Date: Sat, 18 Jan 1997 20:32:57 +0100 (MET)
Subject: M-G: UNITE! Info #26en: 2/2 China, early '76, on nukes etc


UNITE! Info #26en: 2/2 China, early '76, on nukes etc
[Posted: 18.01.97]


[Continued from part 1/2]

*History of Energy Development* (ctd.)

*New energy sources which can be utilized by humans are on the
increase.* With the progress of human society, nature's range
of energy sources which can be utilized is always being extended.
New energy sources are being discovered. Humans only knew
how to burn wood as energy in ancient times. However, several
thousands years ago, coal and natural gas were used as energy.
In the 20th century, we started utilizing nuclear energy.

Viewed from how energy as a motive force was utilized, the
earliest sources of energy as power in production was natural
mechanical energy like water and wind power which could be
used directly. Afterwards, through the use of steam engines,
heat energy was transformed into mechanical energy, so that
the naturally abundant mineral fuels became power sources for
social production.

Since the 19th century when the transformation of electric energy
and other energies was discovered, electric energy has become
the most widely used form of energy. Nuclear fission energy,
which is now being used extensively by the power industry, and
nuclear fusion energy, whose power is much greater than that of
nuclear fission, will become energy sources too. As soon as
controlled thermonuclear reaction comes into being, the vast
expanse of sea water will become an inexhaustible energy
source. It is estimated that the energy stored in deuterium in the
world's oceans can be used for 10,000 million years, if the
present level of consumption is maintained.

In addition, the earth itself is a big thermal energy reservoir.
It has an enormous amount of heat along with energy countless
times greater than the total energy of deposits of coal, petroleum
and natural gas - the present primary energy sources. Utilization
of the abundant energy contained in terrestrial heat is only in its
infancy. Free from pollution, solar energy has not yet been
directly used on a large scale. Besides, with the development of
human society, new energy sources will be discovered to serve
the people.

*Utilization efficiency by human beings is getting higher.* The
development of energy sources shows that humanity not only is
continuously extending the range of energy utilization, but also
raising its utilization efficiency. For example, the thermal
efficiency of the steam engine attained in its initial stage was
only several per cent, but now it goes as high as 30-40 per cent.

With the development of industrial production and the rising of
technical levels, the utilization efficiency of energy is getting
higher and higher. For instance, popularization of steam-power
apparatuses with a large capacity and high parameters, promotion
of gas input parameters of the gas turbine, application of gas-
steam combined cycles and the magneto-hydrodynamic generator and
fuel cells now being studied - all these are pioneering the way
to higher energy utilization efficiency.

The utilization rate of uranium in nuclear fission energy sources
is being raised time and again. In the thermal neutron reactor
generally used for its power nowadays, the rate can only reach
1-2 per cent, but it might be raised to 60 per cent by using the
fast-neutron breeder reactor.

In short, the history of the development of energy sources fully
testifies that *"ideas of stagnation, pessimism, inertia and
complacency are all wrong"*.


*Reflection of the Crisis of Capitalist System*

The so-called energy crisis in the capitalist world today is a
product of the imperialist system itself and an indication of its
aggravating decay. Bragging about her prosperity, the United
States boasts that her population constitutes only 6 per cent of
the world's population but the energy sources she expends are
one-third of the world's total. This is a typical example of waste
and destruction of energy sources due to decadent relations of
production. Energy sources in the United States are consumed
in large quantities for arms expansion and war preparations, 10
per cent of the petroleum and 33 per cent of the industrial
electric power are devoted to the production of munitions.

The reactionary and decadent nature of Soviet revisionist social-
imperialism is also reflected in the question of energy sources. It
wantonly plunders the third world's energy sources for high profits.
In the past few years, its imports of low-priced crude oil from the
Middle East have sharply increased: 100,000 tons in 1967, over
7 million tons in 1972, and over 13 million tons in 1973.

The Soviet revisionists compelled the Arab countries to pay for
their munition debts with cheap petroleum which was resold to
European and American countries at a much higher price in
order to rake in enormous profits. It is because of the wild
exploitation and plunder by the imperialists, especially the two
superpowers, that the third world has to use petroleum as a
weapon against them.

"Energy exhaustion" and "hunger for energy" uttered by the two
superpowers actually mean the crisis of their policy of plunder
and hegemonism, showing that they can no longer ravage the
third world as they please. Take petroleum again as an example.
According to statistics published in the United States, total
discovered petroleum reserves in 1974 was 93,800 million tons,
but total world output of petroleum that year was only 2,800
million tons. How can there be "exhaustion" and "hunger"?

The fact is that around 80 per cent of the known reserves is in
the third world. With the third world steadily awakening and
growing in strength, the superpowers can no longer plunder it
at will.

The frantic cries of the two hegemonic powers about "energy
exhaustion" is but a sokescreen to cover up and create public
opinion to facilitate their aggression and plunder. Whenever the
U.S. imperialists seized Middle East petroleum in the past, they
first of all created public opinion about "energy exhaustion".

After World War I, the U.S. propaganda machine was put to
work clamouring that "U.S. petroleum resources will soon be
exhausted". Soon afterwards, the U.S. State Department
clamoured that "open-door" and "equal opportunity" principles
should be adopted for the exploitation of Middle East petroleum
resources. Thus the U.S. monopoly groups made their way into
the Middle East.

After World War II, these monopoly groups once again raised a
hue and cry about "energy exhaustion", howling that all U.S.
produced petroleum had been used up and that if they were to
maintain their civilization on the basis of petroleum, they should
be ready to go into those rich petroleum areas. Soon after this,
they managed to control most of the petroleum resources in the
Middle East.

The same can be said of the Soviet revisionists. Their "energy
hunger" cry is a smokescreen to conceal their outrageous
plunder of petroleum wealth so as to wrangle with the U.S.
imperialists over Middle East oil.

All this illustrates that the so-called energy crisis is a crisis
of the imperialist system itself. With the victorious advance of
the third world countries and the people of the whole world in their
struggle against imperialism, there will soon emerge a new and
unprecedented bright era in the history of development of energy
sources.


[So far the article in Peking Review No. 4/1976.]

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