The US Could Reliably Run On Clean Energy By 2050 (popsci.com) 214
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Popular Science: The Biden administration has pledged to create a carbon-free energy sector by 2035, but because renewable resources generate only around 19 percent of US electricity as of 2020, climate experts warn that our transition to a green grid future needs to speed up. A group of researchers at Stanford led by Mark Jacobson, professor of civil and environmental engineering, has set out to prove that a 100 percent renewable energy grid by 2050 is not only feasible but can be done without any blackouts and at a lower cost than the existing grid. Jacobson is the lead author of a new paper, published in Renewable Energy, which argues that a complete transition to renewable energy -- defined as wind, water, and solar energy -- would benefit the US as a whole and individuals by saving costs, creating jobs, and reducing air pollution and carbon emissions.
They modeled how wind turbines, tidal turbines, geothermal and hydroelectric power plants, rooftop and utility photovoltaic panels, and other sources could generate energy in 2050. A host of different sources powered these projections: Jacobson used data from a weather-climate-air pollution model he first built in 1990, which has been used in numerous simulations since. Individual state and sector energy consumption was taken from the Energy Information Administration. Current fossil fuel energy sources were converted to electric devices that are powered by wind, water, and solar. This was then used to create projections for energy use in 2050. Time-dependent energy supply was matched with demand and storage in a grid integration model for every 30 second interval in 2050 and 2051. The study authors analyzed US regions and countrywide demand until the model produced a solution with what the authors called zero-load loss -- meaning, essentially, no blackouts with 100 percent renewable energy and storage. According to Jacobson, no other study is conducting this kind of modeling, which is unique in part because it checks conditions for any simulation every 30 seconds.
As the cost of renewables falls, researchers predict power companies and consumers will migrate to using renewables. Solar and wind are already half the cost of natural gas. Policy may also motivate adoption -- or hinder it. While the current administration has set out goals for a renewable energy grid, new permits for gas and drilling in the Gulf of Mexico counteract those same efforts. [...] The researchers quantified these benefits by looking at private costs, such as those to individuals or corporations, and social ones, which also include health and climate costs. Zero-emissions leads to few air pollution related deaths and illness, and a reduced toll on the healthcare system. [...] The model cannot address emissions from things like long-distance shipping or aviation, though the authors argue that green hydrogen could be a possible alternative to explore. They did not include nuclear energy or carbon capture, which [Anna-Katharina von Krauland, a PhD candidate in the Atmosphere/Energy program at Stanford and a co-author of the paper] views as "distractions from getting to 100 percent renewable energy as quickly as possible" because the technologies are costly, unproven, or lacking in their promises. "The best path forward would be to invest in what we know works as quickly as we can," she says -- such as wind, water, and solar energy.
They modeled how wind turbines, tidal turbines, geothermal and hydroelectric power plants, rooftop and utility photovoltaic panels, and other sources could generate energy in 2050. A host of different sources powered these projections: Jacobson used data from a weather-climate-air pollution model he first built in 1990, which has been used in numerous simulations since. Individual state and sector energy consumption was taken from the Energy Information Administration. Current fossil fuel energy sources were converted to electric devices that are powered by wind, water, and solar. This was then used to create projections for energy use in 2050. Time-dependent energy supply was matched with demand and storage in a grid integration model for every 30 second interval in 2050 and 2051. The study authors analyzed US regions and countrywide demand until the model produced a solution with what the authors called zero-load loss -- meaning, essentially, no blackouts with 100 percent renewable energy and storage. According to Jacobson, no other study is conducting this kind of modeling, which is unique in part because it checks conditions for any simulation every 30 seconds.
As the cost of renewables falls, researchers predict power companies and consumers will migrate to using renewables. Solar and wind are already half the cost of natural gas. Policy may also motivate adoption -- or hinder it. While the current administration has set out goals for a renewable energy grid, new permits for gas and drilling in the Gulf of Mexico counteract those same efforts. [...] The researchers quantified these benefits by looking at private costs, such as those to individuals or corporations, and social ones, which also include health and climate costs. Zero-emissions leads to few air pollution related deaths and illness, and a reduced toll on the healthcare system. [...] The model cannot address emissions from things like long-distance shipping or aviation, though the authors argue that green hydrogen could be a possible alternative to explore. They did not include nuclear energy or carbon capture, which [Anna-Katharina von Krauland, a PhD candidate in the Atmosphere/Energy program at Stanford and a co-author of the paper] views as "distractions from getting to 100 percent renewable energy as quickly as possible" because the technologies are costly, unproven, or lacking in their promises. "The best path forward would be to invest in what we know works as quickly as we can," she says -- such as wind, water, and solar energy.
