{DSG}DarkRaven wrote:Once again, how is this a simpler solution than burying it under a mountain? I'd think that with all the talk of global warming going on, the last place we'd want to bury our thousands of tons nuclear waste would be in a place that could melt in another half century.
Hey, I kinda think we're fucked anyway, so we might as well just go out with a bang.
I think it's time we go Sim-City style and build microwave power plants. The idea being that you have a solar-collecting satellite that then beams the energy it absorbs back to Earth in some fashion.
All kidding aside, going to electric-powered hybrids may not actually be a bad idea. The survey you cited seems to be making the assumption that the transition would be gradual over a good number of years, and I think that is a very valid assumption. But we would have to be sure to plan ahead for the increased demand and start building more capacity today. Which again brings us back to the question, where do we get that power?
Hybrids are also a confusing solution, and simply aren't viable as a long term problem solver. Current Hybrid vehicles only function on electric power for about twenty-five miles, provided you keep the speedometer at thirty MPH or less. If you go faster, or beyond 50 miles, the good old gasoline engine kicks in. They're completely designed as suburban vehicles, where the average person only drives 25 miles or less to work in one direction though stop and go traffic.
Cloral, if you search back for that article posted somewhere about wireless electricity (or just google the topic), you'll find that beaming power to earth from solar sattelites was one of the first ideas proposed for the new technology. If you don't have to tether them to the planet with huge copper cables that are hundreds of miles long, the idea is suddenly very possible.
Cloral wrote:I think it's time we go Sim-City style and build microwave power plants. The idea being that you have a solar-collecting satellite that then beams the energy it absorbs back to Earth in some fashion.All kidding aside, going to electric-powered hybrids may not actually be a bad idea. The survey you cited seems to be making the assumption that the transition would be gradual over a good number of years, and I think that is a very valid assumption. But we would have to be sure to plan ahead for the increased demand and start building more capacity today. Which again brings us back to the question, where do we get that power?
If ethanol is going to be the solution, then I say we better start researching and make it better. You know, I haven't heard much about fuel cell cars lately. How would those be, and is there any other way to get pure hydrogen without oil?
Fuel cells, I believe, are just another means of creating electricity, and are essentially the same as electrically driven hybrid cars that you plug in at night. Fuel cells would be great if there was a cheap and safe way of producing and distributing (respectively) hydrogen, but I'm not aware of such a breakthrough.
Of course, we'd still only be able to drive everywhere at 30mph or so, but it would certainly take the burden off of oil consumption. For passenger automobiles, and in theory, of course. Freight trucks, seafaring vessels, and aircraft still can't be run by any of these things, even ethanol, I think.
All this talk of alternative fuels sounds great on the 11 o'clock news, but once you look at the problem closely, you start to realize the enormity of the task we're faced with. Almost depressing, isn't it?
Fuel cell cars run just as well as gasoline cars.
I still think that solar power is the way to go, even if it isn't with solar panels.
Only problem I see with alternative fuel sources other than ethanol is the startup costs. Car companies don't want to put the money into it because they will have to pass the costs onto the consumer and nobody wants the extra cost.
We should have been making the switch to get off fossil fuels years ago. The world is fucked in the long run.
So why didn't we do it in the 70s and 80s when this was just as big of a problem. It got better in the 90s for some reason, but you would imagine that the car companies would have had a plan since then.
Phattonez,
Solar power is indeed the way to go. Unfortunatly, the current generation solar cells are not efficient enough to use as a reliable energy source on a massive scale. Personally, I'm hoping we eventually start using matter/anti-matter reactors. Nothing like living dangerously heh?
I've heard the opposition here, but there are ways to harness solar power without solar panels.
Phattonez,
Could you explain some of the other ways? I'm not trying to be an ass, but I thought you had to have some type of photoelectric cell that converts the solar radiation into electricity.
Trevelyan_06 wrote:Could you explain some of the other ways? ...I thought you had to have some type of photoelectric cell that converts the solar radiation into electricity.
Trev, I once saw on a PBS special how in Canada, people are outfitting their homes with solar powered boiler systems that use the sun to heat water and drive a small steam turbine or something. Generates power, power stored in batteries, house runs. Granted, the homes had to cut down to conserve and not be partially reliant on the normal power grid, but you don't need photoelectric cells in order to have solar powered homes.
You're right though, and I believe I mentioned earlier in the thread how the current efficiency rating of photoelectric panels is somewhere around or less than ten percent.
And of course, I'm not even going to begin to comment on how ridiculous the matter/anti-matter subject is.
Trev, I'll invite you to the link below, which shows some forms or solar power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy#Solar_energy_use
Most consist of using mirrors to heat up water and the steam spins a turbine.
All of those ways of generating/using solar energy are interesting. Of course, I can't see any power company's busting thier balls trying to get this type of technology any time soon. The simple fact is, solar energy is basically free. Sure they could still charge for the infastructure and related other expenses, but they know they couldn't charge as much for generating the electricity and that makes them leery.
