Carl Bliss' call on our leaders not to waste a good crisis is very relevant to Jamaica which is at a crossroads to recovery today, but also replete with many dangers. I pray that our leaders are guided by wisdom and inspiration and the courage to take the steps that will return Jamaica to the forefront of technology.

Minister Karl Samuda's regret that there are no takers for the low-interest loans for agri-processing and energy conservation was quite understandable because, for development loans of any nature, 10 per cent interest is not low by world standards. Furthermore, businessmen are not stupid, they are businessmen. Why flog a dead horse on a badly prepared racetrack?

If they were to take up these loans, they would be required to risk their hard-earned property and life holdings and invest in solar panels and energy conservation liquefied natural gas (LNG) equipment. Where is the ultimate profit in that? Solar energy requires too much capital investment to produce one kilowatt, and there is still no guarantee that netmetering will be introduced.

It would be much better to spend US$140 million on a bio-conversion facility to produce 100 megawatts of energy, using most of the hundreds of tons of waste at Riverton, while producing organic fertiliser and several saleable by-products instead of wasting money on LNG. However, here again, there is no lucid policy on netmetering/netbilling.

WRONG POLICY DIRECTION

As technologists and economists will confirm, the future in LNG is questionable from the point of view of return on investment for infrastructure and delivery, plus the future supplies and prices are not guaranteed, irrespective of what the suppliers may want to say. Somebody is being pushed to flog another dead horse.

If they really want to lower energy cost and have so much borrowed money to throw around, consider nuclear energy from the safe new fifth-generation pebble- bed modular reactors, or bio-conversion, or even the use of mid-size vertical wind towers from Amberland Jamaica which can produce from four to 300 kilowatt per hour wherever the wind is favourable. Every high-rise building could have a VWT perched on its roof to save much of their electricity.

I am, etc.,

DONALD CHUNG

canjamma@yahoo.com

Kingston 6