Nuclear. (Score:2, Insightful)
The US was capable of running on green energy in 1980. Nuclear reactors are the only way we have to produce clean energy. Massive strip mining operations to produce lithium batteries and outsourcing solar panel production to dirty factories in China isn't a good alternative.
Any environmentalist that thinks you should just buy a Tesla and use paper straws isn't taking the problem seriously.
Re:Nuclear. (Score:5, Informative)
Lithium is extracted from salt and brine. Strip mining is not needed unless you want to label a bulldozer scraping salt off the surface of a dry lake as "strip mining".
A nuclear reactor is not a replacement for a battery. We aren't going to put reactors in cars. Nukes provide baseload, so need to be supplemented with either gas-fired peakers or grid-scale storage.
The biggest problem with nukes is the cost. They are twice the price of solar and four times the price of wind, and the gap is getting worse.
More Delays, Extra $1B for Georgia's Vogtle Nuke [wsbtv.com]
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Until we have good mass storage technology, nuclear probably is a good way of maintaining base load. I think the one thing we've all learned from the pandemic is it's never a good idea to have all your eggs in one basket. Up here in Canada it looks like we're moving towards nuclear as the best way to create reliable base load, but wind, solar, hydroelectric and geothermal are all part of the mix. The problem with these is often geographical, and in the case of the latter, geological as well. It rather frust
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By the time we could possibly build out a single new nuclear reactor and get through all of the red tape and permitting we'll have countless inexpensive storage technologies.
The 1990s and early 2000s were the time to mass produce reactors that would be starting to come online today. But we can't wait 20 years to even start chipping away at the issue and the intermittent energy solutions we have today don't even need storage if we over produce them.
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But we can't wait 20 years...
Actually, we can.
Do you think we can build all the windmills and solar PV cells we need in 20 years? No, we can't. Mark Jacobson estimates we can in 30 years. That gives us time to think up better ideas. If no better ideas come then we follow the plan set in his paper.
By the time we could possibly build out a single new nuclear reactor and get through all of the red tape and permitting we'll have countless inexpensive storage technologies.
You've heard the term "cutting the red tape"? Time to get out those scissors.
Not all nuclear power plants suck (Re:Nuclear.) (Score:2)
Nukes don't work as peakers.
Bill Gates disagrees. I have a billion reasons to believe him over you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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I will respond to you the same way. I have billions of reasons to believe Bill Gates over you. While you are saying it can't be done he's making it happen.
What happens when he succeeds? Will you eat your hat?
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Wrong. We have been over this before too.
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Re:Nuclear. (Score:5, Insightful)
"a bulldozer scraping salt off the surface of a dry lake" technically is strip mining. And the environmentalists will sue to stop it. Tidal power is even more doomed to die from environmentalist lawsuits.
I hope the fine analysis took into account a decade of lawsuits for every project. Congress could fix that with a change in the law, and employ he interstate commerce clause to shut down State laws that would stop renewables. But they don't seem to want to so far. Look at the fuss over a natural gas pipeline that would cross NY state.
In the mean time, yet another consecutive cloudy day in the PNW, and the bouncing green line is flat.
https://transmission.bpa.gov/B... [bpa.gov]
Hydro and the nuke are carrying the load here, but the environmentalists want to rip out the dams so the fish can be free.
Oh, by the way, we need to mine very large amounts of copper to run this electricity about the place. And guess who is filing suit to stop new copper mines?
https://theconversation.com/cl... [theconversation.com]
One last thing, the lithium in brine is there as a carbonate. So to use it the first think you do is calcine it to drive off the CO2, leaving you with lithium oxide.
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Tidal power is favoured by groups like Friends of the Earth. While it does need to be done carefully, it's way better than many of the alternatives.
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What do they have against tidal power?
"Tidal power" is completely retarded. Let's enumerate the stupidity:
1. Anything done on or under the water costs twice as much. If it is salt water, double the price again.
2. The tides go in and out twice per day. They don't provide steady power. The peaks and troughs shift by 50 minutes each day.
