DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
3/25/2011
Energy in the Philippines is indeed the highest in Asia and one of the most dependent on outside sources. If those of you in the Meralco (Manila Electric Co.) franchise area, comprising almost 70 percent of all electricity consuming households and industries, have noticed an apparent lowering of power rates the past month, it’s definitely not because of that utility company’s lower distribution rates that are fixed at an exorbitant amount.
Under the prevailing system, which is based on the totally distorted Performance Based Rate-setting scheme of the Energy Regulatory Commission, even as exchange rates affect the generation charge significantly (as does the weather), the overcharging in distribution, supply and metering will simply stay the same and continue to be a festering issue for consumers.
Still, despite the high power costs, very little new power plants have been set up. An oft-cited but scarcely explained excuse is that so-called “investors” have only been able to take over decades-old thermal, hydro and geothermal plants — which is why a revival of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) has been repeatedly proposed, supposedly to make up for the lack.
The ongoing Fukushima nuclear crisis has undoubtedly put the brakes on the BNPP revival plan for now. Its proponent, Mark Cojuangco, has declared a momentary freeze on it as anti-nuke detractors are having a field day lambasting nuclear power, with many otherwise sane people falling into the bandwagon of recoiling from all things nuclear.
One particular individual I berated for this panic reaction (who praised an inveterate obfuscator, Gloria Arroyo economic adviser Joey Salceda, for hurriedly issuing a mea culpa for his previous support for the BNPP revival plan) has shown that we all need to counter whatever irrational, unscientific, as well as opportunistic responses there are from loudmouths who only seek to get on the good side of a nuke-fearing public at the height of the current scare.
Although I, too, am against the revival of the BNPP and have relentlessly pushed for the doubling of this country’s geothermal capacity, I am also against the “nuke from the hip” stance of opponents of fission-based power because there is a real scientific alternative.
On my Global News Network TV show last Tuesday, I invited the eminent Filipino physicist, Dr. Roger Posadas, former Chancellor of the University of the Philippines (UP), who still teaches science courses at the premier state university. In particular, I was interested to bring to the public his knowledge of an old alternative in nuclear power which the US and the other nuclear nations never developed because, in contrast to uranium fuel-based nuclear reactors that were preferred because these offered weapons grade by-products, this other nuclear fuel promised non-proliferation, given its non-weapons grade waste materials.
This material for fuel is none other than “Thorium” (symbol Th, number 90 on the Periodic Table of Elements), an element that is four times more abundant in nature than uranium and available in large quantities, such as in the monazite sands of Palawan.
Thorium reactors were already operating in experimental models in the 1950s when the world was still in the idyllic post-war period of the “Atoms for Peace” program; but the US was at a crossroads then between genuine use of atomic knowledge for peace and its necessity for political power. The latter won out, of course, and uranium-based nuclear reactors became de rigueur as the sole technology for all US nuclear power plants despite all the inherent dangers and highly radioactive wastes that take 10,000 years to decay (which moreover require astronomically expensive facilities to store and contain).
The thorium alternative’s advantage when compared to uranium as fuel is briefly summarized by Turkish nuclear expert Ayhan Demirbas and quoted on Wikipedia: “Weapons-grade fissionable material (U-233) is harder to retrieve safely and clandestinely from a thorium reactor; thorium produces 10 to 10,000 times less long-lived radioactive waste; thorium comes out of the ground as a 100 percent pure, usable isotope, which does not require enrichment, whereas natural uranium contains only 0.7-percent fissionable U-235; thorium can not sustain a nuclear chain reaction without priming, so fission stops by default… unlike uranium-based breeder reactors, thorium requires a start-up by neutrons from a uranium reactor… (with experts noting that) ‘the second thorium reactor may activate a third thorium reactor’… (which) could continue in a chain of reactors for a millennium if we so choose’… (thereby adding) that because of thorium’s abundance, it will not be exhausted in 1,000 years.”
So, there’s nuclear power apart from uranium after all; and that’s thorium.
At the end of my one hour-program with Dr. Roger Posadas, I summed up my view: Push geothermal, study thorium. But Dr. Posadas was far ahead. He wants UP to restore the Nuclear Physics studies that were scrapped after the BNPP was mothballed. He also wants the country to “leapfrog” into thorium energy technology development in order to join China and India in the race to produce the first commercially-viable thorium power plant, which can be as small as 1 megawatt to as large as 1 gigawatt, and be as democratic as geothermal power.
