Achieving a Sustainable Approach to Energy, Food, and Water on Planet Earth
Here’s a letter I sent to a gentleman I met at a presentation called “Planetary Health.” He lives in Cameroon, and is fabulously well connected with some of the most powerful people in Africa. This is my attempt to facilitate a meeting in which I can involve myself as a problem-solver with respect to what I see as a huge gating issue if our civilization is to address its myriad woes and achieve some level of sustainability going forward.
Dear Emmett:
As I explained when we met at the Planetary Health meeting last week, I’ve spent the last six years of my life working to bring a sustainable approach to energy, water and food on this planet. I majored in physics as an undergraduate and did a graduate program in philosophy before becoming a business consultant for 30+ years, so, by training at least, I tend to take a holistic approach to problem solving. My four books on renewable energy focus more on low-carbon and distributed generation of electricity, but much of my other writing addresses the subject more broadly. Here are two excerpts that make this point:
1) For Some Reason, The Gates Foundation Doesn’t Understand the Roles of Education and Family Planning
Bill and Melinda Gates, co-chairs of their Foundation, the most powerful philanthropic force on Earth, gave an hour-long interview on Charlie Rose (PBS) that aired last night. The Foundation aims primarily to remove the threat of dread diseases and improve living conditions for the poorest of the poor, and its emphasis is on malaria, which kills about 600,000 each year, mostly young children.
If we are to succeed in alleviating human suffering in the third world, the real issue isn’t curing disease; it’s generating less suffering in the first place.
It’s hard to sound smart when I’m second-guessing Bill Gates regarding whatever he’s thinking on this or any subject. At this point in his life, he’s tightly focused on his passion to eliminate the diseases that pervade the third world, the most terrible of which is malaria. What could possibly be wrong with that?
I sure wish I had ten minutes with him to make this point: Of the list of the 20 sovereign countries with the highest birth rates on Earth, 19 of them are in sub-Saharan Africa, and his resources would be far better spent addressing the social conditions that cause tens of millions of babies to be conceived each year who are doomed to be malnourished and condemned to die in searing agony. Almost all those who survive their childhood will live in unimaginable levels of poverty, disease, ignorance and squalor. Before they die, however, in most cases they will reproduce themselves with an appalling number of offspring, thus repeating and expanding the cycle.
The 60-minute show last night mentioned contraception for just a few seconds, during which Melinda offered this: a) Finding some means of contraception means that both babies’ and the women’s health are likely to be better, and b) It’s women’s #1 issue. (Yes, that’s right; it’s by far the most important request that women make: Please! Help me stop having so many children!)
In the few moments devoted to the subject, she mused: “It’s weird. When I visit them, all I want to talk about is vaccines; all they want to talk about is contraception.”
But is that really so weird? If I were having those conversations, I’d be inclined to regard them as perfectly rational, though desperate, pleas for help.
Apparently, living under these miserable conditions, and caring about the welfare of their children as only mothers can, means wanting to create fewer of them. Mothers seem to know something that defies our understanding as philanthropists: alleviating suffering means manufacturing less of it. This is what these women are telling us with heart-piercing clarity. Why is this so hard for us to grasp? Why aren’t we listening?
Fortunately, the Foundation has a certain level of focus on education, and obviously that’s better than none at all. But we all need to realize: it’s really the only thing that matters. Educated women have a small fraction of the fertility rate that uneducated women do.
Indeed, if there’s an answer here, it lies in providing a broad level of education for women. Over a period of decades, it has been proven to result in better family planning, far higher personal productivity resulting in higher self-esteem and more focus on the workplace, and, at the end of the day, families that are healthier, stronger, and smaller. If anything about this is “weird,” it’s that we can’t seem to comprehend this concept.
2) Focusing Aid Where It Really Matters
Apparently, United States Secretary of State John Kerry said recently that the U.S. is considering making a major contribution to a fund that would help developing countries deal with both the causes and the effects of climate disruption. Money would go to developing methods of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and improving methods of handling droughts and floods.