3. The strongest tides occur in bays and estuaries that are biological hotspots and fish nurseries. Siphoning off power means reducing the flow and destroying the ecosystems.
Everyone proposing "tidal power" a
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3. The strongest tides occur in bays and estuaries that are biological hotspots and fish nurseries.
Bays and estuaries are also places where ships are funneled through, expect damage from this. This damage may not all be accidental. We have already seen some very suspicious failures of undersea cables for communications and power. Damage from dropped anchors are expected by chance so there is no knowing if any damage is intentional. If it is intentional then there is often no knowing who did the damage or why and therefore holding those responsible to account for the damage.
Put a bunch of tidal power
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Damage from dropped anchors are expected by chance
It is not legal to just drop an anchor wherever you want.
In addition to cables, anchors destroy coral reefs.
Many coastal areas have severe restrictions on where anchors can be dropped. Undersea mount points are often provided for a ship to attach mooring lines.
That's not an excuse to never use tidal power.
Indeed. There are WAY better reasons to never use tidal power.
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It is not legal to just drop an anchor wherever you want.
It's also illegal to intentionally destroy undersea cables. It still happens though.
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That's not how all tidal systems work. Tidal lagoons can produce a steady flow of power, and time-shift it to when it is needed. Much like a hydro dam, but using a lagoon.
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What do they have against tidal power? That seems like a very odd position for people to have.
It disturbs the cetaceans.
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Or a smart grid with demand response [wikipedia.org].
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Or a smart grid with demand response [wikipedia.org].
Smart grids with flex-pricing are a big part of the solution, especially as EVs are widely adopted.
I have a smart-meter and PG&E gives me a steep discount (7 cents/kwh) for power consumed from 2 to 4 am, so that is when I charge my EV. Between 2 and 7 pm, when demand peaks, I pay 30 cents/kwh, but only during the summer months. All other times, I pay 12 cents.
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I have a smart-meter and PG&E gives me a steep discount (7 cents/kwh) for power consumed from 2 to 4 am, so that is when I charge my EV.
That will work until everyone has EVs.
The biggest problem with nuclear (Score:3)
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an entire city evacuated
Actually a huge area, not only a city.
People up to Tokyo are _encouraged_ to not have children.
The total cost is estimated to be 160 Sextillion EUROS (that is in English/US American - in German _Trilliarde_ no, not German Billions/Billiards: Trilliards!), for those who do not use such words regularly (that includes me): 160 * 10^21, yes power by 21.
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The question you have to ask is if you trust every random country in the world with nuclear power. Because if not, it's not a great solution. Even the trustworthy ones might not be in 50 years time, when the government has changed and they have expensive, crumbling plants in desperate need of maintenance.
"nukes cost too much" (Re:Nuclear.) (Score:2)
The biggest problem with nukes is the cost.
Not all nuclear power plants are like Vogtle. On average nuclear power costs less than natural gas.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
They are twice the price of solar and four times the price of wind, and the gap is getting worse.
Yep, and that gap is going to get worse until it doesn't.
Nuclear power costs will keep going up until we figure out how to do it for less cost. Because some very smart people in the UK discovered that there is no path to energy independence in UK without nuclear power, and told the UK government what they discovered, the UK government will keep building nuclear power plants
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We aren't going to put reactors in cars.
Well not any more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
People say the 60s were wild, but for sheer batshit crazy, I think the 50s really take it.
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The biggest problem with nukes is the cost. They are twice the price of solar and four times the price of wind, and the gap is getting worse.
The biggest problem with nukes is hippies. We have been over this before but if it wasn't for a bunch of boomer hippies in the '60s, research was stalled so all we have is these old reactors from the '50 and '60s. If the hippies hadn't caused all the problems then we would be almost 60 years into nuclear research and who knows what we would have developed by now. Possibly even fusion reactors.
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The 60s were the golden era for nuclear power in many countries, including the UK. There was a lot of development, and the government was fully behind it.
In the 70s the reality became apparent. Expensive, delayed due to unexpected problems, and unprofitable in operation. By the 80s the plants were being "sold", except that it wasn't really a sale because not only was the price a token amount, but the government promised to cover all the losses and pay for the decommissioning.
