There is already an existing cheap way to store energy. Pump water up a hill and extract the energy when you let it flow down the hill. 75% efficient and no pollution. Better than batteries.
Pumped hydro, yes. And heated rocks. Batteries are just one tech, not the best in all apps. Don't forget sodium batteries coming online that will displace most lithium battery need; much cheaper.
Sodium batteries will be a very positive step - they are cheaper and the sodium can be extracted without the same environmentally damaging impacts, but also it is a plentiful mineral, whereas lithium is a trace element that we will exhaust relatively quickly at current rates, and even more so under the goal of transitioning transport to fully electric.
Ffestiniog Power Station. "the scheme has a storage capacity of around 1.44 GWh (5.2 TJ) at maximum output for four hours, and the capacity to power the whole of North Wales for several hours."
Hello Marc. I have been too. My first visit to the are was via the steam railway with my parents, perhaps I was 15-16, I can't recall exactly. I went out on my own from Dduallt station and climbed up to Llyn Stwlan, the top reservoir. I believe my wife and I also visited the power station.
I have in-laws in North Wales so go there a lot. I did this on Snowdon looking at the meaning of its name,.
Hi Michael, Yes I vaguely remember reading something a while back about a change of name for Snowdon. Never been there yet but did Striding Edge a few years back in The Lakes. That was some walk!
PS Enjoyed your piece on sodium nitrite. Am reading Ultra-Processed People by Dr Chris van Tulleken and for a change of subject, Bringing Down Goliath by Jolyon Maugham KC.
A ram pump uses no power (electricity) at all. So that's pretty clean energy. Some people on Youtube already use ram pumped water to generate small amounts of power for their home.
To be clear, a ram pump uses the power of running water--a river or the tide, eg. So as you scale up, you will encounter many of the same problems you would with other forms of hydro.
I'm so happy you mentioned that! There is also a technology called a ram pump in which the flow of water downhill ("powered" by gravity) itself is used to pump water uphill, effectively for "free" since gravity doesn't need to be "produced."
From a pragmatic point of view, the simpler and less moving parts, the better. Elevating water or storing hot sand in big tanks are the easiest and most stable solutions.
No rare minerals or metals are needed, just pipes, wire, water, and sand. Flat areas use the sand tank solution, mountainous ares use elevated reservoirs. Simple.
"The existence of methane in the Earth’s mantle does not cause any doubt, however, its possible chemical transformation under the mantle thermobaric conditions is not enough known. Investigation of methane at the upper mantle thermobaric conditions, using diamond anvil cells, demonstrated the possible formation of ethane, propane and n-butane from methane, however, theoretical calculations of methane behaviour at extreme temperature and pressure predicted also heavier hydrocarbons. We experimentally investigated the chemical transformations of methane at the upper mantle thermobaric conditions, corresponding to the depth of 70–80 km (850–1000 K, 2.5 GPa), using “Toroid”-type Large reactive volume device and gas chromatography. The experimental results demonstrated the formation of the complex hydrocarbon mixture up to C7 with linear, branched and cycled structures and benzene. Unsaturated hydrocarbons were detected on the trace level in the products mixture. The increasing of exposure time led to growth of heavier components in the product systems. The data obtained suggest possible existence of complex hydrocarbon mixtures at the upper mantle thermobaric conditions and provide a new insight on the possible pathways of the hydrocarbons synthesis from methane in the upper mantle." https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-61644-5 See also https://phys.org/news/2019-04-rewriting-textbook-fossil-fuels-technologies.html - so these might be developed as natural gas wells.
So what you end up with looks a lot like natural gas, not oil. Anything below pentane - C5H12 - is what you find, anything above, only in trace amounts. We're not looking at reservoirs of octane/iso-octane or the paraffins, here.
If oil wells recharged at an economic rate, then you could shut them in for five years or so, then go back to pumping the oil, you wouldn't need water flooding, and you wouldn't need fracking, which is done mostly in oil formations where most of the easily recoverable oil has been produced, and you wouldn't need plants for dewatering or removal of fracking fluid.
"At a balmy minus 179 degrees Celsius (minus 290 degrees Fahrenheit), Titan is a far cry from Earth. Instead of water, liquid hydrocarbons in the form of methane and ethane are present on the moon's surface." Those were detected by radar. The rest of the sentence is an unproven assumption without any evidence cited: "and tholins probably make up its dunes. The term "tholins"was coined by Carl Sagan in 1979 to describe the complex organic molecules at the heart of prebiotic chemistry."
This is at best evidence for abiotic methane and ethane, CH4 and C2H6, and not oil. Octane freezes at -71F and would be a solid at the surface temperature. As for tholin - https://www.planetary.org/articles/0722-what-in-the-worlds-are-tholins - it's not oil as we would think of it, if it is in fact present - and would have to have been created in or near something hot enough to sustain plasma temperatures, then deposited on Titan, which is far too cold for the reactions producing tholins to have occurred. And methane and ethane exist in interstellar space, too, so none of this is evidence for the production of abiotic oil on earth.
Apparently there are stories of wells that have been idle for many years and found to have producible oil when tested. Have no idea how prevalent such discoveries might be. But it gives some support to Gold's thesis. I suspect a thicket of legal issues since many wells get capped after they "expire" and the company that held the rights is gone.
I saw an article by a Swedish research group testing Gold's hypothesis, and in fact they found roughly 50 barrels of oil - 1 barrel = 42 gallons - at something like 30,000 feet below ground level. That could have been seepage from a pre-existing oil formation which was drilled through.
I have heard on NM wells long shut down that were found producible. Not sure 50 bbl would qualify. OTOH, I am not anything close to knowing much about the topic. My Exxon shares have arrived at the place that I can never sell them, can't afford the taxes, my kids will enjoy them. I do enjoy the compounded returns over the last 50 years. Unlike the railroads, energy still has utility.
Unrelated IMPORTANT question..... Now that the pandemic is officially declared over, does it not follow that the approval of the experimental vaccine in now revoked??? wouldn’t the drug manufacturers have to start selling and administering the approved vaccines for use in the United States now that the pandemic is officially declared over?????
Try reading Corsi’s book about abiotic oil. He’s a Nazi expert, apparently they had technology to make diesel/petrol during the war that we’ve now lost.
If you like. Deep down the earth is too hot for hydrocarbons other than perhaps methane to survive. They turn to gas and char. Why shale is typically black. (Oil shale with kerogen is an intermediate state.) Oxidized shale tends to be green because it stabilizes ferrous iron against further oxidation. When entirely too hot, methane decomposes to hydrogen and char. This hydrogen, along with additional hydrogen from the reaction of metallic iron with water, percolates up, and reacts with the char to form methane, and perhaps higher hydrocarbons. Thus the myth of abiogenic oil. It's almost entirely pyrolyzed subducted algae.
"Myth" of abiogenic oil? Last I looked into it, they found it on some other planets or moons. Checked with someone who knew a lot about these issues, and he did not deny it. Just thought of it as peripheral.
