🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <ndlxsD5yGw6.Hy9@netcom.com>,
Andrew A. Alexis <ndlxs@netcom.com> wrote:
>taylorj@ecs.ecs.csus.edu (Jon M. Taylor) writes:
>> In article <D5q77J.I73@sactoh0.uucp>, Kim A. Berry <kberry@sactoh0.uucp> wrote:
>> 
>> 	*Irrigiation* will poison the topsoil?  Irrigation by itself just
>> means watering.  Are you referring to the water table being contaminated? 
>> Overuse of pesticides?  Overfertilization? 
>> 
>Central Valley and Imperial Valley soils have a lot of salt in them,
>which has to be rinsed out of the soil to grow crops.  

	Much of the agriculte in the CV (rice is the best example) would
not be economically sustainable if not for government subsidies.  This is 
not to say that the CV isn't primo growing land, of course.

[snip]
>San Joaquin River.  It is the Selenium in this waste water that caused
>such grotesque abnormalities in ducks at the Kesterson WIldlife Refuge
>several years ago.

	I didn't live in this area back then - could you give me some 
more info on this?

>> 	Our current worldwide oil reserves have about another 100-150 
>> years left at current consumption rates.  After that, we'll probably end 
>> up going to methanol from corn, assuming no great breakthroughs in 
>> nuclear fusion (cold or otherwise) happen.
>
>The thing that really scares me about methanol and fuel made from crops
>is the economic problems:  if our country went to methanol, all of a sudden
>you have the fuel producers bidding against the food producers for the same
>crops, and food prices would skyrocket.

	Well, I figure by that point most (if not all) of the land
currently used for pasturing cattle will be converted to growing corn for
methanol production.  Right now, we feed the cows off the same land that
feeds humans - if we get rid of the cows, not only do we get a 90% higher
return rate on energy invested in growing the same crops, but a lot of the
land that was used for pasturing cows (and sheep, chickens, etc. as well) 
can be use to grow methanol-producing biomass.  We'll have to get used to 
being vegetarians of course, but I think that's a given already.

>And, I think there is a wide range of estimates of how much oil is left,
>depending on who you are listening to.

	Granted.  If we can develop more efficient coal-processing
technologies, there is still quite a bit of coal left underground.  Shale
oil reserves are greater than current petroleum reserves, I believe. 

-- 
************ Jon Taylor *************************************************
* "For something that has spread with all the forethought of kudzu, the *
* Internet isn't half bad." - Newsweek, 2/27/95 *************************
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