Environment-friendly Energy Sources

Power crisis is a perennial problem particularly among nations which are dependent on foreign countries for their energy source. Oil is an expensive commodity, but it is the life-blood of developing nations in their quest for comfort in life. The life of the business world in said countries depends on a highest degree on power run by oil. But they will have to bear the price of oil in order to maintain operation. Energy for household use is therefore given the backseat in importance due to its high cost. We need alternative source for that matter.

Our country, the Philippines, is believed to have rich source of fossil fuel. However, the problem is how to mine it. Foreign investors are usually allowed by government to explore prospect sites. For example, one latest findings of reservoir sands and hydrocarbon at Dabakan in Mapun island, Tawi-Tawi in southern Philippines by the Exxon Mobil Corp., is now in progress. This discovery of hydrocarbons considered to occur naturally in unprocessed petroleum has prompted the company to invest another $100 million for the drilling of another well, news reports says.Significant oil and gas reserves have also been discovered in Malampaya and Galuc fields in Palawan.

There are other sites of more fuel reserves being mined by foreign investors and yet our country imports expensive oil. Isn't it embarrassing that our country which is rich in fossil fuel underneath, is again being threatened by power shortage, the timing of which is projected to be on the 2010 election day? In fact, it is already beginning to happen these days.

Here, let me share you my personal observation and suggestions to my countrymen along this energy problem. I want to share my views and opinion, in the hope that it would also serve as an eye-opener to people in underdeveloped or developing countries as well, in the following oration piece I wrote for my daughter in high school which she delivered as a contest piece. From this , you can deduce about the state of our power problems more than 15 years ago and which is still gaining intensity now.

Please allow me to give a backgrounder to this oration piece. My daughter emerged champion in a city division oratorical competition when she was in fourth year high school in 1994. She garnered a gold medal. She represented the division schools in the next level, regional contest. She didn't make it there though, but the experience was something she cherishes to this day.

I wrote this oratorical piece with the original title, below, in the hope of giving our countrymen alternative source of energy, at least for household use, and at the same time address the growing problem of pollution of the environment.

Dependence on Indigenous Energy Resources Reduces Power Crisis

"Brownout? Oh no, not again!"

Do you hear the cries of bloody murder, the gnashing of teeth, the sighs of exasperation that follow at the first instance of brownout, from the lips of people in all walks of life in our country today?

The general reactions are understandable. We need energy in order to do our work. Without work, life has no meaning. Without energy, work is hampered and life becomes dull and difficult.

In the beginning, man found food as his fundamental source of energy. The chemical energy he found in food is used by his body in order to do his work. As man continued to live through the years, he learned to transform things into energy that supplied power to his inventions like crude tools, devices, and simple machines. He depended heavily on the abundant natural resources of fossil oil, gas, and coal.

As man continues to multiply in number, so does his energy requirements. He discovers other forms of energy to satisfy his needs- to make his work light and easy, to cook his food, to light his home, and make life more comfortable and meaningful.

Sadly, however, man's wanton environmental negligence, abuse, and greed are slowly depleting the natural energy sources of Mother Earth. If not abated, what do you think will happen next? Once those nature's gifts are used up, we will never see them again. Powerless due to lack of energy sources, we would be pushed against the proverbial wall. I dread the day when the rule of life becomes, "fight in order to survive".

Distinguished members of the Board of Judges, ladies and gentlemen, classmates, and friends, today, I have an urgent message to tell.

We feel the pinch of the crippling power shortage. The long brownouts have been making life miserable and uncomfortable to many. The cost of electricity rises to a point where household users could no longer afford. Our poor consumers are complaining about the dramatic increase in their electric bills. Who would not feel cheated with high bills to pay when consumption has been drastically reduced due to frequent brownouts? Isn't that funny, if not foolish ?

We are becoming poorer and poorer as a nation due to the prolonged brownouts. Statistics from the NEDA show economic losses amounting to 25 billion pesos. In Metro Manila alone, about 122,000 workers were laid off from March to May. The remaining workers who are trying to make our economy stay, either report to work in rotation schedules or consent to shorter working time. As a result, workers on daily wage basis, could hardly make both ends meet.

Unemployment has become everybody's nightmare!

Foreign investors had gone away. We had lost 800 million dollars for the first three months of the year alone. The government's target economic growth of 4.5% this year and every year thereafter had been reduced by our economic planners to 3.5% due to power losses. How can we possibly achieve our dream to be an NIC or Newly-Industrialized country in the year 2000 if our economy continues to plunge down?

Ladies and Gentlemen, it's about time that we do something to help solve our power crisis. Look around us! The environment is full of cheap indigenous materials that we can explore as alternate sources of energy. If we can harness the potentials of these materials, we would eventually reduce our dependence on expensive imported fuels and inflate our thinning economy. But how ?

Have you heard about the Biogas Digester that won the presidential award in 1981? It's an energy converter that uses household organic garbage for its fuel. With it, you can recycle left-over food, rotten fruits, and vegetables. The energy produced provides our household electricity. How about making your own digester now?

You must have heard also about the famous Robina Farm that raises pigs for meat at the same time that it produces its own power out of the pigs' manure? The farm has a refuse incinerator that transforms the manure into energy. If you have few heads of pigs now, energy source is right at your backyard. And that's not a miracle. It's just practical, conceivable, as it is possible.

You may build your own incinerator that burns cattle manure, also. These animal wastes are there in the fields only for the picking. Burnt cattle manure produces steam that drives turbines and generators in California. Why not give this a try, too? Generators for household use! That's great!

Or, you may want to discover the power that could be generated from solar energy; or the hydroelectric power of our running waters, or the geothermal energy from our forest watersheds. And if you want to start with a most down-to-earth energy project, why not build your own cooking furnace, the "pugon" type of a giant stove made of lahar that abounds in the nearby riverbanks? With this stove, use throw-away materials such as rice chaffs, sawdust, corn husks, coco-shells, and many others that litter our environment, to cook your food, bake your bread, etc. This way, we are not only tapping the energy potentials of these indigenous materials, but we are also helping solve the garbage problem and minimize pollution as well. The energy we can produce from these otherwise toxic matters is cheap and environment-friendly.

If today, we begin tinkering with our indigenous materials to produce energy for our household use, we can save on power cost and continue to maintain a comfortable life. Aren't you glad, my dear fellowmen, when we can finally say, TONIGHT, THE LIGHT GOES ON ?"

Thank you!