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Sustainability and Resilience must go together
April 21, 2011 | 09:43 PM
Regarding "A Place in the Sun", i'm wondering if Mr. King didn't quite get the irony of his statement that the Chevy Volt is so technologically advanced that it has to be shipped to the mainland if it broke down. And what about the irony of relying on high tech solar panels, inverters and batteries that embody a high energy and environmental cost from manufacturing them all in the name of sustainability? Not to mention the reliance on an expert who uses imported parts to fix the things if and when they do inevitably break down. What we need is sustainable AND resilient technology that we can make and fix ourselves using nothing more than simple tools and parts. Think Macgyver with duct tape and a hammer.
I'd rather use a gasoline generator and old carbureted car engine both converted to run on either biogas, woodgas, or ethanol to run my household and transport myself. These I can understand and fix myself. One can even conceivably use wind power to pump an air compressor to run all kinds of durable pneumatic tools and appliances around the house. Heck it might even be able to run that aircar everyone is talking about.
I believe that to truly be sustainable and resilient we have to define our technology broadly to include how and where it is made, what it's made of, how it's fixed, and how long it will last. Otherwise we are just deluding ourselves.
Peter Nebres
Kahului
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