What is "alternative technology"?

I was just wondering about the principles of "alternate technology" and I was hoping someone with knowledge about this might show me some links to sites where my questions might be explained. You see I was kinda debating (in my own mind) the issues of finding and sustaining any technology.
Suppose for example we say ok lets get rid of cars that run on fossil fuels and run them instead on lithium batteries (just for argument sake not that I am proposing this) well then would we not have to start wrecking the world looking for enough metals and chemicals to sustain lithium fuelled cars. And wouldnt such technologies be as damaging to the environment as fossil fuels, eventually? Or perhaps this example. Suppose we said hey all this cutting down of trees to make paper is damaging forests and wildlife - lets put everything on computer, well then the ammount of storage capacity on disk would necessitate a rise in the amount of electricity consumed, so I am really asking - doesnt every technology have a down side because so many people require want to purchase or use those technologies and really the issue should be about how we consume rather than what we consume?

could anyone with experience and knowledge of good links please add comments and post links

 

I think this mainly concerns alternative renewable, green-living and cleaner energy production.

Try entering "alternative technology" in your search box and search for it! You will get URLs for thousands of sites...

 

well "alternative" means litteraly, anything and everything other then the way things are usualy done and the ways most people are familiar with doing them.

in the context of energy production, wind, solar and modest scale and rationaly placed hydro, IN COMBINATION are, imho, the most attractive of these, especialy from an environmentaly sustainable perspective.

i don't have the link handy but sierrasolar.com or google up sierra solar ought to get you there. (for a good place to start looking at what's out there. if you live outside of northern california there may be similar outlets closer to you. at any rate, that one is just a starting place. there's a whole universe of alternatives on the net, once you begin to build up your own collection of links to surf them from!)

=^^=
.../\...

 

Two words: Bow Drill

 

That's an excellent explanation of "alternative", I agree with you.

Don't forget geothermal energy. Geothermal energy is only optimal in certain areas, and since it is expensive, it would be most suitable for large scale or commercial applications.

 

There is no free lunch.

 

four words:

"too many of us".

though i like what you are seeming to imply

four more words:

"the time may come"

=^^=
.../\...

and yes, there is no "free" "lunch"

but nature recycles 100%

and if we want there to be a future for our own species
we're going to have to learn to as well, and that does mean,
not continuing to overload its cycles of renewal
with the rediculous mega tons of excess carbon
we are currently dumping into it.

(and that doesn't mean nuclear with all of its problems,
nor pie in the sky future tec nologies,
when we already have what we need, and need to be replacing
carbon and combusion with
now

and nevermind this timetable nonsense, that nobody does anything about
untill the last possible day, and then, when that day comes, and it's
obvious nothing can be done about it overnight, to weasil out of it for another
ten, fifteen, twenty years, repeat cycle indeffinately.

that's political crap that gets nowhere.

no, what politics can and must do, is chainge the incentive context,
and do that now, not x many years down the road with all this timetable
nonsense).

=^^=
.../\...

 

Free lunch is after the ROI, which is absolutely achievable.

 

Yeh. If everyone in America installed a home solar/wind
electrical power system it would do about 10 times as
much damage to the planet as the current setup.

Those things have to be manufactured. With materials
that come from mines that have to be crushed and
smelted and refined first. A lot of energy is involved and
some seriously nasty petrochemicals (for solar cells).
Which means not only oil wells and pipelines and
refineries but petrochemical plants.

Then there's those lovely giant batteries.....

And all those systems have to be transported to
the homes.

And so forth and so on....

292 million people in America. Average household has
4 people. 73 million home electrical generating plants.

Say good-bye to a forested mountain range or two.
And the water and air that come from them...
Most of the alternative energy stuff comes from yuppies
pretending to be hippies who just refuse to believe that
they have to make fundamental changes in their lifestyle
in order to save the planet.

They want to have their Earth and eat it too.

The real motto of the mainstream environmental movement
is:

"I want to save what's left of the Earth after me and all
of my buddies get our piece of it."

Littlefoot

 

i don't know where those numbers came from. sounds like they were cooked up out of thin air to me.

as if what we're using now didn't?
or even more wouldn't be with fuel cells or nuclear for example?

both conclusions that simply do not fallow their premises!

this post cites a number of half truths and a couple of total falshoods. makes me wonder how much some people might be getting paid to go arround doing so.

no, there's no engineering reason, only political ones, we couldn't have all the tecnology, infrastructure and comfort zone we have now, without burning anything to power it. nor will there always be anything to burn in order to do so.

the REAL argument against decentralized energy is that it makes it harder for the few to get fat off of the many and screw everyone by doing so.

(harder, not impossible. british petrolium IS a major investor in the manufacture of solar cells! they make some damd good ones too. SOMEone there has a pretty good idea what side the future is buttered on!)

=^^=
.../\...

 

themnax wrote:
...

"no, there's no engineering reason, only political ones, we couldn't have all the tecnology, infrastructure and comfort zone we have now, without burning anything to power it. nor will there always be anything to burn in order to do so."

http://www.physicstore.com/why_oil.htm

There's nothing that comes close to the efficiency of oil. That's why
we fight wars over it.

"the REAL argument against decentralized energy is that it makes it harder for the few to get fat off of the many and screw everyone by doing so."

Except for one little problem with your reasoning: The solutions you
are proposing aren't decentralized at all. The home owners aren't
manufacturing and maintaining those power systems themselves.

They come from centralized industry.

The home owners are just bringing their energy in by vehicle rather
than by wire or pipe.

"(harder, not impossible. british petrolium IS a major investor in the manufacture of solar cells! they make some damd good ones too. SOMEone there has a pretty good idea what side the future is buttered on!)"

I'm pretty sure the near future is in the hands of self-servingly ignorant
pseudo-environmentalists like you.

Until billions of you pillage the planet past the point of no return, and the
System breaks down because of a scarcity of ecosystem services and
raw materials.

Littlefoot