As someone who loves clean water, oceans and bays more than most. I am truly confused by this nuclear debate. We can come close to quantifying how much damage oil and coal do. We can probably even figure out how much harm should be built into the price. but, how the hell can we call nuclear clean and cheap when we have no idea how to contain store or prevent damage from the spent fuel?
Isn't this where Venture Capital comes in? They make the bets as to which one of the choices wins. From the research I've done, it looks like solar as a source is a great bet to make, and there has been surprising results in a short period of time. And we can get serious large scale deployment in reasonable time to boot. Now if we could only get into one of these VC funds ... even if you are accredited, I think most want you to be able to contribute i)expertise, ii)contacts, iii)if only cash, then LOTS of it. When you guys say hydrogen, I assume you mean as a store of energy. And it's not that great. But, if they can get it to work, well, then cool.
We're also late for the land grab ...damn. The desert land the gov is allowing in CA, AZ have already been bid up 10X or more from their value just a few years ago.
For those against nukes, here is an excerpt from a recent article in DISCOVER Magazine: "Four years ago this month, James Lovelock upset a lot of his fans. Lovelock was revered in the green movement for developing the Gaia hypothesis, which links everything on earth to a dynamic, organic whole. Writing in the British newspaper The Independent, Lovelock stated in an op-ed: âWe have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilisation is in imminent danger and has to use nuclearâthe one safe, available energy sourceânow or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet.â complete article at: http://discovermagazine.com/2008/may/02-is-nuclear-energy-our-best-hope Or this one by the founder of GREENPEACE: " In the early 1970s when I helped found Greenpeace, I believed that nuclear energy was synonymous with nuclear holocaust, as did most of my compatriots. That's the conviction that inspired Greenpeace's first voyage up the spectacular rocky northwest coast to protest the testing of U.S. hydrogen bombs in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. Thirty years on, my views have changed, and the rest of the environmental movement needs to update its views, too, because nuclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change. " complete at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401209.html DS
But the argument I heard was that it takes a long time to get nukes up and running -- so James Lovelock would be wrong, they are not a short term, immediate solution. EDIT: well ok, if you can get some nukes up in good time, throw money at that, but definitely throw money at all the good bets. The simple answer is that a very large pile of money should be thrown at this sector.
Other items to consider.... Auto fleet replacement time Auto production retooling and adoption and by whom Auto finance and by whom ........................................................................ Iraq...$5 lifting costs per barrel Iran...$5 lifting costs per barrel US Wildlife reserve lifting costs...? ....................................................................... Gas costs per gallon equivalent ..................................................................... Nuclear plant time frame .................................................................... Wind technology timeframe ..................................................................... Hydrogen cost per gallon ......................................................................................... Thus time, possibility, proven, and money are the issues Nat gas , auto conversion wins ........................................................................................ Price always wins .................................................................................. When one buys a car and fuels it they are guided solely by monetary efficiency and immediate need....... That's it...... ................................................................................... The Boone Picken's Plan wins the shorter time frame and thus melds into the future..... ............................................................................... And oil is going to come out of the ground anywhere and everywhere it is feasible as well.....but turning points for oil are mostly about Iraq, Iran, and US ..... .............................................................................. Nat gas is less than $2 per gallon in most areas of the world..... Conversion is cheaper, faster than fleet replacement....
don't take it personally. Hydroblunt is so thick, he would happily invest in a company to sell sand to the Arabs...
Agree with that libertad. I would swap out solar for wind though, as wind apparently has far less total energy available then solar. And solar can provide more consistent energy supply.
I wouldn't agree with Nuclear. The supply of uranium is so small. Also I read that at today's resource costs, it would cost about 2x to build a nuclear plant than even 5 years ago. The nuclear plant will not provide cheap energy. The price of uranium is already very high and any meaningful capacity will also shoot up the price of that. From what I understand uranium is in short supply. You have most of the world supply in Australia, Canada and Russia. I think this nuclear push is mostly political, why don't you look at all the nuclear plant utilities and their big valuations and fat margins. They are also asking for huge huge subsidies in the billions while we barely give anything away for wind or solar energy. There is nothing clean about them too, you create toxic waste that we currently do not know what to do with! The whole point of global warming is to protect the future generations, how does an ever increasing supply of toxic waste help the future generations with their environment? It's only a green technology if all you care is the next 20 years. It has no short term effects, but it sure will have long term effects. Wind technology is already here, we should put it everywhere that it's viable. And while we limper with oil, gas, nuclear as stop gaps, we need to develop the truly clean sustainable technologies that will eliminate these energy crisis once and for all.
vv111y wrote.... Agree with that libertad. I would swap out solar for wind though, as wind apparently has far less total energy available then solar. And solar can provide more consistent energy supply. ................................................................................... Solar in day.......wind when it comes...US has better wind than any other country....... Issue is selling and attaching to the grid...... Main issue for individual ownership is storage.....thus better to sell/meld to the grid.....