True Progress

We generally understand efficiency when considering different options to the same problem, for example, how to get from point A to point B, by running, driving, or flying. One method will use more energy than the others and will therefore be less efficient. One refrigerator will chill the same amount of food as another and use less energy and will therefore be more efficient.

We also implicitly understand a trade-off between time and energy (less time to do the same task usually requires more energy). But, when we start to compare different activities, say having steak for dinner versus buying a DVD player or taking a 3-day vacation versus buying a new bicycle we often lack the information to compare the overall efficiency between the two different options in terms of energy or materials or really any possible standard that might interest us. Read the rest of this entry »

Among the mitigation options for climate change are the so-called geoengineering projects, one of which is the placement in space of devices to deflect, block, or diffuse a small amount of the solar radiation hitting the Earth.

This is one of the most straightforward of all the climate control technologies–if Earth is trapping too much heat or the Sun is getting too hot, just block a bit of it. No matter the cause of the increased average temperatures on Earth, this solution will reduce them. Moreover, even if future needs require additional solar radiation to maintain temperatures due to some cooling event, the same shades or reflectors might be quickly redesigned and used for that purpose as well–the beginning of a global climate control system. Read the rest of this entry »

Discussions and debates on the merits of various forms of monetary policy–usually relatively technical–have invaded even the mainstream news media of late. One idea often advocated is a return to the “gold standard”, a form of monetary policy in place (although not continuously) sometime after the invention of paper currency until about the 1930′s depending on what country you happened to live in at the time.

While the advocacy in favor of or against a gold standard is often intense (especially in certain circles in the United States and the United Kingdom) specifics on the mechanics and policy implications of implementing such a system are often lacking. Read the rest of this entry »

There are about 7 billion people on the planet today, with just over 9 billion expected by the year 2050. Given that many of the poorest 1-2 billion people on Earth may not even have enough to eat today, can we really expect to adequately feed more than 9 billion people in less than 40 years time? Well, in fact, our agricultural capacity to produce food, clothing, and shelter at the standards of the western world can accommodate nearly 12 billion people. Read the rest of this entry »

Recently, an article by British academic Toby Ord advocated large annual payments by western-world middle class individuals as way to achieve similar philanthropy to wealthy individuals. This is easily possible for most if not all two-professional families even in the United States which lacks the social security programs of Mr. Ord’s UK. Read the rest of this entry »

During the summer of 2009, the US government operated an economic stimulus program called Cash for Clunkers (C4C). The objectives of this program were to provide an immediate economic stimulus to the US economy, which was currently in recession, and encourage the replacement of inefficient vehicles for efficient ones in the private US transportation fleet, thus reducing overall fuel consumption on a national level. In addition, the government championed an expected reduction in pollution, especially smog forming emissions and greenhouse gases. An analysis summary of this program in meeting these goals based on the information available in September 2009 just after conclusion of the program follows in this article. You can download the full report here (pdf). Read the rest of this entry »

In the next century, the progress of humanity will proceed on the basis of how successfully we address the following six needs. They are not the typical needs of world peace, ending world hunger, or stopping environmental destruction that so often are vaguely thrown about in the press these days. Those are but symptoms of the real challenges that we must attack in the next 100 years. While they are related to some of those subjects, in different ways they are directed at more concrete, more measurable factors that will enable or inhibit our achievement of broader goals this century. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the real driving forces in any human exploration has been intense need. In the initial human migrations around the globe, people explored out of a need for food, and a need to be safe from other potentially hostile bands–there is safety in distance. During the European colonization period the nations and kingdoms of Europe felt an intense need for hard currency (gold) and other physical wealth (spices, gems, etc.) to support their mercantilist economic systems. In today’s world, many hope for human exploration of space in a noble adventure to make our mark in the galaxy, but what will really pull us off the planet will be our needs. Read the rest of this entry »

There has been a lot of talk recently about whether economic markets have imploded due to over-regulation or under-regulation. Although most pick up that argument with their own particular political biases, it is a difficult question to answer not least because many governments actually act in both directions at the same time. But, let us look at a related but different aspect of civilization: innovation and progress.

