The Circle of Energy - What Heats this Place, What Keeps it Warm

It's was a snowy day, perhaps 6 inches fell that night. I was thinking about warmth and insulation, about houses and the Atmosphere.

There's a boiler in crawlspace, and I can hear the pump circulating its somewhat warmed water. There is natural gas coming into the building burning in a boiler. We have a utility bill, monthly accounts for that, let. Unfortunately, through the great West we have decimated the landscape with literally thousands of natural gas and oil permits. I understand their new systems where salt brine is pumped thousands of feet deep into the Earth's crust. Explosions are set off somehow miraculously, gas contract in the rocks is left free to come up to the capture heads and be distributed to our great network of burning heat producing unnatural systems we've created over the last century or two. I wonder how much we will regret pulverizing so much of that great rock we must stand upon. Are we simply recycling it and expecting the earth will harden it again. I am not so optimistic.

We talk about greenhouse gases, the buildup of CO2 in our atmosphere, which has a temerity to trap the lovely heat in. With CO2 our other problem is simple warming. We are doing this everywhere. If you run it vehicle tremendous amount of heat is radiated and then unused in any system. It is simply emanated into the air, or perhaps used to defrost a windshield. Ultimately, as in this house that is what warms the place. And if there's good insulation that heat stays in place. Our "problem" is that we've developed a good insulation blanket, and we have a very effective boiler, but by keeping it to warm the ice in our freezers is melting and our food is going to go bad. But it's on a global scale, and we need to deal with it before it's too late.