Six Months on... Global Collapse Destinations?

[MoonlightShadow]

Interesting point. Are Solar Panels, wind generators, LED lighting systems etc., a good investment, versus generator/main-engine-charging, fuel savings, plus maintenance and capital amortisation/depreciation on the gear? Anyone ever worked out figures on that?

Also, with all the clever guys on here, anyone ever thought of, or built, a cost-effective anaerobic digester small enough to fit on a boat? An excellent manner of getting rid of live-aboard waste and producing power, if it could be done.

Is there such a figure as a cost-benefit value for being green?

[starfish62]

Originally Posted by anotherT34C

In an attempt to be an informed voter, I'm trying to sort my way through understanding the convoluted CDS contracts. I'm now of the opinion that the entirety of this mess is not understandable by any individual, and anyone who tells you how it is, and knows what needs to be done, is lying (maybe to themselves).

I kind of like this site's explanation. Plus, it's politically neutral, so there's no hyperbole or finger-wagging.

The Crisis of Credit Visualized

[Microship]

MoonlightShadow - The ROI is not purely economic in these days when dollar-value is itself a nonlinearity. The payback takes a broader form: increased self-sufficiency, or at least flexibility in making choices. In practical terms, this might mean seeing your boat as alternative housing, or being able to use it as a relocation vector during a move. So yes on the cost-benefit value, but it's not necessarily numeric.

As to the digester, I have difficulty imagining sufficient economy of scale if power-production is expected. Eliminating waste is easy with a composter, however.

Cheers,
Steve

[starfish62]

Originally Posted by Microship

Never thought I'd say this after observing the staggering amount of money that I rescued from stocks and put into nautical toys in 2007-8, but I now consider my boat (and even the electronics) as a great investment.
Cheers,
Steve

That's absolutely crazy, but true! We have seen all of our home equity disappear in the last three years. We own the boat free and clear, however, and bought it at a salvage price so that now it is worth close to twice what we paid for it with all of the work that we've put into it. Interesting, to say the least. Of course, I'm in South Florida which was ground zero for the "housing bubble" so my situation is more extreme than many, I'm sure.

[MoonlightShadow]

I imagine an anaerobic digester simply as a speeded up composter, a form of stomach, the methane given off maybe being used for cooking? Can you use methane for cooking?

I appreciate the return is not just an economic figure, but we have such things as carbon credits and the like, which relate things to economic figures that we can understand. I was wondering if anyone had related the two factors, and actually worked out what the cost of keeping the planet alive actually is, and related that to a value that could be used in a formulae to enable one to see what is worthwhile and what isn't.

(Hmmmmm. Understand economics . OK, perhaps this is a daft question in the present climate).

[rebel heart]

I'd second the notion of the boat being a "good" investment right now.

I was looking at the tax benefits of buying solar/wind, and basically I can get 30% back ( Federal Tax Credits for Energy Efficiency : ENERGY STAR ).

I had a bonus come though a few weeks ago (no, I don't work for a zombie bank!), and I realized that one of the best investments I could make was some green energy for the boat. I get a tax credit of $600, and reduce my shore power bill. Not bad.

[MoonlightShadow]

Hmmmm. If you are a liveaboard in the US, would your boat qualify as your home under the scheme?

We have a similar system in the UK. I shall now commence an investigation into whether I can get tax credits if I move aboard. I've got a kinda feeling what the answer will be, but worth a few enquiries.

[starfish62]

We deducted our two Kyocera 130's, MPPT charger and the whole shebang. So far nothing has been requested, but we did keep the receipts.

[MoonlightShadow]

Cooooooolll.

[westsail42]

my $.02.

We are experiencing the (negative) effects of an economy built on credit. This has nothing to do with one politician or political party. This started way back in the early 80s, just after the last "big one".

Any "fiscal conservatism" practiced by consumers or business owners has slowly eroded since then "giving in" to increasingly cheap credit. Consumers and business have taken on debt to high levels never seen before. Now it has come crashing down.

The difference between this and, say, the dot-com bubble, is that directly affects almost EVERYONE. Anyone who has a credit card, mortgage, HELOC. (If you werent invested in high-tech, you didnt get hit so hard when the dot-com bubble burst).

