Amazing Energy Facts for Fun and Profit
By Donella Meadows
–February 6, 1992–
One mature tree on the south side of your house provides as much summer cooling as five midsized air-conditioners.
A single open fireplace damper sends eight percent of your heating bill up the chimney.
The television sets of the United States collectively draw the power equivalent of a Chernobyl-sized nuclear plant when they are turned OFF! They use [...]
National Energy Policy — Write Now
By Donella Meadows
–September 5, 1991–
“Now, let me get this straight. Energy efficiency — good. Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge — bad.”
So says President Bush in the men’s room at the end — the very end, as the last credits are rolling — of the movie “Naked Gun 2 1/2.”
I would not have gone to see Naked Gun 2 [...]
Grosscon Versus Defendus for the Third World
By Donella Meadows
–June 6, 1991–
Amulya Reddy, a soft-spoken, urbane professor at the Indian Institute of Science, calls his government’s energy policy GROSSCON — growth-oriented, supply-sided, consumption directed. According to the Oxford Dictionary, Reddy says, “gross” means “flagrant” and “con” means “confidence trick.” The Indian energy policy is not different from the policies of most other nations of the world. That [...]
Energy Ideas from Inside and Outside the Beltway
By Donella Meadows
–May 30, 1991–
Dozens of energy bills are before Congress just now, most of them astonishingly dumb. In spite of vivid demonstrations from the Persian Gulf and from the environment that we need to re-think our energy policy, Congress and the President are still pleasing vested interests and playing short-term politics, rather than designing a sustainable energy future.
George Bush, [...]
Another Fight for the NIMBYs
By Donella Meadows
–May 2, 1991–
There’s an environmental fight brewing in my valley that has all the NIMBYs scrambling. You know — NIMBYs — the Not In My Back Yard folks, often looked upon as selfish obstructionists who try to stop progress by opposing somebody else’s idea of development.
In the current case the “development” is an electric power plant that will [...]
