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If we are still talking about the US gasoline, the peak was in 1998. http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=A103600001&f=M It dived more than twice since then.

If their supply of diesel is cut off, do you really expect them to have a supply of hydrogen, which is refined from natural gas? (It can be made in other ways, but this is how it is done.)

US has massive natural gas reserves and production - it is an exporter of natural gas, over 1.4 trillion cubic feet to Canada and Mexico alone, via pipeline. So obtaining hydrogen from that source will not be a question like crude-oil based diesel or gasoline fuel might be. Thats likely why they chose it, the environmental angle is just a PR bonus

All in all, that is really peanuts in terms of electicity bills. If you are spending roughly 2 hours a day gaming, a normal person with a full-time job and a family would have very little time to do much else that can sink money.

Considering that yearly electricty bills routinely reach about a $1000+ for a standard household, this added 10% due to gaming is pretty insignificant when compared to other hobbies...like racing cars for example.

Sure, there may be cheaper hobbies, but I honestly don't think anyone well-settled enough to be practising a daily hobby and deriving enjoyment from it finds it a problem to spend 8 bucks 50 cents a month for their recreation.

In North America, there is ONE refinery still producing it. And they pretty much only run a batch once a year - an entire day's production is sufficient for an entire year. Something like all the avgas used in a year is equal to all the regular gas used by cars in a day.

Don't suppose you have a reference for that assertion do you? There are several refineries in USA that make avgas, and production is much larger than a day.

In 2009 there were 10 refineries making avgas, this article indicates there "seven or eight" in 2011.

Check out this table , courtesy of the Energy Information Administration, for a summary of regions where avgas is produced.

Oh, yeah. Wikipedia is nice and all but since this is a question about geology and energy, let's ask the relevant government agencies, shall we?

This document from USGS shows 550 GWe potential. The science has improved a bit since then. And of course the US was generating 247 GWe of hydroelectric in 2007. Nobody is proposing we get rid of that (well, nobody who's going to get anywhere).

So that's 3/4ths of total power generation needs as baseload power. More than we need until the science improves some more, without cracking a single atom or burning a single gram of hydrocarbon fuel to produce electricity. There is every reason to believe that as we develop enhanced geothermal systems we will improve on the science and efficiency. And the geothermal resources are special in that they're highly dynamic: they can compensate for production changes or outages in non-baseload power like wind and solar in ways that nuclear cannot.

Of course exploiting these resources requires investment, as other energy production technologies do. But enhanced geothermal generation costs less even than nuclear just to get started per GWe, and there aren't the trailing costs and risks. It requires less water than the other methods also. It's geographically distributed, so transmission costs and losses can be lessened. It's a closed loop, so it's as environmentally friendly as it can get. It's no danger to birds or lizards.

Incidentally the EGS hardware can be adapted to capture industrial waste heat also.

I should mention that searching for excess geothermal heat in the near term isn't even necessary. It is quite often found incidental to ongoing oil and natural gas exploration. We know where more than enough resources are to keep engineers busy for a good long time.

This energy transfer from the deep earth to the atmosphere has been going on since the planet was formed. What is proposed is that we stop wasting it.

In 2011 the US was a net exporter of refined oil products. The US is still a huge net importer of crude oil.

Crude Oil: http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_neti_a_epc0_IMN_mbblpd_a.htm
Oil Products: http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_neti_a_EPP0_IMN_mbblpd_a.htm

In 2011 the US was a net exporter of refined oil products. The US is still a huge net importer of crude oil.

Crude Oil: http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_neti_a_epc0_IMN_mbblpd_a.htm
Oil Products: http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_neti_a_EPP0_IMN_mbblpd_a.htm

On a related note, I always thought traffic congestion must waste an enormous amount of fuel. Years ago I came across a stat related to this done by a Texas university, which stated that the daily average was something like 250k barrels of oil per day - which may seem like a lot, but bear in mind the US plows through ca. 9 million barrels of gasoline per day.

My original link is now a 404 but I've found the data source they used: Congestion Data for Your City — Urban Mobility Information. Go to the data for "All 439 Urban Areas," and down to the table for sums. This states that due to traffic congestion 1,943,330,000 gallons were wasted for 2010, thus 5,324,205 per day; there are 42 gallons in a barrel, thus 126,767 barrels/day. I'm not sure if this is the correct way to calculate this, as refineries actually crank out more like 19 barrels of gasoline per full barrel of crude; so maybe 280,221 b/d? That must be how the original study came to its conclusion. Either way it's not much of a dent in the 8.71 million barrels of oil we wolfed down in the form of gasoline last week: Petroleum and Other Liquids - Data - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

The US doesn't import oil from Iran.