In the same way that economics experiences cycles, booms, and busts, innovation and progress when considered as a market of ideas also experiences those things. This earlier article on regulation explains some of this, but we are going to take this idea a few steps further. Read the rest of this entry »

Waste is a terrible thing. At best, it connotes something that has performed no good for anyone. At worst, it is something disgusting that we avoid at all costs. But, nonetheless our lives are filled with waste. It is the rare person or circumstances that allow one to go through a day without creating any unnecessary waste, or even limiting that waste to a small amount. We are so used to some forms of waste that we hardly recognize it.

But, waste should be seen as a failure of our system of doing things. Many of our activities are possible with little or no waste, we are just complacent towards it. As part 1 of this series, we will look at heat, how and why it is wasted and what we should do about it. Read the rest of this entry »

Introduction

Analyzing and controlling risk is one of the most important aspects of the engineering design process. These risks include health and safety, design robustness and reliability, maintainability, marketability, cost, schedule, and performance.

Yet, many of these risks are managed only by the intuition of the project manager or management team. While many are skilled enough to investigate and control most of these risks, the number of projects that fail to meet functional requirements, cost limits, scheduled deadlines, reliability expectations, or other thing, serves as testament to the fact that the complexity of risk management on modern projects is beyond the capabilities of our current system of doing things. Read the rest of this entry »

The following posts describe some of my experiences from service with the U.S. Peace Corps in Guinea, West Africa as a Math and Physics Teacher during the period 1998-2000. This summary article is updated as related content is added.

Part 1: Deciding to join

Part 2: Training in Senegal

Part 3: Beginning of my service

Part 4: Teaching experiences

Part 5: Life in Guinea

Part 6: Connecting with home

Part 7: Adventure and tragedy

What is the difference, and does it matter?

Whether implementing a new technology or attempting to solve a problem we currently face in the world or even just making mundate decisions about our daily activities, we continually make judgements about the risks we face. With our liminted resources, time, and skill we choose to limit some of our exposure to risk and accept others. But, when making those decisions, we open ourselves to psychological biases about risk and often make a decision that puts us in a poorer position than we otherwise would have been. Read the rest of this entry »

Increasingly, green advertising has become much more important among manufacturers and retail businesses. It seems many consumers would prefer given many options to select a product that is less stressful on the environment than another equally functional product. While the degree to which this is influencing each person today varies widely, it is clear that these companies are responding to a real pressure they feel in the marketplace. The current result has been an almost obligatory series of advertisements and public claims regarding a product’s green-ness. However, as some of these claims may be contradictory, how can one know how to make the best choice? We’ll examine one case in this article. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the benefits to service in the Peace Corps is that you find yourself during your service in a region of the world that you probably would not have visited otherwise with the opportunity and some time to take advantage of those adventures all around. Read the rest of this entry »

Of the three main missions of the Peace Corps, two of them relate to cultural exchange: one in showing people who might not have otherwise come into contact with an American a real face that they can relate to, and the other being bringing a part of a foreign culture back to Americans that might not otherwise have traveled to that place. Just the fact that these mission statements exist points to one thing–that these are not simple tasks to accomplish. In part they happen without effort. But, also, the difficulties with them affect volunteers whether they are actively pursuing these activities or not, even to the point of affecting relationships with friends and family back home. Read the rest of this entry »

It is a common conversation piece among those trying to understand how the world works: how did it come to be that Sub-Saharan Africa is far less developed than the rest of the contemporary world? While there is no one simple answer, there is an answer. One that involves several intertwining threads with some causes in the past and some existing today. This article points to 8 books that hold many of the keys to reaching an answer to this question, identifying the causes of the situation we see today, and hopefully sow the seeds of change for the future. Read the rest of this entry »

For background, I am describing some of my experiences from the US Peace Corps in Guinea, West Africa. More information on this series is available in the introduction.

