Rob
The New York Times did a post on polar cities here: Take a look. These come way after transition towns, an idea who time has come, transition towns that is. a great idea. i applaud you and support you. But after transition towns, there will come polar towns, and that’s 30 more generations down the road. Of course, nobody wants to listen to me, except for a few people here and there. You? Do you “get” what I am doing with polar cities? I think you don’t really care….

Danny

http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/03/30/polar-cities-a-haven-in-warming-world/#comments

Two things: first, great post, humorous, yes.

1. i think this was just a PR hustle for the hotel chain, i mean they don’t seriously plan this hotel on moon, it is just PR to drum up business for their hotel chain on earth now, it’s about using PR to make money here and now. But a good hoot of a silly story. SIGH.

2. but since you like that photo, i wonder if you can blog one day, and use one image from my website of polar cities, to do a humorous blog on polar cities, why you might think this is another stupid useless idea, a stupid fire exit of an idea, or maybe, an idea that resonates with you, NOt for use now, but for maybe in the future, 500 years down the road? Can you blog on this yes or no? I fear you might be in denial about polar cities…..can you answer me yes or no? None of my emails seem to get through to you…

http://pcillu101.blogspot.com

i am at

danbloom GMAIL

door always open 24- 7

I’ve just finished reading Red Mars (the first in the series) and really enjoyed most of it (although it does have too much techno detail its easy to skim those bits if they get too much).

A couple of my good friends were both totally inspired by the Mars Trilogy (“Espian” Tav, and OSB Marketing Manager at solarcentury).

Something I recently discovered is that KSR lives at Village Homes in Davis, California.

This made me smile because it meant that, indirectly, me and my friends were all inspired by the same thing: reading about Village Homes in chapter 5 of Natural Capitalism was what first got me into ecovillages

Anyway, Rob, are you sure this isn’t just a joke like story like your Slug Story? In this case generating lots of free press!

And does the end of the Age of Cheap Oil necessarily mean the end of Cheap Energy?

Isn’t Concentrated Solar Power not a proven technology for scalable renewable energy generation?

Sure, reconfiguring the whole economy for a world without cheap oil won’t be easy (a lot of new infrastructure will needed), but surely it can be done?

Whatever happened to your going on a nice holiday analogy?

Smiles,

Josef.

Graham, yes, the Mars trilogy is really heavy going and full of techno-babble. I recommend his novel “Antarctica” which is shorter, set in the nearer future, on planet earth, in… well, you can guess where. A great permaculture novel, IMHO.

I especially love his metaphor for the near future, of Shackleton’s miraculous rescue of his entire expedition by crossing the Southern Ocean in an open boat, navigating to South Georgia and getting across the uncharted mountains to a Norwegian whaling station… inspiring stuff.

I have not read Kevin Scott Polk’s book “Gaiome: Notes on Ecology, Space Travel and Becoming Cosmic Species” – has anyone else? I’d love to see a review from an energy descent perspective?

I’m really more interested these days in “life on earth” than “life on mars” (Although Bowie and Attenborough are both still heroes for more than one day). I wonder though whether humanity was Gaia’s shot at seeding Gaian consciousness off Terra, and we (the human system within Gaia) blew it.

That’s perhaps a little too anthropcentric. Perhaps humans and life like us are just some of the universe’s pioneer species and cosmic succession will later lead to other seres – climax galaxies?

They’re swearing the answer for India is “solar satellites”, beaming the power to earth.

Apart from the fact that every analysis ever done has shown that it would be just jaw-droppingly expensive- there are still two problems.

One is- hey, you’re increasing the heat load on Earth, which we don’t really need. To heck with the carbon, let’s just go straight to heat pollution!

And- they will “beam” it back with a “maser” – the microwave version of a laser.

Ok. So this beam is hitting the receiver on the ground… until-! you have a computer glitch, or the watch-team gets drunk- and the beam starts to wander- frying everything it hits. Death ray, forsooth. Ok, not often- but once is probably more than enough- and given time; it would happen.

SUCH a good idea! SUCH a great use of resources!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraterrestrial_real_estate

“The prohibition of national appropriation [of outer space and celestial bodies] … precludes the application of any national legislation on a territorial basis to validate a ‘private claim’. Hence, it is not sufficient for sellers of lunar deeds to point to national law, or the silence of national authorities, to justify their ostensible claims. The sellers of such deeds are unable to acquire legal title to their claims. Accordingly, the deeds they sell have no legal value or significance, and convey no recognized rights whatsoever.”

Premier Inns will never build such a hotel. They have however bought a lot of cheap publicity and PR with their supposed Moon Hotel Plans. They say £1million – hah!

http://www.lunarregistry.com/land/

1 Acre (43560 square feet) for around £15 plus shipping (ha ha- I’d like to see the Ryal Mail deliver that one.)

As far back as feudal times and perhaps further those with power (armour and a horse) have taken land by force and then invented laws to keep it. It need a whole sales reversal to set up a patchwork of small holdings if we are to seriouls localise food production.

If you would like to visit my moon and are worried about the peak oil travel costs, hitch a lift on the back of a cow.

x steve