Bored With Green Schemes

I CAN’T be the only one to be bored paralytic by the incessant ‘alternative’ or ‘green’ energy propaganda, and tips for energy ‘saving’? There is no alternative to the basic energy sources or oil, coal or gas, apart from such miniscule applications as powering your birdbath fan; and nothing you can ‘save’ will make the slightest difference.

Let’s consider a few of the ‘alternatives’ being touted. Solar water heaters? They cost countless thousands of N$ to install, and take 135 years to achieve a breakeven point in terms of your municipal account savings.And of course get rapidly silted up by our hard water.So not very practical, unless you just want to feel superior at ecological cocktail parties.And have you ever tried to have a shower in one of those lodges that boast solar water ‘heating’? Bracing and invigorating, wasn’t it? Solar electrical power? Again, sounds easy, but the problem is the need for those high-value solar panels, which have to be mounted in very visible exposed locations.Members of our informal sector then steal them as fast as they can be put up.There is a great market for solar panels in Angola.What about those energy-saving light bulbs? Actually, they are not bulbs but rather intimidating, technical looking clusters of tubes.There are apparently two varieties – ‘cool white’, which emit a pale icy glare, and are not popular with your wife or girlfriend because they make her look like the Return of the Undead, and ‘warm white’ which, provide a dim yellow glow that maybe a firefly would mistake for his mate, but serves little other purpose.I think even my local supermarket agrees, since these fluorescent ‘bulbs’ have been removed from sale.”No demand,” the lady said.Wind power? Well, those stately tall white windmills do look dramatic on the landscape, but in no country do they provide more than 0.005% of national energy needs (I guess because the wind does not blow all the time), and can you imagine the mayhem when amateur Namibian pilots start flying into them? Tidal power, which I understand involves some pendulum-like devices parked beneath the shoreline? Correct me again if mistaken, but I assume that from all those videos of undersea wrecks, metallic machinery installed under salt water kind of gets rusted up and inoperative in a rather short period of time, so back to the drawing board.I think for Namibia the decisions are easy.It’s a simple situation of economics.Judging from the rush of interest from Mafia-related prospecting companies (who always know best) there seems to be plenty of uranium ore, even if extracting it may leave an enormous lagoon stretching from Sandwich Bay to Usakos, the kind of feature not seen since Jurassic times, but that is a different question.The point is that it can be sold at US$100 per pound to the Chinese, leaving us laughing all the way to the bank.(Not to get involved in nuclear energy ourselves of course – that really is a mug’s game.) And because the price of uranium has increased more than 20 times since 2000, whereas the price of oil has increased only five times, we will be in a healthy position to import all the oil we want.We might even find some of our own.From oil you can get any other form of energy.And please, there is plenty of oil left.The oil sands of Alberta and Saskatchewan will last for another two or three hundred years, and all they have to do is scoop the sand up and steam it to extract the stuff.No need to go drilling at the North Pole.Why didn’t they think of that before? What about global warming and the melting of the polar ice caps etc? That’s too big a question to deal with here, except to say that although all those icebergs are beautiful, they are not very productive, and if we have just a bit of melt, to free up the northern coastline of Russia and Canada for shipping, and open up some of the frozen areas for human use, it would be a huge benefit to the economies of those countries, and still leave enough ice cap and polar bears for Arctic coffee-table book photographers.Maybe the oil will run out in the time of our great-great grandchildren, but they will be a lot smarter than us, and I’m sure will be able to make a plan.(Weren’t our forebears worried about the future shortage of horses, and the accumulation of manure-waste in urban streets?) So relax – go put some proper lights in your house.Get that V8 SUV you have always wanted, and reassert yourself over those bedraggled parents dropping off their kids at school in CitiGolfs.And don’t worry about the fate of the Earth – as someone said, the earth is big and old enough to look after itself.Burn It Windhoek Note: Real name and address provided – EdSolar water heaters? They cost countless thousands of N$ to install, and take 135 years to achieve a breakeven point in terms of your municipal account savings.And of course get rapidly silted up by our hard water.So not very practical, unless you just want to feel superior at ecological cocktail parties.And have you ever tried to have a shower in one of those lodges that boast solar water ‘heating’? Bracing and invigorating, wasn’t it? Solar electrical power? Again, sounds easy, but the problem is the need for those high-value solar panels, which have to be mounted in very visible exposed locations.Members of our informal sector then steal them as fast as they can be put up.There is a great market for solar panels in Angola.What about those energy-saving light bulbs? Actually, they are not bulbs but rather intimidating, technical looking clusters of tubes.There are apparently two varieties – ‘cool white’, which emit a pale icy glare, and are not popular with your wife or girlfriend because they make her look like the Return of the Undead, and ‘warm white’ which, provide a dim yellow glow that maybe a firefly would mistake for his mate, but serves little other purpose.I think even my local supermarket agrees, since these fluorescent ‘bulbs’ have been removed from sale.”No demand,” the lady said.Wind power? Well, those stately tall white windmills do look dramatic on the landscape, but in no country do they provide more than 0.005% of national energy needs (I guess because the wind does not blow all the time), and can you imagine the mayhem when amateur Namibian pilots start flying into them? Tidal power, which I understand involves some pendulum-like devices parked beneath the shoreline? Correct me again if mistaken, but I assume that from all those videos of undersea wrecks, metallic machinery installed under salt water kind of gets rusted up and inoperative in a rather short period of time, so back to the drawing board.I think for Namibia the decisions are easy.It’s a simple situation of economics.Judging from the rush of interest from Mafia-related prospecting companies (who always know best) there seems to be plenty of uranium ore, even if extracting it may leave an enormous lagoon stretching from Sandwich Bay to Usakos, the kind of feature not seen since Jurassic times, but that is a different question.The point is that it can be sold at US$100 per pound to the Chinese, leaving us laughing all the way to the bank.(Not to get involved in nuclear energy ourselves of course – that really is a mug’s game.) And because the price of uranium has increased more than 20 times since 2000, whereas the price of oil has increased only five times, we will be in a healthy position to import all the oil we want.We might even find some of our own.From oil you can get any other form of energy.And please, there is plenty of oil left.The oil sands of Alberta and Saskatchewan will last for another two or three hundred years, and all they have to do is scoop the sand up and steam it to extract the stuff.No need to go drilling at the North Pole.Why didn’t they think of that before? What about global warming and the melting of the polar ice caps etc? That’s too big a question to deal with here, except to say that although all those icebergs are beautiful, they are not very productive, and if we have just a bit of melt, to free up the northern coastline of Russia and Canada for shipping, and open up some of the frozen areas for human use, it would be a huge benefit to the economies of those countries, and still leave enough ice cap and polar bears for Arctic coffee-table book photographers.Maybe the oil will run out in the time of our great-great grandchildren, but they will be a lot smarter than us, and I’m sure will be able to make a plan.(Weren’t our forebears worried about the future shortage of horses, and the accumulation of manure-waste in urban streets?) So relax – go put some proper lights in your house.Get that V8 SUV you have always wanted, and reassert yourself over those bedraggled parents dropping off their kids at school in CitiGolfs.And don’t worry about the fate of the Earth – as someone said, the earth is big and old enough to look after itself.Burn It Windhoek Note: Real name and address provided – Ed