The Power of Energy

From Frank Herbert’s classic novel DUNE, Baron Harkonnen, former ruler of Arrakis, summarizes the importance of SPICE with the line: ‘He who controls the spice, controls the universe.’ this line is made more significant by a Guild Navigator who states ‘The spice must flow.’ In the world of DUNE, Melange is the drug known as ‘spice’ and when one ingests enough they will be changed enough to the point where they can fold space allowing for travel between star systems. Frank Herbert’s book was published in August 1965

 

The current fuel of the world that facilitates travel is carbon based fuels. Mr. Herbert’s prophetic message from 50+ years ago pointed to the equation that travel facilitates commerce and that the better the travel, the better commerce. In Herbert’s book there is another quote of importance that states: ‘It is by will alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the juice of Sapho that thoughts acquire speed, the lips acquire stains, the stains become a warning. It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.’

 

Once again, respect must be given to Herbert for another observation about carbon based fuel otherwise known as SPICE in the world he created. One of great leaps forward in the acquisition of knowledge and therefore understanding has been the consumption of carbon based fuels. Fire has long been hailed as one of the greatest tools invented by mankind and stands in the realm of the wheel, the inclined plane and a lever coupled with a fulcrum. Fire provides three key significant benefits based on historic evidence and these are: dead germs due to cooking, warmth, and light. As self reliance dropped because social compression increased and as needs surpassed the simple hunter gatherer stage people specialized in the action of making the tools needed to improve that basic acts of hunting and gathering, which we now put under the rubric of animal husbandry and farming.

 

Now the world seemingly regards the use of carbon based fuels and other products as evil. Many country leaders have made pledges to bring their countries to a lower carbon foot print. It is the opinion of this author that this is a fools errand and many of the country leaders know it, because their other policies do not align with the stated goal of ensuing that global temperature rise doesn’t exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius.

 

The problem of climate change is pitched as a global problem and yet the country leaders seem to want to localize or nationalize the solutions. Though they don’t really do that, do they?

 

Canada for example, the housing needs an external energy source to provide heating in the winter and cooling via air conditioning in the summer. Warmth and cooking have been around for 1000s of years while modern A/C has had a life span of about 120 years since the invention in the year 1902. The Canadian government is bringing in people by the droves forcing the creation of new housing that needs Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) units that run on a combination of gas and electricity.

 

Additionally, much of Canada’s consumer goods are imported from places like China and India, two of the most pollution rich counties on the globe. Of course these consumer goods need to be shipped to Canada and that of course requires the use of diesel fuel. Has anyone considered building a nuclear cargo ship yet? 

 

The principle of the economies of scale comes into play here. For readers not in the know, the principle states that a proportionate saving in costs will be gained by an increased level of production. This can be seen in many industries such as the automotive industry, the raising of chickens, the growing of wheat, the making of clothes, and the manufacturing of plastic toys.

 

The idea of economies of scale is a business principle and not an ecological one and as this argument is about addressing the ecology not the economy or so we are told. One problem with economies of scale is that centralization of production is required; this means that transportation to market is also required. So when the ecosystem at risk is the central narrative then perhaps the benefits for any specific business, needs to be set aside.  

 

At the time of this writing, the city of Toronto allows for the raising of chickens in the original 4 wards of the city, much of which has been paved over thus rendering it useless for growing chickens while the outer rim of the centre would be perfect for the raising of small poultry. Yes, chickens are small poultry relative to a turkey. This brings forth the question; why not allow for the raising of chickens across the region to reduce the ecological impact of the transportation of eggs and chicken meat?

 

Of course a man can’t live on chicken and eggs alone, and yes that applies to women as well. Once again when the ecology is at stake the governments of the world should make efforts to reduce the transportation of goods and products. To this end, the COVID situation has shown that many people can work from home. This of course will free-up many square metres of office space that can be converted to hydroponics space for the growth of vegetables near to the grocery store where they are to be sold.

 

NOTE to Reader: The earth is a closed ecosystem and so the amount of water on the planet doesn’t change it just moves from place to place and form to form. One concern for this author is the level of salination of the oceans around the world. The Dead Sea is called the dead for a reason and yet mankind has been working on that problem for years through the sale of Dead Sea salt.

 

Throughout history mankind has striven to improve the harnessing of energy and then all of a sudden someone(s) decided it was about time to put on the breaks on improving the harnessing of energy and decided to replace the carbon based fuels with alternatives all the while taking down the current active energy production at a rate that is far below a one to one kilowatt/hour or horsepower replacement rate; and within the same breath trying to convince people that their expectations for germ free food, warmth, travel and illumination will remain as constant as in recent years.

 

Carbon based resources have allowed for many of our now common ‘creature comforts’, travel and technologies. Some of the comforts and technology currently being deployed that are based on carbon can be recycled though the original source still has to involve some form of carbon in the form of coal, natural gas and of course crude oil. The binary presentation of yes oil or no oil is not a reasonable solution in the mind of this author.

 

At this point in time the reduction in the use of carbon resources means an increase in labour and an increase in the cost of shipping be it people or goods.

 

Some interesting considerations:

Energy = Power x Time

Power = Work / Elapsed TIME

Work = Force x Displacement (movement)

Force = Mass x Acceleration (Please recall that gravity is a force and to lift anything one has to defeat that acceleration 9.8 m/s²)

 

So: Energy = (Mass x Acceleration) x Movement x TIME

                                    Elapsed Time

   

Considering that the two instances of time basically cancel each other out, one may conclude that Energy results in the movement of stuff. Reducing or removing energy from this our current world may very well remove the access to goods from foreign lands. 

Is this a happy making contemplation?