This sounds good in principle, but, obviously, the fund is subject to mismanagement—even if all intentions are good and corruption is entirely absent. If I were directing this effort, I would take a very tactical approach, targeting a large number of small villages in many regions of the third world with a very simple toolkit:
- Microgrids based on distributed generation and storage, e.g., solar PV and batteries. (In places that have adequate feedstock, I’d substitute waste-to-energy systems.)
- Highly efficient lighting and computing for homes and schools, and refrigeration for medical clinics
- Aeroponics, a highly cost-effective approach to sustainable agriculture that minimizes the consumption of water and other resources associated with growing large quantities of produce
There are numerous benefits of this “one-size-fits-all” line of attack, and they fall into two groups. In the first group are all the ways in which this approach is highly efficient, i.e., reasons that a very large percentage of money is made available to address the problem. Minimizing the complexity of the solution greatly reduces the amount of administration required for decision-making, purchasing, executing on logistics, training, installation, and maintenance. It also removes a great deal of the potential for pork-barrel spending on items of dubious value. Simultaneously, it maximizes the pace with which we move through the learning curve and develop economies of scale.
In the second group are the numerous social benefits, as the effort “kills many birds with one stone”:
- Reducing deforestation by providing a clean alternative source of energy
- Removing toxic fumes from the burning of kerosene lamps and improving health generally
- Improving education, thus raising human productivity and prosperity, while reducing women’s fertility in the places with the highest rates of population growth
If Mr. Kerry wants to look me up and invite me to participate, I’m not that hard to find.
Again, Emmett, I look forward to any conversations with you and your colleagues that might facilitate aggressive, forward-thinking responses to the matters above, which, in my opinion, are the top priorities vis-à-vis bringing a sustainable approach to our floundering civilization of the 21st Century.
Agreed. On point 1 I would opine that the issue of contraception is best dealt with from a culture other than the USA. At least two generations or so (including mine) need to die off before we get any rational discourse on the subject.
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I like what it says in part 2) “Focusing Aid Where It Really Matters” and I believe having developed a technology designed to empower this approach (as a tool in the toolbox) I’d also welcome Mr. Kerry’s invite to participate and I’ll email my position paper “Designed for fixing the world’s ills” to anyone who requests it by email directed to LBlevins@aaecorp.com.
Right on! In my opinion, the population loading of Planet Earth is the underlying problem (the elephant in the room, so to speak) to all the other major issues we face – climate change, food security, pollution and disease. Education is perhaps the most important tool to address this underlying fact of life (pun intended).
Your points are very important and carry equal weight as those being focused on by the Gates Foundation.
I live in Africa and I can easily see how your points will greatly improve life in both rural and urban areas.
I sincerely hope more NGOs can focus on enabling rural people to benefit from family planning programs available at local clinics. And use technology as a tool for educating people and helping them live more fulfilling lives.
Thanks for your passionate interest in improving the life’s of other people and the health of the planet we all share.
God bless
too bad someone doesn’t have a re-green africa plan. If there was a plan men could not claim to be moral and leave the plan unmentioned
Well said.
Renewables, especially PV solar, can work very well in small villages. Even a small amount of power to enable them to operate a few small LED lights and recharge cell phones can greatly improve their quality of life even if the power is not totally reliable. This has been demonstrated in many places. Of course that is greatly different from providing for the power requirements of large prosperous countries.
Family planning is also important. Whether it would be reasonable for the Gates foundation to be directly involved with family planning is another matter. When U.S. agencies take on family planning they are sometimes accused of trying to weaken a country by depopulating it. Family planning is sometimes seen as part of colonialism.
When families learn that their children will probably survive to adulthood they tend to have fewer children. Thus, the Gates’ foundation, by reducing death and disease, may also reduce the number of children conceived.
There is a lack of information on renewable projects performances carried out in remote locations. From what I know many of them have been executed without much follow up on maintenance and monitoring as soon as the project is completed.
