Top Diaries

I buy this for wind, and ergo for wave, but NOT tide.

You can predict hundreds of years ahead EXACTLY when tidal power is going to kick in and out, and plan around it. That seems pretty dependable (although admittedly sporadic) to me.

"The future is already here -- it's just not very evenly distributed" William Gibson

by ChrisCook (cojockathotmaildotcom) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 08:45:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]

NNader said "safer", nothing more, in the quote.

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.

by rg (leopold dot lepster at google mail dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 08:51:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]

(I think dependable base load power is a red herring. It really assumes a lifestyle...sorta like "Well, everyone has to commute to work at the same time, don't they?" Well, er, no.)

(Not to mention all the great ideas coming up about how to store energy to create a steady base. I liked Migeru's idea of a huge spring being cranked down--or was it a huge weight on a spring being bent over? All the technophiles should be raring to go...so much new technology! and loads more on the cusp of discovery.)

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.

by rg (leopold dot lepster at google mail dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 08:53:57 AM EST
[ Parent ]

I don't think it's quite a red herring, but I find the way it's been accepted as conventional wisdom slightly strange. It works on the assumption that we can't and won't do anything different with power usage than we have been doing.

Perhaps we should add a fifth element to Jérôme's Creed: smart power usage - using and/or storing sporadic power when it's available, cutting back when it's not. Maybe we can recharge our cars and delivery vans when it's sunny, windy or when the tide's running.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 08:57:32 AM EST
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It works on the assumption that we can't and won't do anything different

That's where the ideological edge lies, I think, both in the "can't" (a form of conservatism with a small c) and the "won't" (big business lobbying / human nature arguments)

Perhaps we should add a fifth element to Jérôme's Creed: smart power usage

Excellent.

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.

by rg (leopold dot lepster at google mail dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:00:40 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Smart Power Usage (none / 0)

And there is a subject that has been aching and calling me for practically over a year now. The coverage on that item has been small - but I also think it's a subheader under what Jerome lists as "conservation".

The wars of coal vs nuclear and the wars between several renewables have always sparked the largest and most intense debates.

Why has the debate on conservation remained so limited? Perhaps because no debate is needed and everyone sees it as a common wisdom? Then where can I find the plan of attack? Because I hardly can't. It's all scatter what I have found so far.

by Nomad (Bjinse) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:43:15 AM EST
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Re: Smart Power Usage (none / 0)

Because there's no "magic bullet" there - solutions will come from all of us making efforts that we are motivated to do.

The closest to a "magic bullet" is the gas tax, or carbon tax, solution, as it gives a clear price signal to everybody. But many things are more complex than that, or require other kinds of efforts

information on energy efficiency of appliances
construction standards
tougher recycling obligations
more up-to-date information on prices of things like power, road availability, etc...

so that we have the icnentive to make the right choices, and that we are able to make them.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 10:57:08 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Smart Power Usage (none / 1)

The big question that has stuck with me: where and what are those efforts and how can I - as an energy consumer - quickly implement them when so motivated?

Just like the patchwork of solutions for renewables, it's clear to me that there is similarly no "magic bullet" solutions when it comes to conservation and that here too a patchwork needs to welded. I should've been clearer on that - but it's wortwhile to have you stress that point. Yet that patchwork of today is what I called scatter. There's little structure - unless a new revolution has taken place which I've completely missed.

It comes back to markets and politics. The solutions you listed are (mostly) inherently political by nature because they are regulation-driven. Market forces -will- provide more conservation techniques and als more accessible (and reliable??) information on those conservation techniques when the energy crunch is in full swing. I, however, would prefer to stay ahead of the latter development (market forces), while in the meantime continue to ply the former (politics and regulation measures).

The Energy Conservation Wiki/Platform that Migeru came up with somewhere before last year's summer is what I have in mind when writing this.

by Nomad (Bjinse) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 12:18:35 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Perhaps we should add a fifth element to Jérôme's Creed: smart power usage - using and/or storing sporadic power when it's available, cutting back when it's not. Maybe we can recharge our cars and delivery vans when it's sunny, windy or when the tide's running.

I suppose that's included in energy efficiency/conservation, but maybe it needs to be a separate item, to flag that idea that using the same energy for the same purpose in different circumstances can make quite a big difference.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:29:34 AM EST
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I know people who live on a small island in the Pac NW. their community owns a generator. they have electricity 12 hours a day -- about 8am to 8pm iirc. they live comfortable lives...

where is it written that except for emergency rooms and the like, we have to have 24x7 electricity on demand? we lived w/o it for 20,000 years, and now all of a sudden it is the end of civilisation if we have to fit our electric consumption into some kind of a schedule?

this idea that every human epoch prior to our own fossil binge was unrelievedly dark, dirty, smelly, cold, miserable and stupid I find historically naif and more than a wee bit arrogant. we can't even match the lifespans of peasant farmers in the Caucasus, and we're the all time hotshots and pinnacle of human evolution? but I bet the Romans thought the same, between swigs of Pb contaminated drinkies...