Many often wonder what it is really like to live as a Peace Corps Volunteer. The fact is it can be a very different experience depending on which country and what position you are posted to. It has also changed significantly from the days in the early 1960s to the present, partly due to worldwide development, and partly due to changes in the Peace Corps methods and objectives. So, while every experience will be different from what I describe, this article will offer one perspective on what it was like for me serving in one place in the nation of Guinea from 1998 to 2000. Read the rest of this entry »

This article recently brought up an excellent point on how some rates can be deceiving, and even reduce the likelihood that we will make the right decision. The example involved comparing impressions of fuel efficiency in miles per gallon versus gallons per mile, or gallons per ten thousand miles. While identifying the better of two options in either case is easy regardless of the rate, other types of evaluations can be much more complex if we end up using the wrong units. Read the rest of this entry »

Recent news has highlighted the opening of the first commercial hydrogen fueling station in California. For people who lease hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (the most common user) or some kind of hydrogen combusion engine, they now have one public place in the state of California where they can refuel their vehicles. A few others already exist in New England and Washington, D.C. Is this the start of a new age in the technology of fuel consumption and the beginning of the end of fossil fuels? And, where does this hydrogen come from anyways? Let’s explore some of those questions in this article. Read the rest of this entry »

For background, I am describing some of my experiences from the US Peace Corps in Guinea, West Africa. More information on this series is available in the introduction.

Although, I was one of only two Americans in a small rural school with one class per grade teaching in a foreign language, my experiences in the beginning were not at all unlike any first time teacher I have spoken with since. A little performance anxiety was common in the first few months, but that gradually gave way to the normal challenges that teaching high school students brings, and a few that were not so normal (at least not to Americans). Read the rest of this entry »

Good Science?  Bad Science?  What do these mean?  How do we know the difference?  We throw these terms around especially in political and policy arguments as if we all understand what they mean.  Exceptions.  Uncertainty.  Facts.  Theory.  Bias.  These ideas seem to determine whether or not we think any particular scientific idea is good or bad.  Do we have the right idea, or is Science really about something else. Read the rest of this entry »

After completion of our training in Senegal, we traveled to Guinea to see our host country for the first time. As the rains had been late in Senegal, our time there was mostly marked by sand and heat and more of the same. The brilliant green lushness of coastal Guinea having already seen months of rain, was a beautiful sight in spite of the humidity. A couple quick weeks of training, and we would finally be on our ways as volunteers at our posts. A healthy dose of nervous excitement permeated this period. Read the rest of this entry »

Often as a reliability engineer, or anyone responsible for researching the reliability of an item, or calculating it, you will find oversimplified published data giving you the impression that reliability is an unchanging physical property like mass or volume, something intrinsic to the materials included in it. This is actually the common sense approach; we know an old thing is less reliable than a new copy of the same thing. But, this common sense gets argued out of us when we are faced with reconciling tables of MTBF (mean time between failures) values, nines (i.e. 0.99999, a measure of reliability), failure rates and other things. Let’s get back to the common sense approach, but with math. Read the rest of this entry »

Drilling for Oil is not the only Potential Energy Producing Activity Offshore

While “green” or renewable energy technologies are often seen as the rival against traditional fossil fuel technologies in some kind of epic battle, they can actually sometimes enhance and support each other. Recent news from wind power companies suggests that they may be able to move their turbines offshore to deep water out of sight of land and away from wind-blocking obstructions by employing technology developed for deep water oil and gas exploration and production operations. Read the rest of this entry »

On Fridays over the next several weeks, I am describing experiences from my service in the U.S. Peace Corps.

An overnight flight from New York’s JFK airport on Air Afrique put us in Dakar, Senegal the next day. In June, when the rains had still not come, Senegal was a very dry and very hot and very sandy place. Peace Corps staff met us just off the plane and we glided through immigration. In the baggage claim area we awaited our lives packed in the two allowed bags to catch up with us and sweated still in a bit of a daze from the long flight and little sleep. We boarded a bus waiting for us that took us to the training center in Thies, a city about an hour’s drive from Dakar. Read the rest of this entry »

Modern Compressible Flow with Historical Perspective by John D. Anderson provides an excellent resource for studies in advanced fluid mechanics. In a field where many texts provide useful content in an entirely unmemorable fashion, this text is an exception. Theory, History, Applications, and other interesting information and stories make this book a beneficial addition to any engineer’s library. Read the rest of this entry »

