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NESTA HAPPENINGS

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A NESTA New Year!

02 Jan 2023 8:43 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

NESTA PLANS A NEW YEAR FOR 2023
A President's Essential Question
How should NESTA develop existing resources and collaborations to strengthen our community? 


Comments

  • 09 Jan 2023 12:50 PM | Anonymous member
    What I would advocate is to get a legitimate full year course in Earth Science in the high school curriculum. Earth Science is not a common science course. Environmental Science is not Earth Science & schools often offer that. A knowledge of astronomy, meteorology, geology, & oceanology provides a good start to improving the cultural literacy of the planet in its realm. I find too much has been tilted toward building student activists in environmental science & frankly not everyone in the public buys this because it comes across as cultish, socialist, & it is not well-grounded in all the cycles that operate on earth. I had a course in earth science in the 7th grade & I loved it. Much later in life I decided I'd go back & get my Masters in earth science & I chose this because it encompassed all the genres. So that I accomplished. In addition I hope you would be open to the reality that not everyone agrees the world is doomed particularly as it relates to climate. Most teachers at this level are not aware of the complexities of thermodynamics & I can tell you that water vapor is our prime agent. There are also other mixes of what is happening with the thermohaline circulation & oscillations. The government wants everyone to hate fossil fuel companies because they make profit. That leads then to the concept that the government really wants to control all sectors of infrastructure. As someone who is pretty well versed in earth science, I can tell you there is information out there that is not allowed to get out & more so, this topic of climate has no one cause & no one solution & that is fine. In particular I'd be willing to bet most of the members are not aware of the reactionary process of CO2 & IR rays. That being said, let me just get back to a recent feat in the US & that is the fusion breakthrough. You don't hear greens jumping all over that good news. Why? Because if nuclear fusion were to come on & supply a good amount of electricity, then they'd be out of a job. This is what I mean there job is activism & protest. Likewise, the carbon capture & decarbonation processes that are just coming on line. Go figure the ingenuity of mankind. This by far should solve any anxities. You have to stop worshipping the IPCC as God. It is a corrupt organization & that corruption led to many scientists leaving it. In addition, I'm appalled at the treatment applied to many fine scientists from some elite schools & interdisciplinary work just because they disagree. We're America & we're supposed to allow for opinion or so I thought. We have reached a point in society where someone like Will Happer is denigrated but Mr. Mann is not. When you preach like a cult people begin to recognize the cult. This applies especially to the application of the earth sciences to the field of energy. Demand is always high & supply less than idea. You simply cannot supply the entire grid with solar & wind; they can be on board I have no problem with that. An amplified grid is what is needed. All sources should be on as many are geographically specific. You have to understand that natural hazards are always part of the planet. The common one I point to given the trend & a mistaken trend toward an all-electric grid, is that when power goes out, how are people to keep warm or cool while it is out. The greens do not have an answer for that. E.g. a blizzard as has happened in the heartland whereby the governor dismisses all employees & sends them home. So people are driving carefully to get home safely. They are going snail pace. Well if you have an electric car & going so slow you may run out of juice. Tell me, who rescues these people? And then their cars? This is one of my concerns. Ditto a hurricane in Louisiana. People in the south don't like to seek refuge until forced. Ok so if the power is out, again same problem. Next problem, if everyone is using electricity & recharging, the current slows down. You don't recharge that car in an hour. Must that person now get up at 3 AM to do so? These are legitimate questions. Now it may be easy to offer the solution of a battery but do you know that a car battery for an EV is 1/3 the cost of the car & where do all kaput batteries go when they are finally done? Furthermore, many of these batteries rely on rare earth elements. I can tell you from my economic geology subspecialty that indeed many of these REE reside in China & Russia. We have some but the Sierra Club is not going to let you mine them. Now I see the market ideally being comprised of many sources. This way consumers can pick in choose. Likewise, this reduces the monopoly opps because it has many players. This in turn can drive price down in any one sector. Unfortunately, what has disenchanted me the most in the climate debate is the idea that govt wants us to use what they want--and that goes across any sector of infrastructure. Just ask Germany now. That is socialism. Another issue coming up is there is a cry for more housing. Well if you paper the landscape with solar panels & wind turbines then where are you going to build houses? That leads to the typical municipal reaction: aka we will build upward. Then what happens in an earthquake or salt intrusion to the beachside condo complex? The theme I want to point out here is that it is indeed a complex science & not all the interactions happen visibly, they occur at the molecular level (co2/IR). Instead of denigrating other industry how about connecting health-first aid-earth science knowledge to our natural hazards so we can improve survivability & mitigate property damage. Next, the carbon capture stuff is starting to steam ahead & the 2 big industries of concrete/steel are also there in the orchestra section. These entities create jobs & careers & pretty much solve the problem. The other part missing in the enviro debate it's very easy to follow trendy issues. But the landscape & waterscape have been shoved to the bench except for that kid out in California who is trying to clean up the Pacific Ocean plastic patch. I have been pushing the Interceptor boat for several years now to my congressional delegation. To no avail. I understand it's used in Baltimore harbor. But this is a job for someone to clean up harbors, shorelines, rivers, lakes, ponds, whatever & then maybe somewhere down the line we can extend it beyond the continental shelf & get other nations abroad in on it . This has been allowed to go by the wayside. Dumping into the ocean. Cleaning up that would be more impressive because this is something that affects the aesthetics immediately.
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