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From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: A naval presence in the arctic
Message-ID: <5982@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 18-Sep-85 13:31:07 EDT
Article-I.D.: utzoo.5982
Posted: Wed Sep 18 13:31:07 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 18-Sep-85 13:31:07 EDT
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Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 35

>     Large solar arrays probably have the least impact.  But this is 
> only a guess...

I doubt it, when you consider manufacturing processes (they have to
be built, and they don't last forever), heat balance (the right place
to put a solar array is in the desert, where most sunlight is normally
radiated back out into space), storage systems (since the sun doesn't
shine 24 hours a day every day), and the truly immense areas needed to
produce large amounts of power.	 Actually, solar power satellites solve
most of these problems; they might compete with nuclear for minimum impact.

> We are not really looking only for the least impact,
> but also one that is below a level that we can consider as unacceptable.
> Like I said before, No way may be totally feasable.

True, although it does look like low-impact methods (power satellites,
nuclear reactors) are within the acceptable level.

> Then the only
> conclusion we can come to is that there is too many of us. The planet
> will not support us!  Hence we have to reduce our population and
> embark upon moderate scale power generation.  Before our decision is
> made for us, and we are reduced in population by means beyond our 
> control.

The only feasible ways to reduce the population of Earth in any sort of
hurry are a major nuclear war or a Third-World famine so drastic that it
would probably result in a major war.  We are stuck with the problem
for the moment.  And the only really effective way to halt population
growth is to industrialize the Third World, so that the resulting economic
changes will slow their growth the same way it slowed ours.  So our near-
term power needs will grow, not shrink.
-- 
				Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
				{allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!henry