Visions and Random Reflections

This page is devoted to random reflections that occur on my journey in search of the true nature of energy and the mythical Knowledge Economy. 

Sustainable Energy Forum Postings 2008

Visions -The Nature of Energy.

History reveals that flawed images of energy can destroy civilisations. Could it be that our present images of energy are fatally flawed? Are we missing out on something truly amazing?

This essay began with a simple search to find a definition of energy and soon became an exploration of how we define energy. Could it be our current approach dissociates us from energy and causes us to generate flawed images? Does our application of Science fragment our vision in dangerous ways? Perhaps the wisdom of the ancients can enable us to transcend this fragmentation and enable us to lead more joyful and sustainable lives?

A Wellington Marine Education Centre 

How to design it for the Post Cheap Oil-Gas Age and minimize carbon emissions & SAVE TE RAEKAIHAU POINT

This submission to the Wellington Councils illustrates a five step method of evaluating the sustainability of education resources. It provides a framework that includes the impacts of:

1.  Construction, maintenance and deconstruction

2.  Sustaining comfort levels e.g. heating, cooling, etc

3. Communicating with audience e.g. transport, media etc

4. The "hidden education" framework e.g. situation, design etc

5. Leveraging  off resource by sponsors.

The submission provides this analysis to two sites – the proposed site and an alternative site adjacent to a public transport depot

Visions- A Building Code that Enlightens and Sustains.

Reflections on a workshop for a new New Zealand Code. Key thoughts are the document be designed as an educational document with regulatory elements contained within it. The Building Principles will contain:
 -direct links to the building's environment; 
-value of the building's generating capacity;
-mandates for the study of elementary thermodynamics in our schools:
-mandates for regional research of building construction, use and maintenance.

Visions -Linking Poetry and Physics.

Reflections on The Party's Over
Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies 
by Richard Heinberg
Key thought is that it is insufficient to know what energy does. To effect sustainable change we need to know what energy is also. A sound understanding of physics and our Thermodynamic Beings is essential to know how energy works. However it is the visions of the philosophers and poets expressing what energy is that nourishes the sense of awe and wonderment in us from which respect and care are born.

Prophecies of Doom and Hope. Why we now have an economic recession and how to avoid a long miserable depression.
October 2008

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 Xmas 08

Warning -All material needs editing and reviewing. My apologies for sudden changes in font.