Poorly design systems are never really exposed and no one really learn from mistakes made due to poor design, equipment selection or lack of maintenance. All renewable projects funded by NGO should insist systems providers provide on line monitoring systems for everyone to access and learn from it.
Most projects die a natural death as soon as the battery system fails, there may be a 1001 reason why a battery fails but without reliable data, no one can learn anything from it, including the system designer. Battery failure due to end battery cycle life can be easily dealt with battery regeneration equipment available today. I personally believe the biggest drawback in many renewable projects in remote locations is the premature failure of battery systems.
Be very weary about the Gates Foundation and its vaccines, for more info please check out this link:-
http://www.naturalnews.com/035105_Bill_Gates_Monsanto_eugenics.html
William H. Gates Sr., former head of eugenics group Planned Parenthood
I suspect that you are right about how successful such projects are. Probably there is considerable variability in success.
A solution to providing water was the “play pump”. The idea was that children like merrygorounds and that by connecting them to pumps, plenty of water could be supplied as the children pushed the merrygoround round and round. The technique worked wonderfully well, perhaps even better than all expectations, but then a problem appeared: there was no provision for maintenance, so they soon stopped working. What the current status is I don’t know, but probably a google search would elicit more information.
Clearly solar power systems for use in remote areas have to be well designed for durability and easy maintenance. There also have to be spare parts readily available and people who have the knowledge and skill to maintain the systems else all the effort to instal the systems will be wasted.
It’s fine to have good intentions, but good intentions alone are insufficient. Careful though and planning are essential. Moreover, projects should be of very limited scale until they can be adequately evaluated for long-term effectiveness.
In his own words
Bill Gates one wish http://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates?language=en
http://blog.sungevity.com/index/2010/03/01/bill-gates-one-wish-for-humanity
Craig,
While I applaud your desire to assist third world poverty, I’m afraid your noble intentions and sentiments are just a continuation of the policies that for over half a century condemned have Africa to misery and chaos.
The USA (and this sounds very harsh) should concentrate on solving social problems within the USA before interfering with the problems of societies they neither understand, nor can assist.
Africa, like Asia and South America, have their own problems. Attempting to export Western concepts before the inhabitants of those nations are ready, is pointless and counter-productive.
It’s also arrogant. These independent nations must be allowed to suffer the same privations and bitter lessons that created first world nations.
There are many excellent technologies available, that would greatly assist the peoples of Africa, but they are all pointless without being supported by strong efficient local government, within responsible, well managed economies. None of that’s possible, until the people themselves become responsible for the type of society in which they live, and their children can inherit.
Blaming colonialism, exploitation, consumerism, etc, are all just excuses to portray Africans as ‘victims’ . The allows for a vast industry of noble “do-gooders” to keep them ‘victims’. Interference, evenfrom the best of motives, is just another way to make these societies weaker and more dependent.
It’s the contradictions and patronizing hypocrisy of Western, (particularly American) aid that’s so destructive to third world societies. Americans especially, preach confused philosophies and advice to third world countries.
What built the vast wealth of the US, was the hard work, ruthless exploitation of land and resources, and determination of it’s Northern European pioneers that developed America, and American industrialization. America became a society based on the acquisition of wealth, and civic responsibility of it’s citizens. The pioneers were immigrants who believed that no one would help them, but themselves. That was the pioneering spirit. The US suffered the same as Europe from the devastation of civil disorder, wars, deprivation caused by bad planning, and over-exploitation.
Americans were always sustained by the dream that by, hard work, education and ambition, any citizen could find prosperity in a well ordered society.
Mostly, this was a just an illusion, but it was a strong enough illusion to keep the belief alive in enough citizens that prosperity was a matter of personal responsibility.
Switzerland, is probably the most orderly, prosperous, self reliant nation on the planet. Its citizens enjoy the highest standard of living, democratic freedoms, justice, health, eduction, public services, and social cohesion. But Switzerland’s society was born from the crucible of bitter conflict and civil war, that nearly destroyed the entire population. Like Britain, Switzerland learned from painful experience the lessons of self-reliance, and need for civic cohesion against all foreign influence.
