Best energy alternatives to stop global warming

[shynung]

...sun is always shining in some part of the world...

2/3 of the Earth's surface is water. A lot of that water is concentrated in several large areas, the biggest being the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. There are currently no practical solutions to put solar panels on them without it drifting off elsewhere uncontrollably, possibly smacking into ships that frequent these areas.

To completely rely on the Sun, and the Sun alone, as a power source, we need large-scale installations, one of the less-costly of it being solar power satellite constellations (even then, plenty of engineering solutions need to be invented to make it work, and would cost dearly to anyone attempting to construct it). The current political climate, unfortunately, does not support such a project.

Edited June 17, 2014 by shynung

[PakledHostage]

I really didn't think the concept was that hard to grasp.

Neither are the concepts of energy balance, radiative heat transfer, global average albedo, etc. yet you seem to struggle with those... Please correct me if I am wrong. Or better yet, maybe provide some links to some reputable references.

[EdFred]

Hey, I didn't do the study, I'm not at MIT. Complain to them.

[Elthy]

Who is "them"? I never heard about this point, it could be just from an oil company who is affraid to loose its profits...

[SargeRho]

Hey, I didn't do the study, I'm not at MIT. Complain to them.

Some of that Source-Sauce would be nice now. Because I couldn't find anything on it.

[PakledHostage]

Hey, I didn't do the study, I'm not at MIT. Complain to them.

My point is, please provide a link to the MIT study that you're citing. That way we can read it and judge its validity for ourselves.

Also, while I am on the topic of studies: Here's a link to an interesting article on Phys.org about research into using nanotubes and solar panels to make methane from atmospheric CO₂ and water vapour. That methane can be distributed, stored and burned to make electricity and power internal combustion engines. And while burning methane produces CO₂, there is no net increase in atmospheric CO₂ (unlike burning shale gas or other natural sources of methane that have been sequestered underground for millions of years).

The real world may not be sim-city, but the real world has engineers who work to solve problems and develop technology that make new things possible. Large scale energy storage and distribution may not be practical yet but that doesn't mean that this will always be the case.

[EdFred]

It was a discussion at lunch, not a published paper, so I have nothing to link to. For all I know they haven't completed the study yet, in which case it's a little hard to publish and send you a link. But when I'm told something by someone who is actually conducting the study I'm a bit more inclined to believe them over people on the internet who say "well, I don't believe that because I'm a solar proponent." And yes, I am fully aware you can call me a liar and full of excrement and my statement is worthless because I don't have an URL for you to link to. That's your right, and I won't lose any sleep over it. All I know is what I was told.

[78stonewobble]

How to Use Solar Energy at Night

Molten salts can store the sun's heat during the day and provide power at night

All we need now to power the world is 8.400.000.000 tonnes of the stuff... o.O

...

Offcourse we can power the earth with solar power alone. The question is whether it's worth the effort and magnitude required to do so. We're talking mega scale engineering to go completely solar power for most of the world and international expense and cooperation on an unprecedented scale and I just don't see that happening.

Edited June 17, 2014 by 78stonewobble

[PakledHostage]

It was a discussion at lunch, not a published paper, so I have nothing to link to. For all I know they haven't completed the study yet, in which case it's a little hard to publish and send you a link. But when I'm told something by someone who is actually conducting the study I'm a bit more inclined to believe them over people on the internet who say "well, I don't believe that because I'm a solar proponent."

So I guess we'll have to wait for the study to be published before we can draw any conclusions. But I trust you understand our predicament? After all, you are just some guy on the internet too. Why should we take your word when you won't take ours? How do we know that you aren't misrepresenting or misunderstanding what your friend at MIT said? Heck, I have a friend at MIT who has seen signs, while doing research in Idaho, that indicate wind turbines have been linked to prostitution...

[EdFred]

So I guess we'll have to wait for the study to be published before we can draw any conclusions. But I trust you understand our predicament? After all, you are just some guy on the internet too. Why should we take your word when you won't take ours? How do we know that you aren't misrepresenting or misunderstanding what your friend at MIT said? Heck, I have a friend at MIT who has seen signs, while doing research in Idaho, that indicate wind turbines have been linked to prostitution...