Dang, first post got eaten. Anyways - on enforcing the law. I did some research. It bans the importation and manufacture of non-compliant bulbs. It doesn't make selling them domestically illegal, nor possession, etc... So unless you're running a factory or importing business, I don't think you have to worry. Just like the toilets. They aren't going to break down people's doors looking for them.

Even you can see the right answer. So why go with a wrong one?

Remember I only stepped in to explain the analogy. Didn't say I agreed with it. I think we can both agree that pollution, especially too much of it, can be bad.

But not from light bulbs.

Let's see: ~70k deaths from air pollution in the USA per year. The UK is 50k. Worldwide is 1.3M per year.
Lighting is 9% of electricity usage.
Eyeballing this and averaging the four sources, I get 24% of air pollution from energy production and distribution. EPA says 67% sulfur dioxide, 23% nitrogen oxide. I dropped CO2. That would be 45%. I'll stick with 24%.

Using a straight blame - 70k deaths from air pollution. 17k would be from electricity generation. 1.5k for pollution from powering lights, on average. 28k worldwide.
So yeah, I can trace thousands of deaths to the pollution from light bulbs. Making matters worse - there's plenty of survivors affected - per 75 deaths there are '505 hospital admissions for asthma and other respiratory diseases, 3,500 respiratory emergency doctor visits, 180,000 asthma attacks, 930,000 restricted activity days, and 2,000,000 acute respiratory symptom days.' Per 75 deaths seems an odd measure to use, but it's what the article listed. That's a lot of lost labor due to the pollution.

As for the baseload vs peak - 'not many lights are left on overnight'? I refer you to this image. And coal power isn't entirely baseload - fire up another boiler, spin another turbine. It might have to be scheduled a bit more compared to hydro or NG, but it's there.

Look, it's not that we don't agree on some things, it's just that, well, if you're going to argue this stuff, you need to do it right, and denying facts isn't going to help. I lean majorly libertarian, but given the pollution levels in my town on occasion,

Not true. Note that:

* Those prices are not adjusted for inflation
* The trend since 2005 has been down

Japan was already the #2 nation in the world at burning oil for power; Saudi Arabia was #1, no surprise. #3? Good ol' USA - courtesy Hawaii. Japan is the #3 oil consumer in the world; Japan - Analysis - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). The estimate is for them to increase oil consumption ca. 238k barrels per day to make up for the shortfall from offline nukes; oil only provides 10% of their generating capacity. This will add a few % points to the overall price of crude but Iran sanctions and growing demand from developing countries will be larger factors.

Japan also shed 423 kb/d in 2009, due to the recession, so they're simply backtracking to earlier consumption levels.

Actually, the reserve will last just 33 days (assuming daily consumption of 21 million barrels). It has specific emergency uses and is too small to be a real buffer for the US economy.

Also, it's Canada, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Nigeria and Venezuela which supply 75% of US oil imports. Some of those countries have been, and may be problematic in the future.

(Cutting back on extra trips? Sure. Looking for a more fuel-efficient car? Probably. Bicycles, high speed trains and mass transit takes over? Don't count on it, even if you like trains as much as I do.)

Is it already here? though trying to find at http://www.eia.gov/countries/data.cfm which lists top to bottom countries that import oil to United States, Canada is #1 importer of oil to USA, Mexico is #2 (used to be #1 few years ago but went from 14.9 billion barrels to 9.something (forgot time scale). I never saw any discussion among policy makers of these trends. What caught my attention looking at import tables (the format that was easy to examine and I'm still trying to find it) when Mexico dropped substantial amount (could it be driver of their economic woes?). Meanwhile I've read Canada is becoming more environmentally destructive (like Russia/Siberia). Examining those charts we could tell Arab countries to shove it, however, other countries are far more depended on them. Oil is sold based on $US and with dollar devaluing, no wonder price per barrel is going up.

In regards to going to war with Iran, it's election year and the best way to increase your popularity and distract from economic woes is attack another country. Iran probably knows they don't stand a chance and will be flattened. However, their leaders may sacrifice their own country because they also know US going in full scale will also plunge US into deeper economic recession.

If you want to know the future of energy, listen to this Chris Martenson lecture, I believe scary times are ahead:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WBiTnBwSWc

As for natural gas.... right now proven world reserves stands at stands at 191T m^3. The US has about 7T m^3, and a huge chunk of the rest is in Russia and Iran, which are not exactly friendly to us nor have we exactly been cultivating decent relationship with them. Since China is scouring the globe for energy sources, I assume they have or will get long term contracts from one or both of them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_gas_proven_reserves

Our world usage last year was 168T ft^3 according to this:
http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/ieo/nat_gas.cfm

Google tells me that is equal to 3.2T m^3.

So at current rates, assuming 100% extraction, we have 60 years of Natural Gas. The best case at current usage for proven reserves, much of which are in hostile countries.

