Sustainable development to get out of the crisis yes or no

[bobono]

Sustainable development to get out of the crisis: a false good idea

By Ingrid Labuzan, December 19, 2008
Ingrid Labuzan

What do you think the economy needs to get out of the crisis?

A certain number of politicians, researchers and thinkers claim to have found the recipe against the recession: it is about sustainable development.

The European Union is for the moment the champion of this cause, with its energy-climate package and its role of leader in international discussions. A role that could be challenged by the United States, which Barack Obama intends to take a green turn.

Should the battle for economic supremacy be fought on this ground?

The proponents of an ecological revival
The great ally of the environmental cause is the former American vice-president, Al Gore. For him, the end of the economic crisis and the end of the climate crisis must be synonymous. He defended in the New York Times a plan in five point to replace the electrical network of the United States so as not to produce more CO2 in this sector, within 10 years. An eco-friendly project that would create thousands of jobs, and therefore offer a path to recovery.

Under this plan, electricity would be produced by solar thermal power plants located in the deserts of the Southwest, by wind farms in North and South Dakota and by state-of-the-art geothermal power plants. The electricity would then be transported through a new distribution network, to be built entirely.

Then, the automobile industry should be helped in order to make a shift to hybrid vehicles, which would therefore run on this clean electricity. Finally, American buildings should be reconstructed or improved in order to be better insulated and to consume less energy. Finally, Al Gore pleads for the United States to take the lead in the Copenhagen climate talks scheduled for next year - a role that Europe has implicitly assumed.

Becoming a listened world leader, creating millions of jobs thanks to green energies and thereby helping to save the planet, we would understand that Obama is sensitive to Al Gore's speech. Especially since the American president has already announced that he wants to reduce the country's greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050, while promising to invest 15 billion dollars per year in renewable energies.

The green shift in the United States has already convinced some companies. Thus, British Petroleum (BP) finally decided to invest 5,8 billion euros in wind power in the United States and not in Great Britain. Reason: "the incentives are more favorable". Shell, also British, is expected to do the same.

Europe could therefore lose its green battle against the United States. And, if one believes Al Gore and the thinkers of the same edge, to pass beside the economic revival.

Although environmentalists are convinced and fully aware of the risks of global warming, we do not believe that the path to recovery is necessarily this. On the other hand, we believe that Europe has a game to play to regain a preponderant global role and that it should act before the United States rebounds, faster and more keenly than we do.

Greenway traps
It is undeniable that giving a boost to all industries would create jobs. On the other hand, is it reasonable to think that we can thus go from all-polluting to all-green?

In Iowa, the transition from old industrial towns specializing in automobiles and household appliances to the production of sustainable energy has made it possible to limit the damage. Getting hired into these new companies represented a second chance for many. But, as the New York Times puts it, "no one believes that the renewable energy sector alone will replace the traditional industry, which had allowed people who had not gone to higher education to access the middle class. Many workers at Maytag (a former industrial company that closed) were paid $ 20 an hour, excluding health benefits. Arie Wersendaal (former Maytag employee who now works in a wind turbine factory) earns today hui $ 13 ".

On the other hand, equipment manufacturers and car manufacturers are forced, in the United States as in France, to ask for state aid to survive. How to think that they will manage to launch lines of less polluting cars or hybrids, more expensive to realize? Not to mention that it would take to build new factories, which means abandoning or transforming the old ones.

We also do not have the necessary distribution network for hybrid cars. Either way, there wouldn't even be enough lithium available at the moment (a possible lithium shortage is an ongoing debate among specialists). But lithium is an essential component of hybrid batteries. The Times has consulted specialists, who come to this conclusion: "Lithium production will never be able to meet demand if we switch to electric cars on a large scale."

As for wind or solar energy, it can certainly replace our current consumption of electricity, but the flow of energy that it produces is not enough to run our industries, our factories.

Europe must remain the engine of the ecological cause. But the way out of the crisis is probably not on this path. It is based above all on the end of the credit and liquidity crisis.

[bobono]

For the record The US has

A 110-volt electrical network = a lot of line loss.
Poorly insulated homes = high energy consumption to heat the winter and cool the summer.

Vehicles too greedy in petrol.

Long distance to travel for home work.

[Remundo]

Ingrid Labuzan.

An excellent contemporary philosopher of peak oil and the crisis that makes oil very cheap.

We are meeting him in 4 or 5 years, when the barrel will be at $ 300 or even $ 500, and the euro will be weak against the $.

She will have to bring out her guguss arguments "bé, no need to make a hybrid, there is not enough lithium "

[You put a reserve of compressed air in the car and you recover the brakes much better than with the batteries. In addition, there is a whole range of batteries with different material: all Li-On deserves to be "re-engineered"]

"Converted workers are less well paid"

[It seems to me that they are no longer paid at all on traditional industry: this is a much broader and independent problem than that of renewable energies (the redistribution of wealth ...)

"Europe must remain the engine of the ecological cause. But the way out of the crisis is undoubtedly not in this direction. It rests above all on the end of the credit crisis, of liquidity."

There we agree on the immediate, with the nuance that the renewable energy industry is undoubtedly very important (even crucial) for the future. See the Russian warnings on the price of gas, the development of unconventional oil which will blow the budget of the unfortunate countries dependent on oil and gas (just about all! except the underdeveloped ...)

@+