Trevelyan_06 wrote:Sure they could still charge for the infastructure and related other expenses, but they know they couldn't charge as much for generating the electricity and that makes them leery.
Sadly, this is the answer to the question several people have asked, "Why wasn't this research begun sooner? (etc.)" Unfortunately, corporations are mostly profit driven, and since (despite what some politicians have claimed) there really hasn't been a complete concensus on global warming and peak oil until very recently (some stubbornly debate the first, many still debate the second), there was no need to spend billions of dollars on research for an unprofitable technology.
Of course, corporations will still find a way to charge you, no matter how cheaply made their product is, Trev. Wal-Mart, for instance, could cut it's prices in half and still make a profit, but they're content to knock off a few dimes and pennies here and there in order to make it look like they're genuinely low prices.
Long story short: technology is driven by necessity.
Isn't it cheaper to make solar power, so a whole new company could use solar power to sell?
I guess if it was cheaper it would have already been done.
Phattoonez,
It maybe cheaper to produce, and you are right that could give a company a unique way to get a toehold. However, this is one other problem.
The only place where something like this could take place would be a developed country like America or Britian. Third world countries consider themselves lucky if they have power, they don't care how eco-friendly it is. Which leads to an interesting problem....
Americans are spoiled. When we turn a switch we expect thier to be lights, T.V., A/C, etc. et. al. With a new technology like solar energy that doesn't have the huge infrastructure of the large fossil fuel power stations there may be more interuptions of service. Most Americans aren't going to use something unless it's 100% tried and trued and comes with a little American flag sticker.
I'm not saying that these problems could happen to solar energy. I'm not saying that solar energy would be less reliable or even have any start up problems at all. The problem is, the general public is stupid. They aren't going to research solar energy on thier own, they are going to rely on the media and the government to tell them what to think about it, just like everything else.
And do we really think that the media and government, both of which have ties to the big oil companies, are going to grease the way for any sort of solar energy company? Fuck no. They're going to fight it at every turn, overplay or even lie straight out about it's shortcomings. Sadly, for all the talk of greener energy and renewable resources, oil interests have become an ugly monster whose first concern is to destroy that which threatens it's profits. Alas, solar energy is one of those things.
phattonez wrote:Isn't it cheaper to make solar power, so a whole new company could use solar power to sell?I guess if it was cheaper it would have already been done.
Cheaper, maybe, but not more efficient. Like I said before, the amount of energy it takes to build solar panels and arrays to collect power is far more than such a system would ever produce with the current level of tech.
And Trev, geez, you ought to cut down on the rage against humanity. Not everybody and everything in this country is evil and out for profit at the expense of others.
{DSG}DarkRaven wrote:Cheaper, maybe, but not more efficient. Like I said before, the amount of energy it takes to build solar panels and arrays to collect power is far more than such a system would ever produce with the current level of tech.
I think I remember hearing about a solar plant built somewhere that was operated for a few years and then shut down because it wasn't producing enough energy to be profitable. At the time it was shut down, more power had been consumed to produce the plant than it had generated over its entire lifespan.
As for the question about solar power without solar panels, not too far from here in the Mojave Desert there's a power plant that uses a huge array of mirrors to heat a brine solution that drives a generator. There's also the concept of the solar draft tower that was mentioned previously in this thread. Unfortunately, both use up huge tracts of land and large amounts of infrastructure (pipes, glass plates, etc) for the amount of power that they generate.
{DSG}DarkRaven wrote:
And Trev, geez, you ought to cut down on the rage against humanity. Not everybody and everything in this country is evil and out for profit at the expense of others.
Oh I don't believe that everyone and everything is. It's just those that are, exceed at making things harder for everyone else with an efficiency that is greater than thier numbers.
Cloral wrote:Unfortunately, both use up huge tracts of land and large amounts of infrastructure (pipes, glass plates, etc) for the amount of power that they generate.
Infrastructure is the hidden cost of any operation like this, and it's the thing that most people don't consider when they talk about how great alternative energy concepts are. It's sad when otherwise intelligent people talk about solar panels like they grow on trees. Simply producing electricity or changing what cars run on will not solve the problem.
So then from what I'm hearing here, except for the pollution that it creates, nuclear power is the most plausible?
Pretty much. Sure, it requires a giant plant to house the reactor, cooling towers, lots of water, etc., but the fuel source is very powerful and efficient.
Think of it this way: solar power is like collecting water in a porous bucket. Nuclear power is like tapping a mineral spring. Solar power collects energy, and nuclear power uses fuel to generate it. This makes solar power more viable in the long run, but for the time being, nuclear power is a fuel source that we can tap much more easily and conveniently, not to mention efficiently. It's the same reason why oil is so great. The effort required to harvest abundant energy is minimal.