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More with Less
The meta-challenges of climate change and natural resource depletion compel humanity to transition to an economy based on renewable energy and cradle-to-cradle industrial cycles. We are indebted to those who discovered, extracted and transformed the coal, oil, natural gas, and uranium that were used to build our modern endowment. Now it is time for a drastic, rapid shift: our seemingly vast supply of fossil fuels is dwindling. Fossil fuels are insufficient to sustain us and their continued use has consequences which threaten life as we know it.
Within the fossil fuel framework, renewable energy sources are diffuse (weak) and intermittent (unreliable). In the solar age, that's like saying the earth is flat. The web of sophisticated fossil fuel artifacts is breaking down. We need to build alternatives.
The sunshine intersecting the earth delivers as much energy in 12 hours as all the oil ever consumed. The sun provides enough energy; we just have to design to a new set of parameters. For example, the answer to diffuse is thin. And thankfully, just in time, we have learned how to do thin (more with less).
Rapidly, that new generation of artifacts is emerging, based on natural flows rather than toxic combustibles being released from where they belong, buried deep in the ground. I envision a better world for ourselves and future generations, made accessible by transforming our global economy from oil to ingenuity.
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- Spartan Superway May be the Ride of the Future, SJSU Today [2015 April 16]
- Small business struggles to compete in global market, Santa Cruz Sentinel [2010 May 9]
- Santa Cruz building rules go green in 2007, Santa Cruz Sentinel [2006 December 21]
- Hearing on Renewable Energy by the U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Science, Subcommittee on Energy. Webcast of Ron Swenson's testimony begins at 51:25 [2006 August 2]
- Forefront of modern energy sources, Green technologies represent opportunity for NorCal companies, Santa Cruz Sentinel [2005 May 26]
- Engineer in Race to Develop Oil Alternative, The Australian [1996 October]
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