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Oh just shut up. You kooks have been braying that same line over and over for decades not wanting to own up that you where and are wrong. Because of people like you we live in a world on a edge of climate collapse. If you fools had just shut your damn mouths we would be half a century in to solving these problems. We would have deployed thousands of safe reactors. Coal plants would have already been a footnote on history by now.
But there is some good news. Nuclear research its picking up speed. I
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I wasn't even alive in the 60s, so it's a bit harsh to blame me, or associate me with hippies.
It's interesting you should mention China. Their shiny new advanced reactor seems to have a design flaw. EDF is currently scrambling because they are building a couple of identical ones in Europe, which will have the same issue.
Regardless of the past, we are at a point now where we don't need nuclear. You can waste your own money on it if you want to, but I actually want to solve climate change and limit the damage
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I'm not even going to bother to read your response much less correct it for you. There is no point. Like I've pointed out before you have been proven wrong time and time again, and refuse to believe the science. I suspect that if God himself dropped a stone in your lap saying you where wrong, you would just dig in. It is no longer my job to educate you.
Here is what is going to happen. The research is going to continue, problems will be overcome, and new nuclear designs will be deployed. This is goi
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What science? The main problem with nuclear is engineering.
Why are your posts always at +1 even without moderation? There seems to be a site bug, if you contact the staff they will fix your account.
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It's obvious we won't have nuclear reactors in our cars -- we will have fusion reactors, duh. This guy has never seen Mr Fusion from Back To The Future.
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nobody is willing to insure them
It is not a matter of will.
Fukushima cost a trillion dollars. No insurance company has pockets that deep.
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nobody is willing to insure them
It is not a matter of will.
Fukushima cost a trillion dollars. No insurance company has pockets that deep.
Well, that would mean nobody _can_ insure them then. That would be worse.
On the other hand, I have a friend that worked for a back insurer for a while as risk modeler. And he said that they could insure nuclear power plants by sharing the risk with other back insurers. But the real problem apparently is that the premiums would be so high that nobody would ever be able to justify or pay them and nuclear power would be excessively expensive, as in orders of magnitude more expensive than any other form of powe
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The US was capable of running on green energy in 1980. Nuclear reactors are the only way we have to produce clean energy.
The Left is still dominated by the hippy-ish "No Nukes!" mantra. They're never, ever going to be onboard with nuclear power.
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They're never, ever going to be onboard with nuclear power.
I guess the cheap, legal weed distraction isn't working. I suppose we can discontinue it.
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Contrary to other energy sources, nuclear energy is so full of unpredictable risks that no insurance company can make a deal that is financially acceptable. In the end only states take over the risks. What we saw in Ukraine and Japan is that common citizens in the end pay the bill.
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France went all in on nuclear and is now trying to switch to renewables. It's been tried, it doesn't work.
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France never was "all in" on nuclear. True, they have about 70% nuclear but they have a really unreliable power-grid as a result and need to buy massive amounts of electricity from the European grid regularly. Sure, in summer they export, but overall they are not in a good state. Also, France only ever went nuclear to be able to build nuclear weapons, electricity was always only ever a pretext.
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Sure, in summer they export,
I guess you typoed.
In summer they import, as they have to shut down or run the plants with lower load because the rivers have not enough water for cooling them. At least since a few years due to "global warming".
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Sure, in summer they export,
I guess you typoed.
In summer they import, as they have to shut down or run the plants with lower load because the rivers have not enough water for cooling them. At least since a few years due to "global warming".
Well, simplified. France overall does export, but at this moment (winter) they are importing and it is driving European electricity costs noticeably. Sure, one reason is that several of their unreliable nuclear plants are down at the moment. But remember that ice on the rivers makes using them for cooling just as unsuitable as too warm water. Well, maybe they are exporting in spring and fall, but they sure are not doing it at the moment.
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France went all in on nuclear and is now trying to switch to renewables. It's been tried, it doesn't work.
France has saved well over 100,000 lives by going all on nuclear early, compared to e.g. Germany. It's more than a bit of a stretch to say that it didn't work and they're switching to renewables because they've also had a strong renewables showing for a long time with hydropower.
This is what "failed" nuclear power has a achieved in France:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Interesting map, because of course France also heavily promoted diesel cars which turned out to be really bad for human health.
