Reply #3: No, it wouldn't [View All]

[Spider Jerusalem]

manufacturing solar panels or photovoltaic cells requires the expenditure of energy, usually from fossil fuels, not only to produce the finished product but to obtain the raw materials (which, for solar panels at least, include petroleum-derived compounds). Solar power = not currently a viable alternative to petroleum. Electric power in general = not currently a viable alternative to petroleum. In fact, to be perfectly brutal, there ARE no viable alternatives, and there is no way that those of us in industrialised nations will be able to continue to enjoy our current way of life if we wish to also reduce carbon emissions; and given depletion of oil reserves, we may not be able to in any case. Yet people still hold out the misguided hope that technology will save us from the error of our ways and allow us to go on much as we have; it would be funny, were it not tragic.