I covered that with my last two sentences. I have no dog in the fight. I'm not a proponent or opponent of anything. If solar works out to be the best, fine lets go with that. If it's hydro, lets go with that, if for some inexplicable reason it remains fossil fuels, well let's just keep doing what we're doing - or the only real way to combat it - get rid of 90% of the population and go back to living in caves. But somehow, I don't think most people would go for that solution.

[SargeRho]

Fossil fuelss have already been proven not to be a solution, but a problem.

[EdFred]

Fossil fuelss have already been proven not to be a solution, but a problem.

Evidently the term inexplicable isn't as well known as I thought it to be.

[rtxoff]

2/3 of the Earth's surface is water. A lot of that water is concentrated in several large areas, the biggest being the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. There are currently no practical solutions to put solar panels on them without it drifting off elsewhere uncontrollably, possibly smacking into ships that frequent these areas.

To completely rely on the Sun, and the Sun alone, as a power source, we need large-scale installations, one of the less-costly of it being solar power satellite constellations (even then, plenty of engineering solutions need to be invented to make it work, and would cost dearly to anyone attempting to construct it). The current political climate, unfortunately, does not support such a project.

Have you even read all i wrote? Where did i say that we have to rely onto the sun alone? Also a few posts back there are photos of installations on water although this is even not necessary to power the world. Also i am not strictly against nuclear power but to rely onto it solely without taking other forms into consideration would be stupid too.

Edited June 17, 2014 by gpisic
grammatical error

[SargeRho]

Evidently the term inexplicable isn't as well known as I thought it to be.

I know what inexplicable means. But it has already been proven Not to be the solution.

[EdFred]

Which would make it even MORE inexplicable if it was!

[theend3r]

All we need now to power the world is 8.400.000.000 tonnes of the stuff... o.O

...

Offcourse we can power the earth with solar power alone. The question is whether it's worth the effort and magnitude required to do so. We're talking mega scale engineering to go completely solar power for most of the world and international expense and cooperation on an unprecedented scale and I just don't see that happening.

I'd rather live in a nuclear powerplant than have Earth covered in solar panels, which are btw very toxic, not to mention their production. We'd be better off dumping spent fuel in the oceans than that.

[SargeRho]

Silicon pannels are very toxic? That's news to me.

[vger]

No. What he was saying is that because solar panels really suck as far as efficiency goes, you are heating the atmosphere more with solar panels than the CO2 emissions that may be generated IF your electrical supply is from fossil fuels. If your electrical supply is from hydro or wind already, you are contributing more to GW than if you didn't use solar panels at all. You *might* be able to save money by going solar, but you aren't saving the planet from GW by going solar. I really didn't think the concept was that hard to grasp.

We need to keep improving solar panels. I would sincerely hope that the final development of solar energy is to not use panels at all, but to use genetically engineered plants that we can actually draw energy from.

Earth is utterly covered with living solar-collectors, and they are far more efficient at it than man-made solar panels.

[lajoswinkler]

Two Ways:

-Power to Gas (Pipeline are well understood). It can be a problem to get enough water in the desert, though...

-Direct current instead of alternating current (not sure if thats the right translation) is more efficient on long distances. Since solarpanels produce direct current anyway thats not such a big problem.

Power used to make methane out of CO2 and water? Huge energy losses.

DC more efficient on long distances? Dude, where did you learn physics? Ever heard of current wars? Gosh...

[Seret]

It was a discussion at lunch, not a published paper, so I have nothing to link to.

I think you may have misunderstood something your friend said.

What's sitting on the ground doesn't effect the amount of energy the in the sun's rays. What it does effect is what happens to that energy after it reaches the ground.

In the case of a flat white panel, a small amount is absorbed as heat and a large amount is reflected away.

For a black panel a large amount is absorbed as heat and a small amount reflects away.

For a PV cell a large amount is absorbed, some of that as heat and some is converted to electricity. A small amount reflects away. Due to the fact that some energy turns to electricity instead of heat a PV cell will heat up less than a flat panel of the same colour.

