Milestones and Trends in Renewable Energy

Sterling D. Allan writes "Some reflections and projections: The year 2005 saw large wind power installments come into a price range where they are now competitive with traditional grid prices. 2006 could see several solar designs do the same. Cold fusion was boosted with two, concurrent and independent sonofusion breakthroughs, though the stigma in the name is still deeply seated. 2006 could see floating wind turbines arrive on the commercial scene -- floating in the water like oil rigs, or floating high in the air, courtesy of helium. 2006 will see at least three companies offering after-market kits for adding Brown's gas (H and O from electrolysis, common ducted) to the air intake of vehicles for enhanced mileage and performance. Many other fuel economizing systems are slated to mature in the marketplace. Climate change evidence will continue to mount. It will yet be years before we harness lightning, but stable tornado systems prototypes that tap waste heat from power plants could arrive this coming year. Will 2006 be the year that clean energy becomes more the vogue than cool computer gadgets?"

Comments

Yes.

[Zarhan]

Finland and France are constructing new nuclear power plants - first new ones in Western Europe for many years, and China and Russia are also going to nuclear (with 40 pebble-bed reactors coming to China in the coming decades).

So yes, we're finally starting to see some clean energy.

Re:Yes.

[natmakarvitch]

"Chernobyl killed about 3000 people" is an awful lie. The figure coined by a 'conclusion' published by the IAEA (a pro-nuke agency) is 4000, and is completely ridiculous because it:

• does not precisely define the population concerned (by those 4000 deaths). The official conclusion is "premature deaths of around 4000 people from the 600 000 affected by the higher radiation doses", but "higher radiation doses" and the 600000 group composition, are not defined. The group may only have nearly not-exposed people!
• this is not a scientific work, even if it is presented as such because nobody signed this conclusion. The WHO guys (Dr Repacholi), in charge of the pertinent study, even said that this "conclusion" was made by PR people... Read about it in Nuclear News (which is NOT a frenzy anti-nuke paper but a verious serious pro-nuke publication)
• this conclusion was 'drawn' from a report which only exists in draft stage and was not scientifically published. No peer review... no scientific value
• this conclusion is not expressed in the drafts reports
• the conclusion is presented as global, albeit the reports only covers 3 countries
• the 'health' report only studies cancers and leukemias, but many other problems arise (mutagen, teratogenesis...)
• the 'health' report states major limits for his model and data:
  • radio-induced cancers appear at last 10 years after exposition, and on average after 20 years... but the data used were collected between 1992-1998 (less than 12 years after the accident)
  • bad data quality (as already stated in 1995 in a real ONU report)
  • the model used is far from perfect
• low radiations were neglected albeit many experts think that they are dangerous, especially over long period and/or when ingested
• a model used came from observations done in another context (Hiroshima and Nagasaki: brief major and external exposition, instead of the "long, minor and often internal" after Chernobyl)

Here is a critic of those "conclusions" (French).

no mention of bio-diesel

[User 956]

They didn't mention bio-diesel that I could see. Though I have to admit, that's not really a technology I'm rooting for. I'm not sure if I could stomach a $50,000 mercedes that smells like french fries.

Re:Climate Change

[LarsWestergren]

You are describing weather, and weather changes, correct. But when you measure weather over time, you get a climate average, and that average is shifting:

CBS: "The year 2005, the World Wildlife Fund said, is shaping up as the worst for extreme weather, with the hottest temperatures, most Arctic melting, worst Atlantic hurricane season and warmest Caribbean waters.

It's also been the driest year in decades in the Amazon, where a drought may surpass anything in the past century, said the report by international environmental group. "

BBC: "The area covered by sea ice in the Arctic has shrunk for a fourth consecutive year, according to new data released by US scientists.

They say that this month sees the lowest extent of ice cover for more than a century.

The Arctic climate varies naturally, but the researchers conclude that human-induced global warming is at least partially responsible. "

Re:why?

[pfdietz]

Why would it be a "disaster"? Really, expound on this a bit. All the proposed methods and techniques and crops are "wrong"?

Because it would cause very large areas to be replaced with unnatural monocultures instead of natural ecosystems. The underlying cause is the great inefficiency of photosynthetic energy conversion.

Biodiesel is fine as a boutique-scale touchy-feely fashion statement for those who don't think too much about what they are actually proposing. As a real solution to the problem of producing significant amounts of liquid fuel, it's a ghastly crime against nature.

What's wrong with using some of the huge quantities of biowaste produced every year to make fuel?

Well, aside from the fact that if organic waste is not recycled into the soil it can cause the soil to degrade, the biggest problem is that even if all of it were converted to fuel, it would not produce more than a small faction of fuel demand. US refineries produced about 125 billion gallons of gasoline in 2003; using all US corn stover (for example) for cellulosic alcohol production would produce maybe 12 billion gallons. And that's just gasoline, which accounts for just a third of the output of an oil refinery.

Re:Wait a sec.

[Zoyd]

WindBourne: China loses 30000 mine workers a year? You are implying that they died from mining accidents or job-related sickness.

China loses 6,000 coal miners per year at the jobsites (in the mineshafts).

http://www.google.com/search?q=china+mining+deaths