Recap of the coming industrialization of South America

[auroraglacialis]

Perhaps the tip-off to this lunge toward technological expansion arose when billboards leading into the tiny agricultural town of Tiquipaya were abruptly changed from “EL CAPITÁL DE FLORES” to “EL CAPITÁL DEL PROGRESO” – and high-rise apartments and office buildings, suddenly and without local input, began to tower over tin-roofed shanties and women hawking papayas on the Reducto.
[...]
The discovery of lithium was the biggest boon to Morales’ urge to emulate Brazil’s rise to economic potency. The rarity of the “gold of the 21st chellis mapcentury”-- with its importance to the up-and-coming electric-car battery industry, as well as to nuclear weaponry -- has put Bolivia in the running to build a Saudi-Arabia-size bank account, with battery sales between 2011 and 2014 slated to top $902 million and total sales possibly reaching $515 billion. At the same time, partnerships with the likes of Mitsubishi and South Korea have traditional communities nervous about any possibility of local input – as does the inevitable contamination of air, water, and soil via leeching, leaks, spills, and emissions.
[...]
The Initiative for the Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South America aims to construct mega-high-tech-industrial-highway-telecommunications-corridor networks throughout the continent, and Bolivia’s part has already been started: a 300-kilometer highway that will bust through a national eco-reserve, slashing the forestlands of at least 11 endangered animals and 60 indigenous communities, some of whom are the last to live according to their traditional hunter-gatherer ways.

Chellis Glendinning: The Techno-Fantasies of Evo Morales

[Tsawke`Iheyu]

Oh, no... it's getting worse Was this really necesary thinking that South America has the BIGGEST reservoir of flowing water and green, the last piece of green that ever survived ? It seems that yes, we are in a rush of consuming everything and we might share the same type of world as in Earth City from AVATAR... I just feel so bad for those indigenous communities -the last living- I don't think they will be very satisfied to leave the forest for living between 4 walls and a window.

But as we know from the experience of "mankind" there are stuff like this that need to happen before we will notice that we were wrong, totally wrong !

[Tsyal Makto]

But as long as we in the first world get our light beer and blue jeans, who gives a damn? Right?

The last of the ancient green...the last of the ancient people...about to be destroyed. Nothing like the "gift" of western civilization, huh? It's so easy for Evo Morales to sit on his well-padded ass and dream about techno-topia, but he doesn't have to live with the trail of destruction he will leave in his path. The worst part too is that he's indigenous to the country, he should know his roots. Shame on him.

[Tsawke`Iheyu]

Originally Posted by Tsyal Makto

But as long as we in the first world get our light beer and blue jeans, who gives a damn? Right?

The last of the ancient green...the last of the ancient people...about to be destroyed. Nothing like the "gift" of western civilization, huh? It's so easy for Evo Morales to sit on his well-padded ass and dream about techno-topia, but he doesn't have to live with the trail of destruction he will leave in his path. The worst part too is that he's indigenous to the country, he should know his roots. Shame on him.

Guess I have mentioned Selfridge and Quaritch for something in the "Humans" thread. It's very easy for them to drink their coffee and watch everything being destroyed in just a matter of hours, smiling the profit is coming. Should this be a thing ANYONE must cope with ? I mean, how much can the "clans" resist without fighting back for their teritory ? Oh, sorry... forgot to mention, they have just "bows and arrows" and the "superiors" have "gunships and weaponry".

A very bad thing is that they don't look for some other options, like wind powered or solar powered resources, because South America isn't missing sunlight and winds that bad... Why to build hundreds of thousands of tons of concrete and to cut thousand acres for.. nothing useful when you know that there are other options ? "Because this little gray rock sells for 20 million 'a kilo, comprendo ?"

[auroraglacialis]

Originally Posted by Tsawke`Iheyu

A very bad thing is that they don't look for some other options, like wind powered or solar powered resources

Well that may be interesting, but in the end it is not the solution. I keep saying this, but the resources to build these "clean" energy solutions are not gained in a clean way (as the paragraph on Lithium shows above). Hydropower is still considered a green and clean alternative renewable energy in many countries. It is the reason Germany can claim so high percentage of clean energy. Yet it requires dams, flooded areas, displaced people and plenty of other impacts. Solar and wind need resources (REEs, copper, large stretches of land) too. And all this aside - producing energy in a cleaner way does not solve the other problems like roads (which would be built for electric cars as well) or eliminate the pollution in the businesses that use that energy. What I am saying is that people these days focus too much on energy, fuel, oil and CO2 emissions. Of course this is natural as the energy crisis is dead ahead, but it is merely a symptom of something bigger - something that causes not just CO2 emissions and carbon mining operations, but large scale mineral mining in general, highways through rain forests and the Serengeti, overfishing, conversion of pristine landscapes into farmland... - and Sout Amerrica is at the frontline of that as well as Africa. They are among the last areas that have not been transformed and they work with all their power to that transformation. It is what "development" is: Building roads and railways and powerlines and cities and factories - no matter if all this is powered and used by solar energy or not. Solar driven bulldozers and gunships (the US military wants to use 100% biofuel for their operations until 2050) still destroy forests and indigenous communities. Or to stick with Avatar: A solar powered "Dragon" with missiles produced by wind energy will still tear down homwtree.

[Marvellous Chester]

Something has to happen soon. Humanity is lost and out of control. Bring on 2012!

[Empty Glass]

The discovery of lithium was the biggest boon to Morales’ urge to emulate Brazil’s rise to economic potency. The rarity of the “gold of the 21st chellis mapcentury”-- with its importance to the up-and-coming electric-car battery industry...

I find this sad and ironic, given how electric cars are supposed to be 'greener' than gasoline ones.