I proposed that we start an advocacy and educational movement for the thorium alternative, and there is an international Thorium Energy Alliance (TEA) to link up with. Among other things, reducing fossil fuel, coal and other polluting energy sources will significantly reduce medical costs for lung problems that are currently costing billions annually. For this and several other compelling reasons, we have to start this initiative NOW.
(Tune in to Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM dwAD; TNT with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “The Merci Show and Other Zarzuelas;” visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our articles plus select radio and GNN shows)
Friday, March 25, 2011
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Why Merci will be acquitted
Alan F. Paguia
Former Professor of Law
Ateneo Law School
University of Batangas
Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila
alanpaguia@yahoo.com
March 22, 2011
Merceditas Gutierrez, who is claiming to be Ombudsman, will be ACQUITTED.
14 Senators have disqualified themselves by publicly recommending the impeachment of Merci and necessarily lost the APPEARANCE of the "cold neutrality of an impartial judge"- thereby giving her the defense of NONCOMPLIANCE with due process of law. This is if we follow the logic of the prosecution which ASSUMES that Merci is still the Ombudsman.
The fact is she merely inherited her TENURE of about 4 years from Simeon Marcelo's constitutional 7-year TERM - which expired, by operation of law, on November 2009.
After the said EXPIRATION, Merci's official acts were done WITHOUT JURISDICTION, and therefore, VOID from the beginning.
Hence, the current impeachment process appears to be a grand COVER UP of her illegal acts by those who, directly or indirectly, benefitted therefrom.
Who are those powerful or influential beneficiaries?
The Filipino people must know.
Former Professor of Law
Ateneo Law School
University of Batangas
Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila
alanpaguia@yahoo.com
March 22, 2011
Merceditas Gutierrez, who is claiming to be Ombudsman, will be ACQUITTED.
14 Senators have disqualified themselves by publicly recommending the impeachment of Merci and necessarily lost the APPEARANCE of the "cold neutrality of an impartial judge"- thereby giving her the defense of NONCOMPLIANCE with due process of law. This is if we follow the logic of the prosecution which ASSUMES that Merci is still the Ombudsman.
The fact is she merely inherited her TENURE of about 4 years from Simeon Marcelo's constitutional 7-year TERM - which expired, by operation of law, on November 2009.
After the said EXPIRATION, Merci's official acts were done WITHOUT JURISDICTION, and therefore, VOID from the beginning.
Hence, the current impeachment process appears to be a grand COVER UP of her illegal acts by those who, directly or indirectly, benefitted therefrom.
Who are those powerful or influential beneficiaries?
The Filipino people must know.
Monday, March 21, 2011
Agnotological war
DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
3/21/2011
Agnotology is a neologism on the study of culturally-induced ignorance or doubt, particularly as this relates to the publication of inaccurate or misleading scientific data. And since the press and media shape 70 percent of what’s known to be culture and knowledge today, it would be more accurate to also include media-induced ignorance through their selective information and news.
In the three literally burning issues of the day, many problems in people’s understanding of the truth are symptomatic of the agnotological conditions perpetrated by news media and the dominant information system hegemonies of the world. From the Fukushima crisis in Japan, to the Libyan struggle in North Africa, to the pro- and anti-nuclear as well as the pro- and anti-Merci impeachment debates in our own setting, the deliberate inducement of ignorance have all led to adverse consequences for people everywhere.
In the nuclear fall-out crisis stemming from the Fukushima reactors’ failures and radiation emissions, we find a culturally-induced ignorance of the Japanese people toward complacency with regard to their authorities’ abuses and unreliability. Japanese power plant officials, for one, kept everyone ignorant of very vital information.
In the first few days, no one was given an inkling as to the enormity of the problem. It was only when one nuclear reactor after another gave way that a clear admission that at least four of them were in really serious trouble came out. Despite this, the Japanese continued to be very trusting of their nuclear authorities, even after threatening radiation levels reached beyond the 20 to 30-mile radius.
What we’re witnessing here is a case of “structured ignorance.” It took criticism from cultures less trusting of authorities against Japan’s niggardly crisis updates to alert everyone of the mortal dangers in this unfolding crisis. Still, this hasn’t been the worst of the lot.
In the case of Libya , where media-induced ignorance through blatant misinformation and disinformation are being used to justify a foreign-backed coup d’etat and eventual Nato oil and land grab, so-called “Allied” fighter jets are now pounding on Tripoli as of posting time.
