EVERY DAY IS SUN DAY – A GENTLE MOONLIT RANT

The person who binds herself to Joy

Doth the winged life destroy:

But the person who kisses the Joy as it flies

Lives in Eternity’s sunrise.

 

William Blake

 

This post was largely written soaking up the morning sunshine. It’s evening now, and not so different than a few nights ago when Francis and I experienced this full moon.

 

While camping out or spending a night in the countryside, have you ever noticed how well you can see by the light of that silvery moon? It’s really just a celestial solar powered light bulb.  An effective solar reflector indeed.

 

Although moonlight is best unadulterated, we added some extra illumination for effect. . . 

 

Listen to cosmologist Brian Swimme:

One of the gifts of science is in understanding that life exists by drawing in the sun; one of the gifts of science is to realize that what is surging through us in every moment of our life, with every breath we take, is the sun. So in a real sense the human is the human form of a solar flare. It is surging into the life of the Earth, and in all beings, in the fish, in the mammals, and in the human we have another form of the energy that first was captured by the early photosynthetic organisms. We are the sun in a new form.

 

Wow – I guess that’s why people called me sunny when I was a kid. . .

 

Fifty three years onwards, modern civilization now begins our long awaited embrace of the sun.

Solar power is one of the fastest growing energy sectors on the planet, growing exponentially as it becomes more economical. Compare this to fossil fuels with its dwindling supply and rising expense. Completing the equation is the incredible un-accounted costs of climate change. . .

Meanwhile, the average US taxpayer pays almost 100 times as much in subsidies for fossil fuels than for solar energy. 

Lets not be fooled.  Our whole lives and economy are based upon reliable sources of energy. Up until recently that’s been oil, but now the sun is setting – once and for all on hydro carbons.

 

Picture this editorial cartoon, which I can’t reproduce due to copyright issues.

An executive sits behind a desk with a Big Oil nameplate, and the man says:

You want Coal? We own the mines.
You want oil and gas? We own the wells.
You want nuclear energy? We own the uranium.
You want solar power? We own the er..ah..
Solar power isn’t feasible.

 

Ya right. . .  Am I imagining things? 

Like this chicken – or maybe it’s an egg. Fran cooked one in the Sun Oven the other day.

 

 

 

What about our solar electric array?

Do the windows  help passively solar heat our home? Well today they didn’t because it was hot outside so we opened the windows and created a cooling cross ventilation.

 

Look at this black tank behind glass. We have been using this solar batch heater since 1986. It was 2 years old then. That’s 30 years of hot water. Solar energy isn’t feasible, eh?

 

Here’s some facts from Wikipedia :

The total solar energy absorbed by Earth’s atmosphere, oceans and land masses is approximately 3,850,000 exajoules per year. In 2002, this was more energy in one hour than the world used in one year. . . The amount of solar energy reaching the surface of the planet is so vast that in one year it is about twice as much as will ever be obtained from all of the Earth’s non-renewable resources of coal, oil, natural gas, and mined uranium combined.

 

Considering this, Stanford University professor Mark Jacobsen came up with a scenario for California to be completely independent of fossil fuels or nuclear energy by the year 2050. . .

 

 

Amazing. eh?

Lets do it.

 

 

In this world of so much strife, danger and cynicism, let’s remember not to be blind or ignorant. The world is also filled with goodness, creativity, and love.

As you can see, even from this moonlit reflection –  The Solar Age is Dawning.

 

Arundhati Roy puts it this way. . .

Not only is another world possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.

 

Photo by Daniel Hui

Peace to all ~

 

Bruce

 

 

 

 

 

Tags: Brian Swimme, moonlit night, solar batch heater, SOLAR HOMES, sun oven, transition to renewables

• July 15, 2014
• appropriate technology, gardens, poetry +, Politics, Renewable Energy, SOLAR HOMES, Spirituality, Sustainability....., writing
• 28 Comments