Energy Option

Continuing to talk about green energy, Solar energy's source, clean energy, and benefit for the environment.

Source: www.elllo.org.

Kat	Matt

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Matthew: Hey Kat, you were just telling me about all the pros and cons of different renewable energies and you just got me thinking we're going to run outof oil in the next couple of decades. There's reports that say we're going to run out of oil in the next twenty years, but I'm guessing that in fifty years or a hundred years we really will run out and we'll need some sort of other energy source. What do you think's going to happen?Kat: I think it's going to be a combination of all the renewable energy sources we have right now, but there's a lot of development going on especially into solar energy. Solar panels are becoming more and more efficient. There's now solar panels that are flexible and you can actually bend them around objects and the newest ones are actually made by biodegradable materials and they start to be see-through so you can actually apply solar energy harvesting tools to windows and I think that might be the future of renewable energy.
Matthew: What about as far as cost performance goes andsustainability?
Kat: Well when it comes to sustainability, I think these new forms of solar panels that are made of biodegradable material, I think they are definitely going to be the future.
Matthew: It seems like it's a lot of resources. We use a lot of energy every day. Every person uses a lot of energy every day. Do you think that there's going to be a time where all houses are run by renewable energy? Do we have the space, the capacity on this planet to actually fit every household with solar panels or wind energies?
Kat: Well as far as the resources go as how much solar energy actually hits our planet, we can provide energy for the world a thousand times over. That is not a problem but I think financially it's going to be very difficult. At the situation we are at right now, I think it won't be possible.
Matthew: I'm sure that scientists are going to figure out something but I just think solar panels, wind turbines, everything, they actually use plastics and metals and in order to produce those you need oil. Now if you have zero oil, how are you going to produce these renewable energy resource products?
Kat: I have been trying to explain that earlier with biodegradable materials. There's actually solar panels being built from renewable materials themselves.
Matthew: You're in the industry, you've been working there for a while and I am just wanting to ask you do you think that it's going to be successful? Will there be renewable energy throughout the globe or are people going to be too stubborn?
Kat: Well as the situation stands right now, renewable energy will not be able to take care of our energy needs and I truly hope that there will be scientific discoveries in the next fifty years because as it is right now we will not be able to go on as we are just supported by renewable energy.

WE ARE WHAT WE DO

What do you do to improve your life and the environment? 

Source: Speak Up

For more info www.speakup.com.br 

THE ENVIRONMENT

50 (small) Ways to Change the World

By Derek Workman

Make a cup of coffee for someone who’s busy, shout with happiness, don’t swear for 30 minutes, pick one piece of litter up every day, make sure you use both sides of the writing paper, or shake someone’s hand. These may not seem like things that will change the world, but hopefully they will help to make it a better place. At least that’s what the people from: “We Are What We Do’ (WAWWD) think.

RECONNECTING

David Robinson had been a community worker of 25 years when in 2004, he decided to write a document called Reconnecting. It eas about the need for change in society and the power of people coming together to make it happen. He gathered people from a wide range of backgrounds to see how it could be done. They asked the question. “What would you ask one million people to do to change the world?” Thousands of people from all over the world replied, and the result was the best-selling book. Change the World for a Fiver - 50 actions to change the world and make you feel good. It was later published in six countries and sold over a million copies worldwide.

THE NEXT GENERATION

The first book was based on the ideas of people of all ages, but for the next book they decided to make one especially for children – and asked them to create it too. The thousands of interesting, intriguing and wonderful ideas for actions sent in by almost four–and-a-half thousand children were narrowed down to thirty and became Teaching Your Granny To Text. And Other Ways To Save The World. (The little is based on a suggestion by a young lady named Erica). Every school in England now has a copy of the book. 

HANDS ACROSS THE SAND Part II, Audio

Source: Speak Up

Speakers: Jason Birmgham and Chuck Rolando

Standard: American Accent

INTERVIEW

IN DEEP WATER

      One of the most dramatic events this year has undoubtedly been the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, better known as the “BP oil disaster.”

      The spill lasted from April 20 to September 19. BP estimates its total cost to rectify the situation as $ 40 billion. According to Wikipedia, it is the largest marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry.”

      Not surprisingly, the disaster has given great impetus to the environmental movement and has made people think again about alternative energy sources. On June 26^th a series of events called “Hands Across the Sand” took part. They linked hands across beaches around the country in order to protest against offshore drilling.

      One person who was closely involved in the organization was John Weber, of an environment group, the Surfrider Foundation. He met with Speak Up on a rather noisy beach. As he explained, the Deepwater Horizon Spill is just one of many in a long line of American oil disasters.

John Weber

Standard: American Accent

In  1969 there was an oil spill in Santa Barbara, California and there were many dead seabirds and sea life and it was such that people in California could see the damage right in front of their eyes and many people think that that helped give rise to the modern environmental movement in the United State. So, after that, offshore oil drilling was questioned because in Santa Barbara that was a bad accident. So that was over 40 years ago and then. In 1989, we had the Exxon Valdez oil spill. An I haven’t been there myself, but people say you can go to Prince William Sound in Alaska and dig down a few inches in the dirt, or among the rocks, and there’s still oil there. And Exxon never properly cleaned up there, and they never properly compensated fishermen and people that made their living in such a way. Exxon neverspent more money fighting it in court, on lawyers, than it would have taken just to compensate people properly.