Anyway, the issue now is the way forward. When France got started there was limited scope for renewables, but now they have a clear choice. Nuclear has proven to be too expensive.
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France also heavily promoted diesel cars which turned out to be really bad for human health.
That is a stupid myth and repeating it is stupid [slashdot.org]. TL;DR: Gassers produce just as much soot as diesels and it is a more hazardous kind of soot, plus they release more unburned HCs, so they are more dangerous than diesels.
Nuclear - we'll do fine without it. (Score:2)
Humans are adaptable so we can create numerous solutions that produce energy from contemporary sources such a solar, wind and geothermal power.
Mined energy sources such as coal, oil and nuclear have finite limits built into them and are complex methods of extracting solar energy from the past.
The sooner we turn our efforts to developing technological solutions to extracting energy from the present the sooner we will have solutions to problems like C02 and radio-isotope effluents in the environment.
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Your post doesn't make sense, BBB included provisions for boosting nuclear power:
https://www.hlnewnuclear.com/2... [hlnewnuclear.com]
Re: Nuclear. (Score:4, Insightful)
BUT, for God's sake, please don't cut the line/tap on our current means of energy (fossil) will we are fully ready for the switchovers and those renewables ARE fully capable of fueling our transportation, AC and Heating as we need, etc.
I can't believe Biden, cut work on pipelines and is halting/hindering domestic oil exploration and drilling (while giving Russia the "OK" for their pipelines)...and then is pleading with OPEC and Russia to produce me now that the US is in crisis.
We were energy independent...we should STAY that will until the tools and resources are in place to make the transition.
There's gonna be some really COLD people up in the NE of the US this winter.
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There's an old saying about babies and bathwater you should consider.
Or maybe the one about cures being worse than the disease.
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How the fuck are you supposed to power a car through nuclear infrastructure without using batteries??
Synthesized hydrocarbon fuels. It's a very old technology.
Do you know how "natural gas" got it's name? A long time ago we used to use natural gas for lighting. Before that we used something called "town gas", "illuminating gas", or "synthesis gas". It was called that because towns would build a facility that would synthesize gas for illuminating the streets and homes. An alternative was discovered that "naturally" came from the ground by drilling holes in the Earth. People needed a name to for this ga
new permits for gas and drilling are not a problem (Score:3)
"While the current administration has set out goals for a renewable energy grid, new permits for gas and drilling in the Gulf of Mexico counteract those same efforts"
No they don't. If renewables are better and cheaper they will eventually kill off the alternatives.
People didn't give up horses and buggies because they were banned, cars were just better.
Re:new permits for gas and drilling are not a prob (Score:4, Interesting)
But horse and buggy didn't have the extreme external costs that burning fossil fuels does, so it's not comparable. One thing that is interesting about the history of automobiles is just how quickly they toppled horse and buggy. In 1900 there were 8,000 automobiles registered in the United States, by 1910 there were over 450,000, by 1920 there were eight million. In just twenty years the automobile went from idle curiosity to a widely available technology. Tipping points are amazing things.
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But horse and buggy didn't have the extreme external costs that burning fossil fuels does,
They really do and it smells really bad.
dammit, who posted this? (Score:5, Informative)
https://www.science.org/conten... [science.org]
He dropped the case when he finally realized that suing the firkin National Academy of Science is sort of like suing a minor demigod, and was then found liable for court fees because OF COURSE HE WAS.
This is how science works. People working towards the truth but making errors along the way that get corrected by others. BWhoever posted this on Slashdot presented this guy's work as established science. It's not. It's not at all proven that we can reach 100% renewable by 2050, at lower cost AND better grid reliability. It might not be that easy,
The climate deniers are gonna have a field day with this. They're gonna use it to push for doing nothing at all. Which will cook the planet. That part is DEFINITELY established science.
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As far as I can see, his current calculations don't assume any additional hydropower at all over current levels. As such, it would seem he's closing off this area from attack. See this slide set, which isn't paywalled as the article itself is:
http://web.stanford.edu/group/... [stanford.edu]
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The Named-like-rsilvergun troll posse is, well, a troll. Don't feed him.
Popular Science?! (Score:3)
When I was a kid my dad has a subscription to pop sci magazine. I remember they had a cover story on the new ice age cause by pollution blocking out the sun sometime around 1970+/- a year. It was just that, pop science. That magazine might not be the best source for information.