So, you’ve got a design that you want to prove is better than the existing design from your own or another company. What’s the most efficient, fastest way to get to that answer with a very small sample size? Whle there may be several options you have, including accelerated testing, they each can have their benefits and drawbacks. Here, I will advocate for zero-failure testing as a realistic and useful option, especially since it is something we often do anyways, but without the mathematical justification. Read the rest of this entry »

If we consider development to be the general increase in well being of a population, then we have to recognize that there are times when the increase in one type of measure (real income) is countered by the negative action of another type of measure (disease rates). In these cases, government often steps in to regulate the problem. However, there are times when government regulation is necessary and other times when it is ill-advised. How can we tell the difference? Read the rest of this entry »

Recently, this article on CNN.com revisits the idea of collecting solar power in space and beaming it down to Earth. With such a large world demand for energy expected in the next 20 to 50 years, and declining costs for access to space, could this be the time for this science fiction technology to become a reality? As our costs continue to increase, geographically sourced resources are seen as unstable, unpalatable, or insufficient, this idea may finally have come of age. Read the rest of this entry »

For the next several Fridays, I am going to retell some of my experiences from my service in the United States Peace Corps. This is probably not obviously directly related to the aim of True Progress, but I feel that it can be instructive and I believe that the Peace Corps has a specific and valuable role to play in progress around the world. So, understanding at least one image of how it currently works and could work in the future is valuable both in correctly interpreting some of my ideas and formulating your own on how to use or not use this agency. Read the rest of this entry »

So, what happens when the very actions that we each individually take to improve our lives in the end cause detrimental consequences to all of us? The sage might say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and she might be right. But, does it have to be that way? Are we doomed to one step forward and one step back? Can we anticipate the things that might go wrong? And, how important is the collective good when compared to personal freedom? Read the rest of this entry »

This review concerns a niche of mechanical engineering that involves heat transfer at very small scales. Understanding this phenomenon, which is considerably different from typical heat transfer and thermodynamics experienced in the everyday world, is critical to the advancement of nanotechnological machines and microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). Read the rest of this entry »

Energy efficiency is a wonderful investment both for businesses and consumers often paying far better returns than the stock and bond markets. If so, then why don’t we take advantage of it? Increases in efficiency can reduce energy consumption for the same or increasing amount of output. All the while, pollution is reduced and money is saved increasing the health and well being of our communities. Is all of this good news falling on deaf ears? Read the rest of this entry »

Why considering a monetary value of life is not only acceptable, but morally necessary

Typically, the first time we consider someone placing a monetary value on protecting a life, the risk of death, or other similar circumstances, we cringe. The mere mention of life in the context of money seems cruel and far too calculating. Rightly, we have learned that an absolute monetary value cannot be placed on the worth of a person whether young or old, experienced or inexperienced, whatever race they are or religion they hold. This article is not going to challenge any of those ethics. Life is a priceless phenomenon and every person’s experience is something to be held at the pinnacle of our value system. Read the rest of this entry »

With energy costs increasing faster than inflation and much faster than income in the United States, many have a desire to conserve. But, without information, our conservation may be more expensive than it is worth and hardly as effective as it could have been. The kill-a-watt electricity usage monitor provides a useful way to be smart about conservation. Increase the efficiency of your home. Read the rest of this entry »

In this earlier article on the new CAFE standards, I found that depending on the assumptions made for the number of future miles driven, restricting the speed limit to 55 miles per hour would be a more cost effective and more energy efficient solution than changing the CAFE standard. That analysis only considered the total amount of fuel consumed between the two options. Now, let’s take that analysis a few steps further. Read the rest of this entry »

Getting answers before you are finished. Why are people always so impatient? Why can’t they just wait until testing is complete before they ask for answers? I suppose it is just human nature, as I have heard that question any time I have been involved in reliability testing programs. And, although we would know much more if we waited for more data to roll in, there are times that we can evaluate where our project stands on the basis of partial test results. Read the rest of this entry »

As landfills which hold municipal solid waste are closed the emissions from decay of the material in the landfill becomes a pollutant. That pollutant can either contribute to smog and the increase in greenhouse gases, or it can be used as an energy source. A free, environmentally friendly fuel, potentially harmful if released, is not being used everywhere? What are we thinking? Read the rest of this entry »

