Posted by Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's n on April 25, 2009, 3:35 pm
> Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's newest fan! wrote:
>>
> (...)
>>> Every WHr of energy generated by 'direct' sun and wind and hydro and
>>> tidal and biomass and biogas
> ... and geothermal...
>>> is a wHr that doesn't come from
>>> irreplaceable oil.
>>
>> But the point here is that they are constructed, delivered, and installed
>> by methods and machines that DO use petroleum, and therefore develop a
>> "carbon deficit" that needs to be recovered before they produce a single
>> watt. Once operational the first have to repay all the energy that was
>> invested in their existance before they produce "free" power.
> Why?
> Funny how we don't consider a carbon deficit when constructing
> facilities that are to be part of the petroleum infrastructure.
> We never require a gas station to be 'carbon neutral', for example.
> At what point does a asphalt - paved freeway pay for itself?
> Do we consider the financial cost of oil?
> How much would a barrel of oil cost if we had to make it rather than
> pump it out of the ground? A few hundred thousand dollars?
> Could we even make so much as a drop of oil that was 'carbon neutral'?
> (How would we power the various processes? Natural gas? Oil?) :)
The point that you're missing is that traditional power doesn't advertise
itself to be carbon neutral. The wind and solar people act as if the
turbines and panels magically appear on the towers and rooftops. No
construction costs, no transportation, no installation... just close your
eyes, click your heels, and WHOOMP! there it is, producing "clean" power.
> Do we include the cost of military adventures to maintain the supply?
Oh goodie! The 'war for oil' bullsquat...
> How many body bags do we specify to pay for the power from each
> wind charger, each solar panel? (I'll help here:None.)
How many mills and panels come to existance without input of petrol? (I'll
help here:None.)
> Yet 4277 is an acceptable number of bags (so far) from Iraq to help pay
> for oil. Why is that?
> These are examples of lopsided bookkeeping. We are deluding ourselves.
> (The Easter Bunny, Santa Claus and God told me that.
> We couldn't get concurrence from the Tooth Fairy, however.
> He'll come around.)
So this is your advisory panel on world affairs, is it?
>>>> Whereas the solar panels and windmills are being touted for their low
>>>> carbon footprint, lower overall pollution, and financial benefits, and
>>>> therefore have to justify themselves by overcoming their construction
>>>> costs.
>>>> Eventually.
>>>
>>> Yes. Given the same criteria, have we justified the use of nuclear
>>> energy and included the cost of safe storage of spent fuel rods for
>>> several tens of thousands of years? Of course we have. Wait a
>>> minute....
>>> No we haven't.
>>
>> Why do you think we still have Nevada?
> This country has lasted what, 230 odd years? What is that, in relation
> to the tens of thousands of years it will take before those rods
> return to (relatively safe) lead? (Answer: We're a rounding error)
>>> We cooked our energy books and our decisions will continue to be
>>> affected by our lopsided accounting practices.
>>
>> Ohhh... okay, got it... WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!
> Yes. We all will. But that's a different conversation.
> See the above. We are killing off our strongest for oil because
> that is off the books. Those deaths are 'free'.
HALLIBURTON!!!
>> You are seriously overcomplicating this. You lay down an equal area of
>> mirror wherever you would have installed a solar panel instead. Again, if
>> your aim is to cut down on Global Warming then reflecting the sunlight
>> back into space will do more for you than having 80% of it turned to
>> heat.
> It refuses to go back.
> The atmosphere traps longwave infrared, yes, M'Lord?
> Once the infrared enters the atmosphere the game is over.
Easter Bunny again? Oh, that's right, Santa is the flyboy so he handles the
skies. EB specializes in animal biology...
LG
--
Drill Alaska!
Drill offshore!
Build refineries!
Build reactors!
And shut the hell up!
Posted by daestrom on April 25, 2009, 1:16 pm
>> Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's newest fan! wrote:
>>
>> (...)
>>
>>> The point is that until sun and wind are guaranteed to be present in
>>> sufficient quantities to meet all energy needs the fossil fuel plant
>>> needs to be built regardless (negating a reactor, of course), thus
>>> rendering its construction costs moot to this argument.
>>
>> Nonsense, M'Lord.
>>
>> Every WHr of energy generated by 'direct' sun and wind and hydro and
>> tidal and biomass and biogas is a wHr that doesn't come from
>> irreplaceable oil.
> But the point here is that they are constructed, delivered, and installed
> by methods and machines that DO use petroleum, and therefore develop a
> "carbon deficit" that needs to be recovered before they produce a single
> watt. Once operational the first have to repay all the energy that was
> invested in their existance before they produce "free" power.
An interesting question would be to compare the 'capital carbon' investment
in building wind/solar versus that to building conventional. Amortized over
the lifetime energy produced, it would be interesting to see which had the
shorter 'carbon payback'.
Of course the ongoing 'carbon cost' of wind / solar is practically nil
compared to the ongoing 'carbon cost' of conventional. But working the
numbers out over the entire energy production I just have to believe that
solar/wind come out miles (km) ahead of any conventional generation.
Now if we could just get the cost down...
daestrom
Posted by stu on April 26, 2009, 1:11 am
>>
>>> Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's newest fan! wrote:
>>>
>>> (...)
>>>
>>>> The point is that until sun and wind are guaranteed to be present in
>>>> sufficient quantities to meet all energy needs the fossil fuel plant
>>>> needs to be built regardless (negating a reactor, of course), thus
>>>> rendering its construction costs moot to this argument.
