Sustainable Energy

The Gardens of Paradise would give us all the energy we need if we would choose to live harmoniously.

"Sustainable" in this sense of ecological sustainability is about whether or not we're using resources within the limits of ecological regeneration… "are we cutting down trees faster than they can grow?" is an oversimplification to the point of being misleading and wrong, in essence you could look at it that way but there are terribly problematic timber plantations which meet the letter of that definition by "harvesting at the rate of regrowth" but which should not be considered sustainable by reasonable sense of the word. This needs to be better contextualized: within an ancient forest and divine harmony with the ecosystems, cutting only within this regenerative measure without killing the broader ecosystems or having otherwise adverse affect on the ecosystem.

Some problematic uses of the word exist

"Greenwash" has furthered the meaninglessness of words. With products to sell, the word "sustainable" is applied as a "positive attribute" in the advertisement and labels/packaging and such to con people into buying the product rather than to accurately describe the products of products. There's a spectrum of fraudulence in this area, from baseless claims of "eco-sustainable-whatever" to claims whose quantitavive improvement is too insignificant for the qualitative benchmark of ecological sustainability.

Few people comprehend the supply chains that must be calculated in order to measure the energetic-ins-and-outs which determine "sustainability".

Many "less bad" alternatives are falsely sold as "sustainable".

This problem can be seen profoundly with electric cars being promoted as sustainable when car-less villages is what's needed to achieve sustainability. Promoting electric cars "green" "eco" is delusional … nothing of the electrical grid charging the cars is sustainable, nothing of the manufacturing lifecycle is sustainable, nothing of the transportation infrastructure required by cars is sustainable. Anyone promoting electric cars as part of a sustainability "solution" is solving nothing and worsening the problem.

"Heat pumps" are another instance of product that gets hyped as "eco-friendly" in a market of "sustainable technologies", while it simply shouldn't even exist. "Heat pumps" exist because manufacturers want to sell products and consumers don't know any better option. The production and operation of these products called "heat pumps" (sometimes geothermal heatpumps) is such a highly over-engineered "solution", an innappropiate application of technology, sufficiently far from actually being a sustainable energy solution that we should consider them in the realm of absurd. This absurdity is due to the terribly problematic focus on individual living units rather than broader community developments, a scale at which achieving sustainability is simply not possible. One of the featured synergies is the elimination of the heating system altogether, that is a solution in this regards. Harmonodes utilize geothermal energy without the overcomplication of manufactured apparatuses, the building-as-mountain-as-organism has its own pumping circulatory effect through design.

What sustainability actually looks like in terms of energy

Staying warm all spring, winter and fall and cool in the summer without energy inputs like electricity and heating fuel, while being done in a way that's harmonious, beautiful and joyous — this is the kind of benchmark that defines a "sustainability" worthy of the word.

Getting all your food, clothing, energy and building materials from your neighborhood gardens — this is essential.

To attain our energy needs in a sustainable way we need these technologies:

That's all the energy needed to meet human needs. It can all come from the neighborhood gardens.

Stop thinking in terms of electricity

Electricity is ommitted from this list very intentionally. It's crucial to look at the essential purposes of which particular human needs we're providing for, and strategizing to do so in the most effective and efficient way possible. This means: stop thinking of electricity as a focal point of energy use. Electricity is neither efficent nor effective when it comes to the basic utility needs that we have.

Stop thinking about solar panels, wind turbines, and so forth, as this way of thinking fails to deliver viable solutions. Only very small amounts of electricity are "needed" and what's actually needed is better attained without electrical systems.

Solutions for the sustainability crisis are a matter of developing optimal human habitat, not finding a magical supply of electricity for an insatiable pattern of consumption.

And forget about automobiles

You poor sheep. Cars don't belong within healthy human villages. To LOVE paradise means: don't destroy it. And since it's too late for that we need to create it from this wreckage, that means eliminating automobile transit from the design equation.

The research and development priorities outlines a more detailed focus on technologies needed for a sustainable prosperity.