Since the nuclear catastrophe in Japan, nuclear energy has been discussed all over the place.
Many talk about pulling out.
People talk and talk. Allegedly, the pull-out process is supposed to cost us 3 billion Euros each year? Whether we can afford to do without nuclear energy, if we can still reach our climate goals, if we should be permitted to import nuclear energy, how to speed up the process of developing regenerative energies, about how we need to renew our no longer very new (electrical) networks, whether or not we can pump CO2 into the earth. …
I can only understand parts of this discussion.
Others say electricity has to remain cheap by all means. Both for the consumer and the industry. It is allegedly the only way for us to make all the jobs secure.
I cannot understand that. After all, having to be innovative usually creates more new jobs than it destroys old ones.
At the same time, the radio-active juice increases in the Asse. The “final depository question” is less solved than ever. In the end, the only solution that might remain left to us is probably “thinning it down and throwing it into the ocean”. Isn’t it all just atrocious?
And there is something else I fail to understand:
Nobody talks of saving energy!
Because change that deserves the name will hardly be possible without economizing. Incidentally, electric and other energy are the fields where you can economize a lot with very simple methods. Both on a large and on a small scale.
Let me start with electric energy:
How many devices are on standby in the network day in day out all over Germany? How many lamps burn during the day, both in public and private places?
How many traffic lights are on around the clock, making no sense? Do we really need full-scale air-conditioning in all public and soon also in private places? Do the superfast trains really give us such an immense advantage, or would it perhaps not be a better idea to make connections to far-out places better? Is it really necessary that we have so many screens on the walls of public places that annoy us with stupid information? Do we need all those illuminated advertisements?
In the IT sector, you could save a whole lot of energy with simple means. As you know, I often write about it. I think if we did a little thinking, we would quickly find a lot more potential.
But we could also achieve a lot when talking crude oil:
Why is there still no tempo limit? Wouldn’t it be possible to reduce the amount of kilometres driven in individual traffic considerably if we organized car pools? Is the staff car regulation as a gigantic subsidy (all car costs can be completely tax-refunded if you have a “staff car”) really still feasible? How much could be saved if more people used public transportation in densely populated areas, or if we simply went by bike?
To me, it seems that most rooms are just overheated in winter (but that may be my subjective view because I am in the fresh air a lot). And do we really have to take three or more hot showers each day?
There is also a lot you might question about work places:
Who benefits from the constant increase of the packing orgy? The only ones I can think of are the industry, because processes get more efficient and the consumer because he can be even more inactive. Does an industry that produces masses of one-way packages using raw material like aluminium, special alloys and, of course, huge amounts of crude oil and/or “renewable primary products” really create jobs?
Do we really need all these many beverages that come in containers? No matter if we are talking beer, soft drinks, water or mini milk products in the smallest imaginable plastic containers? Do we create jobs when we import food from far-away continents? The air transport of these products alone uses up more kerosene than the entire mass of the transported food weighs.
In other words: we need a change in energy politics that deserves the name and includes all areas! And we should say it clearly. And we all must start at home and change our habits step by step.
And what is perhaps even more important:
We finally have to accept that the charismatic sentence
Growth Solves All Our Problems!
can no longer be the basis for all business thinking and activities. We really have to cross it out with a thick red pencil and forget it.
RMD
(Translated by EG)
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