Oil, coal, wind, water and sun. These are the primary sources of energy as used by the industrial and non-industrial nations. I left out slaves for the really non-industrial nations, though I suppose they have to be counted in the overall equation for cheap shoes and knick knacks we buy at tourist trap gift shops.
Energy is a fact of life. Energy is a necessity to fledgling and established industrial societies. And without adequate sources and supplies of energy, economies tend to suck. Hot climates don't have air conditioning. Cold climates don't have heat. There's no light at the end of the darkened hallway, or anywhere along it. Ice cream melts in an icebox that ain't iceboxing 'cuz it ain't got no power to make it icebox and deplete the ozone layer.
But if it's a choice between ice cream or ozone, make mine chocolate, though I'm digressing a tad.
At any rate -- and in the field of energy, that rate is kilowatts, or more -- oil and coal are in abundance, though of varied expenses to extract, and aren't exactly environmentally-friendly. Wind power isn't so bad, except for occasional flocks of birds that get sucked into a wind turbine, with all parts being unequal. Solar power's okay, where there's adequate solar exposure to generate it. Oil seems to be the biggie, and where it's most plentiful -- the Middle East -- it's also controlled by some rather dubious, even undependable sorts who have weird notions about our way of life, and camels.
Democraps want less oil exploration and more alternative fuels looked into. Republican'ts want safer, more dependable access to oil, both at home and abroad. What we of the National Barking Spider Resurgence Party want and believe lies somewhere obtusely in between, kinda sideways sort of: we believe that a renewable energy source is right at hand, in a manner of speaking. It's plentiful. It's generated by the thousands, even millions of cubic tons, daily. Most of it goes to waste, though some serves to create mirth, jokes, clear elevators and let dogs get their owner's chairs.
It's methane, folks. Methane, in the form of flatulence.
I propose to allocate funds to research, to determine how to harness, store, and synthesize methane into useable fuels. Fuels for personal and business transportation, residential and industrial energy, even military applications. Some ideas to explore will include:
- collectors placed in the seats of autos, which feed it to a synthesizer, and in turn powers the auto.
- collectors placed in the seats of commercial aircraft, allowing the passengers to pay their way by fuelling the aircraft in flight, especially on the airline-quality food which has always been a superb methane generator.