Increasing the quality and quantity of education in poor countries is critical and absolutely necessary to their development, but let’s not lose sight of how disruptive a free and generous education can be. Education changes cultures, economies, and governments, and for nations entering that transition period the way must be prepared. Read the rest of this entry »

Sustainable technology is an idea that may produce a new level of real progress around the world. But often today, the term is more of a marketing badge that may or may not prove to be true when put to the test. I have written before about sustainable technology and some of the problems with realizing that idea. In this article, let’s consider a set of objectives that we can use to actually measure whether something is sustainable. Read the rest of this entry »

As a reliability analyst, sometimes none of your data matches the form you are interested in. It all comes in different collections of units, statistical distribution parameters, failure rates, environments, MTBF, MTTF, and on and on. In this article, let’s consider one common conversion for which my research found too little information available on the internet. Read the rest of this entry »

What is the state of the American university system?  Does it produce the types of professionals needed to keep the American economy strong and innovative?

We often hear a lot about how our contemporary economy requires plenty of professionals skilled in science and technology to maintain a healthy rate of innovation. There are are many reasons why science and engineering degrees are often used as barometers or leading indicators of the future state of innovation of the American economy. Read the rest of this entry »

True-Progress.com has released its Free Weibull Reliability Calculator version 1.0.2.

You can download this tool by following this link.

This simple calculator utilizes the Weibull distribution to generate reliability data for your system Read the rest of this entry »

Why pilots (and humans in general) get a bad rap during accident investigations.

In my earlier article on root cause analysis, I mentioned that every cause present in a given situation can be considered equally responsible for the occurrence of the failure in question. Many times, however, investigations end up ascribing the fault of the entire situation to a particular “root cause” that may or may not have happened without the presence of other contributing causes. When we identify the “root cause” as human error and fail to take actions against the system that set up that error, we are perpetuating the problem. Read the rest of this entry »

Progress via a True Global Internet

In our contemporary world, one of the most important factors constraining the growth of societies is lack of information. In some places, infrastructure is not sufficiently developed in communications and electricity and the availability of electronics in the market to even allow people to connect to the information available via the internet. In other places, totalitarian governments partially or entirely limit the access their people have to the information available on the internet. Read the rest of this entry »

How Conservation and Efficiency Can Sometimes Increase Consumption

Conservation and efficiency are always good, right? Unfortunately, not always.

Many of us, myself included, consider ourselves conservationists. We don’t buy or take things that we don’t need (for example, lots of extra paper napkins at the restaurant). We consider the energy efficiency of our vehicles, appliances, and other things we use in our homes. And, in principle, we are in favor of measures that encourage everyone to conserve more like recycling. But, things don’t always turn out as we expect, and we must be diligent that our conservation measures don’t end up resulting in more consumption than would otherwise have occured.

There are several causes and conditions for this type of occurence, and most involve market economics. To illustrate my point with an example, let’s consider a few potential conservation regulations that could be enacted by a municipal government. Read the rest of this entry »

When Subsidies are Hard to See

When we think of our governments subsidizing a particular industry we usually envision a nice big check sent to them every year to the tune of millions of dollars from tax revenues. Sometimes, instead, it is that industry that is free from a particular tax that most others have to pay. But, what if instead there are payments in kind that elevate one industry or one form of technology over another. Would we recognize those things as government subsidies? Read the rest of this entry »

Stay Focused on the Big picture

This is the fifth article in a five part series.

In this series, we have been outlining a evidence-based, constructive method to address the issue of climate change. While using this method doesn’t eliminate any disputes, it does change them from one of attacking philosophies, which are not easily changed, to disputes about data analysis. And disputes about data analysis although sometimes nearly as heated can eventually be objectively resolved. The earlier articles focued on defining the real problem, determining causes, developing solutions and evaluating policy. While those articles briefly covered all of the major aspects of the method I am advocating, there are other important ideas that must be agreed upon to some degree by those participating in the process. Read the rest of this entry »

This review refers to version 6.3 of IRCMS by NAVAIR (Naval Air Systems Command).

