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The World as Pigsty

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Written by Francis de Winter   
Sunday, 05 January 2014 13:23
We live in curious times. Everywhere you see people turning the world into a pigsty, so that we can continue living like pigs. Many are enthused at the disappearing north polar icecap, for this will allow them to get at the polar oil, and to add still more carbon dioxide and pollution to the atmosphere. Mountaintop removal has become a major industry, for this makes it possible to harvest the local coal, to turn the local scenery into a bleak and sterile moonscape, to pollute the local rivers illegally and essentially forever, and to add still more carbon dioxide and pollution to the atmosphere. Fracking is becoming popular, for this makes it possible to contaminate the groundwater, to cause local earthquakes, to turn the local traffic into a nightmare, to ruin the local scenery and roads, to pollute the local air, to produce more cheap oil and gas, and to add still more carbon dioxide and pollution to the atmosphere. Tar sands make it possible to create huge areas of wasteland, to use lots of outside energy to get the tar sand out of the ground and to prepare and clean the oil for the refining process, to create large polluted ponds that will kill any duck that lands in them, and to add still more carbon dioxide and pollution to the atmosphere. Coal burning power plants make it possible to decrease the air quality all the way across an ocean, to add so much mercury to the air that one can no longer eat much fish, and to add still more carbon dioxide and pollution to the atmosphere. There is a lot of propaganda and political pressure aimed at installing still more nuclear power reactors, despite the problems of Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and Fukushima, the radioactive waste dumps at uranium mines and elsewhere, the unsolved problems of spent fuel and of nuclear proliferation, and the permanent and very harmful radioactive contamination of Iraq through the use of depleted (but still highly radioactive) uranium in the ammunition the United States used in its petroleum war in Iraq.

What can you do about this? You can recognize that humanity is clearly at the beginning of the end of traditional energy sources (fossil fuel energy and nuclear energy), and at the beginning of the permanent age of renewable energy. The proof? The solar and wind energy industry is booming, and the public is enthused about the renewable energy products. Much of the traditional energy industry is in chaos and decline, trying to get a few more decades of enormous profits.

ASES needs to grow, for ASES is still too small, and there are still too few readers of Solar Today, for the US population to become widely aware of the advantages of solar and wind energy, and the terrible disadvantages of the competing energy sources, fossil fuel and nuclear power. You can make a donation to ASES and the money will be used wisely, or you can become an ASES member. You can send your friends a copy of this article, and get them to become a member of ASES or to subscribe to Solar Today. You can buy them a gift membership or a gift subscription, or buy a gift subscription of Solar Today for your public library, or for the library of your local schools or college.

People do not need to become simply passive members of ASES, or passive readers of Solar Today, for there is a lot of work to do. People can become volunteers at the National Solar Tour of ASES in October, at any of the meetings of ASES or its regional chapters, or at the Solar Speakers Programs we hope to set up around the nation. People can also become a part of the ASES do-it-yourself program being planned. Tell us if you are interested in these efforts. ASES hopes to have the best source for solar do-it-yourself projects on its website. The 1970s saw many solar do-it-yourself projects that were sloppy and slovenly, but the ASES projects must be good, worthy of being in any family home in the world. Like the recipes in cookbooks, the instructions must be tested and adjusted or improved before they are published. This will require people to propose projects, and groups of people to get the projects ready for publication. In the near future we will be asking for do-it-yourself project suggestions and project participants.

Stay tuned!

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Résumé of Francis de Winter
Francis de Winter & Associates
3085 Carriker Lane, Bay D
Soquel, California 95073-2077, USA
Contract R&D and Engineering Consultancy in the Thermal Sciences
Phone: +1 831-475-2210; Cell Phone +1 831-295-1100;
E-Mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Employment History:
1988 to Present: Owner of Francis de Winter & Associates, Soquel, CA.
1974 to 1988: President of Altas Corp., Santa Cruz, CA.
1967 to 1974: Member of the Technical Staff, JPL Spacecraft Power Section, Pasadena, CA.
1966 to 1967: Sr. Engineer, Thermo Electron Corp., Waltham, MA.
1961 to 1966: Technical Director of the Thermophysical Property Measurement Dept., and several other technical management positions, Dynatech Corp., Cambridge, MA.

Professional Experience:
Mr. de Winter has specialized in heat transfer and such associated fields as fluid flow and thermodynamics. He has worked on freeze-drying, on the design of instruments for determining thermophysical properties of materials, on thermal control of space vehicles, and on spacecraft power system design, notably the JPL Venus-Mercury flyby (Mariner 10) mission and the JPL Voyager mission to the outer planets (and now to space beyond). The JPL spacecraft power work involved solar photovoltaic, solar thermionic, and radioisotope thermoelectric power system design. In terrestrial solar energy applications, Mr. de Winter has worked on swimming pool heating and domestic water heating, on flat plate collectors and on concentrating collectors, on heat exchangers in solar water heating systems, and on gas water heaters for solar backup service and for stand-alone service. The de Winter "Heat Exchanger Factor" has become a standard part of the solar energy literature, and is used worldwide. He holds two US Patents, has written well over 100 technical articles, has prepared several surveys on solar energy activities, is the editor of the 1990 MIT Press annotated bibliography book on "Solar Collectors, Energy Storage, and Materials," and has edited the proceedings for numerous conferences on solar energy and other energy topics. He was the founder and president of the Altas Corporation, a company involved in contract R&D in solar energy between 1974 and 1988.

Local Civic Activities:
He is a Past Chair of the Energy Advisory Committee, City of Santa Cruz, Calif., Past Commissioner of the County of Santa Cruz Energy Commission, Past Chair, Past Vice Chair and Past Treasurer of the Environmental Council of Santa Cruz County, and Past Chair of the Board of Directors of the Open Space Alliance of Santa Cruz County.

Professional Society Activities:
Elected in late 2010 for a fifth term (of three years) as Member of the Board of Directors, International Solar Energy Society (ISES). Past Member, Board of Directors, American Solar Energy Society (ASES) (1976 - 1991), elected to the ASES Board again in 2012, and elected as Vice-Chair of ASES in 2013. Other positions held in ASES include Past Chairman (1978, 1982, 1984, 1985), Past Vice-Chairman (1980), and Past Treasurer (1981, 1988-1991). Mr. de Winter has been involved in many committees in ISES as well as ASES. He was Finance Chairman for the 1991 ISES World Congress in Denver, Colorado, Chairman of the 1986 ASES Annual Meeting in Boulder, Colorado, Technical Program Chairman for the 1978 ISES World Congress in New Delhi, and he was for many years a Member of the Finance Committee of ASES. He is a past Member of the Board of Directors of the Solar Lobby. He is the 1983 recipient of the ASES Charles Greeley Abbot Award, a member of the Solar Energy Hall of Fame since 1985, was designated Pioneer in the Field of Renewable Energy at the World Renewable Energy Congress in Denver in 1996, and is a Fellow of ASES.

Educational Background:
Primary - Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and Buenos Aires, Argentina
Secondary - Buenos Aires, Argentina
B.S. (1958), M.S. (1960), Mechanical Engineer (1961), all in the Department of Mechanical Engineering of MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA

Languages:
Fluent in Dutch, Spanish, and English. Working knowledge of French.
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The World as Pigsty
By Francis de Winter
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
December 16, 2013
Submitted for the Solar Today Magazine of the American Solar Energy Society (see http://www.ases.org)
Already published in the internet edition of Solar Today
See http://solartoday.org/2013/12/the-world-as-pigsty/ , in a somewhat edited version

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