- rudatron
- May 31, 2011
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by Fluffdaddy
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I think if you can find a good way of leeching heavy metals from sewage, you can 'close the cycle' and treat sewage instead of pumping it out into the ocean. But as it is now you have to, otherwise that stuff will just slowly build up. It's kind of both a technological problem, but more than that a development problem. We have great technology to produce from raw inputs, but not the technology to recycle efficiently (disassemble back into raw inputs). Though you could mitigate some problems with heavy regulation, there's just still a lot of things you just can't do.
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Dec 22, 2014 13:43
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May 14, 2024 06:01
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- rudatron
- May 31, 2011
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by Fluffdaddy
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That's really not likely to happen - we'll use the easiest and most accessible resources until they start getting scarce/expensive, at which point people will have an incentive to start introducing alternatives. It's not like we're going to wake up one day and go 'ooops, all the productive land/phosphate/whatever is all gone, time to die.'
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Dec 22, 2014 18:52
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- rudatron
- May 31, 2011
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by Fluffdaddy
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It's actually much worse though, because the assumption, that rising prices will lead automatically (magically) to new alternatives, still assumes a rising price from a falling supply. Thing is, fertilizer is going to be used in any kind of agriculture, and everyone needs to eat. So a falling supply will lead to a rising price until demand falls to meet supply, so the theory goes. But what does a 'falling demand' mean in this context? People being unable to feed themselves, because they can't afford to.
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Dec 22, 2014 19:01
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Dec 22, 2014 13:43