Off-topic, kinda meta-topic. Sorry if sorry be needed/relevant 😊
It'd be of immense help if you cared to format headings properly, so as to facilitate the direct linking to your ever-brilliant-yet-sometimes-forking chapters (and subchapters). My advance ty for considering this technicality of consequence 🙏
Grabbing the opportunity fast & fast, a huuuuge ty for all the indispensable work & knowledge & wisdom you magnanimously share here! 🤩
--
ETA Can't explain it: all of a sudden, the chapter links have come alive! One of those mysterious cases when mere complaining is the remedy? Sends a message to the universe as it were 😁
Our bodies themselves run like a hydrogen fuel cell! However I will check out Gold - thank you for putting together such an all-encompassing article on energy:
James Hansen tells the story of how and why we didn't get 4th-generation fast-neutron reactors, and what the many advantages are. Breeder reactors, generate more fuel than they use, automatically shut down rather than melt down, and can use radioactive waste from thermal-neuron reactors as fuel. "Storms of My Grandchildren". Wikipedia has an interesting article too.
Germany just shut down their last nuclear plant, and they will certainly gun for the coal and natural gas power plants next.
In other words: The leadership of Europe has brainwashed their denizens into believing that green energy is feasible when they know full well it is not. Additionally, they've convinced their population that if they do not act by shutting these power plants down, climate change is going to kill them all.
So they're brainwashing their own countrymen to manifest conditions that will kill them, while promising them salvation for doing so.
When a gaggle of people walks, the likelihood of an injurious crash is practically nil, as the concept has no meaning.
When the gaggle load onto a bus and seat themselves behind a driver, the situation changes markedly. Now, it is entirely possible for the entire gaggles to be lost when the driver loses control at higher speed. The circumstances can be myriad, but the end result can potentially be the same: total loss.
Civil society organized with a manager class carries that hazard innately.
Will do. Hopefully having a substack will galvanize me to write again =) The problem has been - and I've felt this way for quite awhile now - that there is nothing left to say. I believe I have covered the fundamentals of what we are facing, and it has changed nothing.
A mental picture of a man screaming into a void, comes to mind.
I understand that point of view. However we need to be reminded over and over again of the fundamentals. People don’t learn until they are ready to hear and learn from what they heard. We are constantly bombarded with a false narrative
Very good point Dr Linda - I need to be reminded from time to time as well because it is so easy to drown in the torrent of endless lies and propaganda.
You're the kindest friend I have and it is much appreciated. The good you bring to the world through your work and care-giving is far more valuable than a keyboard warrior's could ever be. You make me so proud to be able to call you my friend.
God creates us all for different things! I appreciate the kindness , but not taking the credit. iJames Corbett interviewed with Dr. Mercola today….Find like minded people . We must help and support each other .
Hi Tritorch, Remember me? You greatly influenced and helped me back awhile. Your posts always get amazing 'likes' - people listen to what you say. So please keep doing it! Best wishes
I “liked” this article on the title alone. I’m looking forward to reading your view on this. It’s what I’ve been saying for years. “Climate change” is such an unfortunate distraction for those who really DO care about the environment and the health of our planet; their love and energy is redirected from things that really do need urgent action (like cleaning up the plastic in the ocean, like soil health, like preventing species loss and destruction of biodiversity) to a phantom fiction whose “solutions” so often do nothing to actually better the health of our planet. Perhaps by design?
100% agree. Everyone should be talking about ecosystem health, not climate change. It’s a compelling argument that our ecosystem is destroyed by design because, in general, large industries lobby (i.e. legally bribe) and are allowed to put profits first. Big Ag/Food is a great example (CAFOs that pollute water and destroy soil, nasty fertilizers/pesticides/herbicides on monocrops that destroy soil/biodiversity/pollinators).
Regarding the temperature monitoring stations, many are located at airports. In the 1930s, 40s, 50s, many of them had grass runways and not a lot of built infrastructure, now they all have concrete/tarmac runways and a lot of buildings, with the obvious result on temperatures recorded.
Don't forget: every unit of energy harnessed by the earthlings ends up as waste heat in the biosphere. What this amounts to vice that of natural emissions from the core and radiation from without is probably not reasonably estimable, but even so if it were a net poor prognosis, the only alternative is retrograde, and that means downgraded standard of living and eventually loss of population. People who made it into the world are reluctant to leave it voluntarily, so regardless of how the numbers stack up, the only path forward is to let be what relatively free people desire with least conflict.
One of the key characteristics of the smartest people I know, most of whom are engineers, is recognizing what you don't know and what you must assume. And the really smart ones can recognize when they have no solid basis for assumptions and how important that is to conclusions and decisions.
Something as complex as our environment has to have tens of thousands of factors in play, most of which we have no way to know of their relative importance. We are, as all scientists now and before have done, guessing...
Michael Crichton said in the author's forward of his novel "State of Fear" that what struck him was how passionate the climate protectors could be with absolutely no data or studies to back what they believed. He absolutely believed in climate change, but stressed repeatedly that nobody had yet proven any connection between human behavior and warming/cooling. He didn't say it did not exist; just that the link had not been proven. He then stated, if you're going to bet the future of the human race on a strategy to solve the problem, that maybe knowing the link is required.
That's where I stepped off the human caused climate change solution train. And where I began to start seeing how this playbook works and repeats. Now, it's easy to see.
In my view, the basic issue is that we now have Consensus Science which is driven by the profit motive. Covid 19 is a prime example where Herr Fauci rewarded those who went with his Corrupted view of medical science and punished those who saw the fallacies of the mRNA. Same scenario is playing out in Global warming and etc. Our Universities are being rewarded by going along with Consensus Science and are turning out scientists that see no wrong in this. Professor Krimsky of Purdue wrote a book on this. Science in the Private Interest. RFK Jr. is a major voice on the issue today, and needs to be heard. Will there be a synergistic effect with Tucker Carlson and RFK Jr. that will educate everyone to the lies that have been told? We are at a crossroads and taking the wrong path will lead us to our extinction. Was Fox directed to shut up Tucker or else?
“For climate change, there are many scientific organizations that study the climate. These alphabet soup of organizations include NASA, NOAA, JMA, WMO, NSIDC, IPCC, UK Met Office, and others. Click on the names for links to their climate-related sites. There are also climate research organizations associated with universities. These are all legitimate scientific sources.
If you have to dismiss all of these scientific organizations to reach your opinion, then you are by definition denying the science. If you have to believe that all of these organizations, and all of the climate scientists around the world, and all of the hundred thousand published research papers, and physics, are all somehow part of a global, multigenerational conspiracy to defraud the people, then you are, again, a denier by definition.
So if you deny all the above scientific organizations there are a lot of un-scientific web sites out there that pretend to be science. Many of these are run by lobbyists (e.g.., Climate Depot, run by a libertarian political lobbyist, CFACT), or supported by lobbyists (e.g., JoannaNova, WUWT, both of whom have received funding and otherwise substantial support by lobbying organizations like the Heartland Institute), or are actually paid by lobbyists to write Op-Eds and other blog posts that intentionally misrepresent the science.”