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...

by DeAnander (de_at_daclarke_dot_org) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:25:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]

He says "safer than the alternatives", which implies that renewables are not considered "alternatives".

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 08:57:44 AM EST
[ Parent ]

kerching!

"Because they can't generate enough power"

and round we go again...

Did we have any debates that summed this up anywhere? I remember discussing wind turbines and railways with DoDo, there were some numbers in that. And there was another debate where we worked out the power output of wind turbines plus geo-thermal plus solar. Then we can add wave power (anyone got any info on that?) and there were those European Parliament translator chaps and chapesses, one of whom had a link to a site with that funky map showing PV across the sahara and down into the arabin peninsula, wind around the top left of europe, geo thermal to the centre right...

So maybe throw out the challenge:

Can someone show me the proof that renewables can't supply Europe (and by implication any other large group of countries = all humans on the planet) with enough energy to...

And there's another merry-go-round there.

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.

by rg (leopold dot lepster at google mail dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:05:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]

No, because there are advantages to using fuels. If your specification includes the ability to deploy anywhere, scale arbitrarily, or provide mobility and autonomy renewables can't compete with fuels. Which goes back to Starvid's tagline "peak oil is not an energy crisis, it's a liquid fuel crisis".

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:14:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

That sounds a set of problems at the margins rather than in the main line of day-to-day living where most of our energy usage is.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:19:03 AM EST
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Unless you're talking about hydrocarbons and you live in suburbia. Starvid is very happy with his electric scooter feeding off nuclear.

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:20:47 AM EST
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Does living in suburbia need liquid fuels for some reason?

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:21:56 AM EST
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It needs either fuels or batteries for vehicles. Note that transportation fuels need not be a source of energy but only a store of energy. Synthetic hydrocarbons would also work.

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:28:55 AM EST
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Or small nuclear power plants in each vehicle. That'd be ok too.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:31:28 AM EST
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Nah, too much need for radiation protection.

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:35:53 AM EST
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Think of the new markets for lead underwear though. It'd be a new industrial revolution!

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:38:44 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Isn't there a theory that lead poisoning brought down the Roman Empire?

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:41:33 AM EST
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A theory? (4.00 / 3)

A theory?!? The Romans were solely responsible for boosting the atmospheric lead pollution to such levels they are recognisable as anthropolical markers in ice cores. The whole elite of Romans who drank wine (and who at that time didn't?) is suspect to have suffered of chronic and heavy lead poisoning.

The evidence, however, remains scant - because the Romans cremated when possible. And because the elite had the money to cremate their deceased - little adult bones have been preserved. But children bones have - and each analysis shows they were over the top contaminated with lead. Even although children have a larger uptake of lead into their system, the evidence that the entire Roman civilisation was high on lead is stacking.

Thanks for that. This was part of my thesis subject.

by Nomad (Bjinse) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:50:06 AM EST
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Of course (none / 0)

Putting the whole blame of the destruction of the Roman Empire on Pb - would be a little too much credit for one element.

But contributed? Very feasible, in my mind.

by Nomad (Bjinse) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:53:01 AM EST
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Intermittence (4.00 / 2)

"Because they can't generate enough power"

That's emphatically not the issue. The issue is electricity that's available 24/7, instantly on demand.

renewables like wind and solar are not available when needed, but when the resource (wind, sun) is there, which makes them less useful to respond to some form of demand.

Now, there are many ways around that (storage systems, use of that power for non-time sensitive demand, etc...), but it is an issue.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 09:32:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]

If that is not the issue, what makes nuclear safer than wind or tide power? (Or geo-thermal, etc...)

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.

by rg (leopold dot lepster at google mail dot com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 04:12:49 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Intermittence (none / 1)

The issue is not total capacity but intermittency and the inability to adjust production to demand.

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed Jan 10th, 2007 at 03:41:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]

...which I think is pretty much a red-herring argument (see comments elsewhere, including Jerome's link to the wind turbines --> compressed air situation in the U.S.)

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.

by rg (leopold dot lepster at google mail dot com) on Wed Jan 10th, 2007 at 08:17:10 AM EST
[ Parent ]

No, it's a real source of uncertainty: we don't know if we can store enough energy to buffer the unreliability of wind etc. If we can't work out a way of doing so we need to provide base-load from somewhere else.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Wed Jan 10th, 2007 at 08:32:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Can passive geothermal provide the baseload?

Those whom the Gods wish to destroy They first make mad. -- Euripides

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed Jan 10th, 2007 at 08:34:43 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Intermittence (none / 1)

Some of it, at least. We know it's going to have to be a patchwork depending on local conditions.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Wed Jan 10th, 2007 at 08:36:18 AM EST
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I guess it's the sporadicity (is that a word??) that's the problem: if the tide isn't favourable during the tea-breaks in the Blair-Bush trial then you'll need something else to pick up the slack.

I'm not all that convinced by the 30% limit anyway - last time we went looking for justification it came down to one study somewhere that has been accepted as conventional wisdom.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jan 9th, 2007 at 08:52:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]