Pro-nuclear (Score:5, Insightful)
I respectfully offer that if nuclear advocates were sincere they would be able to transmute the complaints about nuclear power into solutions that overcome objections to it's use.
Often refusing to look at facts and science their criticisms of people with genuine reservations often becomes personal before projecting most of their behaviors onto anyone who makes any statement about nuclear power that points out it's flaws.
When the rubber hits the road and deep analysis to nuclear technology is required they often resort to magical thinking and social proof to make their point.
The official report into the Fukushima disaster [reliefweb.int] cited this very attitude and "belief in the infallibility of nuclear technology" as the primary contributing factor to why certain steps were avoided that could have prevented the entire situation.
Before the next nuclear accident happens nuclear advocates should consider if their attitude is in-fact preventing improvements to reactor safety. There are many such issues like this that they could get behind, for example reducing the density of spent fuel rods stored at reactors, that would make dramatic improvements in the safety of all nuclear plants.
However what we do see is attacks on people who do think about how to improve nuclear power by pointing out the flaws, "pro-nukers" label them as "anti-nuclear" because black and white thinking is much easier than thinking.
I ask pro-nuclear folk to challenge their own assumptions about nuclear power and question which of their opinions are based in fact.
Thanks, and have a good day.
Well I certainly agree with you (Score:3)
That said, I don't know any way to avoid that cost cutting because it's just too tempting. The siren song of lower rates and lower taxes is too much for voters to resist and sooner or later they'll privatize just about anything. And I keep coming back to the fact that the people responsible for Fukush
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I do not think any costs where cut.
That's stupid and wrong.
The whole thing is simply stupidity and ignorance.
You are being stupidly ignorant.
The emergency power generators were flooded? Yes.
Yes, and they had only one pipe to deliver cooling, when they should have had two. Is this flaw common to this reactor design? Yep. Is it in fact a flaw? Also yep. Don't make excuses for shitty nuclear plant designs. The rule of redundancy is, if you have one you have none, and if you need two you should have three. Making excuses for stupidity is stupid. There's no room for mistakes in nuclear power. And that is why we should not use it unless it it a
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How does it come that you know how the reactor was designed, and it's cooling, especially when all that is irrelevant as the cooling "inside" of the reactor was destroyed long long before the flood wave hit it?
There's no room for mistakes in nuclear power. And that is why we should not use it unless it it actually necessary, and it is not actually necessary because it's actually cheaper to overprovision renewables to the point where the alleged base load advantage is irrelevant.
Completely agree. But don't a
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I respectfully offer that if nuclear advocates were sincere they would be able to transmute the complaints about nuclear power into solutions that overcome objections to it's use.
You mean just like how the Mark Jacobsons of the world transmute complaints about a wind/water/sun only solution is not viable into solutions? Mark Jacobson has been trying to sell this utopian vision of a world freed from nuclear and fossil fuel power before and it's been shown clearly using the numbers from his own papers that the math does not work out.
The people defending nuclear power do not have to provide you a an answer to all the objections you raise. That's because this isn't about finding a per
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Mark Jacobson has been trying to sell this utopian vision of a world freed from nuclear and fossil fuel power before and it's been shown clearly using the numbers from his own papers that the math does not work out.
Do you have a link for that? Because it seems that he does have a set of numbers that stand up to peer review, and peer review is key.
By the way, what happens to the price of Uranium if everyone starts building new nuclear power plants and needs fuel? Isn't the price going to skyrocket, requiring new mines to open to meet demand (causing further environmental damage), requiring new facilities, centrifuges, etc to create the fuel rods, creating monumental mountains of waste that is slightly toxic and radio
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Do you have a link for that? Because it seems that he does have a set of numbers that stand up to peer review, and peer review is key.
Peer review just means a bunch of other people that don't like nuclear power read the paper and nodded their approval. What happens when it is reviewed by a community college professor and a technology journalist? http://www.roadmaptonowhere.co... [roadmaptonowhere.com]
Not a direct attack on Jacobson, et. al., but a more general analysis of the problem of getting all of our energy from wind, water and sun. Dr. David MacKay was an advisor to the UK government on climate and energy policy, and that is past tense because of his d
Re:Pro-nuclear: (Score:2)
The people defending nuclear power do not have to provide you a an answer to all the objections you raise
Then you can't expect thier support.
