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Tuesday, June 17, 2008
High Stakes for Our Little Eco-Towns
We know global warming is bad, and we know that human beings' misuse of natural resources has caused it to occur. The explanation of accelerated global warming being due to the Earth's natural climate swings has been discredited. Has tangible global warming not yet taught us that a reactive response to scientific research is quickly ruining our planet? Yet it is our duty to try to figure out how to decrease the intensity of global warming, and fast. I grope for new models that will provide effective information.
Though we are now blazing under unrelenting heat, up until a week and a half ago, it has been chilly while I work in my studio in upstate New York. Global warming involves massive swings in the highs and lows of the Earth's temperatures, and it is still spring in these northern climes until late May. In New York, spring and fall are represented by two-week periods between winter and summer. The rest of the year is dominated by severe weather; I now call our two seasons "Freeze" and "Inferno."
There are many arguments against alternative fuel sources used by the U.S. government and other capitalist-based fossil fuel addicts. Wind energy uses spinning turbines that cause noise pollution. Solar energy isn't powerful enough for a typical household's increasing fuel needs. Combustibles, like wood and coal, pollute the air. Hydroelectric power, because of the use of dams, has ruined ecosystems. Geothermal energy is only available to a small part of the world. But if more funding was given to develop these alternative energy technologies, answers to these arguments will be discovered.
It is interesting to look at recently planned eco-towns and see if these will offer any viable alternatives. Prince Charles has completed the development process for Sherford, a new community in England that has been planned to be mostly sustainable. Solar and wind power will be used in the homes and businesses, which are quaintly designed to evoke the kinder, gentler (for some) Georgian era. I also discovered that Prince Charles already designed one of these communities, Poundbury, in Dorset. Why hasn't this been all over the news? The architect Lord Norman Foster has designed a city in the desert of Abu Dhabi, called Masdar, which will also be almost fully sustainable and self-contained, despite its harsh surrounding terrain.
Average citizens, it is argued, must struggle every day to survive in an unrelenting economic downturn, and do not have time to worry if their coffee is heated with purloined fossil fuel, or a pinwheel. Sherford and Masdar have been criticized as the pet projects of imperialist aristocrats with too much time and money on their hands. If that is the case, then shouldn't we encourage the heirs of wealth and power to shoulder this burden? If they have the time, money, and energy to apply to a global problem, shouldn't we let them? Tracking the success of these communities, and applying the lessons learned as an essential part of urban planning, could alter our global future. We should not reject anything that offers a possibility to clean up this apocalyptic-level mess.
Check out information on these projects:
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COMMENTS
I like this entry. I learned things. Thanks, Mo.
Posted by: Cintra "Concerned Citizen" Wilson at June 19, 2008 11:04 AM
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