Thursday, April 15, 2010

Political Atomic Bombs!

The night before, we had to attend a philosophy debate about nuclear energy. The debate WAS in the syllabus of the subject Philosophy of Science that I'm taking for this semester. Why it was taken out from the syllabus is doesn't matter anymore. What is more important is about the energy which is NUCLEAR ENERGY.

So, the debate was about 'Should or Shouldn't Malaysia Go For Nuclear Energy'. The first round started off quite well with the captain of the Affirmative team explained why we should go for nuclear. It was very brief. I like the way she presented the points plus I agreed with the points she gave. Come the captain of the Opponent team with his points, I got bored. The points he gave were very deniable. I'm not saying that he wasn't good but he was actually quite good in presenting but the points are just not relevant to me.

You see, it was right when he said Malaysia should opt for Renewable Energies like hydropower, solar energy, wind energy and etc but to build a dam for hydropower costs a lot of money and it will consume a lot of time. Take China for example. The Manwan Dam was built in 1986 and only finished 17 years later! Multiple issues arose during the 17 years of building just a single dam in China. Political issues, environmental issues, money problems and so forth.


The Manwan Dam in China


The major argue arose when the Opponent team suggested about the Bakun Dam Project. Do you know how many flora and fauna species will be killed just to build a dam? Yes, the energy that will be produced can cater almost the whole Malaysia but think about our future. What will happen to the next generation if the forest is destroyed? Will they know about how Rafflesia flower bloom looks like? Will they know how big the elephant is? Think...

Solar energy is good but only in certain area. Not to the whole Malaysia. We are not in the UAE where the probability of rain is like once a year. Here in Malaysia, it is raining almost once a week. Plus, the maintaining cost is very high. To buy a solar panel is not the same as to buy a new Mercedes or BMW. It is beyond the price of buying an aeroplane. So, think again...


A Solar Panel - This type of solar panel has the ability to detect the sun and able to move as the sun moves


Wind energy? There is not much to say. Malaysia is totally not suitable for wind energy. How fast can the wind blows here? Plus, Malaysia is 'protected' from Philippines at the top and Indonesia at the bottom. So, the wind is not that strong to apply wind energy here.


The Wind Energy Tower


Personally, I would say that Malaysia should opt for nuclear energy. It is much cleaner and cheaper (long term) compared to others. Uranium will not run out cause as far as I know, we can plant Uranium. I mean, if we have the seeds, we can create new Uranium to be used. We are using the nuclear energy for electricity and not for creating the atomic bombs. What happened to Iran is just political issues.

So, Go Nuclear Energy!

ps; I apologize if there are any untrue facts. My opinions are based on what I learned and read.

1 comment:

shams said...

its been yrs that u hv this blog n this is the first time that ur blog is realy informative..he he..the comments n ideas are bold..probbly better than the debaters that nite..excellent argumentation...boleh kata bijak gak awak ni ek..ha..ha.. ingat kan DB..ooppps sory..keep it up...

ps ; but u always be my DB....