Al Gore

[MoCarp]

Eventually fossil fuels will be more expensive than other green forms, when that happens we will see a massive shift to those green forms. Tech and innovation is ongoing, just read about a breakthrough on fusion technology. if that pans out, it will be a game changer...the issues I have with forced change by taxing ones “carbon footprint “ is flawed when tax credits to encourage new green tech is less damaging to the economy. But when more money can be taken from your pocket to enrich and empower the elite they will do what’s best for them than you. Snagged if your work is making green Energy goods I can see what dog you have in this fight...

I see cars all electric in the future that need no or minimal battery power with small self generating devices in some yet invented device. We will pine away all the fossil fuel jobs losses and its impact on our economy.

perhaps we can tell them all to # “learn to code”or by that time all those jobs will be outsourced to some other country for pennies on the wage dollar, nothing is perfect by I will bet on the USA getting right before some other country

[fishinwrench]

5 hours ago, Terrierman said:

The energy costs have to be included in the cost to build and install a wind turbine.  A wind turbine with a design life 20 years is a net energy producer within five to eight months of installation.  Break even on total installed cost, not just energy is around five years.   Do you know that the cost/MW of wind is lower than the cost /MW for new coal fired power station?  Do you ever research anything or just parrot what you "understand"?

I stopped researching when I got THIS far. 

 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/energy/windpower/9770837/Wind-farm-turbines-wear-sooner-than-expected-says-study.html

You can get all indignant with me if you want, cuz IDGAF about any of this.  It isn't going to happen so why are you being all defensive and snarky about it?  Go have a beer and calm yourself down!   Good grief

You have been a "Wrench hater" for going on 2 years now.   Let's examine what I did to originally hack you off, and how I managed to keep you hacked off for this long.    We can probably fix THAT.  Do I owe you an apology for something, or what? 

Wind turbine efficiency is DEFINITELY not going to be solved here.  Ever.  🙄

[Al Agnew]

There are plenty of subsidies and government help on various fossil fuels, it ain't just green energy that gets subsidized.  And making it all pay for itself without subsidies sounds good, but when you have an already established technology that already has all the infrastructure and established markets, and you THINK that society would be better off if something begins to replace it, it only makes sense to subsidize that something else to help it compete with the established technology.  Otherwise, the "new" thing never gets off the ground because it can't compete with the already established technology from the get-go.  So you subsidize it until it can compete, and then entrepreneurs will keep trying to improve it to make it cheaper and better.  At least that's the way it's supposed to work.

And...there are other benefits to "green" technologies besides just less pollution and emissions.  The mining and removal of fossil fuels messes up a lot of land.  Transporting it results in the occasional disaster from spills, leaks of coal ash ponds, etc.  Fracking may cause more earthquakes, uses a LOT of water, requires a lot of strip mining of the sand used in the process, and can contaminate ground water. And then there are the health problems associated with fossil fuels.  These are all "hidden" costs, that we all end up paying.

In my opinion, though, we are going about a lot of this all wrong.  We are trying to adapt renewable energy like wind and solar to our existing power grid, which requires these huge wind farms and massive solar installations that cover large amounts of land.  I think that instead, we should be going full steam on perfecting smaller systems, from municipalities to individual homes--everybody can be more or less responsible for their own energy generation.  There should be major benefits to this...including developing a whole new economic engine not only from the manufacturing of the equipment but in the numbers of technicians needed to install, maintain, and repair the systems.  And another major benefit would be that we aren't as dependent upon the power grid, which can be sabotaged by terrorists pretty darned easily.

Having completed an off-grid solar installation at our cabin, I know first hand it works.  And I also know that the whole key to making it work better is better battery technology.  This past fall and winter, there were so many days with no sunshine, far more than normal, that the weak point of our system became not enough battery storage.  Our backup propane generator was required more than we expected, though most days it wasn't needed.

[tjm]

1 hour ago, Al Agnew said:

we are going about a lot of this all wrong.  We are trying to adapt renewable energy like wind and solar to our existing power grid, which requires these huge wind farms and massive solar installations that cover large amounts of land.  I think that instead, we should be going full steam on perfecting smaller systems, from municipalities to individual homes--everybody can be more or less responsible for their own energy generation. 

I can agree with this. And if the subsidies are made available at individual level I would be much more comfortable with  them than I am with them being paid to corporations that can vanish. Still a fraud factor but it should be less. I don't recall what the transmission loss   amounts to per mile but taking the transmission and switching out of the equation autocratically boosts the usable output. 

I think the battery technology will never take us where we need to be, there must be another means to store the energy. Pump water uphill when the sun shines and let it turn a generator on the down trip when there is no sun, some built in loss but it might work for a small installation.

[MoCarp]

Some pretty good fishing in “messed up land” old coal pits and gravel / rock quarries come to mind...

sometimes laws are needed, gas stations were required by law to carry unleaded gas, most all cars made after 1975 were designed to run on unleaded. Yet people punched out the nosle restrictiver and used much cheaper leaded gas by 83 you could not find leaded gas in but a handful of places and it was very pricy, hot rodders bought the high octane gas from small airports, I suspect we will see charging station requirements once charging can be done quicker...In Brazil cars there burn alcohol, half the BTUs of our gas, made from the vast amounts of sugar cane grown. Cars that get 30mpg here get 15 on the candy gas...efforts here to make energy from trash has met with limited success, it would take decades to effect change if it was economically viable

[fishinwrench]

1 hour ago, MoCarp said:

people punched out the nosle restrictiver

They didn't just punch it out, they knocked it into something that never was !  

[MoCarp]

36 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

They didn't just punch it out, they knocked it into something that never was !  

Yeah those motors got wonky run on leaded gas for a bit gummed up all the emissions equipment catalytic converters burned out

[Terrierman]

11 hours ago, fishinwrench said:

I stopped researching when I got THIS far. 

 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/energy/windpower/9770837/Wind-farm-turbines-wear-sooner-than-expected-says-study.html

You can get all indignant with me if you want, cuz IDGAF about any of this.  It isn't going to happen so why are you being all defensive and snarky about it?  Go have a beer and calm yourself down!   Good grief

You have been a "Wrench hater" for going on 2 years now.   Let's examine what I did to originally hack you off, and how I managed to keep you hacked off for this long.    We can probably fix THAT.  Do I owe you an apology for something, or what? 

Wind turbine efficiency is DEFINITELY not going to be solved here.  Ever.  🙄

If I was a wrench hater you'd be on ignore.  I just don't buy all of your B.S. and call you on it.  Don't be that guy who likes to dish it out but can't take it. 

[snagged in outlet 3]

I checked with the guy in here and his Model S was over $90K.  He does not have Ludicrous mode.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/research/how-much-does-a-tesla-actually-cost/ss-BBUPBtF?li=BBnb4R5#image=1

[David Unnerstall]

Remember in the nine-ties scientists recognized that acid-rain was killing forests in the north-east.  Government enacted laws to reduce its causes.  Industry followed those laws and now forests are slowly recovering.

Today scientists are telling us the earth is getting warmer because of man-made greenhouse gases.  But we choose to believe politicians and talk-radio show personalities.

And CarpMan; you wanting to believe that the ozone hole was a hoax when, in fact, it was fixed by following scientists recommendations and changing our behavior tells me all I need to know.

What about gravity?  Is that a hoax, also?