I suppose the evil elites doing this to humanity have an exit plan, if they do not, they will have to live on a dead planet with the rest of us, hopefully I will be in Heaven with God by that time as Im 71 now. Fear is the common theme in all of their evil crap they do, once you have people paralyzed with fear, you can control them and here we are. I have "the knowing" so I never bought into any of it from day one. I was never afraid because I knew it was a plan of theirs to get Trump out of office so everything else they did from that day forward I knew was a lie. The bioweapon injections have been the worst crime on the global population and will go down in history as such. I wonder what earth will look like in 10-20 years, will it be totally decimated or will we have won with God's help, I pray we win for all the kids left behind.
“ I care about the environment but am stuck in a position where the environmentalists hate me because I do not support the Climate Change narrative. “
I am in the same boat. I am an older individual (elderly I suppose by sone definitions). I find it very frustrating to converse with someone who WILL NOT be bothered to actually look at the historical records. Or even check their sources.
For years I dutifully wrote state legislators asking that California increase its drilling for oil instead of relying on outside sources. I thought, foolishly, California could lead the way in innovating on how to do it while minimizing environmental impact under the watchful eyes of the public. Besides, relying on developing nations seemed akin to putting your septic on your neighbor's property because you don't want the eyesore. Covid made me realize the scam. Recently I attended the unveiling of a joint partnership between UCLA, gov't entities, and natural gas monopoly company to capture carbon dioxide using the ocean. (https://www.dailybreeze.com/2023/02/19/startups-turning-to-the-ocean-to-capture-more-carbon-off-southern-californias-coast/) One of the presenters gushed about how her work won approval from her son's grade school class. I was appalled. I later queried an auto executive, how do we stop this from becoming Fascism in the Mussolini style? He responded 'Don't vote for Trump.' I was astonished and realized how corrupt things had become. One researcher, who presented. tried to point out it wouldn't be the panacea the others were proclaiming. But, he as the expert, was drowned out by the enthusiasm of others. I told my friend I felt like I was in the den of thieves.
When I was child, it always confused me why people's hearts weren't behind a lot of what they said (and often then their actions), but as I grew up I realized it was just an accepted norm of our society.
It is interesting how CA is home to the tech industry, or was, but they've never stepped up to develop schools where kids could receive training to work in the industry. If Google opened up a high school in Compton or Inglewood, you would have parents fighting to get their child in. That they don't tells me all their woke nonsense is a distraction.
Everyone alive today is descended from an enslaved people. And if we are holding people responsible for the actions of other members of their race, that opens the door to reparations going in the opposite direction when you consider the FBI crime statistics.
I think you hinted at the growing use of internet censorship and could have made the connection with Covid-19 as a tool to expedite the war on freedom as necessary to maintain the climate narratives
Renewable energy 'simply won't work': Top Google engineers
Two highly qualified Google engineers who have spent years studying and trying to improve renewable energy technology have stated quite bluntly that whatever the future holds, it is not a renewables-powered civilisation: such a thing is impossible.
Both men are Stanford PhDs, Ross Koningstein having trained in aerospace engineering and David Fork in applied physics. These aren't guys who fiddle about with websites or data analytics or "technology" of that sort: they are real engineers who understand difficult maths and physics, and top-bracket even among that distinguished company.
Even if one were to electrify all of transport, industry, heating and so on, so much renewable generation and balancing/storage equipment would be needed to power it that astronomical new requirements for steel, concrete, copper, glass, carbon fibre, neodymium, shipping and haulage etc etc would appear.
All these things are made using mammoth amounts of energy: far from achieving massive energy savings, which most plans for a renewables future rely on implicitly, we would wind up needing far more energy, which would mean even more vast renewables farms – and even more materials and energy to make and maintain them and so on. The scale of the building would be like nothing ever attempted by the human race.
In reality, well before any such stage was reached, energy would become horrifyingly expensive – which means that everything would become horrifyingly expensive (even the present well-under-one-per-cent renewables level in the UK has pushed up utility bills very considerably).
While oil has many other important uses (lubrication, plastics, roadways, roofing) this section considers only its use as an energy source. The CMO is a powerful means of understanding the difficulty of replacing oil energy by other sources. SRI International chemist Ripudaman Malhotra, working with Crane and colleague Ed Kinderman, used it to describe the looming energy crisis in sobering terms.[13] Malhotra illustrates the problem of producing one CMO energy that we currently derive from oil each year from five different alternative sources. Installing capacity to produce 1 CMO per year requires long and significant development.
Allowing fifty years to develop the requisite capacity, 1 CMO of energy per year could be produced by any one of these developments:
4 Three Gorges Dams,[14] developed each year for 50 years, or
52 nuclear power plants,[15] developed each year for 50 years, or
104 coal-fired power plants,[16] developed each year for 50 years, or
32,850 wind turbines,[17][18] developed each year for 50 years, or
91,250,000 rooftop solar photovoltaic panels[19] developed each year for 50 years
The world consumes approximately 3 CMO annually from all sources. The table [10] shows the small contribution from alternative energies in 2006.
“To provide most of our power through renewables would take hundreds of times the amount of rare earth metals that we are mining today,” according to Thomas Graedel at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. So renewable energy resources like windmills and solar PV can not ever replace fossil fuels, there’s not enough of many essential minerals to scale this technology up. http://energyskeptic.com/2014/high-tech-cannot-last-rare-earth-metals/
Renewable energy 'simply won't work': Top Google engineers
Two highly qualified Google engineers who have spent years studying and trying to improve renewable energy technology have stated quite bluntly that whatever the future holds, it is not a renewables-powered civilisation: such a thing is impossible.
Both men are Stanford PhDs, Ross Koningstein having trained in aerospace engineering and David Fork in applied physics. These aren't guys who fiddle about with websites or data analytics or "technology" of that sort: they are real engineers who understand difficult maths and physics, and top-bracket even among that distinguished company.
Even if one were to electrify all of transport, industry, heating and so on, so much renewable generation and balancing/storage equipment would be needed to power it that astronomical new requirements for steel, concrete, copper, glass, carbon fibre, neodymium, shipping and haulage etc etc would appear.
All these things are made using mammoth amounts of energy: far from achieving massive energy savings, which most plans for a renewables future rely on implicitly, we would wind up needing far more energy, which would mean even more vast renewables farms – and even more materials and energy to make and maintain them and so on. The scale of the building would be like nothing ever attempted by the human race.
In reality, well before any such stage was reached, energy would become horrifyingly expensive – which means that everything would become horrifyingly expensive (even the present well-under-one-per-cent renewables level in the UK has pushed up utility bills very considerably).
The $2.5 trillion reason we can’t rely on batteries to store energy
Fluctuating solar and wind power require lots of energy storage, and lithium-ion batteries seem like the obvious choice—but they are far too expensive to play a major role.
