How's the weather in Moscow Boris? Looks like your comrades have approved your post as well. Double ration of vodka for you tonight along with your rubles.
From TFA: "The culprit is a chemical produced in the bean roasting process that is a known carcinogen". Acrylamide in foods, including coffee, appears to be a byproduct of the Maillard reaction (the darker you make your toast, the more acrylamide you consume, for example, and bread crust itself contains acrylamide); it's also found in cigarette smoke, and is the primary source of exposure by smokers. An article about acrylamide points out that it has been part of humanity's diet for as long as we've been cooking our food.
Looks like we'll have to post a warning on our Grills that a nice steak with grill marks is a carcinogen. And lest vegans decide they are exempt, so is that grilled tofu.
Damore apparently actively made a significant number of people uncomfortable. That's disrupting the work environment.
Here's an alternative question, made relevant by #metoo.
Years ago on our campus, when the first wave of sexual harassment indoctrinations were going on, the question was asked of the representative of the Women's studies program in charge, "What defines sexual harassment". The answer without a moment's hesitation was "Anything a women says is sexual harassment."
After that bit of definition got around campus, men would actively avoid any unnecessary interactions with women. It was considered a major failure, especially considering that it was the men who were least likely to be a problem for the women who were pulling well away from women. The creeps didn't miss a beat.
Why did this happen? Easy. When you can be destroyed by anything, you are made really uncomfortable, and will make certain to avoid that which has the power to terminate your career. Men who would never dream of harassing or sexually assaulting a woman being pre-judged being made exceedingly uncomfortable. Seems like that would fit your metric as a fireable offense.
Having worked through that period, I only interacted with those women who I knew long enough to trust. Many of us considered the situation as reminiscent of working around radioactive substances with no protective gear. Maybe you'll die, maybe you won't. You'd have no idea if saying hello was going to end your career.
Am I correct that you only support women who are made uncomfortable? Eagerly awaiting how you rationalize the difference.
So, why the hell don't we give the little snowflakes all 4.0 GPA, and just let them declare themselves as whatever they identify as.
Given that grades aren't earned any more, why on esrth are we studying ways for people to learn things - that is not what it is about now. You go to college, attempt to destroy your liver and enjoy the college lifestyle, and get all A's.
What kind of Internet connection would you prefer to have it use to download updates? You may trust your local network, but that network's connections to the wider Internet should not be inherently trustworthy. Even if you more or less trust your ISP, do you really know all the networks that packets traverse on their way to the server?
This is like saying that since I cannot personally verify all of the paths any internet connection might take, nothing is trustworthy.
While that isn't incorrect, it is a rabbit hole that ends up with the person never using a computer again.
At least at home, I have a whole lot of protection. At that wifi spot I go to every morning? Only what is on my computer.
This is why things like https and package signing were invented. As long as the update was properly signed (in this case by Microsoft, but most Linux distributions do the same thing for their packages) and the signature is verified before applying (and this is really important), then it doesn't matter what network it was used to download it.
At least as far as security is concerned. If it downloaded a large amount of data through a cell phone hotspot causing a large bill, that could certainly be a problem!
The mere existence of turning off downloading of updates over metered connection switch on the computer is a symptom of the problem.
What I said is perfectly understood by any proper scientist.
Well Brenda - not everyone here is a scientist. And those of us who are find you to be a tad lacking. As well as making an egregious error in assuming what scientists do or do not know. They are not all fountains of identical knowledge.
But enough of calling you out - let's delve into your writing.
First, it it those people's duty to look up the possible references, if they want to style themselves as, you know, scientists; since this is very old news, and I'm not the one at fault, I won't spend the time required to find the old papers.
Well lookie here! A "proper scientist" who refuses to provide citations! There was a word for people like you around campus.
Unemployed.
I have always maintained that a good scientist or researcher should be able to explain to regular people (reasonably intelligent but ignorant of the matter at hand) what it is they are trying to say, to educate them to at least a minimal level of the subject.
But here you come in like the Grand Maximus lord of science, waving your massive science cock around like a bludgeon, slaying anyone who dares to disagree or even ask for clarification. It is useless, even self destructive as the immediate result is to look upon you as a mental masturbating douchenozzle who is first ridiculed, then laughed at, then ignored.
Even the victims aren't completely blame free. They knew they were trading privacy for all the things Facebook offers. They just didn't realize they were trading all of it.
Yeah - its a hellava thing, and some of us have to be there. FWIW, I obfuscated and completely malformed my data, which is why I suspect I hardly got any of the Facebook/Cambridge Analytic Bullshit. But today, I only check the groups I have to, and haven't been on my page or home for a few months now.