The only time a PV panel will result in a net increase in absorbed heat is if it is substantially darker than the object it replaces. This is effectively a small change in the Earth's albedo. The albedo does directly affect radiative forcing, which is important in climate change,but the idea that emplacing solar panels would significantly affect radiative forcing to the degree where it would be a stronger signal than the carbon emissions avoided is the kind of claim that would definitely raise eyebrows and have most people coughing rude things under their breath. At the very least it falls into "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" territory.

Personally I think you either misconstrued what your friend was saying, or your friend was talking from a non-expert position. Being (a student?) at MIT hardly makes you infallible, especially when it comes to topics like renewables and climate change, where everybody seems to have a strong opinion whether they're well-educated on the facts or not.

[Seret]

Silicon pannels are very toxic? That's news to me.

The panels aren't, but the silicon industry uses all sorts of extremely nasty stuff during fabrication. They don't emit it deliberately, because to do so would be illegal and dangerous for their workers, not to mention expensive, but accidents do happen. That's all taken into account in lifecycle analysis, and PV does still come out having a substantial net benefit. It's difficult not to when they directly make a high-grade energy source like electricity using no fuel.

[AngelLestat]

The biggest difference is that anyone can put a gas generator in their basement if they have the room, so most people in suburban areas. The amount of people that would be able to put a wind generator on their property would be a tiny fraction.

Also could you provide some numbers for that conclusion you made?

First, the noice issue with a gas generator is many times more than a wind turbine. The efficiency of a small generator it has no comparison with a big one.. A fossil thermo plant is close to 75% of efficiency, a small gas/oil otto generator is close to 35%.

Then you always need to paid for the gas to produce energy (the cost rise all years).

How your energy is not renowable, the sale cost (price/Kw is low, that take away any advantage of produccing in the main hours.)

About the payback cost of wind it was like I said. From 2 to 4 years the new models. (Search in google in this last year: wind turbines payback cost), wind turbines pay its manufacture energy cost in just 5 month.

Now read this, it would clear you up many doubts:

It also explain why the time-load is not an issue against any other technology.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/wind-and-solar-harvest-enough-energy-now-to-pay-back-manufacture-plus-add-storage/

The payback cost also depends on the country policies and the winds locations of course, if you dont have wind, PV then..

http://www.enerpower.ie/page/wind/wind-turbine-payback-period

While you are correct that a lighter car would improve efficency creating it one large balloon is silly. I fail to see how letting air out would achieve anything. Unless you have a solid structure you still get flattened. Again do you have actual designs to back this up?

I saw this 2 years back but I dont remember the name so I can not find it, of course it was not constructed yet, they was in the materials selection phase. For example kevlar with CNT semi rigid structures would work but the cost is still high.

If you have valves to manage how much air you release in a crash and how much you keep. You can absorb most of the energy and avoid any damage to the driver. Depending from what direction the crash is, air mechanism activated using the same energy from the crash helping to keep the driver save.

You can fall from a high hill with this car and be totally ok. In fact the car would not get almost any damage.

You can also run over people and it would be impossible to kill them.

I'm beginning to wonder if any risk is acceptable to you. It's all about acceptable risk. And the probability of said risk. You have yet to explain how renewable energy could be used for base load.

If nuclear plants would be cost efficient, then maybe I would not be so against.

But their are not, and the risk that any of our already nuclear plants had an accidenct with their facilities or wastes in the next 20 years is too high. So why to add more future problems even if the new nuclear plants are more safe?

What if this plant has a issue?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Point_Energy_Center

How many people from New York you need to move? Who paid that cost?

About the load issue is explained in the first link that I gave to you. Smarted grid technologies would solve many of the power distribution and load problems.

To compare a battery to a fusion reactor is akin to comparing a black powder rocket to the space shuttle.

Fusion hasn't been used commercially because it is still being developed. As to the latter part of that statement I'm confused. Are you suggesting that any country which does not contribute to the project would have the technology withheld to the point of war?

I think that you are totally our of context, read our replys history to verify that.

I am saying that battery develpment funded can not be compare with fussion, becouse fussion never had any comercial payback yet.

Please explain how the methods of radioactive disposal listed in this thread release enough radiation to do any harm.