Why Germany’s nuclear phaseout is leading to more coal burning
Between 2011 and 2015 Germany will open 10.7 GW of new coal fired power stations. This is more new coal coal capacity than was constructed in the entire two decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The expected annual electricity production of these power stations will far exceed that of existing solar panels and will be approximately the same as that of Germany’s existing solar panels and wind turbines combined. Solar panels and wind turbines however have expected life spans of no more than 25 years. Coal power plants typically last 50 years or longer. At best you could call the recent developments in Germany’s electricity sector contradictory. https://carboncounter.wordpress.com/2015/06/06/why-germanys-nuclear-phaseout-is-leading-to-more-coal-burning/
Germany Runs Up Against the Limits of Renewables
Even as Germany adds lots of wind and solar power to the electric grid, the country’s carbon emissions are rising. Will the rest of the world learn from its lesson? After years of declines, Germany’s carbon emissions rose slightly in 2015, largely because the country produces much more electricity than it needs. That’s happening because even if there are times when renewables can supply nearly all of the electricity on the grid, the variability of those sources forces Germany to keep other power plants running. And in Germany, which is phasing out its nuclear plants, those other plants primarily burn dirty coal. https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601514/germany-runs-up-against-the-limits-of-renewables/
I share your frustration of having environmental concerns but knowing that the green movement has been bought off. There seems to be a huge lag among most in the movement in recognising that. . Environmental degradation, habitat loss, oceans full of plastics, all actual concerns are buried under the clamour for zero carbon. I used to share not only environmental concerns with many but also ideas on tolerance, governments, big pharma, the MIC and on and on.
Another great article by the way. Many thoughts triggered. I don't want to get into all of them currently. I will say one. The way we went from Covid directly into a date when all vehicles will be converted into electric. Some states wrote it into law like CA. NY just passed the law that all new structures will have electric stoves. Originally tried to make it everyone, but that got struck down. They are moving fast with the agenda while they still feel they have control or the states where they do.
It is sad that people are letting their rights being taken away so easily. They think the government is doing what is best for everyone. Total lack of critical thinking or questioning.
We might suspect that the push toward all EVs will arrive at reality at some point. Power generation that will fall short and rapid increases in prices for battery materials become obstacles. The Chinese have cornered many markets for raw materials but will face a production shortfall given their demographics. They may import slaves but that may not turn out well for them. Nearly all the EV cost lies within the battery.
This is why we are all here: "I care about the environment but am stuck in a position where the environmentalists hate me because I do not support the Climate Change narrative. In contrast, those who do not support the Climate Change narrative hate me because I care about the environment and do not believe polluters should be given a free pass to support economic growth."
While there are definitely some people who don’t buy into climate change who feel that way (and those people tend to be obnoxiously loud, especially among libertarians) I think that the more common belief is that something should be done to make sure companies don’t pollute but I’m not sure who should do the policing or rule making. Companies cannot be trusted to police themselves but the federal government has also proven itself incapable in this area as well. Maybe this is a rural thing but most people I know:
1.) Care deeply about the environment
2.) Don’t trust major companies or corporations (unless they happen to work for it)
and
3.) Don’t trust the government (except when it’s promising them money)
I think #3 more than trust in free market enterprise is why so many people who don’t believe in climate change come across as anti-environmental. They fear government oversight more than they fear pollution, but they aren’t pro-pollution.
Great article and hope it gets lots of attention; I restacked it. I'm very bummed like you how the environmental movement was hollowed out from the inside and redirected toward graft by the elites. There's so much that could be done in a sustainable way environmentally if our elites actually cared about the platitudes they espouse, but they don't. I remain skeptical about RFK Jr, though!
Great information! Eugyppius has some great articles on the current green energy Nazis in Germany. He leans towards building more nuclear power plants.
One flaw with solar mirrors is their unfortunate tendency to microwave the passing birds that haven't yet been mangled by the wind turbines....
Hydrogen seems to hold a lot of promise, but has been suppressed by the oil and auto powers. Once they can develop enough control over it, and make enough money from it, I think we'll see it come to fruition. Toyota has been working on it for a long time, and claims their newest models are vastly more efficient than previous attempts.
Thank you. If you take an objective full view of the energy situation, it's pretty obvious what needs to be done, so everyone who looks at it comes to a similar conclusion. I have a few unique contributions because I've been looking at this for a long time, but my position is still essentially the same as everyone elses.
The barriers to hydrogen are all technical so are subject to research. But that effort seems slow to develop perhaps stalled by vested interests. At least hydrogen powered vehicles track the existing infrastructure for fuels. Small nuclear reactors can fraction water as can experimental solar furnaces but both require development.
I am really hoping someone comments on Thomas Gold's work or Green Nuclear Energy that is stored as hydrogen.
There is already an existing cheap way to store energy. Pump water up a hill and extract the energy when you let it flow down the hill. 75% efficient and no pollution. Better than batteries.
That is an interesting approach I had never heard of.
Its been around for decades. "The first use of pumped storage was in 1907 in Switzerland"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity
Pumped hydro, yes. And heated rocks. Batteries are just one tech, not the best in all apps. Don't forget sodium batteries coming online that will displace most lithium battery need; much cheaper.
Sodium batteries will be a very positive step - they are cheaper and the sodium can be extracted without the same environmentally damaging impacts, but also it is a plentiful mineral, whereas lithium is a trace element that we will exhaust relatively quickly at current rates, and even more so under the goal of transitioning transport to fully electric.
There's one of these lakes in Wales, UK. It's used when they need a surge of energy quickly - but it doesn't last very long...
Two lakes one upper, and larger one lower.
Ffestiniog Power Station. "the scheme has a storage capacity of around 1.44 GWh (5.2 TJ) at maximum output for four hours, and the capacity to power the whole of North Wales for several hours."
Wikipedia.
Hi Michael, I've actually been there but couldn't remember the name. Thanks & best wishes
Hello Marc. I have been too. My first visit to the are was via the steam railway with my parents, perhaps I was 15-16, I can't recall exactly. I went out on my own from Dduallt station and climbed up to Llyn Stwlan, the top reservoir. I believe my wife and I also visited the power station.
I have in-laws in North Wales so go there a lot. I did this on Snowdon looking at the meaning of its name,.
https://alphaandomegacloud.wordpress.com/2022/08/28/snowdon-or-yr-wyddfa-whats-in-a-name/
Hi Michael, Yes I vaguely remember reading something a while back about a change of name for Snowdon. Never been there yet but did Striding Edge a few years back in The Lakes. That was some walk!
PS Enjoyed your piece on sodium nitrite. Am reading Ultra-Processed People by Dr Chris van Tulleken and for a change of subject, Bringing Down Goliath by Jolyon Maugham KC.
That's enough to stop rolling blackouts in some US cities during the hot summer months!
I am stunned by the number of people who are hostilely against this idea. I have been verbally assaulted by folks regarding this concept
A ram pump uses no power (electricity) at all. So that's pretty clean energy. Some people on Youtube already use ram pumped water to generate small amounts of power for their home.
To be clear, a ram pump uses the power of running water--a river or the tide, eg. So as you scale up, you will encounter many of the same problems you would with other forms of hydro.
I'm so happy you mentioned that! There is also a technology called a ram pump in which the flow of water downhill ("powered" by gravity) itself is used to pump water uphill, effectively for "free" since gravity doesn't need to be "produced."