The problems of Africa must be solved by Africans. Well meaning aid workers, are just as weakening to African development, as the old colonial official . In fact, worse ! At least the motives of the old colonial officials were clearly understood.
Well meaning Americans, should look to solving problems within US society, before preaching to others. It’s time to end the blame/victim trap that saps the will of third world nations to solve their own problems. If an African woman has too many children, what business is that of someone who lives in Pleasentville USA ? If Africans kill each other, in brutal civil wars, it’s still not America’s business.
If an African nation finds itself with a repulsive and brutal dictator, it’s the business of that nations people to rise up and remove the despot, not America. It’s always painful to watch the mistakes made by others, but sometimes helping just breeds dependency, worse it breeds a sense of patrimony in the “helper”.
The US was successful in restoring peace and prosperity to Japan, Germany and Italy, even South Korea and Taiwan, because the people of those nations were ready to accept, and implement, Western social and economic values. Africa is not.
I have seen so many projects, both grand and humble fail in Africa. Mostly they fail because they don’t understand the size or diversities of African societies and conditions. Even in settled, advanced African societies like Botswana, most agencies misunderstand the nature of African aspirations.
Africa is a richly endowed continent. It’s cursed by corruption and ignorance. Colonialism didn’t help, as the African learned the worst of western values, without acquiring the best.
The high level of education among the women of Botswana, has led to a lower birth rate, but it’s still the ambition of every woman to be a mother. The fact that women in Botswana live in a relatively free, well organized society, with (by African standards) a low level of corruption, is also a determining factor.
I agree with a great deal with this. In particular, giving things away is antithetical to the concept of establishing commerce. For example, every megawatt of solar we install as an act of philanthropy is a megawatt of solar that a vendor cannot sell.
Needless to say, I disagree that the “ruthless exploitation of land and resources” is a good thing.
You may disagree that the “ruthless exploitation of land and resources” is a good thing.
However, I employed the phrase in the historical context of the 18th, 19th and twentieth century.
The entire progress of Western Civilization and economics (especially American )came about as a result of ” ruthless exploitation”. Those practices may no longer be suitable for the 21st century, but they shaped many of our Western philosophies and achievements.
Broad-acre farming, the taming of wilderness , draining swamps and disease ridden marches, even the reclaiming of land from the sea, developed confidence in our ability to develop technology to ensure long term prosperity. It taught the value of organization and investment.
So did the discovery of energy in the form of coal and oil. These discoveries changed the world as profoundly as the discovery of fire. Industrialization brought huge benefits, both economic and political. The development of technology dramatically increased Western knowledge and education. (It also advanced our ability to kill each other).
We in the West are the heirs to all this struggle and conquest. Those Asian nations that have added Western technology to their own experience of struggle and conflict, acquired independence, without succumbing to the temptation “victim-hood”. Instead they chose progress and prosperity.
Africa has a cargo cult mentality. Western ( especially American ) aid programs try to impose Western values and philosophies on people who have never had the opportunity to learn through bitter experience the price of those values.
No “aid” was given to early American pioneers. Bitter winters, crop failures, and other adversities were overcome by hard work, sacrifice and ingenuity. The pioneers learned self-reliance self-discipline and ambition.
Sometimes a situation has to get so bad, so unbearable, so intolerable before people will sacrifice everything to build a better society. Like a child, some lessons can’t be taught, they just have to be learned the hard way, by bitter experience.
Third world poverty exists in America, and right on America’s doorstep. The US should devote it’s time and energy to assisting the millions of US citizens suffering deprivation with t the US before preaching to others, that which it doesn’t practice in it’s own country.
If the people of Syria want to indulge in a vicious civil war, that’s their own business, not America’s. If Africans continue to slaughter each other, it’s sad, but sometimes necessary, just as casualties are inevitable in war. A decisive,( even if unjust) outcome is preferable to , an endless simmering, debilitating, unresolvable conflict.