IRCMS 6.3 provides users with an aid to perform Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) analysis. RCM is a process by which the life cycle costs of performing maintenance on a system are compared to the consequences of not performing maintenance as well as other options. This is a free tool, available here. As it is free to download and test this tool, I will not go into every feature available, just what I have noticed as its strengths and weaknesses. Read the rest of this entry »

Evaluating Solution Effectiveness and Translating Analysis into Policy

This is the fourth article in a five part series.

To date in this series, we’ve looked at objective measures of how to frame a problem, how to determine the causes of that problem, and consider implementing a robust solution to the problem. In the last article, we examined what to do about risk in an environment of uncertainty both from the standpoint of the problem and in the effectiveness of our solutions. In this article, I am going to discuss how we could form policy in a non-political fashion when given that kind of situation. Read the rest of this entry »

In honor of Earth Day on 4/22 (a little late, I know), let’s consider the relationship between “green” production and conservation.

Our question is does conservation or “green” production result a greater positive impact regarding our use of resources. I am going to take the case of paper, as it is relatively simple product to manufacture, is a major waste product, and can be easily recycled.

As of 2000, paper consumption in the United States was approximately 324 kg per person. Americans recycle approxmately 38% of that total, and of the remainder that is thrown away, it makes up nearly 40% of the municipal waste stream eventually being incenerated or deposited in a landfill. Recycling has been growing slowly, however, only growing from 20% in 1921 to 38% today. Consumption has grown faster increasing more than 1% compounded annually or over 23% since 1990. Read the rest of this entry »

Evaluating Likelihood and Addressing Uncertainty when Applying Solutions

This is the third article in a five part series.

In the first two articles in this series we looked at identifying a problem and a functional understanding of that problem and then at determining all the causes of that problem. Now, we are going to consider how to take account of uncertain data regarding future events both in the probability that they may occur and in the degree to which they might occur. People are generally bad at statistics, which makes this part of the risk assessment process counterintuitive at times. However, risk is something we do accept on a daily basis, and so I will try and find some analogies. Again, this series is about taking politics and argumentative posturing out of the decision making process regarding climate change. To be sure we adhere to that premise, I will continue to make my examples totally neutral regarding the data and whether we are talking about a warming or cooling climate; I am discussing the decision making process. Read the rest of this entry »

Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond is an excellent explanation of why the world is the way it is. Combined with William Easterly’s book reviewed earlier on this site, a reader can finally get his or her hands around the broad historical causes that have produced the world that we live in.

This is a broad brush of history and geography to explain the current state of societies in the world today. This is a partial answer to the question of why do some societies have wealth and power and why are others poor and constantly on the verge of a natural or man-made disaster. Read the rest of this entry »

A Root Cause Analysis on the “Failure Mode” of Changing (Increasing or Decreasing) Temperatures.

This is the second article of a five part series.

In the last article I outlined our functional model of the Earth. According to that model to explain why the current temperature of earth is the way it is, we have a primary energy input from the sun, and secondary energy inputs from other astronomical sources and internal energy from the Earth itself. The properties of the Earth that effect the temperature are the reflectivity, the percentage of energy reaching Earth reflected back out into space, and the emissivity, the ease at which the energy Earth contains can be released into space (cooling at night for example). The goal in this series is to address climate change in a real, technocratic, nonpolitical manner to elimate the arguing and posturing, and outline a process whereby people could identify what problem exists and the best most robust solution. Read the rest of this entry »

Some would say progress is continually achieving a higher and higher level of capability as individuals and collectively as a society. For example, we can buy improved cell phones, computers, and automobiles each year. Others would say that progress involves reaching a state of balance such that we are not destroying any nonrenewable resources and not using any more renewable resources than we produce. But, perhaps either of those cannot be achieved consistently without the other.

Recently, an initiative launched in Japan seeks to
increase the average lifespan of homes to 200 years. That would conserve resources as fewer home building materials would be needed over the long term. Homes would serve several generations before replacement and include flexibility in arrangement to meet the needs of a variety of families.

Read the rest of this entry »

A Risk Assessment Approach to Climate Change Policy

This is the first article of a five part series.