From a pragmatic point of view, the simpler and less moving parts, the better. Elevating water or storing hot sand in big tanks are the easiest and most stable solutions.
No rare minerals or metals are needed, just pipes, wire, water, and sand. Flat areas use the sand tank solution, mountainous ares use elevated reservoirs. Simple.
Pumped Storage Hydropower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsSUPpwtqhQ
Sand Energy Battery: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6ZrM-IZlTE
Here is an example of an over engineered and inefficient solution, the Energy Vault: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGGOjD_OtAM
"The existence of methane in the Earth’s mantle does not cause any doubt, however, its possible chemical transformation under the mantle thermobaric conditions is not enough known. Investigation of methane at the upper mantle thermobaric conditions, using diamond anvil cells, demonstrated the possible formation of ethane, propane and n-butane from methane, however, theoretical calculations of methane behaviour at extreme temperature and pressure predicted also heavier hydrocarbons. We experimentally investigated the chemical transformations of methane at the upper mantle thermobaric conditions, corresponding to the depth of 70–80 km (850–1000 K, 2.5 GPa), using “Toroid”-type Large reactive volume device and gas chromatography. The experimental results demonstrated the formation of the complex hydrocarbon mixture up to C7 with linear, branched and cycled structures and benzene. Unsaturated hydrocarbons were detected on the trace level in the products mixture. The increasing of exposure time led to growth of heavier components in the product systems. The data obtained suggest possible existence of complex hydrocarbon mixtures at the upper mantle thermobaric conditions and provide a new insight on the possible pathways of the hydrocarbons synthesis from methane in the upper mantle." https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-61644-5 See also https://phys.org/news/2019-04-rewriting-textbook-fossil-fuels-technologies.html - so these might be developed as natural gas wells.
So what you end up with looks a lot like natural gas, not oil. Anything below pentane - C5H12 - is what you find, anything above, only in trace amounts. We're not looking at reservoirs of octane/iso-octane or the paraffins, here.
If oil wells recharged at an economic rate, then you could shut them in for five years or so, then go back to pumping the oil, you wouldn't need water flooding, and you wouldn't need fracking, which is done mostly in oil formations where most of the easily recoverable oil has been produced, and you wouldn't need plants for dewatering or removal of fracking fluid.
One part of Gold's model was knowing that hydrocarbons are really common in space.
If you didn't see this link in my earlier post, it's worth looking at as it proves abiotic oil is real (brief article):
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/media/cassini-20080213.html
"At a balmy minus 179 degrees Celsius (minus 290 degrees Fahrenheit), Titan is a far cry from Earth. Instead of water, liquid hydrocarbons in the form of methane and ethane are present on the moon's surface." Those were detected by radar. The rest of the sentence is an unproven assumption without any evidence cited: "and tholins probably make up its dunes. The term "tholins"was coined by Carl Sagan in 1979 to describe the complex organic molecules at the heart of prebiotic chemistry."
This is at best evidence for abiotic methane and ethane, CH4 and C2H6, and not oil. Octane freezes at -71F and would be a solid at the surface temperature. As for tholin - https://www.planetary.org/articles/0722-what-in-the-worlds-are-tholins - it's not oil as we would think of it, if it is in fact present - and would have to have been created in or near something hot enough to sustain plasma temperatures, then deposited on Titan, which is far too cold for the reactions producing tholins to have occurred. And methane and ethane exist in interstellar space, too, so none of this is evidence for the production of abiotic oil on earth.
Thank you this post
Apparently there are stories of wells that have been idle for many years and found to have producible oil when tested. Have no idea how prevalent such discoveries might be. But it gives some support to Gold's thesis. I suspect a thicket of legal issues since many wells get capped after they "expire" and the company that held the rights is gone.
I saw an article by a Swedish research group testing Gold's hypothesis, and in fact they found roughly 50 barrels of oil - 1 barrel = 42 gallons - at something like 30,000 feet below ground level. That could have been seepage from a pre-existing oil formation which was drilled through.
I have heard on NM wells long shut down that were found producible. Not sure 50 bbl would qualify. OTOH, I am not anything close to knowing much about the topic. My Exxon shares have arrived at the place that I can never sell them, can't afford the taxes, my kids will enjoy them. I do enjoy the compounded returns over the last 50 years. Unlike the railroads, energy still has utility.
Unrelated IMPORTANT question..... Now that the pandemic is officially declared over, does it not follow that the approval of the experimental vaccine in now revoked??? wouldn’t the drug manufacturers have to start selling and administering the approved vaccines for use in the United States now that the pandemic is officially declared over?????
There was some under handed government rules that allowed the shots to continue
Good point
Yeah, I read about how there are different end dates for different aspects of the pandemic. The EUA has not expired and will not for some time.
Try reading Corsi’s book about abiotic oil. He’s a Nazi expert, apparently they had technology to make diesel/petrol during the war that we’ve now lost.
Kinda like the technology of going to the moon that is now lost forever.
If you like. Deep down the earth is too hot for hydrocarbons other than perhaps methane to survive. They turn to gas and char. Why shale is typically black. (Oil shale with kerogen is an intermediate state.) Oxidized shale tends to be green because it stabilizes ferrous iron against further oxidation. When entirely too hot, methane decomposes to hydrogen and char. This hydrogen, along with additional hydrogen from the reaction of metallic iron with water, percolates up, and reacts with the char to form methane, and perhaps higher hydrocarbons. Thus the myth of abiogenic oil. It's almost entirely pyrolyzed subducted algae.
"Myth" of abiogenic oil? Last I looked into it, they found it on some other planets or moons. Checked with someone who knew a lot about these issues, and he did not deny it. Just thought of it as peripheral.
Obligatory video on this subject: https://bitchute.com/video/S7IA3lR9BpZt
So the Rockefellers lied and mankind is worse off as a result? Same as it ever was
Ra used a stargate to bring it from Titan? Those fossils below 16,000 feet cracked it to asphalt, etc. Fill 'er up with Dino! Sorry, Fred.
Off-topic, kinda meta-topic. Sorry if sorry be needed/relevant 😊
It'd be of immense help if you cared to format headings properly, so as to facilitate the direct linking to your ever-brilliant-yet-sometimes-forking chapters (and subchapters). My advance ty for considering this technicality of consequence 🙏
Grabbing the opportunity fast & fast, a huuuuge ty for all the indispensable work & knowledge & wisdom you magnanimously share here! 🤩
--
ETA Can't explain it: all of a sudden, the chapter links have come alive! One of those mysterious cases when mere complaining is the remedy? Sends a message to the universe as it were 😁
Our bodies themselves run like a hydrogen fuel cell! However I will check out Gold - thank you for putting together such an all-encompassing article on energy:
https://romanshapoval.substack.com/i/120334740/our-bodys-battery
PLEASE read James Hansen, "Storms of my Grandchildren" and you will know a lot more about CO2 than you apparently do at present.
https://peterwebster.substack.com/p/wind-up-the-spring
James Hansen tells the story of how and why we didn't get 4th-generation fast-neutron reactors, and what the many advantages are. Breeder reactors, generate more fuel than they use, automatically shut down rather than melt down, and can use radioactive waste from thermal-neuron reactors as fuel. "Storms of My Grandchildren". Wikipedia has an interesting article too.