Fortunately, that project is ending soon, and the only thing left is to block the FB scripts on the rest of the net after I kill my account.
This is as unnaceptable as screwing a horse. Unless you're another horse of course.
But it's OK to jerk them off and steal their sperm? Humans have a keenly unique sense of what is deemed to be acceptable behavior.
What exactly is your point? This is the most bizzare howaboutism I've ever heard. The closest thing I can pars out of it is that you are standing up for humans screwing horses.
"The decision was issued in light of the company's recent privacy concerns over third-party data mishandling."
There had been no mishandling of data. The data were used in precisely the manner intended by all parties involved, except perhaps those who provided it fully understanding the implications of their decision.
The problem with your blessing of facebook's actions is this. Facebook is in the position of acting as the snitch. If they give people data who are acting illegally, they can be held responsible for the act. If you don't believe this hire a hit man. Give them the address of your significant other, who put no restraints on your giving out their address. Now after the hit man kills you SO, use the excuse you are using for a defense against hiring the hitman.
The problem of course is money. The shakers and movers at facebook have done this before, and they will do it again. The only way they won't, is if they don't have the product to abuse. And we all know who the product is. But you can bet if you continue to use facebook, your data will be sold to whoever they like.
The update situation is ugly, however. It's all 'Windows 10', but are you on 1507? 1803? LSTB? CBB? A device that was supported for Windows 10 (1507) might not work with Windows 10 (1803)
You have a gift for understatement. While I can delay updates for my W10 Pro laptop, I have another inexpensive laptop running W10 Home. I use it at morning breakfast. That's the only place I use it. So last week I went to shut it down in preparation for leaving, and it installed an update. It had been downloading updates over a insecure wifi connection! This is as unnaceptable as screwing a horse. Unless you're another horse of course.
But some how or another, that kind of crap has to stop.
I've seen no cases of Google firing someone for disagreeing with them. Damore was fired because he made a nuisance of himself, pushing his essay on people in a way that could reasonably be foreseen to get out of Google.
Now thst's a fine bit of wordsmithing. His opinion was exactly why he was considered a nuisance. In today's world, where it is considered appropriate to destroy a man because a woman goes on a date with him and doesn't enjoy the evening, yes. Wordsmithing can validate many things. https://www.dailynews.com/2018...
This is where we have come to - I'm certain that Mr Ansari made a nuisance of himself - eve if he broke no laws - but he needs destroyed because he was a nuisance and she didn't enjoy thd evening. This is not debateable in today's world.
Wordsmithing can validate many things even when completely wrong. But it's your narrative, and your ideology is strong and impervious, if my other conversations with you bear any resemblance of your actual opinions.
I don';t see why you think this is primarily a feminist thing. The more vocal opponents to porn tend to be evangelicals and people appealing to them.
They become the strange bedfellows. And remember, I'm only talking about sex negative feminists. And there might be connection with who thinks who should access the pr0n as well, as many of my search results were from same sex pages on tumblr. I'm not at all certain about the last, but tumblr has a large community of 3rd wave feminists and same sex women. Youtube is largely male - but I think that they are working on changing that.
Sex positive feminists have no issue with pornography. But they aren't the ones doing the yelling. My wife knows some strippers, and rather than fit the stereotype of the damaged woman with the daddy issues, they are no one's fools, and actually rather strong women. Sex positive feminists in fact. Interesting thing is, they do not hate men.
The present day culture at Google and Youtube is sex negative in the aspect that the assumption is that any disagreement with their narrative is somehow destructive to women, so it must be eliminated. Actual strong women laugh at such a sexist opinion that women are mentally unstable and easily destroyed. Because yes, third wave feminists and theor sycophants are some of the most sexist people ever put on this earth.
And just as an example of this... while I stand up for strong women - I would be fired for my opinion if I worked at Google. My opinion is not allowed there. My opinion is terribley damaging to women in their sexist bigoted narrative. Women are too weak - hey believe.
This Ted talk is so f-ing sane that it should be mandatory viewing for all of the people participating in the discussion.
There are some pretty wicked assumptions in all of that. While I wasn't speaking of gasoline specifically, I was speaking of electrical generation. And here's the rub.
The assumptions are rather rigid. While none of us can predict with 100 percent accuracy exactly how the future will pan out, but aoow me to take a stab at what I consider some errors. Why on earth would we decide to produce biofuels via old school farming? Might biofuel from algae be practical? You'll probably note that after a promising start, a lot of the companies pulled back from algae biofuel. At which point I'll point out that battery technology of today was considered impossible by engineers I worked with in the 1970's. Not being feasible now does not mean never feasible.
