We already have the technology to solve our problems

To solve asthma, global warming, housing prices, and a host of social ills that define an unsustainable lifestyle today, policy makers and talking heads resurrect the spectre of future technologies. Electric cars that can go 100 mph for 100 miles will solve asthma, biofuels will solve global warming, 100 mpg or higher CAFE standards and High Speed Rail will connect people better and reduce that bad air travel.

These are all false choices. As the Iraq war drags on against all popular support, we know what problems technology has created, but are unable to acknowledge the problems future technologies will create, or how to solve our problem today. Electric cars will not solve asthma because battery and electricity production move pollution to other sites while tire dust, break lining and other pollutants from traffic take away any benefit for particle emission reduction after all scenarios have been studies (See graphs 24 and 25.)

Time published an excellent article on how biofuels replace established carbon reservoirs that will take 150 to 250 years to replace, much longer than the 50 year time frame we have to address GW, resulting in a more drastic GW future, while killing streams, starving people and the soil, and killing the seas. And higher CAFE standards and HSR only allow people to commute from far away places where we should keep sequestered carbon sequestered, not allow poeple to buy cheap land agricultural land in Tracy or Chico, or cheap forest land in Modesto.

The problem to solve today is how to live on 20% of our infrastructure so that 80% of our fossils fuels can stay in the ground through 2300 AD because of the lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere. Policy makers instead are trying to add infrastructure in the mistaken belief that the carbon we produce today is ok; and going forward we need the latest widget that will produce less carbon than existing technology. We need to take bold steps now that benefit people, the economy and the environment while rolling back carbon in the atmosphere. Now, not in another 20 years.

So stop pushing the next frontier of technology and acknowledge that we are trying to fix the problems that technology has created and new technologies will bring more problems that we don’t have time to fix.

Reduce asthma by drastically reducing todays cars on the road, moving freight to rail AND thus reduce the need for biofuel because we reduce the need for fuel. Create twenty mile per hour high density city cores with higher speed traffic only allowed on trunk arterials outside the core, where dust and carbon and pollution have a minimal impact on fewer people. Link trails up in the dense cores to the landuses of children into an Urban Trail System that takes advantage of the expensive infrastructure in Pedestrian OverCrossings, and use Bicycle Boulevards as urban connectors to open space so that we can eliminate 50% of the trips that are under 2 miles. Create a standard for infrastructure expenditure that looks at the benefit to people, environment, and the enonomy and move projects up based on their sustainable return on investment. Reducing health care costs for reduced pollution and an active population will benefit both people and the environment and help the economy by making local business sustainable