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Fast-neutron_reactor
what is green nuclear ??
what is that ?
Provide links ?
Germany just shut down their last nuclear plant, and they will certainly gun for the coal and natural gas power plants next.
In other words: The leadership of Europe has brainwashed their denizens into believing that green energy is feasible when they know full well it is not. Additionally, they've convinced their population that if they do not act by shutting these power plants down, climate change is going to kill them all.
So they're brainwashing their own countrymen to manifest conditions that will kill them, while promising them salvation for doing so.
Woke = mind control.
Full story here: https://tritorch.com/suicide
When a gaggle of people walks, the likelihood of an injurious crash is practically nil, as the concept has no meaning.
When the gaggle load onto a bus and seat themselves behind a driver, the situation changes markedly. Now, it is entirely possible for the entire gaggles to be lost when the driver loses control at higher speed. The circumstances can be myriad, but the end result can potentially be the same: total loss.
Civil society organized with a manager class carries that hazard innately.
Eugyppius has some great articles about this on his SS.
So true Tritorch ... put that link on your new substack!!!
Will do. Hopefully having a substack will galvanize me to write again =) The problem has been - and I've felt this way for quite awhile now - that there is nothing left to say. I believe I have covered the fundamentals of what we are facing, and it has changed nothing.
A mental picture of a man screaming into a void, comes to mind.
I understand that point of view. However we need to be reminded over and over again of the fundamentals. People don’t learn until they are ready to hear and learn from what they heard. We are constantly bombarded with a false narrative
Very good point Dr Linda - I need to be reminded from time to time as well because it is so easy to drown in the torrent of endless lies and propaganda.
You have a lot to say and give .. put all your essays up , one at a time for comments. People need your wisdom and knowledge.
You're the kindest friend I have and it is much appreciated. The good you bring to the world through your work and care-giving is far more valuable than a keyboard warrior's could ever be. You make me so proud to be able to call you my friend.
God creates us all for different things! I appreciate the kindness , but not taking the credit. iJames Corbett interviewed with Dr. Mercola today….Find like minded people . We must help and support each other .
Hi Tritorch, Remember me? You greatly influenced and helped me back awhile. Your posts always get amazing 'likes' - people listen to what you say. So please keep doing it! Best wishes
Of course I remember you sir! You've always give such kind feedback. Thanks as always, and I will!
Don't stop calmly speaking out.
Always refer to your acquaintances electric cars as “coal fired cars”.
I wish I could "like" this more than once!
I did it for you! 😉
I “liked” this article on the title alone. I’m looking forward to reading your view on this. It’s what I’ve been saying for years. “Climate change” is such an unfortunate distraction for those who really DO care about the environment and the health of our planet; their love and energy is redirected from things that really do need urgent action (like cleaning up the plastic in the ocean, like soil health, like preventing species loss and destruction of biodiversity) to a phantom fiction whose “solutions” so often do nothing to actually better the health of our planet. Perhaps by design?
Just finished reading. Absolutely awesome information and researching. Thank you SO much.
Thank you. I wanted to write this one for a while and just was waiting for the right time to do it.
Sure is AMD
So grateful for your hard work and articles on the most important subjects of our time. Truly, thank you.
Thank you.
100% agree. Everyone should be talking about ecosystem health, not climate change. It’s a compelling argument that our ecosystem is destroyed by design because, in general, large industries lobby (i.e. legally bribe) and are allowed to put profits first. Big Ag/Food is a great example (CAFOs that pollute water and destroy soil, nasty fertilizers/pesticides/herbicides on monocrops that destroy soil/biodiversity/pollinators).
Well said! I really like your way of summarizing it: we need to be talking about ecosystem health, not climate change.
Yes!
Regarding the temperature monitoring stations, many are located at airports. In the 1930s, 40s, 50s, many of them had grass runways and not a lot of built infrastructure, now they all have concrete/tarmac runways and a lot of buildings, with the obvious result on temperatures recorded.
95% of the monitor stations around the world are not precise enough to support the data supposedly produced from them.
Heat islands.
Don't forget: every unit of energy harnessed by the earthlings ends up as waste heat in the biosphere. What this amounts to vice that of natural emissions from the core and radiation from without is probably not reasonably estimable, but even so if it were a net poor prognosis, the only alternative is retrograde, and that means downgraded standard of living and eventually loss of population. People who made it into the world are reluctant to leave it voluntarily, so regardless of how the numbers stack up, the only path forward is to let be what relatively free people desire with least conflict.
Another thing to remember is that all the heat we produce is a tiny fraction of what the earth produces and constantly emits.
"...What this amounts to vice that of natural emissions from the core and radiation from without is probably not reasonably estimable..."
It's anyone's guess. Therefore, wrecking society to throttle it is pointless. Energy is lifeblood. To destroy it is to harm mankind.
One of the key characteristics of the smartest people I know, most of whom are engineers, is recognizing what you don't know and what you must assume. And the really smart ones can recognize when they have no solid basis for assumptions and how important that is to conclusions and decisions.
Something as complex as our environment has to have tens of thousands of factors in play, most of which we have no way to know of their relative importance. We are, as all scientists now and before have done, guessing...
Michael Crichton said in the author's forward of his novel "State of Fear" that what struck him was how passionate the climate protectors could be with absolutely no data or studies to back what they believed. He absolutely believed in climate change, but stressed repeatedly that nobody had yet proven any connection between human behavior and warming/cooling. He didn't say it did not exist; just that the link had not been proven. He then stated, if you're going to bet the future of the human race on a strategy to solve the problem, that maybe knowing the link is required.
That's where I stepped off the human caused climate change solution train. And where I began to start seeing how this playbook works and repeats. Now, it's easy to see.
Check out john dees climate corner for lots of detailed info on this.
Yes, it's excellent: https://jdeeclimate.substack.com/
In my view, the basic issue is that we now have Consensus Science which is driven by the profit motive. Covid 19 is a prime example where Herr Fauci rewarded those who went with his Corrupted view of medical science and punished those who saw the fallacies of the mRNA. Same scenario is playing out in Global warming and etc. Our Universities are being rewarded by going along with Consensus Science and are turning out scientists that see no wrong in this. Professor Krimsky of Purdue wrote a book on this. Science in the Private Interest. RFK Jr. is a major voice on the issue today, and needs to be heard. Will there be a synergistic effect with Tucker Carlson and RFK Jr. that will educate everyone to the lies that have been told? We are at a crossroads and taking the wrong path will lead us to our extinction. Was Fox directed to shut up Tucker or else?
Completely agree. Consensus science is not science.
“For climate change, there are many scientific organizations that study the climate. These alphabet soup of organizations include NASA, NOAA, JMA, WMO, NSIDC, IPCC, UK Met Office, and others. Click on the names for links to their climate-related sites. There are also climate research organizations associated with universities. These are all legitimate scientific sources.