So, what about those objections to nuclear power?
There are too many to list.
What about nuclear waste?
You keep saying Build it - In Granite!!
What of the cost of nuclear power?
You can barely afford one that works, let alone one that is safe.
Nuclear power is not perfect
It's not even good. You could improve it but you don't and, for your efforts, no one else cares enough about nuclear to want to.
Are you directly or indirectly paid to make comments on behalf of the nuclear industry?
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I respectfully offer that if nuclear advocates were sincere they would be able to transmute the complaints about nuclear power into solutions that overcome objections to it's use.
I'm not sure it's possible. Nuclear is considered "very dangerous" despite for the longest time being about 10x safer than all alternatives (now down to about 3x safer). The use of nuclear power has saved millions of lives worldwide compared to the alternatives.
This is what nuclear power does:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
That'
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the world is big enough that we can gather good statistics, and the main thing about nuclear power is it's safety.
The main thing about nuclear power is that it's not a viable answer to our power problems. If we solved all our power needs with nuclear then we'd run out of fuel before all the plants were even decommissioned. Meanwhile we do not need it and it's not cheaper than the alternatives, so there's literally no reason to use it. It makes no sense on any level.
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What a load of bullshit.
Fear-mongering lefties have been lying in front of trains and screaming to the heavens about the terror of nuclear power for FIFTY YEARS, largely enabled and supported by their philosophical fellow-travelers in the media.
Unsurprisingly, that's ultimately had an impact. /shock
VASTLY more people have suffered and died as a result of coal power than nuclear, and your summoning Fukushima is certainly on-brand.
(+1 for avoiding the obvious Chernobyl, I guess that's like rewarding someone f
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I respectfully offer that if nuclear advocates were sincere they would be able to transmute the complaints about nuclear power into solutions that overcome objections to it's use.
I disagree. They rightly recognize that such an endeavor would be a fool's errand.
Have you given up on a safe viable nuclear industry?
The people who don't like nuclear will never be appeased.
What if you just forgot about that and concentrated on what would make the nuclear industry better. Do you have an objection to to making the nuclear industry safer and more viable?
The objections that they raise are straw men to cover the real reasons.
I've given you a potential solution to nuclear safety issues that you could lobby for right now if you really cared for nuclear power. An easy safety improvement for the nuclear fuel cycle. You could write a letter *today* or are you against improvements to the nuclear fuel
Study fails to test for problems. (Score:3)
I note that the study simply showed that if everything is functioning correctly, the grid could be moved to full renewable using short term storage.
Whet they didn't appear to test was what happens when something goes wrong. For example their simulation depends on being able to move power from area to area efficiently across the country - what happens if some of the major cross country power lines go down?
Since you are looking at a true mission critical system, you need to look at how it will handle problems being thrown at it, not just if it can handle the normal days traffic. (Remember Amazon would consider it a failure if their website went down during black Friday traffic, no matter how well it handles normal day to day traffic.)
Jacobson is a con man (Score:2)
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Joe Manchin says no (Score:4, Insightful)
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The problem is CRT (Score:3)
Problem solved (Re:Joe Manchin says no) (Score:2)
What does the US Senate have to do with this? Mark Jacobson just demonstrated in his model that we can produce all the electricity we need from wind, water, and sun at a cost lower than we could from fossil fuels and nuclear power. We don't need the US Senate to approve rooftop solar and windmills. Those are projects that would be done on private property on small scales.
If someone were to want to build a large hydroelectric dam then that might come to something the Senate could prevent by legislation.
Drink ! (Score:2)
We solved the problem of CO2 emissions from human activity causing catastrophic global warming.
Drink !
This is a solved problem.
Drink !
All it takes is a $9T investment (Score:3)
The paper is paywalled, but searching for the title brings up this presentation:
http://web.stanford.edu/group/... [stanford.edu]
I'm going to round off the numbers here, because it's pointless to quote 5 decimal places for something so speculative. I'm not rendering any judgement whatsoever on whether these figures are realistic, as cost figures, or our ability to construct all this generating capacity in 30 years, and whether his usage & storage model are accurate. I'm just quoting the statistics from the model, which the public articles seem to be completely leaving out.