The IEA predicts a 2.2% increase in demand annually. Using the rule of 70, that's a doubling time of ~32 years. That cuts down the best case scenario for Natural Gas down to 39 years, at current uses, meaning we don't start leaning on it heavily for transportation and the like.

Now, the scientist in my top link talks about how if everyone switched over to electric cars, they would have to go from 300 generating plants to 3,000. One order of magnitude, 10x. Without doing specific calculations, perhaps we can assume that could carry over to natural gas if used extensive for personal transportation. How many years then?

Yes, NG can be used in conjunction with oil and other energy sources and carry us for a while longer until we find a real solution.

1. load factor in wind is about 44%, and I quote,"Represent the highest quality resource available in the specific year".This means that, assuming nuke' load factor at 80%, that capital costs per Mwh produced goes to about 122$ for nuclear (97/0.8), and 250$ for wind (97/0.44); wind therefore seems twice as expensive;

2.another interesting piece from you source is:

"For all thirteen EMM regions combined, 1.3 percent of windy land is available with no cost increase, 5.4 percent is available with a 20 percent cost increase, 11.2 percent is available with a 50 percent cost increase, 27.3 percent is available with a 100 percent cost increase, and almost 54.8 percent of windy land is assumed to be available with a 200 percent cost increase. "

, and

"Because of downwind turbulence and other aerodynamic effects, the model assumes an average spacing between turbine rows of 5 rotor diameters and a lateral spacing between turbines of 10 rotor diameters. This spacing requirement determines the amount of power that can be generated from wind resources, about 6.5 megawatts per square kilometer of windy land, and is factored into requests for generating capacity by the EMM."

So, let's compare land use and energy density; the Westinghouse AP 1000 has a rated output of about 1.100MWh, and let's put load factor at 80%, meaning actual production through time is about 880 MWh; to have the same production, given stated density (6,5MW/KM2) and load factor (0.44), means occupying ((880/6.5)/0.44) square kilometers, [(nukes' megawatts after load factor/wind power density)/wind load factor), equaling about 300 hundred square KM, meaning a square 17 km long and 17 km deep. We've come from "the land of plenty" to "plenty of land".
incidentally, if a similar lot of available land could be found, probably the nuclear plant could not be seen from the ground, and it would make a perfect wildlife sanctuary; a military weapon range without the sound and fury, any biologist's dream.

can you cite sources for this argument? I want to believe it, but without any sources it is not creditable. (please no Wikipedia links)

Sure can! But only because you asked so nicely...

Libertarian think-tank contends nuclear power is not economically viable in a free and fair marketplace

If you prefer to trudge through raw data sources, which will contain tons of stuff that isn't relevant, you can look at the DOE's 1992 report on direct government subsidies to energy production and the 1999 update to that report, and of course you can look up the actual Price-Anderson act at the NRC site (note in passing how the NRC pretends it isn't a subsidy, and how they gloss over the goverment's role in assuming costs of fuel and waste processing). At the NRC's site you can find an attempt to refute my statement, in which the NRC will do all sorts of gymnastics to try to explain the fact that no profitable enterprise is willing to build a plant without subsidization. That's the real proof - when subsidies exist, there are new license applications, and when subsidies expire, there are none. I can link stuff all day long but the empirical proof is hard to ignore!

This post will likely get marked "troll" too, because the nuke shills have a bury brigade here on slashdot. Sorry about that.

Sorry; saying "No it won't", and claiming nuclear and fossil-fuel generated electricity costs more than photovoltaic just makes it appear that you are uninformed.

Solar power is tied with off-shore wind as the WORST bargain. Nuclear power is HALF the cost of photovoltaic.

Levelized total cost per kWh, based on 2016 technology and economy:
Natural gas 6.3-12.5
Hydro 8.6
ON-LAND wind 9.7
Geothermal 10.2
Biomass 11.3
Advanced nuclear 11.4
Coal 9.5-13.6
Photovoltaic 21.1
OFF-SHORE wind 24.3
Solar thermal 31.2

This includes amortization of the capital cost, plus operating cost: fuel, maintenance, and general operating expense.

Source: Energy Information Administration, Annual Energy Outlook 2011, December 2010, DOE/EIA-0383(2010).
http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/aeo/electricity_generation.html, Table 1

55.4% hydro in Oregon. This is down from 73.6% in 2000, according to the Energy Information Administration. The slack has been taken up by everybody's favorite fossil fuel, gas, at 17.6% in 2010, now at 28.4%.

Everyone's favorite fossil fuel is oil (and from it, gasoline). We don't burn oil or gasoline for electricity generation.

We do however use a lot of natural gas, which does not come from fossils.

55.4% hydro in Oregon. This is down from 73.6% in 2000, according to the Energy Information Administration. The slack has been taken up by everybody's favorite fossil fuel, gas, at 17.6% in 2010, now at 28.4%.