If you have to dismiss all of these scientific organizations to reach your opinion, then you are by definition denying the science. If you have to believe that all of these organizations, and all of the climate scientists around the world, and all of the hundred thousand published research papers, and physics, are all somehow part of a global, multigenerational conspiracy to defraud the people, then you are, again, a denier by definition.
So if you deny all the above scientific organizations there are a lot of un-scientific web sites out there that pretend to be science. Many of these are run by lobbyists (e.g.., Climate Depot, run by a libertarian political lobbyist, CFACT), or supported by lobbyists (e.g., JoannaNova, WUWT, both of whom have received funding and otherwise substantial support by lobbying organizations like the Heartland Institute), or are actually paid by lobbyists to write Op-Eds and other blog posts that intentionally misrepresent the science.”
https://thedakepage.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/how-to-assess-climate-change.html
(Thank you for the book rec. Looks good.)
I suppose the evil elites doing this to humanity have an exit plan, if they do not, they will have to live on a dead planet with the rest of us, hopefully I will be in Heaven with God by that time as Im 71 now. Fear is the common theme in all of their evil crap they do, once you have people paralyzed with fear, you can control them and here we are. I have "the knowing" so I never bought into any of it from day one. I was never afraid because I knew it was a plan of theirs to get Trump out of office so everything else they did from that day forward I knew was a lie. The bioweapon injections have been the worst crime on the global population and will go down in history as such. I wonder what earth will look like in 10-20 years, will it be totally decimated or will we have won with God's help, I pray we win for all the kids left behind.
I really don't know if they have an exit plan.
Transhumanism. It'll never work, but they can still dream.
The billionaire class has an exit plan.
We all live like the people who work in the Congo mines.
Cheap labor that uses none of the resources the elite over consume.
I am right there with you Hannah
God bless and keep you
You too my friend.
“ I care about the environment but am stuck in a position where the environmentalists hate me because I do not support the Climate Change narrative. “
I am in the same boat. I am an older individual (elderly I suppose by sone definitions). I find it very frustrating to converse with someone who WILL NOT be bothered to actually look at the historical records. Or even check their sources.
For years I dutifully wrote state legislators asking that California increase its drilling for oil instead of relying on outside sources. I thought, foolishly, California could lead the way in innovating on how to do it while minimizing environmental impact under the watchful eyes of the public. Besides, relying on developing nations seemed akin to putting your septic on your neighbor's property because you don't want the eyesore. Covid made me realize the scam. Recently I attended the unveiling of a joint partnership between UCLA, gov't entities, and natural gas monopoly company to capture carbon dioxide using the ocean. (https://www.dailybreeze.com/2023/02/19/startups-turning-to-the-ocean-to-capture-more-carbon-off-southern-californias-coast/) One of the presenters gushed about how her work won approval from her son's grade school class. I was appalled. I later queried an auto executive, how do we stop this from becoming Fascism in the Mussolini style? He responded 'Don't vote for Trump.' I was astonished and realized how corrupt things had become. One researcher, who presented. tried to point out it wouldn't be the panacea the others were proclaiming. But, he as the expert, was drowned out by the enthusiasm of others. I told my friend I felt like I was in the den of thieves.
When I was child, it always confused me why people's hearts weren't behind a lot of what they said (and often then their actions), but as I grew up I realized it was just an accepted norm of our society.
There is enough oil in CA. to pay reparations.
It is interesting how CA is home to the tech industry, or was, but they've never stepped up to develop schools where kids could receive training to work in the industry. If Google opened up a high school in Compton or Inglewood, you would have parents fighting to get their child in. That they don't tells me all their woke nonsense is a distraction.
AFT has and will continue to rob and steal.
Rob children of education and steal tax dollars.
Follow the money.
I say whoever controls the pension really controls everything
This tells you who runs the show in CA.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/05/16/gavin-newsom-eliminates-vote-by-mail-for-farmworker-union-elections/
Everyone alive today is descended from an enslaved people. And if we are holding people responsible for the actions of other members of their race, that opens the door to reparations going in the opposite direction when you consider the FBI crime statistics.
Well, welcome to clown land
Incredible research,
I think you hinted at the growing use of internet censorship and could have made the connection with Covid-19 as a tool to expedite the war on freedom as necessary to maintain the climate narratives
Renewable energy 'simply won't work': Top Google engineers
Two highly qualified Google engineers who have spent years studying and trying to improve renewable energy technology have stated quite bluntly that whatever the future holds, it is not a renewables-powered civilisation: such a thing is impossible.
Both men are Stanford PhDs, Ross Koningstein having trained in aerospace engineering and David Fork in applied physics. These aren't guys who fiddle about with websites or data analytics or "technology" of that sort: they are real engineers who understand difficult maths and physics, and top-bracket even among that distinguished company.
Even if one were to electrify all of transport, industry, heating and so on, so much renewable generation and balancing/storage equipment would be needed to power it that astronomical new requirements for steel, concrete, copper, glass, carbon fibre, neodymium, shipping and haulage etc etc would appear.
All these things are made using mammoth amounts of energy: far from achieving massive energy savings, which most plans for a renewables future rely on implicitly, we would wind up needing far more energy, which would mean even more vast renewables farms – and even more materials and energy to make and maintain them and so on. The scale of the building would be like nothing ever attempted by the human race.
In reality, well before any such stage was reached, energy would become horrifyingly expensive – which means that everything would become horrifyingly expensive (even the present well-under-one-per-cent renewables level in the UK has pushed up utility bills very considerably).
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/21/renewable_energy_simply_wont_work_google_renewables_engineers/
http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/23/google-gives-up-on-green-tech-investment-initiative-rec/
I tried to say that point a bit more politely here, but I completely agree.
Fast Eddy,
I've heard there is enough copper and other necessary minerals, etc to do the transition to "clean energy" once. After that the gig is up.
"horrifyingly expensive"....yup!
Replacement of oil by alternative sources
While oil has many other important uses (lubrication, plastics, roadways, roofing) this section considers only its use as an energy source. The CMO is a powerful means of understanding the difficulty of replacing oil energy by other sources. SRI International chemist Ripudaman Malhotra, working with Crane and colleague Ed Kinderman, used it to describe the looming energy crisis in sobering terms.[13] Malhotra illustrates the problem of producing one CMO energy that we currently derive from oil each year from five different alternative sources. Installing capacity to produce 1 CMO per year requires long and significant development.
Allowing fifty years to develop the requisite capacity, 1 CMO of energy per year could be produced by any one of these developments:
4 Three Gorges Dams,[14] developed each year for 50 years, or
52 nuclear power plants,[15] developed each year for 50 years, or
104 coal-fired power plants,[16] developed each year for 50 years, or
32,850 wind turbines,[17][18] developed each year for 50 years, or
91,250,000 rooftop solar photovoltaic panels[19] developed each year for 50 years
The world consumes approximately 3 CMO annually from all sources. The table [10] shows the small contribution from alternative energies in 2006.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubic_mile_of_oil
“To provide most of our power through renewables would take hundreds of times the amount of rare earth metals that we are mining today,” according to Thomas Graedel at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. So renewable energy resources like windmills and solar PV can not ever replace fossil fuels, there’s not enough of many essential minerals to scale this technology up. http://energyskeptic.com/2014/high-tech-cannot-last-rare-earth-metals/
Renewable energy 'simply won't work': Top Google engineers
Two highly qualified Google engineers who have spent years studying and trying to improve renewable energy technology have stated quite bluntly that whatever the future holds, it is not a renewables-powered civilisation: such a thing is impossible.