>>>
>>> Nonsense, M'Lord.
>>>
>>> Every WHr of energy generated by 'direct' sun and wind and hydro and
>>> tidal and biomass and biogas is a wHr that doesn't come from
>>> irreplaceable oil.
>>
>> But the point here is that they are constructed, delivered, and installed
>> by methods and machines that DO use petroleum, and therefore develop a
>> "carbon deficit" that needs to be recovered before they produce a single
>> watt. Once operational the first have to repay all the energy that was
>> invested in their existance before they produce "free" power.
>>
> An interesting question would be to compare the 'capital carbon'
> investment in building wind/solar versus that to building conventional.
> Amortized over the lifetime energy produced, it would be interesting to
> see which had the shorter 'carbon payback'.
> Of course the ongoing 'carbon cost' of wind / solar is practically nil
> compared to the ongoing 'carbon cost' of conventional. But working the
> numbers out over the entire energy production I just have to believe that
> solar/wind come out miles (km) ahead of any conventional generation.
I'm not so sure about that, given that it would take 750x2MW wind turbines
to replace 1x500MW steam turbine. Even then that's averaged out over a year.
Unless wind comes up with storage or customers are willing for the lights to
go out, the carbon cost of having coal(or the fuel of your choice) fired
steam turbines as back up to the wind power has to be costed against the
wind power.
Posted by Tim Jackson on April 25, 2009, 2:05 pm
Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's newest fan! wrote:
>
> Further question to ponder: A PBS documentary I watched claimed current
> solar electric panels were about 20% efficient. If my gradeschool
> science holds up that would mean that about 80% of the sunlight striking
> a black solar panel is converted into heat! That being the case, if
> reducing Global Warming is your goal, wouldn't it make more sense to lay
> down mirrors instead of solar panels?
>
> LG
100% of the sunlight striking a black solar panel gets converted into
heat, sooner or later.
You could try dusting the sahara with aluminium oxide. But it will blow
away or get covered with sand pretty quickly. And sand's pretty bright
anyway.
There is a large area of he earth's surface covered by a natural
(optical wavelength) 'mirror' - the polar ice caps. I doubt that any
man-made construction could be built as fast as they are being eroded.
Although to be fair, they probably are pretty neutral in the
calorimetric stakes, they reflect more sunlight during the day (albeit
at a low-angle) but insulate the ocean and radiate less IR at night.
There do exist scary geo-engineering proposals to reflect solar
radiation away from earth, such as injecting sulphate ions into the
upper atmosphere. Scale however is only one of the problems. A search
of the internet will find many others.
Tim Jackson
Posted by Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's n on April 25, 2009, 3:21 pm
> Lord Gow333, Dirk Benedict's newest fan! wrote:
>>
>> Further question to ponder: A PBS documentary I watched claimed current
>> solar electric panels were about 20% efficient. If my gradeschool science
>> holds up that would mean that about 80% of the sunlight striking a black
>> solar panel is converted into heat! That being the case, if reducing
>> Global Warming is your goal, wouldn't it make more sense to lay down
>> mirrors instead of solar panels?
>>
>> LG
> 100% of the sunlight striking a black solar panel gets converted into
> heat, sooner or later.
> You could try dusting the sahara with aluminium oxide. But it will blow
> away or get covered with sand pretty quickly. And sand's pretty bright
> anyway.
> There is a large area of he earth's surface covered by a natural (optical
> wavelength) 'mirror' - the polar ice caps. I doubt that any man-made
> construction could be built as fast as they are being eroded. Although to
> be fair, they probably are pretty neutral in the calorimetric stakes, they
> reflect more sunlight during the day (albeit at a low-angle) but insulate
> the ocean and radiate less IR at night.
> There do exist scary geo-engineering proposals to reflect solar radiation
> away from earth, such as injecting sulphate ions into the upper
> atmosphere. Scale however is only one of the problems. A search of the
> internet will find many others.
My point wasn't a mass scale solution for Global Warming, but rather that
any individual trying to cut Global Warming by installing solar panels would
be better off laying down an equal amount of mirrors instead, as in their
current state solar panels directly generate heat in what is likely a
greater amount than they can counteract.
LG
--
"Keep it simple. If it takes a genius to understand it, it will never work."
- Clarence Leonard "Kelly" Johnson
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>>
> (...)
>>> Every WHr of energy generated by 'direct' sun and wind and hydro and
>>> tidal and biomass and biogas
> ... and geothermal...
>>> is a wHr that doesn't come from
>>> irreplaceable oil.
>>
>> But the point here is that they are constructed, delivered, and installed
>> by methods and machines that DO use petroleum, and therefore develop a
>> "carbon deficit" that needs to be recovered before they produce a single
>> watt. Once operational the first have to repay all the energy that was
>> invested in their existance before they produce "free" power.
> Why?
> Funny how we don't consider a carbon deficit when constructing
> facilities that are to be part of the petroleum infrastructure.
> We never require a gas station to be 'carbon neutral', for example.
> At what point does a asphalt - paved freeway pay for itself?
> Do we consider the financial cost of oil?
> How much would a barrel of oil cost if we had to make it rather than
> pump it out of the ground? A few hundred thousand dollars?
> Could we even make so much as a drop of oil that was 'carbon neutral'?
> (How would we power the various processes? Natural gas? Oil?) :)