30 April, 2010
a definition of sustainability:
A structure is sustainable if A. the energy requirements for its formation, sustenance, and expansion come from immediate solar radiation and geothermal activity, rather than energy that has been stored by structures from previous times. And B. if the structure does incorporate chemical processes that convert elements and molecules in the earth's crust from a form that is necessary to that structure, to elements and molecules that are not usable by it.
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I could use help with this one. Where I'm going with it is that when we talk about sustainability we are talking about a system that is (basically) powered by fossil fuels, and its relation to the earth, which is (basically) powered by the sun. Fossil fuels are so effective because they allow us to release solar energy that has been accumulated and stored for hundreds of millions of years just by lighting it on fire.
ReplyDeleteWhen viewed from the earth's perspective, effects of burning fossil fuels are that you are compressing the release of many millions of years of stored solar energy into a relatively small amount of time--perhaps a few hundred years. and, as Non has pointed out, you're also releasing carbon that was trapped in a rather unsustainable relation (at least in the case of coal: plants proliferated underwater where the particular microbes that break them down can't get any oxygen, so the carbon just stays there and eventually gets buried under sediment, thus removing it from the system.) You're also configuring the entire planet in a way that means slightly more solar energy is absorbed at a given time by the earth, raising temperatures and increasing the motion of the atmosphere.