Both men are Stanford PhDs, Ross Koningstein having trained in aerospace engineering and David Fork in applied physics. These aren't guys who fiddle about with websites or data analytics or "technology" of that sort: they are real engineers who understand difficult maths and physics, and top-bracket even among that distinguished company.
Even if one were to electrify all of transport, industry, heating and so on, so much renewable generation and balancing/storage equipment would be needed to power it that astronomical new requirements for steel, concrete, copper, glass, carbon fibre, neodymium, shipping and haulage etc etc would appear.
All these things are made using mammoth amounts of energy: far from achieving massive energy savings, which most plans for a renewables future rely on implicitly, we would wind up needing far more energy, which would mean even more vast renewables farms – and even more materials and energy to make and maintain them and so on. The scale of the building would be like nothing ever attempted by the human race.
In reality, well before any such stage was reached, energy would become horrifyingly expensive – which means that everything would become horrifyingly expensive (even the present well-under-one-per-cent renewables level in the UK has pushed up utility bills very considerably).
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/21/renewable_energy_simply_wont_work_google_renewables_engineers/
http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/23/google-gives-up-on-green-tech-investment-initiative-rec/
The $2.5 trillion reason we can’t rely on batteries to store energy
Fluctuating solar and wind power require lots of energy storage, and lithium-ion batteries seem like the obvious choice—but they are far too expensive to play a major role.
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/611683/the-25-trillion-reason-we-cant-rely-on-batteries-to-clean-up-the-grid/
Why Germany’s nuclear phaseout is leading to more coal burning
Between 2011 and 2015 Germany will open 10.7 GW of new coal fired power stations. This is more new coal coal capacity than was constructed in the entire two decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The expected annual electricity production of these power stations will far exceed that of existing solar panels and will be approximately the same as that of Germany’s existing solar panels and wind turbines combined. Solar panels and wind turbines however have expected life spans of no more than 25 years. Coal power plants typically last 50 years or longer. At best you could call the recent developments in Germany’s electricity sector contradictory. https://carboncounter.wordpress.com/2015/06/06/why-germanys-nuclear-phaseout-is-leading-to-more-coal-burning/
Germany Runs Up Against the Limits of Renewables
Even as Germany adds lots of wind and solar power to the electric grid, the country’s carbon emissions are rising. Will the rest of the world learn from its lesson? After years of declines, Germany’s carbon emissions rose slightly in 2015, largely because the country produces much more electricity than it needs. That’s happening because even if there are times when renewables can supply nearly all of the electricity on the grid, the variability of those sources forces Germany to keep other power plants running. And in Germany, which is phasing out its nuclear plants, those other plants primarily burn dirty coal. https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601514/germany-runs-up-against-the-limits-of-renewables/
I share your frustration of having environmental concerns but knowing that the green movement has been bought off. There seems to be a huge lag among most in the movement in recognising that. . Environmental degradation, habitat loss, oceans full of plastics, all actual concerns are buried under the clamour for zero carbon. I used to share not only environmental concerns with many but also ideas on tolerance, governments, big pharma, the MIC and on and on.
It's been so sad to watch.
Yes, yes, yes the conflating of carbon with letting everything else go to sh!t is so frustrating. the green movement was indeed bought off with oil money https://georgiedonny.substack.com/p/i-knew-it-hugely-annoying-insulate and Stop Oil stunts create negative media.
🙏🏽
Another great article by the way. Many thoughts triggered. I don't want to get into all of them currently. I will say one. The way we went from Covid directly into a date when all vehicles will be converted into electric. Some states wrote it into law like CA. NY just passed the law that all new structures will have electric stoves. Originally tried to make it everyone, but that got struck down. They are moving fast with the agenda while they still feel they have control or the states where they do.
Yup....very frustrating.
Thank you.
It is sad that people are letting their rights being taken away so easily. They think the government is doing what is best for everyone. Total lack of critical thinking or questioning.
We might suspect that the push toward all EVs will arrive at reality at some point. Power generation that will fall short and rapid increases in prices for battery materials become obstacles. The Chinese have cornered many markets for raw materials but will face a production shortfall given their demographics. They may import slaves but that may not turn out well for them. Nearly all the EV cost lies within the battery.
This is why we are all here: "I care about the environment but am stuck in a position where the environmentalists hate me because I do not support the Climate Change narrative. In contrast, those who do not support the Climate Change narrative hate me because I care about the environment and do not believe polluters should be given a free pass to support economic growth."
While there are definitely some people who don’t buy into climate change who feel that way (and those people tend to be obnoxiously loud, especially among libertarians) I think that the more common belief is that something should be done to make sure companies don’t pollute but I’m not sure who should do the policing or rule making. Companies cannot be trusted to police themselves but the federal government has also proven itself incapable in this area as well. Maybe this is a rural thing but most people I know:
1.) Care deeply about the environment
2.) Don’t trust major companies or corporations (unless they happen to work for it)
and
3.) Don’t trust the government (except when it’s promising them money)
I think #3 more than trust in free market enterprise is why so many people who don’t believe in climate change come across as anti-environmental. They fear government oversight more than they fear pollution, but they aren’t pro-pollution.
This is an excellent point.
Great article and hope it gets lots of attention; I restacked it. I'm very bummed like you how the environmental movement was hollowed out from the inside and redirected toward graft by the elites. There's so much that could be done in a sustainable way environmentally if our elites actually cared about the platitudes they espouse, but they don't. I remain skeptical about RFK Jr, though!
Thank you.
Great information! Eugyppius has some great articles on the current green energy Nazis in Germany. He leans towards building more nuclear power plants.
One flaw with solar mirrors is their unfortunate tendency to microwave the passing birds that haven't yet been mangled by the wind turbines....
Hydrogen seems to hold a lot of promise, but has been suppressed by the oil and auto powers. Once they can develop enough control over it, and make enough money from it, I think we'll see it come to fruition. Toyota has been working on it for a long time, and claims their newest models are vastly more efficient than previous attempts.
Thanks for everything you do!
Thank you. If you take an objective full view of the energy situation, it's pretty obvious what needs to be done, so everyone who looks at it comes to a similar conclusion. I have a few unique contributions because I've been looking at this for a long time, but my position is still essentially the same as everyone elses.
The footprint of solar, any type, makes it un feasible for a large percentage of any power grid.
The barriers to hydrogen are all technical so are subject to research. But that effort seems slow to develop perhaps stalled by vested interests. At least hydrogen powered vehicles track the existing infrastructure for fuels. Small nuclear reactors can fraction water as can experimental solar furnaces but both require development.