our species under pressure. If we were really making any effort at some sort of transition phase towards a low/zero carbon way of living, we would drive micro cars when needed and use public transport as a matter of course. Most of our travelling would be local. There would be no such thing as a 500hp luxury SUV, though we might have one in the museum. Perhaps on a stand near the other dinosaurs.

Views on the the safety of a SUV depend on whether you are inside or outside it. In general they are bigger and heavier than most other cars. They have longer braking distances and since the drivers reaction times are the same as everyone else's, there is a higher chance it won't be able to stop in time. If it hits you there is a lot of it, to say nothing of the damage that 'bull bars' do. The driver is, of course, safe as milk. This safety advantage over others, is purchased at the expense of the environment.

Our elected representatives have legislation in place to force us to drive no faster than 70mph on motorways. That figure was arrived at as a compromise between the desire of the general public to drive fast and the level of carnage they are prepared to tolerate for the privlage. Unfortunatly we can't do that sort of deal with respect to our oil habit and the toll it has taken on the environment, so I would say the government (as our representatives) has a duty to protect the environment from our activities.

Electric cars are better but no where near good enough. They are 'polute elsewhere' technology. They are largely dependant on the efficiencies of their charging system. Plugging into a coal fired power station via a lossy grid, is not going win any awards from me. Jim pointed out that a tiny percentage of the fuel actually moves the passengers, the rest is consumed in overcoming the inefficiencies of conventionaly fueled cars. Electric cars are very heavy so, still, a great deal the fuel is used to move the vehicle itself. They also come with a huge level of embodied energy.

If we were to attempt the sustainable version of powered transport then what ever it might be has to run on what Wes Jackson calls 'contempory sunlight', (oil being ancient sunlight). Imagine the number of PV panels you would need to charge the battery of a 250watt electric bike; 5 days a week. Think about the number of full batteries you would need to be sure there was one to get you to work on gray days and through the winter. Is PV enough? Perhaps a small wind generator might help. The batteries will need to be replaced. New batteries take a lot of energy to make..... You can see where I am going with this, the energy collected from an urban garden full of technology would not provide most of us with basic transport to and from work. A luxury SUV consumes about 1600 times more energy than an electric bike.What would it take to run one of these on contempory sunlight.?

conor

[campbeji]

Hi Conor,

I can't disagree with what you say, in fact I am inclined to agree with a lot of your points. There are however a few things that I don't agree with fully;

Government intervention. I do not want the government involved in my day to day decisions and certainly not in dictating what I can and can't do, at least over and above the current laws (some of which are already ridiculous imho), if they get a mandate to directly restrict our buying decisions by legislation you will have to think of where it will stop, Big Slob SUV's today, large luxury cars tomorrow, next week classic cars and anything that won't do 50+mpg. Then they will want to put a black box in to make sure you are driving efficently and at least 50% of your miles will have to be sharing with others (they will be able to check that with your RFID identity card). Then you will have to restrict your airtravel cause those awful planes put out a lot of CO2 (Portrush again this year). Food miles and 'import miles' will have to be restricted so no more Bannanas or South African wine.

Basically our lifestyles use energy, some more than others, in the end it will be down to how much we are willing to give up.

The second point is that eco technology is still quite new, 10 years from now we will be able to do stuff that seems like a dream now, for example I watched a TV show a few days back where these scientists were developing a SUV that ran from Hydrogen fuel cells, and when you wern't driving it you could plug it into the house and use it as a mini power station.

OK dinners ready, bye for now.
Jim

[caveman]

Jim, I was being a little tongue in cheek about government regulation of our lives. I am no fan of it either but I was thinking that they seem to have a lot of time and money to chase us about dog licences and to hassel people for littering. They seem endlessy concerned with small things but destroying the atmosphere for kicks or profit seems not to bother them.

You are, of course, correct when you say that our lifestyles use energy. Where we differ is that I don't think we have a choice (anymore) about how much we use. We are steaming into the biggest energy crisis we have ever experienced. So much of what we take for granted about our lives depends on abundant, cheap energy, that it is almost impossible to imagine how our lives are going to change when it becomes scarce. I don't think we have 10 years to get our acts together. I wouldn't be sure we have 10 months. Taking the broader view, the rate of change is frightening.
Did you look at that piece from The Post Carbon Institute called 'The trouble with money'. It explains many painful things but, most relevant to this conversation, it points to our dependancy on cheap energy.
Sustainability is living on the energy we can extract from 'contempory sunlight'. As the fossil fuel era draws rapidly to a close, our choices are becoming very limited. We can meet sustainability, prepared for the change or we will forced into it kicking and screaming.
conor