Al Jazeera was at the forefront of this disinformation and misinformation campaign, starting with its unsubstantiated reports (and later proven false by Russian satellite monitoring) of Gaddafi forces and war planes mowing down unarmed civilian demonstrators. In all video docus from Libya I have seen, the anti-Gaddafi forces were always heavily armed. While there are those who see Al Jazeera as an alternative to CNN and BBC, it actually plays a complementary role through its more subtle information subversion as it appears to be less pro-West than it actually is.
Al Jazeera, for instance, pumped up demonstration casualties to “thousands,” even when these later turned out to be only over a hundred. Such exaggeration was especially blatant considering the fact that even as the turmoil in Libya entered its third week, with a full scale battle in the city of Misrata, the real casualty figure there numbered only 25.
By and large, Al Jazeera’s interviews and panel discussions hardly ever feature the side of Gaddafi or the voices of pro-Gaddafi people on the ground. And as the Gaddafi counter-offensive gained ground, it became clear, too, that the alleged “total loss of popular support” for the Libyan strongman was completely false. Yet, Al Jazeera’s on-site reporters kept on annotating their news with a blatant anti-Gaddafi virulence.
One of the most obvious lies Western media and the anti-Gaddafi forces tried to foist on the world in the first week of the conflict was that the Libyan opposition movement abhors foreign intervention even to support its cause. But not long after Gaddafi’s counter-offensive successes and before the UN “No Fly Zone” resolution, the anti-Gaddafis in Benghazi were literally begging for it and jubilated when Nato promised to start arming them and bombing pro-Gaddafi Libyans for a grand bloodbath of Arab blood.
With Nato and monarchist anti-Gaddafi forces collaborating, an oil and land grab that will “Balkanize” Libya isn’t too far in the horizon. But more devastation will follow, just as what invading forces did to Iraq.
As the world continues to be kept ignorant of the systematic destruction of the cultural heritage and infrastructure of Iraq by its occupying forces, this is the crux of what Felicity Arbuthnot wrote in a recent article about Libya: The bombing of Libya will begin on or nearly to the day of the 18th anniversary of the beginning of the destruction of Iraq, 19th March (in Europe). Libya, too, will be destroyed — its schools, education system, water, infrastructure, hospitals, and municipal buildings. There will be numerous “tragic mistakes” and “collateral damage,” involving mothers, fathers, children, babies, grandparents, the blind and the deaf, and so on. And like the wonders of past empire’s remains, as with these nations’ rich histories (Iraq and Afghanistan), Libya’s, too, will be gone… forever.
Finally, let’s apply this agnotology to the Philippine setting: The debates between pro- and anti-nuclear power advocates, same with pro- and anti-Merci Gutierrez impeachment proponents simply reveal that both sides are wrong. In the former instance, all of them are all deliberately leaving out geothermal power in their discussions. This, despite a 2010 report by the World Geothermal Congress that total potential of the world for geothermal energy “…is equivalent to 40,000 GW while the total world energy demand (today) is equivalent to 15,000 GW.”
Both the pro- and anti-nuclear power lobbies are definitely creating ignorance of the only true alternative — geothermal energy, of which the Philippine has limitless potential.
Meantime, in the Merci impeachment moro-moro, the nation is being kept ignorant of the fact that both sides are similarly corrupted and will never work to sustain the “Rule of Law” when they all threw this away and resorted to the “Rule of Force” in the case of President Joseph Estrada.
Truly, the facts are there for all to see; and only an agnotological media will continue to befuddle the issues to the people’s detriment.
(Tune in to Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM dwAD; TNT with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “Energy Futures;” visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our articles plus select radio and GNN shows)
Herman Tiu Laurel
3/21/2011
Agnotology is a neologism on the study of culturally-induced ignorance or doubt, particularly as this relates to the publication of inaccurate or misleading scientific data. And since the press and media shape 70 percent of what’s known to be culture and knowledge today, it would be more accurate to also include media-induced ignorance through their selective information and news.
In the three literally burning issues of the day, many problems in people’s understanding of the truth are symptomatic of the agnotological conditions perpetrated by news media and the dominant information system hegemonies of the world. From the Fukushima crisis in Japan, to the Libyan struggle in North Africa, to the pro- and anti-nuclear as well as the pro- and anti-Merci impeachment debates in our own setting, the deliberate inducement of ignorance have all led to adverse consequences for people everywhere.
In the nuclear fall-out crisis stemming from the Fukushima reactors’ failures and radiation emissions, we find a culturally-induced ignorance of the Japanese people toward complacency with regard to their authorities’ abuses and unreliability. Japanese power plant officials, for one, kept everyone ignorant of very vital information.