The link you provided cites as it source the EIA which is the very site that I linked in my post. I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Nickel-and-dime me all you like, the story is still gloomy. Here's more. The US consumes 20 million barrels of oil per day -- almost a quarter of the world total. We spend roughly $522B each year on petroleum. More than half of our petroleum (58%) is imported. We send about $300B abroad each year to support this nasty habit. And the price is volatile! If the price per barrel stays at its current value which is over $100 per bbl, then we will be spending $700B and sending $400B abroad every year. That's a lot of treasure -- and I haven't factored in any costs for our wars which are arguably caused by our desire to insure oil supplies. Personally, I would like to see that $400B spent here at home.

As for my original point -- that we are sending a lot of money to some dodgy regimes -- here is some more detail. We import 5 million barrels per day from OPEC. We import 1.465 million barrels per day from Saudi Arabia alone. The average cost per barrel for crude oil is $74.71 per barrel. *Every single day*, that comes out to:
$109,450,150 USD to Saudi Arabia ($40B/yr)
$56,704,890 USD to Venezuela ($21B/yr)
$39,521,590 to Nigeria ($14B/yr)
$30,108,130 to Iraq ($11B/yr)
Iran - none (my bad).

That paltry 16% of our oil imports from the Persian Gulf means we are sending $48B (16% of imports which are 58% of total 522B) to the Persian Gulf every year.

O RLY? It's true we get a lot from Canada and Mexico, but Saudi Arabia is right up there too.

Check your facts much?

Except they don't dictate the pricing; demand dictates it. The US consumes 20 million barrels of oil a day. Even in the depths of the last recession, crude remained at $40 a bbl (DOUBLE that of 10 years prior), and gas prices only went down to $2 something a gallon. Demand for gasoline went down, but not by much. What really went down was demand for diesel. Interesting data here (in the historical links).

"Over the lifetime of the panels, that's about 30 cents per kilowatt hour, which is three times the cost of typical utility fees."

[citation needed]

I'm not sure how you arrived at that number.

You can get grid-tie kits around 9KW for less than $20K. Double that for installation, to be generous. That's $40K, before Fed and State incentives. But for the sake of argument, let's leave those out. The 9KW system provides enough power to cancel out the electrical usage of the average US home (958 KWh/month see http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs).

The typical rated lifespan of solar panels is 25 years. But again, lets be generous and say it is only 20 years. So $40K over 20 years for an average monthly electrical usage of 958 KWh/month (see http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs) works out to 17 cents per KWh.

That's before any incentives were thrown in. You get a 30% federal tax credit for solar panel installations, so that $40K is now $28K, dropping the 20 year rate down to about 12 cents per KWh. Numerous states offer additional incentives which can bring the price even lower. And these rates won't go up over time like electric rates will.

Maybe 10 years ago you numbers were correct, but that certainly isn't the case anymore. In fact, if you live in the sunny areas of the country you can get average KWh prices down into the single digits using solar.

"Over the lifetime of the panels, that's about 30 cents per kilowatt hour, which is three times the cost of typical utility fees."

[citation needed]

I'm not sure how you arrived at that number.

You can get grid-tie kits around 9KW for less than $20K. Double that for installation, to be generous. That's $40K, before Fed and State incentives. But for the sake of argument, let's leave those out. The 9KW system provides enough power to cancel out the electrical usage of the average US home (958 KWh/month see http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs).

The typical rated lifespan of solar panels is 25 years. But again, lets be generous and say it is only 20 years. So $40K over 20 years for an average monthly electrical usage of 958 KWh/month (see http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs) works out to 17 cents per KWh.

That's before any incentives were thrown in. You get a 30% federal tax credit for solar panel installations, so that $40K is now $28K, dropping the 20 year rate down to about 12 cents per KWh. Numerous states offer additional incentives which can bring the price even lower. And these rates won't go up over time like electric rates will.

Maybe 10 years ago you numbers were correct, but that certainly isn't the case anymore. In fact, if you live in the sunny areas of the country you can get average KWh prices down into the single digits using solar.

Meanwhile, 95% of US electric power is generated by BURNING COAL

This is badly wrong. Please check your facts. 2010 net electric generation in the US was 4120.0 GkW/h, of which 1850.7 was coal, 44.9%.

source: EIA Annual Energy Review 2010, pp. 238.

You're cherry picking anti-coal propaganda to make your nuclear case. Those people just make stuff up.

First, you're wrong about the average cost. It's 11.6 cents per KwH according to the DOE: http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=electricity_factors_affecting_prices

Second, you're not paying the average price of power. You're going to be paying time of day, and charging between midnight and 5am (I live in Northern Illinois, and get my nuclear-generated power from ComEd. To charge my Roadster, I pay under 2 cents per KwH if I charge between the hours I previously mentioned).