This time, they are saying the consumer can only bailout the economy. But, the consumer has already been over-leveraged with high credit card debt, big mortgage payments, car payments, etc. Any credit left is being taken away. To make matters worst, the average consumer has almost no savings. And if you were unfortunate to lose your job, things are still worse. There is NO WAY the consumer can bail out this enconomy in the short term.

It will be years before things really turn around. When it does, it will not be the same economy we have become used to the past couple decades. Hopefully it will be built on assets, equity and real value. Not credit.

Problem is, for the US at least, the "next generation" of workers (todays kids/teenagers) are less likely to produce the innovation and entrepenurship this country has been fortunate to provide that revs up the economic engines. The US is/will be outpaced by other countries. Meaning, it wont be the US alone that will turn the global economy around. And as was said earlier in the thread, the US will have lost all that much more economic clout.

Implications for cruising, in the short term, will be destabilisiation of smaller countries and civil unrest. It is no coincidence that piracy has been on the rise. The cruiser will need to be more alert of the social and economic issues going on in the places they plan to visit.

[Christian Van H]

Originally Posted by anotherT34C

I hold a doctorate in applied physics, did my dissertation on the mathematics of j/psi suppression in quark-gluon plasma, and now design accelerators for a living. The understanding of these contracts and the math that goes into them eludes me. Maybe I'm just too stupid to get it

OH MY GOD! Thats exactly what my dissertation was on!!! Just kidding, but quantum mechanics is fascinating. As for the reason you cant get it, it's really quite simple. Although you are well endowed in the brain category, you also have morals, which makes it impossible for you to see the truth, much as I cant see the letters on eye tests because I am colorblind...You can think on twelve planes, but they have invented a thirteenth, simply because of lack of regulation...

[anotherT34C]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

OH MY GOD! Thats exactly what my dissertation was on!!! Just kidding, but quantum mechanics is fascinating. As for the reason you cant get it, it's really quite simple. Although you are well endowed in the brain category, you also have morals, which makes it impossible for you to see the truth, much as I cant see the letters on eye tests because I am colorblind...You can think on twelve planes, but they have invented a thirteenth, simply because of lack of regulation...

You may be right!... If you add an axis of deception (which I naively didn't consider) the math might simplify. Similar to when mapping to the complex plane, the addition of imaginary numbers often allows the mathematics to become tractable. Problem is, nobody ever told these guys that you have to be able to map the solution back onto the real plane for it to be applicable in the real world. For my fellow nerds, you might say that "modern" finance is endowed with a non-Hermitian symplectic structure.

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by anotherT34C

.....you might say that "modern" finance is endowed with a non-Hermitian symplectic structure.

This is why I love CF, I never would have learnt this at home, work or in the yacht club bar

[john540]

I planned on selling my overvalued California house and buying rental property in a market that actually provided a return on equity, however, before I could do that, the California market tanked, and I lost most of my paper net worth. Fortunately, I had borrowed against my house back when I could and paid cash for my boat. Now if I have to, I can sail away from the house. If things get a lot worse, and we have a SHTF or TEOTWAKI scenario, gold might be nice to have, but not my first investment, real estate could be nationalized, and the dollar will be history. Fuel could become scarce, rendering generators worthless. My idea of good investments are anything that lends itself to self-sufficiency, such as, in no particular order;
1. watermaker
2. solar panels
3. wind generator
4. firearms, ammunition, and reloading equipment (ammunition makes a good substitute currency)
5. fishing equipment
6. tools
7. canning equipment
8. canned and dehydrated foods
9. vacuum packed grain and grain grinder
10. fuel
11. distillation equipment
12. biodiesel mfg. kit
13. a well prepared and stocked bug-out plan

You can never be too prepared. It's easy to dismiss people as "survivalists", but remember, Noah got the last laugh.

[Tempest245]

Originally Posted by john540

4. firearms, ammunition, and reloading equipment (ammunition makes a good substitute currency)
You can never be too prepared. It's easy to dismiss people as "survivalists", but remember, Noah got the last laugh.

I watched a news story the other day reporting that the gun and ammunition manufacturers cannot keep up with the current demand for non military firearms.