In the first few days, no one was given an inkling as to the enormity of the problem. It was only when one nuclear reactor after another gave way that a clear admission that at least four of them were in really serious trouble came out. Despite this, the Japanese continued to be very trusting of their nuclear authorities, even after threatening radiation levels reached beyond the 20 to 30-mile radius.
What we’re witnessing here is a case of “structured ignorance.” It took criticism from cultures less trusting of authorities against Japan’s niggardly crisis updates to alert everyone of the mortal dangers in this unfolding crisis. Still, this hasn’t been the worst of the lot.
In the case of Libya , where media-induced ignorance through blatant misinformation and disinformation are being used to justify a foreign-backed coup d’etat and eventual Nato oil and land grab, so-called “Allied” fighter jets are now pounding on Tripoli as of posting time.
Al Jazeera was at the forefront of this disinformation and misinformation campaign, starting with its unsubstantiated reports (and later proven false by Russian satellite monitoring) of Gaddafi forces and war planes mowing down unarmed civilian demonstrators. In all video docus from Libya I have seen, the anti-Gaddafi forces were always heavily armed. While there are those who see Al Jazeera as an alternative to CNN and BBC, it actually plays a complementary role through its more subtle information subversion as it appears to be less pro-West than it actually is.
Al Jazeera, for instance, pumped up demonstration casualties to “thousands,” even when these later turned out to be only over a hundred. Such exaggeration was especially blatant considering the fact that even as the turmoil in Libya entered its third week, with a full scale battle in the city of Misrata, the real casualty figure there numbered only 25.
By and large, Al Jazeera’s interviews and panel discussions hardly ever feature the side of Gaddafi or the voices of pro-Gaddafi people on the ground. And as the Gaddafi counter-offensive gained ground, it became clear, too, that the alleged “total loss of popular support” for the Libyan strongman was completely false. Yet, Al Jazeera’s on-site reporters kept on annotating their news with a blatant anti-Gaddafi virulence.
One of the most obvious lies Western media and the anti-Gaddafi forces tried to foist on the world in the first week of the conflict was that the Libyan opposition movement abhors foreign intervention even to support its cause. But not long after Gaddafi’s counter-offensive successes and before the UN “No Fly Zone” resolution, the anti-Gaddafis in Benghazi were literally begging for it and jubilated when Nato promised to start arming them and bombing pro-Gaddafi Libyans for a grand bloodbath of Arab blood.
With Nato and monarchist anti-Gaddafi forces collaborating, an oil and land grab that will “Balkanize” Libya isn’t too far in the horizon. But more devastation will follow, just as what invading forces did to Iraq.
As the world continues to be kept ignorant of the systematic destruction of the cultural heritage and infrastructure of Iraq by its occupying forces, this is the crux of what Felicity Arbuthnot wrote in a recent article about Libya: The bombing of Libya will begin on or nearly to the day of the 18th anniversary of the beginning of the destruction of Iraq, 19th March (in Europe). Libya, too, will be destroyed — its schools, education system, water, infrastructure, hospitals, and municipal buildings. There will be numerous “tragic mistakes” and “collateral damage,” involving mothers, fathers, children, babies, grandparents, the blind and the deaf, and so on. And like the wonders of past empire’s remains, as with these nations’ rich histories (Iraq and Afghanistan), Libya’s, too, will be gone… forever.
Finally, let’s apply this agnotology to the Philippine setting: The debates between pro- and anti-nuclear power advocates, same with pro- and anti-Merci Gutierrez impeachment proponents simply reveal that both sides are wrong. In the former instance, all of them are all deliberately leaving out geothermal power in their discussions. This, despite a 2010 report by the World Geothermal Congress that total potential of the world for geothermal energy “…is equivalent to 40,000 GW while the total world energy demand (today) is equivalent to 15,000 GW.”
Both the pro- and anti-nuclear power lobbies are definitely creating ignorance of the only true alternative — geothermal energy, of which the Philippine has limitless potential.
Meantime, in the Merci impeachment moro-moro, the nation is being kept ignorant of the fact that both sides are similarly corrupted and will never work to sustain the “Rule of Law” when they all threw this away and resorted to the “Rule of Force” in the case of President Joseph Estrada.
Truly, the facts are there for all to see; and only an agnotological media will continue to befuddle the issues to the people’s detriment.
(Tune in to Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM dwAD; TNT with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “Energy Futures;” visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our articles plus select radio and GNN shows)
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