Electricity still wins out. You can move it across the country at speeds physical fuels can only dream off, it can be generated in a distributed fashion from all sorts of different energy sources, and its price is MUCH less volatile than petroleum products.

Actually, I think that you actually put 'Fucked that for you'. America uses more ENERGY than any other nation. We are also the worlds largest user of Nuclear energy. China just surpassed on intstalled capability, but china's production is very low relative to most other nations because they do not have good areas to place it in.. We are one of the largest of the hydro. We are the largest of geo-thermal electricity.

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/ene_coa_con-energy-coal-consumption"> Now, as to coal, CHINA uses 30% more in 2008. Since that time, America's use has dropped, while China's has grown at the rate of 1-2 new coal plants EACH WEEK. At this time, they are approaching DOUBLE what America uses in coal. Worst, they run zero pollution controls and have some of the worlds dirtiest coal.
So, that leaves oil and gas.
Oil is used in transportation, but it is also used in chemical production, roads, etc. In 2009, America used about double in oil of China. But again, our oil use has dropped, while China's rises at ~10% or more a year (economy has been growing 8-12% for some time and then you add the fact that China is becoming a very rich nation; slop factor into this). China is already approaching America's oil use.

Finally in the end, simply look at the energy usage. In 2008, China and USA used almost the same amonut of energy. However, China's growth in all fossil fuels have jumped tremendously. America is basically flat, with much of the growth coming by moving to AE, as well as moving Coal to Natural gas. OTH, more than 90% of China's growth is in fossil fuels.

This would be like the USA getting most of it's energy from the middle east....oh wait, we do.

While I think the US should move to domestic nuclear power as much as possible, we don't get even close to most of our energy from the middle east.

In 2008, petroleum was the largest source of energy in the US, providing 38% of the energy consumed

In 2008 the US consumed 19.5 million barrels (3,100,000 m3) per day of petroleum products

4.9 million barrels per day are from OPEC.

4.9 / 19.5 = 0.251
0.38 * 0.251 = 0.095
The US gets 9.5% of its energy from OPEC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_in_the_United_States
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_impcus_a2_nus_ep00_im0_mbblpd_a.htm

Note this like pegs the imports from the Persian gulf at 18% vs the 25% I calculated. Probably because of OPEC countries that aren't in the Persian gulf.
http://www.eia.gov/energy_in_brief/foreign_oil_dependence.cfm

This would be like the USA getting most of it's energy from the middle east....oh wait, we do.

While I think the US should move to domestic nuclear power as much as possible, we don't get even close to most of our energy from the middle east.

In 2008, petroleum was the largest source of energy in the US, providing 38% of the energy consumed

In 2008 the US consumed 19.5 million barrels (3,100,000 m3) per day of petroleum products

4.9 million barrels per day are from OPEC.

4.9 / 19.5 = 0.251
0.38 * 0.251 = 0.095
The US gets 9.5% of its energy from OPEC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_in_the_United_States
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_impcus_a2_nus_ep00_im0_mbblpd_a.htm

Note this like pegs the imports from the Persian gulf at 18% vs the 25% I calculated. Probably because of OPEC countries that aren't in the Persian gulf.
http://www.eia.gov/energy_in_brief/foreign_oil_dependence.cfm

Humans contribute 2% of greenhouse gas emissions globally.*

* http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/1605/ggccebro/chapter1.html

This page does not address the relative amounts of natural and human-caused greenhouse gas emissions.

The 2% figure occurs in the pie diagram showing different types of greenhouse gases, all of them expelled into the atmosphere by human activities, of which the hydrofluorocarbons (HFC's) and related synthetic compounds make up 2%. The 2% figure is repeated below figure 4 for "human-made gases", but this appears to be a rather ill-chosen way of indicated that these compounds do not occur naturally at all, while the other greenhouse gases in the pie chart also have natural sources. But again, the entire page only talks about the composition of man-made greenhouse emissions, and does not make any claims how big these are compared to gases emitted by natural processes.

I have been looking for more information on the relative contributions of natural and artificial CO2 emissions. So far the most succinct description I found is this: "How do human CO2 emissions compare to natural CO2 emissions?".

That's a little extreme. I've been convinced of global warming for some time. Since I'm not a conservative (or making hordes of cash based on something that requires emissions) I am not morally threatened by the idea but I'm not a save the planet eco-freak either so I actually did want to see science and peer review happen and am glad for these results.

I am still skeptical of humans being the cause. Unlike warming itself, there is no consensus on this. Of course humans contribute, we don't even need to guess. Humans contribute 2% of greenhouse gas emissions globally.* The question is whether or not that 2% is the cause of global warming. There is evidence of historical climate swings and the only evidence that human emissions are a SIGNIFICANT contribution is correlation. Even if they are, a we are the world type globally concerted effort is only going to drop our emissions by maybe 10% or .2%? So the miserly "if you can stand to be 1 degree from comfortable you can cut by x" approach is probably a bunch of wasted discomfort.

