There are extant examples of wholly carbon free electricity grids. They all rely on favorable geology (hydro, geotermal) and nuclear. And these technologies can be scaled up to meet a future with very high electricity demand, so these are the technologies we should deploy. We know this will work, because it already does. In this context, wind is, basically, nothing but a distraction. The concrete in the bases would be better poured into containment domes, and the steel better used in pressure vessles.
(note that I am not really a fan of the extant nuclear industry either. Its not ambitious enough, by far. We need to increase our build rate by orders of magnitude)
double plus good... ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
"doing some good", "gradual improvements", "20 % decrease in carbon emmisions"- all these are things that strike me as "Not fracking good enough". Carbon has to be entirely removed from electricity production, because nothing can really be done to clean up transport, industry or heating without clean electricity.
Then I flatly fail to comprehend why you take issue with wind and solar. To achieve that target - which seems like a sensible and responsible thing to do - you'll need to mobilise a considerable fraction of our industrial capacity. Ignoring an entire class of energy technology strikes me as a poor way to mobilise industrial capacity swiftly.
any decrease in electricity consumption your gain from more efficient appliances and tvs, ect is going to evaporate when you plug in your electric car to your mains
Cars are never going to be economical for bulk transportation over middling to long distances. The thermodynamics favour rail and water too massively for that. So no, there will not be a massive migration to electrical cars. There will be a considerable migration to electrical trains, but they are more energy-efficient than cars pr. person-km and ton-km. By around an order of magnitude...
not to mention what asking industry to burn as little gas and coal as possible will do to demand.
Presuming that industrial production continues at its present pace and energy intensity. Which is a dubious assumption, since we are entering a century of widespread raw material scarcity (not just energy, though that is certainly the most pressing constraint).
And, frankly, much of what is being produced is worthless garbage that we would be better off without.
- Jake If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.