As far as I can glean from these slides, Jacobson's model needs $9T in investment: $7T in new generation sources, and $2T in storage (batteries). It calculates electricity usage, at 1.2TW, to be half of current energy usage (2.4TW), due to the idea that electricity is used in industrial processes and the like more efficiently than fossil fuels that have to go into ICE engines, etc. About 1/2 of the usage is categorized as "flexible," presumably meaning that it can be rescheduled as needed - I'd presume this reduces storage needs in a big way.
We'd need much more generating capacity, proposing about 30% from onshore wind, 20% from offshore wind, 20% from rooftop PV, and 30% from utility PV. The nameplate ratings of the generating capacity, to get 1.2TW to the loads, is 1.1TW onshore wind (10x growth), 0.9TW offshore wind (20000x growth), 0.7TW rooftop PV (50x growth), and 2.2TW utility PV (60x growth). That totals about 5TW of generating capacity to get 1.2TW of output. It sounds like a breath-taking amount of development over what we have today.
That $2T mostly goes into batteries, for 4TW of battery charge rate, 4TW of battery discharge rate and 16TWh of capacity. I didn't see a statistic about how much battery capacity the system has now.
There's other power generating categories listed, (CSP with storage, Geothermal-electricity, Hydropower, Wave, Tidal, Solar thermal, Geothermal-heat) that don't amount to significant capacity in the model, or are completely zeroed out. It's hard to argue Jacobson is poorly modeling Hydropower, for example, as it's hardly a factor.
Re: (Score:2)
I think that 1/2 of usage categorized as "flexible" is way too much. It means that about half of our devices will switch off when the wether is bad. I do not like that.
Problem solved. (Score:2)
This paper form Mark Jacobson is yet more evidence I can present that we solved the problem of catastrophic global warming cause by the CO2 emissions from human activity.
We solved the problem and Jacobson shows that we will make money solving the problem. Nothing is going to stop us now.
Problem solved!
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Nuclear is the only way to go (Score:2)
Nuclear, for a lot of reasons. It's cheap (once the red tape is set to a reasonable level), efficient, reliable, safe, plentiful, well-understood, diesn't take up much space, doesn't scar the landscape, doesn't kill birds, scales well, and the equipment can be very long lasting.
Can/must be faster (Score:2)
Even with only 40% YoY growth, going from 19% to 100% is a matter of 5 years.
Given the massive untapped potential in the US, 40% YoY growth may be a stretch but should be achievable.
With a very moderate 20% YoY growth, the transition can be done by 2030. Where is the f** problem?
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You can always do a worst case scenario, which is what a good model has, and then ask "At the worst case scenario that renewables don't drop in price at the current pace, is it still worth it." In some cases, probably not, but then again, a model arguing for continuing to use coal and gas fired generation that doesn't take into account the long term externalities and the costs these will have isn't a very damned accurate model either. And really, all models are wrong. The question to ask of any model is how
Re: Modeling (Score:2)
Two words: Donald Trump.
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But you see, the right people have the costs of climate change foisted on them, so that the O&G purveyors can still make a fortune regardless of how much it costs everyone else.
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The world is not ideal, and is not governed by people who think logically and scientifically.
Realism, I'm afraid, paints a much darker picture of the future.
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Wind tax credits (Re:But can we do so affordably?) (Score:2)
I'm buying "green" wind power where I live and the cost is about the same as dirty.
Okay then, the global warming problem is solved.
I have a suspicion that this is an illusion brought about by the production tax credits that wind and solar power get. A tax credit that will apply to nuclear power soon.
We are already seeing wasteful practices from this production tax credit, and it's likely to only get worse. The tax credit applies even if nobody wants the electricity. When the wind blows, and there's nobody taking the power then they just lower the price until someone buys. This means t
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Nobody wants nukes! (But can we do so affordably?) (Score:2)
I'm really not interested in paying half of my income to "green" electric companies.
The claim made by Mark Jacobson, et. al., is that "green" energy is lower cost than fossil fuel energy. If you are paying half your income on electricity then you made some very unwise choices in your life. There's the possibility that you made wise life decisions and still saw high energy costs but that's going to mean many others are seeing this, and with a large number of people seeing this same problem there will be something done about it.
We've already seen a ceiling set on fossil fuel costs. More t
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Is Al Gore still alive?
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Stanford campus looks like a homeless camp the whole place is a homeless garbage dump
What?
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He means Stanford US, not Stanford UK :P