#WORLD #WORLDWIDE #SPAIN #ANARCHISM #News #Journal #Update - (en) #Spain , CNT-AITAnarchosyndicalisme! n°178: Renewable Energy Myth (ca, de, it, fr, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 Here we are! The warning signs of this dreaded event, foreseeable for a long time

(from the end of the nineteenth century, scientists were concerned about the
risks posed to the climate by the enormous quantities of CO2 released into the
atmosphere by industries) are indisputable. . The poles are warming up, the
glaciers are shrinking, the rivers are drying up, the level of the oceans is
rising, the forests are burning, water is becoming an infinitely rare and
precious commodity. But fortunately, our leaders tell us, we have the solution:
since this change in the global climate is due to the excess greenhouse gases
that developed societies have been releasing into the atmosphere since the start
of the industrial revolution, all we have to do is decarbonize the economy and
things will go back to normal.

Of course, the effort required will be fantastic: for two centuries, fossil
fuels, coal, gas and oil have been the basis of the global economic system and
replacing them with another type of energy is no small task. But, the politicians
tell us, in its history, humanity has been confronted with many problems, the
consequences of poorly controlled technological innovations; and each time
solutions have been found which have made it possible to remedy this: for
example, when it was realized that the CFC gases used in all refrigeration
appliances were destroying the ozone layer, science developed new technologies
that have eliminated this problem; and since then the ozone layer is slowly
recovering. Of course, sometimes the cure turns out to be worse than the disease.
Any innovation involves some risk, but human genius is such that we always find a
solution. We are not obliged to share this optimism, and given the importance of
the issue, it seems to me essential to ask the question: is the replacement of
fossil fuels by renewable energies realistic? What are the consequences for our
societies?

Fossil fuels have a number of advantages that have made them indispensable and
have enabled the development of capitalist society: they are abundant, relatively
easy to extract, use, store and transport. To assess the productivity of an
energy production system, one must take into account the total amount of energy
required to produce it (for example in the case of oil to extract it, transport
it, refine it and update it). available to the consumer a finished product) and
relate this quantity to the quantity of energy delivered to the user. It is thus
estimated (a precise calculation is very difficult) that to produce one hundred
kilograms of oil delivered to the consumer, three kilograms of oil are needed,
that is a ratio of one to thirty. This ratio is roughly equivalent for gas and
coal. It is estimated that the same calculation carried out for renewable
energies gives a ratio between ten and twenty times lower, that is to say that to
produce 100 KW with wind turbines or photovoltaic collectors, it is necessary to
invest at least between 30 and 60 KW (extraction of raw materials, manufacture,
installation and maintenance of facilities) (concerning photovoltaics the ratio
would be even closer to 1 KW invested for 1 KW delivered to the end user). This
poor ratio is due to the fact that wind or photovoltaic installations require a
lot of energy to be manufactured, have a relatively short lifespan (two or three
decades and require a lot of maintenance, mainly wind power). Moreover, if fossil
fuels are easily storable and transportable, this is not the case with
electricity: electric vehicles need very efficient batteries which require for
their manufacture (and their recycling at the end of their life) quantities
phenomenal energy (extraction of rare earths, lithium, etc.) while the
manufacture of a fuel tank is simple and inexpensive; similarly, the need to
build a very dense network of electric charging stations requires considerable
investment. All this further worsens our ratio and in the end, in the best case,
to obtain a KW produced with wind or photovoltaic power made available to the
consumer, it will have been necessary to invest a KW. From an economic point of
view, this relationship makes no sense: in the current state of technology, a
company operating solely with photovoltaic and wind power would go around in
circles or else it would outsource the manufacture of its installations to
countries where labor is overexploited and lives miserably (which is the case
today). It should also be noted that renewable energies are not as ecological as
claimed: the extraction of the necessary minerals causes enormous damage to
biodiversity, the installation of solar panels artificializes agricultural land
or natural spaces, wind turbines destroy landscapes , harm wildlife, etc.

A society exclusively based on renewable energies is not realistic; (If
governments are so attached to their development, it is because they consider
them a formidable tool at the service of economic growth and, for industries, a
source of profits). But that is why, in the current state of technologies,
governments (starting with the French) only consider them as a complement
associated on the one hand with hydroelectricity (renewable energy which requires
considerable investments , but which are amortized very well because the
reliability and lifespan of these infrastructures is very important (more than a
century) and on the other hand in nuclear power We have enough for decades in the
columns of this newspaper denounced the dangers of nuclear power on the
ecological, social and political levels so that it is not necessary to add more.
Nuclear power is a false solution, source of future disasters (and the war in
Ukraine shows it a little more).

If the use of fossil fuels is both a health catastrophe (several hundred thousand
deaths each year due to air pollution by fumes) and a climatic and environmental
catastrophe, if atomic energy constitutes a for present and future generations,
if renewable energies are not the solution, then what?

In reality, the ills from which the planet suffers today, geopolitical, economic
or ecological, all have the same origin: it is because states, companies,
communities and individuals engage in fierce competition and launched in a
frantic race for power, for wealth that leads to the suicidal absurdities that
characterize our society. This system regulated by the laws of the market, as
ruthless as they are (Adam Smith in his book "The Wealth of Nations" asserts that
the invisible hand of the market is all-powerful and determines the winners and
the losers) justifies the exploitation of the man by man in the name of the
unlimited exploitation of nature and the search for maximum profit. If we listen
to the proponents of this ideology, the richer an individual is, the more
material goods he accumulates, the more power he has, the freer he is, the
happier he is, and this desire to get rich justifies all the excesses . It is
because states, companies, individuals have wanted to enrich themselves without
limits that millions of people have been, throughout the world, reduced to
slavery, forced to work in undignified, oppressed, massacred conditions, etc. .

The paths of growth of Western economies are paved with millions of victims,
sacrificed to allow the enrichment of the dominant classes, and if in developed
societies, the fierce struggles of workers have enabled the conquest of social
rights, in the majority of countries , in the name of the pursuit of profit, tens
of millions of people are today still exploited, despised, and live in atrocious
misery, suffering from famine, etc. If to exploit the labor force of humans, the
system has been able to use unlimited barbarism, it is not surprising that to
exploit the resources of nature, it shows brutality and equivalent violence. If
workers are considered as simple owners of a work force with whom we have to
deal, nature, passive, is seen as a simple commodity, a simple accumulation of
resources and wealth that can be exploited without limits. Mineral, vegetable and
animal resources have thus been systematically plundered and destroyed, solely to
satisfy the thirst for profits of the dominant classes. Climate, epidemiological,
biodiversity crises, etc. are only the logical consequences of this madness and
their multiplication is the clear proof that we are coming to the end of this
system. The natural balances are broken!

The forces of nature have defeated the invisible hand of the market dear to Adam
Smith. A radical transformation of our societies is necessary. We must put an end
to this system which deifies merchandise and profit and authorizes the scandalous
exploitation of man by man and the destruction of nature. It is up to us to take
back our destiny by building a desirable, egalitarian, democratic and respectful
future that is much less dependent on the merchandise of nature.

http://cntaittoulouse.lautre.net/spip.php?article1277
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