August 17th, 2010

A contentious cartoon about renewable energy

by Alex Hallatt

This cartoon raised the ire of some readers, because Hector can’t really think of why he doesn’t support renewable energy and flippantly says it’s because it looks funny. Of course there are problems with the efficiency of wind and solar and in storing that energy, but it is still early days for the renewables industry. If half as much money invested in fossil fuel and nuclear research had been used to subsidise wind and solar in the last fifty years, we would be seeing much better wind and solar energy generation.

I would be happy to have solar panels or a wind turbine in my back yard. I wouldn’t want nuclear.

Update: there is an uplifting article in the NYT about how Portugal has made a major switch to renewables.