That said, it really doesn't matter how much humans contribute. What matters is how effective we can be at engineering sequestering. I have little doubt the earth will self correct. Things like algae blooms are the earth doing exactly that and life thrived with CO2 levels that are MUCH higher than today in the past (1500ppm I believe). In fact, plants evolved in that environment and are actually limited in growth by the lower CO2 levels found today. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee the earth will do it fast enough to save humans. As for the loss of the coasts... if you don't move you have it coming. I lived in FL and moved after it was struck by a few hurricanes. I was so broke I had to pack my possessions into a rental car, with just enough for gas, food, and 1 month at a long term lodging hotel. My wife and I made it through that month on a $50 grocery budget. So you can skip your sob stories of not wanting to leave your home in New Orleans, or Southern California, Tornado alley, or a Mississippi flood zone.

* http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/1605/ggccebro/chapter1.html

I'm not an expert, but I'm not sure how representative those numbers for the energy mix are. I found this page which seems to be more reliable: http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/index.cfm#electricity

For 2010 (Electricity Net Generation: Total (All Sectors)), it lists roughly 44% coal, 23% NG, 20% nuclear, 6% hydro, 2% wind, and the rest is peanuts.

In peak times the wholesale price of electricity can be 5-9x more than average. If the power companies were to give you a cut, it could be made to be financially beneficial.

Everything in your post is heresay, and frankly, incorrect. Let me provide some real data.

The reason California has the highest electricity costs in the western world

Actually, California is #9 in the US in electricity costs. Their rates are comparable to east-coast rates. To name a few: New York, Vermont, Maine, and Hawaii are higher than California. As for the western world, Canada has very cheap energy (LOTS of hydroelectric there) but South American countries pay a lot more for electricity than the US.

...privatized the whole system but without any protection to protect the consumer from price fixing or profit maximization.

Many states have privatized power-supply. But like most states, the infrastructure is maintained by an entirely different company than the ones that provide the electricity. In California, energy prices are partially set by the legislature. California is trying to be green and has very strict energy emissions standards which accounts for at least part of the cost. They also consume a *lot* more energy than other states, partially thanks to air conditioning.

Everything in your post is heresay, and frankly, incorrect. Let me provide some real data.

The reason California has the highest electricity costs in the western world

Actually, California is #9 in the US in electricity costs. Their rates are comparable to east-coast rates. To name a few: New York, Vermont, Maine, and Hawaii are higher than California. As for the western world, Canada has very cheap energy (LOTS of hydroelectric there) but South American countries pay a lot more for electricity than the US.

...privatized the whole system but without any protection to protect the consumer from price fixing or profit maximization.

Many states have privatized power-supply. But like most states, the infrastructure is maintained by an entirely different company than the ones that provide the electricity. In California, energy prices are partially set by the legislature. California is trying to be green and has very strict energy emissions standards which accounts for at least part of the cost. They also consume a *lot* more energy than other states, partially thanks to air conditioning.

Henry Ford achieved economies of scale using an assembly line, because his product was labor-constrained. Most renewable energy is technology and materials-constrained. Scaling, even with an infinite amount of labor, won't make it economical. Just ask Solyndra.

Solyndra was looking for a way to get around the then-high cost of silicon. What hurt them is (probably) bad management and being undercut by China's recent investment of nearly $30 billion in solar alone. Had Reagan and subsequent administrations invested in solar at least to the extent that Carter envisioned, solar thermal and PV would have surpassed Hydro as the leading renewable form of electricity generation, possibly as long as 15 years ago.

If you can make high-efficiency, you can make it cheaper and less efficient.

Not really.

Er, what? You get that I'm saying that if you have a way to make panels at a given efficiency, you should be able to make a cheaper panel that's less efficient, right?

But cheap oil and no national vision killed what could have been a great head start.

I'm not sure how else to explain that the price of oil has nothing to do with electricity. This insane focus on replacing oil (in transport applications) did more to harm the development and uptake of solar photovoltaics than anything.

Check the historical percentage of petroleum-generated electricity - http://www.eia.gov/emeu/25opec/sld014.htm - 17% before the Arab Oil Embargo is nothing to sneeze at. Jimmy Carter is probably most responsible for the shift from oil to coal for electricity as for the interest in renewables, especially solar. Unfortunately, America did the 1st aggressively while only toying with the latter, until fairly recently.

You're off. That 440TWh number is huge. In 2009, US generated 314 GW from coal. That works out to about 2.75 TWh for the whole of 2009 from coal.

2.75 TWh * 15 deaths/TWh = ~41 deaths.

So the original poster's figure sounds reasonable.