It is difficult to find a more hotly debated public policy issue today than the one about potential regulatory actions related to global climate change. Much of this debate is emotional focused on various groups’ attitudes toward government action and personal responsibility, pessimism or optimism related to human interactions with the environment, and other philosophical differences. That being what it is, I think a different approach could show us the way out of that kind of divisive argument and produce positive action in an amount properly proportional to the nature of the threat. So, in a series of 5 articles, I am going to address this issue, not as a politician or a policy advocate, but as an engineer considering options and trying to reduce the risk associated with a particular problem. To maintain the non-partisan nature of this series, I am going to assume that increases or decreases in global temperatures are equally likely, and since, in theory, they have related solutions, it does not diminish the outcome of the analysis. Read the rest of this entry »

And, I mean way off…

Picture yourself in a small tropical village a few hundred miles south of the Sahara Desert. About 800 people live there. You are probably related in one way or another to most of them, but you don’t really know how exactly, beyond your own close-knit extended family. There is no electricity, no running water, no telephone.

During 6 months of the year when thundershowers pass over most afternoons, you work hard in your small fields taking care of cassava, corn, peppers, eggplant, okra, tomatoes, and rice, and look after your 9 goats. During another 2 months in the dry dusty season you have work to do tending your small orchard of mango, papaya, cashew, and orange trees. You are good at what you do, providing almost all the basic food you need, and have a surplus of almost 20% in products you can sell for cash. This covers the costs in supplies and uniforms to send you son and daughter to primary school. Read the rest of this entry »

What is Risk Assessment; how do we already use it; and how do we misuse it?

If our goal is to achieve progress, one of the ways we can determine that progress has been made is by a reduction in the quantity and severity of problems we face. Another way, would be to determine the quantity and magnitude of new capabilities we gain. However, new capabilities often bring new problems of their own, if we are not careful. The discipline of risk assessment and mitigation or control, if we take the time to apply it properly, can address the reduction of our current problems and the mitigation of potential future problems caused by our new capabilities. Read the rest of this entry »

What would more effectively reduce pollution from small vehicles?

Recently, there was a significant political argument in the United States about the costs and benefits of increasing the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards. Increased efficiency, the argument went, would reduce the consumption of fuel, and therefore help restrain fuel prices, also reducing pollution from vehicles causing reductions in greenhouse gasses and even more important things in the immediate term including smog producing substances, which are a major concern in large cities with warm climates like Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas-Ft. Worth, and Atlanta. The counter argument said that the costs would be too high, adding to the prices of vehicles, reducing auto industry revenue, eliminating jobs, and reducing passenger safety. Read the rest of this entry »

The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Out Time by Jeffery Sachs, is an optimistic, forceful argument for the economic potential of developing countries and the necessity of increased in aid from rich countries to realize it.

Jeffrey Sachs is an accomplished macro-economist, currently at Columbia University, who has experience helping poor countries get on track to development. While, often described as left-leaning, he makes strong cases in favor of free-trade, market forces, and the role of the private sector in achieving economic development. He does often tout his own success regarding recommendations for economic reforms that enhanced development in impoverished. However, given the overall pessimistic attitude that many have towards real, subtantial economic development in these difficult places, I am not so sure it was out of place. Read the rest of this entry »

In Search of The Best Answer, Not a Better Answer

Whenever there is a major man-made disaster or some kind of accident, responsible officials usually convene a team that conducts an investigation. The results of that investigation will usually identify a “root cause” and several “contributing causes”. If it was a plane crash, the team will probably present the root cause as either pilot error or some kind of maintenance error. But, if you really want to find out what caused the problem and how to fix it, look at the “contributing causes”. Those are the keys to not experiencing that event in the future. Read the rest of this entry »

So, how long will it be before our trash is more valuable than existing iron mines?

