timesonline.co.uk— Britain's armed forces could acquire a new tinge of green under plans to end the military dependency on fossil fuels.
Apr 27, 2008View in Crawl 4
this isn't going to happen anytime soon, if ever. nobody really knows how successful alternative energy research will be until the research has been conducted.
To be honest, nobody knows how successful any form of research will be until the research has been conducted. Nobody knew if nuclear power could be successful until we funded and stuck with the research that took the theories and made them practical. We've blown tens of billions of dollars on fusion research, and it's still "50 years off", and can't sustain a break-even generation rate for more than a few seconds. But we're still funding fusion research with far more money than we're funding research for improving wind and solar and other renewables that can start yielding power even with current technology, and find ourselves importing the best turbines from the Germans and the Danes and many of our solar thermal systems from the Spanish and the Israelis, even though the technologies for both were originally invented here.
The cost of research in the US, and many other countries, is supported in staggering proportion by the military. In this case, at least it has the possibility of benefiting the rest of us, instead of killing us.Not that that is their intention, mind you.
A good deal of the worlds great technological advancements have come from the military and space programs. Maybe competition here will come up with something good for civilian use.
bosssmileyApr 28, 2008
Great, now if they could only stop using the MoD budget as a slush fund for BAE...
Closed AccountApr 28, 2008
this isn't going to happen anytime soon, if ever. nobody really knows how successful alternative energy research will be until the research has been conducted.
berkanaApr 28, 2008
To be honest, nobody knows how successful any form of research will be until the research has been conducted. Nobody knew if nuclear power could be successful until we funded and stuck with the research that took the theories and made them practical. We've blown tens of billions of dollars on fusion research, and it's still "50 years off", and can't sustain a break-even generation rate for more than a few seconds. But we're still funding fusion research with far more money than we're funding research for improving wind and solar and other renewables that can start yielding power even with current technology, and find ourselves importing the best turbines from the Germans and the Danes and many of our solar thermal systems from the Spanish and the Israelis, even though the technologies for both were originally invented here.
thcobbsApr 28, 2008
Everyone has been pointing out that our growth as a species IS unsustainable.
alwaysawakeApr 28, 2008
The cost of research in the US, and many other countries, is supported in staggering proportion by the military. In this case, at least it has the possibility of benefiting the rest of us, instead of killing us.Not that that is their intention, mind you.
mrhappymanApr 28, 2008
A good deal of the worlds great technological advancements have come from the military and space programs. Maybe competition here will come up with something good for civilian use.