Fossil fuels get heavily subsidized. According to this, (which I have not independently verified or checked sources on) solar would be cheaper if that was turned around.

Alas, I wish that were true, but it isn't. The subsidies for fossil fuels appears huge because the vast majority of energy generated comes from fossil fuels. Once you normalize by the amount of energy generated (p6, table ES5), you find that the subsidy for fossil fuels is about $1.10 per MWh, while the subsidy for solar is around $24.34 per MWh. You could completely eliminate fossil fuel subsidies and it would have almost no impact on solar's cost-competitiveness.

At the very least "less optimal economy" seems like disingenuous or stupid way to judge the cost/benefit to me. The costs of global warming, asthma, coal-related deaths, and smog would massively tilt the scale in favor of green.

Nobody seems immune from this. When pro-nuclear people point out the cost of renewable technologies in terms of deaths (wind kills approx 4x more people per kWh than nuclear, solar is around 10x more once you factor in rooftop installation, and the worst power-related accident in history by far was a hydroelectric dam failure) or materials (wind and solar require approx 3-4x more construction materials per TWh than nuclear), renewable advocates likewise pretend these problems can simply be ignored.

Germany and a few other EU countries have recognized the danger from wind, and established exclusion zones around wind turbines where people are prohibited from entering (600m radius for Germany, 500m for others). But if you calculate the area of the exclusion zones, you find that it's much larger than the evacuation zone of an equivalent-power nuclear plant during an emergency, only these are permanent while the wind turbine is operational. Oddly, most renewable advocates are surprised when they hear this. They shouldn't be. If you advocate a technology, you should learn everything you can about it - benefits and drawbacks.

There is (probably not surprisingly) a widespread tendency for people to see primarily the benefits of the technology they favor, while ignoring or downplaying the drawbacks. In my experience, this is true of advocates of for fossil fuels, renewables, and nuclear - none are immune. (I am pro-nuclear, and about a third of my posts are correcting other pro-nuclear people who are under-emphasizing the risks of nuclear.)

Today I learned that people would rather breathe toxic fumes from coal fired power plants than spend $3 extra per year to have clean air.

If it were truly only a difference of $3 per year, then solar would be enjoying great success in the market. The average U.S. household electricity use was about 10,500 kWh. Average retail electricity price for the U.S. is $0.112 per kWh, for an annual cost of $1176 per household per year.

Electricity from solar costs (excluding subsidies, since the whole point of this exercise is to see if solar is "worth it") about $0.25-$0.30 per kWh. So it would in fact cost the average U.S. household an extra $1500 to $2000 per year to switch completely over to solar.

I completely agree with phasing out our toxic coal plants, but solar is far from ready, neither technologically nor economically, to fill in for coal. The only technology which can do that today is nuclear. While its waste is still a problem, it is considerably less of a problem than the pollution from coal. And its cost ($0.05-$0.07 per kWh wholesale) is competitive with coal ($0.04 per kWh for wholesale). The best course of action is to shift over to nuclear power now, then shift from nuclear to solar/wind in the future when those technologies mature.

It might not be the oil companies fault as is some states there is a minimum markup that must exist on gasoline. Here in Minnesota it is $0.08 a gallon. Also the states and federal government ($0.184 per gallon) make far more money from gasoline taxes than the oil companies make in profit from the sale of gasoline. Also keep in mind how many billions of gallons of fuel we burn each year (about 378 million gallons a day). What you have is a low margin very high volume product.

Also for the exact Minnesota the defines that cost of gasoline and states that is can't be sold for below cost. Below is the section defining cost:
(3) for purposes of gasoline offered for sale by way of posted price or indicating meter by a retailer, at a retail location where gasoline is dispensed into passenger automobiles and trucks by the consumer, "cost" means the average terminal price on the day, at the terminal from which the most recent supply of gasoline delivered to the retail location was acquired, plus all applicable state and federal excise taxes and fees, plus the lesser of six percent or eight cents.

Well since you asked... http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/aeo/electricity_generation.html

Review of the source of that article shows that it's misleading.

Figure 44 shows nuclear passing renewables(including hydro) for electricity production in 1974, and still in the lead today.

Figure 59 shows "renewables" leading worldwide energy production since the graph start in 1970. It's in BTUs, so includes things like burning wood.

Rereading the article, it boils down to that more is now being invested into renewable power, than nuclear power. Given that we aren't building a lot of nuclear plants, that's not surprising. Despite that, renewable power isn't trending upward significantly enough to pass nuclear anytime soon; most of the increase is in natural gas.

http://www.eia.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/epm_sum.html

20% of total electricity production in the US is not a tiny amount, and is thousands of times the currently installed wind and solar capacity. It'll be many decades before they can replace nuclear.

according to the International Energy Outlook the world energy consumption in 2007 was 495 quadrillion British thermal units. If I calculated correctly one year of [Steve] Jobs is worth 16.56 trillion Watt years.