The municipal waste collection system in the United States is very efficient at removing whatever materials we place in our trash bag. So much so, that we normally find it difficult to imagine the scale of the operation, and especially the scale of the mountain of material that is buried in our landfills each year. I wonder how long it will be before the sources of metals in our landfills is more valuable than our sources of metal ore. Read the rest of this entry »

Back in the good old days…

Cultures seem to have their own ideas about what progress truly is and whether it exists at all or is just an illusion. Americans, in general, seem to have faith in progress over time, yet many continue to just as strongly express nostalgia for times past. Others have a more cynical view of progress believing life and history to be more cyclical, while others who have recently experienced opression have no doubt that progress is real and something to strive for. Read the rest of this entry »

Development as Freedom, by Amartya Sen, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, provides a powerful argument that development and progress cannot be measured on the basis of economic output and consumption alone, that personal freedom is a very important and in some areas predominate variable in determining whether progress has been or will be made, and in defining what poverty truly is.

Amartya Sen chooses to describe poverty not as a lack of resources, but as a lack of freedoms. Those freedoms include choosing where to live and work, with whom to associate, freedom to choose our leaders and decide the rules we live by, and many others. This key point is useful in that it does not focus solely on maximization of wealth as a way out of poverty. The problem with poverty is not lack of money, but that lack of money means that people are not free to make their own way in life. They may be trapped being at the mercy of nature, an opressive government, or an economy cripled by bad policy. The conclusion therefore, is that money alone cannot fix the real problem. Government reform, economic liberalization, and the general increase of personal freedoms is the true end we are striving for. Increasing incomes is one of several necessary steps to be accomplished and not an end in and of itself. Read the rest of this entry »

Excuse me, are you going to use all that Sun in one place?

Given present-day concerns about energy independence, pollution control, and energy price stability, solar energy is often touted as one of the (at least partial) solutions to that problem. Solar energy involves making electricity or other useable energy out of light from the Sun. And while humans have been using solar energy on some level since before history, most applications including solar cells (photovoltaics) and other efficient conversion systems have only been in use since the late 1940s. As of 2005, the total share of domestically produced electricity from solar energy was very small at 0.065%, or a total of about 19 billion kilowatt-hours, but growing rapidly. Read the rest of this entry »

One small step forward…

While I was serving as a teacher in the small town of Kankalabé (population: ~5000), Guinea in West Africa, the European Union financed a project to install a running water system in that town. The project, of limited benefit, was soon sabotaged and has since been nothing but a monument to unrealized progress. The rationale of the planners and managers, I cannot verify, but I will describe observations from the level of the townspeople during my time there. Read the rest of this entry »

Is this for them or for us?

A couple years ago, I was advising a group of undergraduate engineering students from Rice University on a project they were pursuing for Engineers Without Borders. They were designing a rainwater catchment and drip irrigation system for a village in Mali, West Africa. Having heard about their project and having experience in that part of the world, I offered to help and provide what guidance I could. Read the rest of this entry »

The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists’ Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics by William Easterly is an honest answer to part of the question, “why hasn’t the world improved like we thought it would?” Easterly conducts a post-mortem conference on western aid programs since the end of World War II, finding that in many cases we should have known better. The incentives created by some nations’ economic environment, or the aid programs themselves led national economies into periods of stagnant or negative growth. Easterly’s mantra is “people respond to incentives.” Ignoring this truth, a central tenet of economics, has led to several irrational choices in the area of development aid, and many failures to achieve our objectives. Read the rest of this entry »

Please, That’s Not Appropriate Here…

Appropriate Technology, a somewhat condescending (from the receivers point of view) title for a movement that arose in the 1970s, focuses on providing an improved intermediate step on the technology staircase between developing and industrialized countries. While some of these ideas have been expressed for many decades (see The Ugly American by William Lederer and Eugene Burdick), the success of the movement has not been universal. Skeptics claim that while the ideas have merit in reducing the destruction of natural resources and improving living conditions with minimal outside investment, the entire idea typically fails to take into account the economic aspects of technology transfer and development. Read the rest of this entry »

Onwards and Upwards

Do we know what we are doing? Maybe the right question is do we ever know what we are doing? What are the true consequences of our actions today and tomorrow and hundreds of years from now? Are we responsible for those consequences or should we never be concerned with them?

I believe that too often we accept not having the answers that we could have. We have chosen not to know whether our ways of “helping” each other really turn out to be help in the end. We have chosen to push the solutions to problems we have today off into the realm of tomorrow. While some of that may be rational (I am fairly certain that my computer will be faster in 5 years), not all of it is. Read the rest of this entry »

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