America, and Americans, can’t become defacto colonialists. Not without earning the resentment of the local people who see the hypocrisy of American’s assuaging a patronizing guilt complex, while US (and Western) corporations sell the weapons of self-destruction, in return for raw materials.
Most third world nations can understand the corporations whose the motives, while predatory are at least familiar and the desire for profit . What third world citizens really resent is the motives of NGO’s and American aid agencies, who want their souls !
The argument that intervention in Africa etc, is necessary to prevent issues that could affect other nations, (epidemics, migration, environmental practices etc) sound perfectly reasonable. But, once you start to provide aid and interfere with local social organization, (even with the best of intentions) you become responsible for all the outcomes.
Western interference is inevitable. It always follows trade. First comes the welcome trader, the the less welcome trader, then the missionary/aid worker. The local children of the local elite are encouraged to attend Western eductional institutions and return with political philosophies and ideologies, completely unsuited to local cultures.
The smartest learn corrupt practices on a much larger scale. The presence of the missionary/aid worker teaches the local people how poor and backward is the local culture, but offers no replacement, except the worst of Western culture.
The resentment grows. America’s history of third world involvement, is an unhappy record of failure and deprivation. South America, the Caribbean, Philippines, South East Asia , Middle East etc, it’s a long litany of well meaning disasters.
Even when the US supports intervention with military power, its soldiers and politicians lack the commitment and ruthlessness to be effective colonialists. Instead they meddle with local society and culture, and leave only an imitation of the most corrupt aspects of American society. The Americans always mean well, but always results in failure.
Liberia should be a shinning example of American-African cultural achievement. Instead, it’s just another poverty ridden, corrupt, failed state. America’s blundering efforts in Lebanon and Somalia only made the local situation worse, and lessened American prestige.
A harsh and ruthless military intervention, back by determined support for a local, genuinely effective local leader, even if that leader didn’t follow American values or political alignment, would be preferable for the people of Somalia. At least the fundamentals of civic organization could be recommenced and in time society could have developed. With prosperity comes the desire for political freedom.
Probably, America’s only successful interventions have been in Granada, Panama and Chile. In each case the objectives and exit plans had been thought through from the beginning. General Pinochet may not have had a great human rights record, but he did use American (and European) assistance to raise his nation to the status of the only first world economy in South America.
The answer to Africa’s problems is trade, not useless “peace keepers”, or aid workers. Eventually, Africa will sort itself out with its own home grown solutions. In the meantime, international trade keeps African aspirations alive.
Africa’s problems aren’t all political. Like the rest of the world, African nations suffer from increasing loss of tribal identities, loss of cultures and values, urbanization, corruption, lingering effects of old colonial era policies that created artificial countries full of people who hate each other, religious divisions, language, disease, poverty , economic mismanagement, over-population and environmental catastrophes.
These problems must be addressed by Africans, even if with terrible pain and suffering, it must be an African solution.
Craig,
I also disagree with the “ruthless exploitation…” etc.
There are Africans who have been educated in the U.S. Perhaps they are in a better position to solve Africa’s problems than are some of the people in the U.S. who, without adequately studying the situation in Africa, think that they have all the answers. Also, Africa’s problems can spill across borders. For example, if an ebola epidemic were allowed to kill half of the people in Africa, obviously ebola would spill across Africa’s borders and affect people all over the world. Moreover, if Africa used the cheapest and quickest methods to provide more power for its people, CO2 emissions would greatly increase thereby affecting the entire world.
The answer is not to halt all aid to Africa, but rather, to provide aid in a manner that is appropriate for Africa. The idea that we must solve all our own problems first doesn’t make sense since we will never solve all our own problems. Every country has problems and always will, but that does not mean that no country should help another country.
That said, marcopolo has made some good and valid points which should be heeded. It’s just that he’s carried things too far.