I think you don't know what you're talking about much less being confused. Emissivity defines reflectivity, as in an objects emissivity rate is it's effective reflection rate for a particular wavelength at a particular temperature, etc. etc.

Also, the solar spectrum is not most intense at the visible part. To quote Wikipedia, who has a source.

"Sunlight at zenith provides an irradiance of just over 1 kilowatt per square meter at sea level. Of this energy, 527 watts is infrared radiation, 445 watts is visible light, and 32 watts is ultraviolet radiation.[2]"

The GP's point still stands for two very important reasons, most objects emit radiation almost exclusively in the infrared and visible light is a significant source of energy. To demonstrate the importance of this, take these two situations:

Situation 1:
You have a paint A which reflects 50% of visible and 50% of infrared light. Paint B reflects 90% of visible light, but only 40% of infrared. This is more or less the situation described by the original parent where the Krylon paint has higher infrared emissivity (lower reflectivity). From the numbers you provided, paint A would be absorbing 486 Watts (527*.50+445*.50) while paint B would be absorbing 320 Watts (527*.10+445*.60). So paint B would still absorb less energy, and it would dissipate the energy more quickly as infrared radiation, while paint B would be forced to conduct more of its energy into the underlying surface.

Situation 2:
Taken to the extreme, paint C reflects 0% of visible light and 100% of infrared light. Paint D reflects 100% of visible light and 0% of infrared. Now paint D is consuming more energy than paint C, however it is simultaneously quickly dissipating most of that energy via infrared. Paint C however will probably burst into flames if its underlying surface is unable to absorb enough of the energy quickly enough.

These are both carefully crafted situations to show specifically that higher emissivity in the infrared CAN be just fine, and it's good to know that this is often not the case. The point was to clearly show the flaw in the OP's assertion that Krylon white paint having a higher emissivity in the infrared could somehow be the only fact to prove that it would be worse for covering a house.

Furthermore, and conveniently ignored, is the fact that above a certain latitude more energy is expended heating in the winter than cooling in the summer. New York City and Chicago are above that latitude, which is around 38-42 degrees on the East Coast depending on the year's average solar irradiance but varies widely across the country (because of airflow and humidity).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insolation

Or the fact that air conditioning was never a major concern for energy conservation, since the vast majority of energy used in buildings are to heat it, not cool it.

http://www.eia.gov/kids/energy.cfm?page=us_energy_homes-basics

In very cold climates/seasons, the roofs are typically covered with snow, which negates the benefits of light absorbing roofs. Often you'll see snow melt just where the roofs are leaking heat, which is where you would would a roof with a very low emissivity in the infrared. And at those latitudes and times of the year, the amount of solar radiation available is not going to make much impact. Besides, heating energy statistics can be very misleading. For instance, the Mall of America in Minnesota runs their cooling system all year round due to the heat produced by lighting and human bodies.

I think you don't know what you're talking about much less being confused. Emissivity defines reflectivity, as in an objects emissivity rate is it's effective reflection rate for a particular wavelength at a particular temperature, etc. etc.

Also, the solar spectrum is not most intense at the visible part. To quote Wikipedia, who has a source.

"Sunlight at zenith provides an irradiance of just over 1 kilowatt per square meter at sea level. Of this energy, 527 watts is infrared radiation, 445 watts is visible light, and 32 watts is ultraviolet radiation.[2]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared

The numbers Mr. Sokol is repeating are for micrometers, per the site he references. Note the name of the site. Only one page of the measurements has the micro symbol, probably because the author didn't save the first two pages properly from Excel or what not.

And his point stands. Painting a visible white is only taking care of a small portion of the heat creating wavelengths.

Furthermore, and conveniently ignored, is the fact that above a certain latitude more energy is expended heating in the winter than cooling in the summer. New York City and Chicago are above that latitude, which is around 38-42 degrees on the East Coast depending on the year's average solar irradiance but varies widely across the country (because of airflow and humidity).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insolation

Or the fact that air conditioning was never a major concern for energy conservation, since the vast majority of energy used in buildings are to heat it, not cool it.

http://www.eia.gov/kids/energy.cfm?page=us_energy_homes-basics

Most of that must be imported to the U.S.

A large part, yes, but not most. An that is mostly because the US is a large oil consumer (1/4 of world production), and conveniently close, unlike China, Japan & Russia.

Venezuela’s oil is heavy and loaded with sulfur, unlike Libya’s light sweet stuff. Nobody else can buy the stuff because there refineries can’t handle it.

Interesting, but they refine a large part, if not most of their own oil. Brazil & the Caribbean do handle a sizable part, too.

Venezuela would face ruin.

All in all, I wouldn't be so sure.