I already did with many examples in my previous post. And not always procedures and things go out like they are planned. Is not a theorical world.

**** HAPPENS

3. No, it would be different. As evidenced by the fact that a newer nuclear powerplant was even closer to the earthquake and tsunami and survived it easily. It was actually so safe that people from the nearby town used it as emergency shelter.

Your replys 1-2 are already answered. If you only way to continue with this discussion is giving fake facts and nonsense then is over.

First, there is no way to make something super safe, or it has a super cost, or is not super safe.

Mostly all important accidents are just a a chain of unfortunate events. Not becouse is earthquake safe means that nothing can happen.

4. If, you're gonna have a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami, you're probably gonna have bigger problems than the nuclear powerplants.

First, a natural disaster is just a natural disaster, there is nothing that we can do. But when an eartquake or tsunami strike, then with the time you can rebuild the town, but if remains radioactive then is other issue.

6. No, it functions like everything else. It evolves as time passes by. The risk is minimal and as I said we need hundreds or even thousands of giant chernobyl disasters, for nuclear power to be as dangerous as the ignorant choice to go with renewable energy without removing the main polluting sources.

Fukushima and Chernobyl are labeled as the 2 most expensive/damage industrial accidennts from all time.

And you want thoudsand of them before said that Nuclear is unsafe..

Take a min and try to think what are you saying... Your nuclear fanatism makes you blind.

http://www.wreckedexotics.com/articles/011.shtml

http://agreenroad.blogspot.com.ar/2012/06/fukushima-crisis-total-cost-up-to-10.html

So even if nuclear is the most cost ineficient technology out there, with biggest investment cost, with he higher operational and maintaince cost, with the waste management cost, with the other cost that are not included as decommissioning or accidents. You still believe that it worth it just becouse you can produce electricity in the main hours?

How quickly do you think mass adoption of electric cars will take? But in any case, lets say that this does happen, in a normal scenario you would need to power a family house on one or two cars worth of battery power for the majority of the night. I do think that you have over estimated the battery capacity of an electric car. Not to mention that utilises of the city that need to be powered.

I think that it is safe to say that the majority of people would be leaving for work at approximately the same time, so you need the majority of your batteries to be fully charged, meaning that they wouldn't be able to be used to power your city at night where power generation would be low. Not the best situation.

WTF? XD 2 cars only is enoght to 1 night? The cars in your example are toy cars?

1 car, is sufficient to supply 2 houses a whole day (24 hrs).

Everybody leaves at different times to work even if everybody enters at 8:00 am becouse not everyone takes the same time to get to work.

The cars has an average parking time of 95%, and if all people is traveling to work at the same time, this mean that nobody is in house so there is no need to get energy from the batteries.

Of course this never happen

[EdFred]

I think you may have misunderstood something your friend said.

You're right, I'm a moron that has no concept of anything scientific. I will go back to reading myths and fairy tales and passing them off as scientific fact. Thank you for showing me the error of my ways. *mumbles something about UHI and wanders off to proselytize about floods and dead guys nailed to sticks*

[PakledHostage]

I will go back to reading myths and fairy tales and passing them off as scientific fact. Thank you for showing me the error of my ways. *mumbles something about UHI and wanders off to proselytize about floods and dead guys nailed to sticks*

I don't think anyone wants you to do that, but there are a lot of engineers and scientists who read this forum and they ARE going to hold you to a higher standard. If you're going to make a claim, be prepared to defend it with references to reputable sources. If you can't do that, maybe think twice about posting or frame your post as a question rather than as an argument from authority.

And if by "UHI" you are referring to urban heat islands, then let's go down that rabbit hole. I presume you would like to draw some parallels with them in support of your earlier point?

[phoenix_ca]

It's not going to work if not the whole world is going to do it. Some countries also rely heavily on water power which does not depend on the weather.

If you're talking about hydroelectric power, like hell it doesn't depend on the weather. That water comes from precipitation deposited over a vast area, and unexpected reductions in inflow to a dam's reservoir can mean the dam needs to be run at less than max capacity (in a really bad situation, possibly even only a small fraction of capacity, or if the area has a drought, stopped entirely).