top of page
Writer's pictureAlan Baker

Politics of Pollution

I find it hard to watch videos of actual fossil fuel pollution being created. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHkpkWwAAT8  I min on You tube. Thermal imaging of Methane emissions from fracking in Texas.


It is even harder perhaps to see (even with minimum research and analysis), the self interest, misleading or false information and often corruption which is so often supporting the fossil fuel industry and its products pollution.


Is this an intractable problem of the fossil fuel industries power, influence and money always winning over our kids right and freedom to breath clean air?


I think not. Why?

Energy from Solar, Wind and Hydro has now reached a price tipping point and is now essentially the cheapest available energy and getting cheaper. The ´´green back´´ ´´dollar´´ argument will win. A green circular economy is coming our way. Clean, sustainable energy will be a spin off of the financial argument. Your Return on Investment is now on the side of renewables.


Low cost clean renewables are driving at the heart of fossil fuels power and influence and reducing demand for fossil fuel products.


Smarter people than I are now are now not only often talking about this tipping point being reached but also in creating over capacity of wind and solar energy. 100%, 500% 900% over capacity. (Solves many of the sun don´t shine, wind don´t blow all the time arguments and also reduces the battery capacity storage needs).


Solar and wind energy is now a policy and economic discussion, not a technical one.


So, quite simply Solar and Wind energy is now cheaper at the point of use than most fossil fuels energy uses. Solar and Wind is even the biggest merchants of doubt cleaner.


Solar and Wind can, with suitable governmental policy, give energy end users control and security over energy supply and cost.


Solar and wind essentially can support a circular economy and increasingly is doing so.


Would you rather buy a solar panel every 25 years or a barrel of oil once a week?


So as strange as it may seen the ´´Green Back´´ (dollar) argument is leading these successes over the more emotional, heart felt green and net zero arguments and the fossil fuel propaganda. That said the emotional argument of our kids right and freedom to breath clean air is also gaining traction as a motivator of change.


Financial justification is one small step at a time defeating big oil and gas and its products and by winning over its consumers who have an eye on their wallet and the future of their kids. (What will happen when energy is essentially free. A different, but nicer policy problem to solve).


From inexpensive, clean energy kids will breath clean air in a sustainable atmosphere with sustainable foods and minerals.


There are some truly inspirational individual who are devoting the lives now to exposing the realities of the pollution, its effect on kids and communities and the often despotic politics behind fossil fuel industries activities. One such is a Lady called Sharon Wilson.


Sharon is 71 year old Texan lady who has faced up first hand to what is happening in the Permian shale oil fields of Texas. One of her tools is a special video camera which can see Methane. She has fought SLAPP law suits brought against her by multi billion dollar corporations and won by simply showing and sting factual realities. Corporations can do this against individuals in the USA.


Here is a really insightful You Tube video where Sharon chats with Rob Llewelyn on the Everything Electric You Tube channel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHkpkWwAAT8


I think most of us have a mental picture that getting oil and gas out of the ground is polluting and bad. This video goes into the detail of the pretty frightening destruction of local water supply, the release of Methane (both burning and as a raw gas), how bankruptcy is used so they never have to clean up or cap the wells, (there are millions of wells, yes millions mostly uncapped and those that are capped are now mostly leaking).


Midland Texas is the capital of Texan fracking. As you check in to a local hotel you will be given a bottle of free drinking water. The fracking industry has made the local supply unsafe to drink.


The short you tube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pp3C4tBH2g shows a council meeting where a fracking company needs a storage reservoir for the fracking pollutants it creates. (By Oilfield Witness). So, because it cheaper and more convenient they build it next to a school with 300 kids. The council commissioners approve the reservoirs location, (despite it being likely that a retarded goldfish knows it is bad idea and a health risk). Then with a last gasp of conscience towards their influential self serving paymaster and no doubt a feeling parents with sick children coming at them in the future say, ´´please´´ to the requesting company, can you consider putting it somewhere else. You could not make this up as an act of fiction.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvg_PBukHZc A 50 second you tube video showing thermal images of methane, done by Texan Sharon Wilson. Methane is 70 to 80 times more polluting than Carbon Dioxide.


We have to believe and support solar energy to defeat this type of activity.


So please talk up solar and wind. It is now cheaper to build a fence with solar panels then good standard wood. Some are even cladding houses with solar panels as it less expensive. Both have the benefits of free electricity as well as being cheaper.






Comentarios


bottom of page