Quote:
Originally Posted by Varn
....From an ecological point of view, composites are bad. Lots of hydrocarbons are used to make the epoxy Lots of industrial operations into make the cloths Lots of waste between the layup and final product......
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Yes, from this limited viewpoint, composites may not be the most eco-friendly, however there is another viewpoint...
Take any device that will allow us to live environmentally friendly over the long-term - such as wind generators.
Any company making composite blades for these generators has several issues to consider...
1) The process of making the blades is not the most eco-friendly as you have pointed out above.
2) However, if we don't make blades for these turbines and harvest "green wind", how long before we run out of fossil fuels? What about the impact of that on the environment?
3) Over the long-term, I think the fossil fuel tail-pipe emissions far outweigh the small amount of hydrocarbons from making blades that can provide power for 1000's of people in the area of the wind generators.
No, the decision to use composites to help mankind over the long haul will mean that more of these will be designed and built to achieve higher levels of sustainable energies for everyone's future. And we must do this while the cost of fossil fuels is still reasonable to allow this to happen.
Let's not wait until fuel cost is so high we can not afford such sustainable forms of energy.
Jim.