I swear that I never thought I would say this, but We should be emulating Brazil.I know, we all think of Brazil as being a third-world nation, populated by models in bikinis and fat men in speedos*, but it appears that there's a bit more to the nation than most of us thought.
Apparently, (and this is kind of older news - it apparently was announced a few months ago - sorry, running slow 'round here) Brazil has announced that they should be totally energy independent by the end of the year. This means they will not be importing a single barrel of petroleum from outside the nation.
This is huge, absolutely huge.
The US government has spoken of making steps toward energy independence as well, but those steps have not been backed up with a financial committment toward alternative energy sources.
Brazil's path to independence came primarily through a committment to ethanol produced from sugar cane. It's a fuel that the US market is just barely beginning to take advantage of, but we still have a long way to go and a whole lot of stuff that we could learn from Brazil.
* Research shows that this is the dominant impression of Brazil. Studies show it. Seriously, trust me.
Does this mean they'll be giving up their conga lines as means of public transportation as well?
ReplyDeleteNope...conga lines are incredibly efficient means of transportation. They produce almost no greenhouse gases and use very little in the form of fossil fule. If I remember correctly, they're primarily powered by salsa music.
ReplyDeleteah...now, if we could just get them to stop chopping down the rainforest, we could really do something to slow the global warming...I mean, reduction of burning of fossil fuels is one thing, but if we could leave the trees that absorb the CO2 in the first place...then we'd really have something!
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