NNEMA

11/28/2006

Let there be light.

While this site has a tendency to take pot-shots at the wealthy, this ire is not totally directed to the wealthy, rather it is to the greedy.
One can be wealthy and not greedy. One can also be poor and greedy.
There are many kinds of wealth. There is discovered wealth, invented wealth, inherited wealth, and surely other means.
This is directed to those of us who haughtily claim that their riches are the result of their hard work. And whether or not this hard work included ruthlessness and taking advantage of others, the real conclusion here is that your wealth is a result of the hard work of our whole society. Those who build and maintain our infrastructure, those whose work has made it possible for you to acquire your wealth are just as responsible and deserving of it as you are. For without this infrastructure, this golden playland of opportunity created by us all, you would not have been able to gain these riches.
An excellent book, "Global Survival" edited by Laszlo and Seidel, suggests that part of the blinders on us is the belief that money buys happiness. We are spending our environmental capital and not living off the interest as we should be, while under the delusion that more and more consumption are necessary for us to be happy. Not so, says David Myers in chapter 7, "The simple, stubborn fact is that the Earth cannot indefinitely support our present consumption, much less the expected increase in consumption. For our species to survive and flourish, some things must change."
With an expected doubling of our global population in the next 40 years, and no sign of lessening of energy use, we may be very hard pressed to keep the boat from sinking in the next few short decades.
Mr. Myers' chapter clearly points out that it is not how rich one is, but rather how fulfilling life is that is the real source of happiness.
Soaring wealth and shrinking spirit is as he calls it the "American Paradox."
Yet those who market to us our newer and newer luxuries claim that without economic growth, the world will end.
No no no and No.
The world will end if we do not curb our consumption.

Enough bashing of the economically enhanced, let's talk tools.
Surely you have a flashlight somewhere in the house for those infrequent power outages.
Ours probably has dead batteries, go figure.
In an emergency, it is nice to have a good light source, no matter how small, and the problem of dead batteries is of some concern.
In a functioning world, we merely have to go to the local convenience store and get new batteries.
In a malfunctioning world it may be a lot less simple, especially if the world malfunctions long-term.
We do have new tools to use thanks to our technical planet.
The LED flashlights now available have several advantages. LED's practically last forever, and also they use much less juice to run.
Rechargable batteries are good for many hundreds of recharges. And, while the voltage of a rechargable is typically less than that of an alkaline, (1.2Volts as compared with 1.5) the light they give out is nearly as bright as alkalines. Not too much difference. They work.
Also, solar battery chargers have been available for many years now. A standard solar recharger can fill up 4 batteries in between 8 and 10 hours.
The average disposable battery uses 40 times the energy to make as we get out of it. Not so with rechargables.
Rechargables are much more green, sustainable, and make sense, especially for emergency lighting.
A pocket sized 9-bulb LED flashlight will cost about $7. 8 rechargable batteries will run you about $8 to $10. A pocket sized solar battery charger will cost somewhere around $15. So, for less than $40, you can add to your survival kit a good, reliable, rechargable, long lasting source of illumination for those times when the power goes out, or you find yourself in the boonies, looking for wood in the dark to start a fire. Pretty darned handy, and fairly earth-friendly.

For those of us who don't have the bread to lay out to get a rechargable system, those nice aluminum Mag-type small flashlights will work with LED bulbs instead of those fancy, expensive krypton-type ones which seem to burn out every time you put in new batteries. Buy a white LED bulb from your local electronics store, and if you cut the leads to about1/3 inch, they will plug in directly into the bulb socket (plug). Of course, if the light does not come on, then you probably have the leads reversed. Take out the LED and plug it in the other way. You may have to drill out the reflector, also, because the LED is just slightly larger than the standard bulb. Also, it doesn't hurt to slightly crimp the ends of the leads to ensure good contact into the socket.
This works reasonably well, and makes a servicable light, even tho' it's not extraordinarily bright. Good enough in a pinch.