As well - he seems to assume that the only way to be really efficient is for people to revert to pre-industrial levels. Sorry, none of this requires a lifelstyle change. I pay only a bit more than than my neighbors for electricity, even though the ones on the north side are only there a couple days a month and presumably hardly use any electricity.
I have a spa too. I bought an efficient one, I insulated my place over the good quality insulation that is already there. I converted to a 99 percent efficient gas furnace which extracts so much heat from the natgas that it's chimney is a 2 inch PVC pipe. I have all LED lights in the house. No lifestyle changes at all, and an arguably better lifestyle than my neighbors
Now yes if we use a supply only setup that uses a paradigm that only present methods are allowable, that it is not possible to produce energy more efficiently and that any changes on the consumer end will result in markedly lowered standard of living - you are 100 percent correct - this is not possible. We might as well just use up the petroleum and move back to the caves. Because nothing is as good, and nothing will ever be as good.
But even the level with alternatives we are at now was considered completely impossible 50 years ago. I was doing it more for solar -- if we completely filled the median strip of most US interstates with solar panels (or imagine making the road surface itself out of drivable solar panels) would it be enough to power 100% of the traffic on those roads?
Well, to be certain, modern medians won't be accessible because they are constructed a specific way for safety, whereas a car in an accident will be more likely to end up coming to rest in the median rather than in the middle of the opposite lane. So the idea isn't worth pursuing other than as a BOTE exercise.
But I also did it for biofuels. The problem is that nobody pays the slightest attention to the scaling issues. One gallon of gasoline (for example) is IIRC 34 kWh. To "fill a car with gasoline" (say, a 20 gallon tank) is roughly 700 kWh. This is somewhere between half and a third the ENTIRE CAPACITY of a 16 kW premium cell array pretty much covering my SW facing roof for a MONTH.
Come on now, your idea that no one is paying the slightest attention to scaling is patting yourself on the back a bit too hard. Yes, there is nothing like the energy density of Gasoline and diesel fuel 116,090 and 128,488 BTU/gal respectively. But what are we going to do with that now? Simply say well, they are the best, so when we use most of it up, we'll fold the tents and go die? We have what we have - or are you arguing for nuc reactors in cars?
If I bought a roof-covering array and used it for nothing but running two cars for the month, with NO long trips, I'd be barely breaking even. It would, however, on average cover my electrical bill.
So far, there just isn't a good replacement for gasoline in energy density and (the thing nobody thinks of) POWER density.
That is for just the panels. Payback is just under 5 when you consider the rest of the system and inverters need replacement about every 10 years.
Even at 5 years, it's pretty good. I would hope that they'd wait for a failure before simply replacing them instead of cluttering landfills or some third world recycling dump with perfectly good electronics.
I have some small solar installs that aren't showing any signs of deterioration after 10 years now. They're used for powering radios. The batteries (gel cels) get rotated out, then used for other purposes before failure and recycling. Its difficult to determine any payback for that, because traditionally generated power simply isn't available for that use. If I had to design a difficult to access system with extreme life, I'd probably go with Solar/Nickel-Iron batteries.
If cost is no object, then yes, it is possible that we can power the country with wind and solar. However, it is not currently cost effective and will not likely be cost effective for a very long time.
Solar electricity generation is highly inefficient.
If it were cost effective, we'd all be doing it. Same goes with electric cars.
That's a load of horse manure. Solar energy and Wind energy are currently cheaper than coal and are about to beat gas for electricity production.
I live in coal country, where the coal fired plants are a few miles from the mines. The cost of production has to be about as low as coal can go. Yet they are aging out. Our friend who thinks it is too expensive to produce solar or wind needs to research out the costs of new turbines.
So here in the place when coal should blow out other forms of generating power - it isn't.
But we are still meeting demand for power. Wind power is carrying the load, providing the electricity.
And for individual houses, solar is becoming significantly cheaper. If you build new outside of a development, and need to run power lines to your new house, you'll find that the cost of running those poles and lines will be higher than a solar install in many cases - with no payback period.
So the haters - probably a group of frustrated nuclearphiles and those who cannot handle change can yell all they want. This is happening, and t is happening now.
Damn, they used to talk about payback in 15 years, not in 3.
I've found that many of the payback points to be outlandishly pessimistic. My costs for installing extra installation and changing to natgas for heating paid off in just a few years, when the "experts" were telling me no less than 10.
My biggest issue with going totally solar at home is that I have a spa, which even with a very efficient unit would stress the storage batteries. But I'm expecting even that barrier will fall, sooner rather than later.
Too bad you only get to generate solar for - at most - 12 hours a day, and a conservative estimate for wind is about the same...
Many of the same solutions that are used by traditional power sources are also applicable in the case of solar. And then there is wind.
At present, we can power houses and buildings via solar, and all of the wind turbines popping up just north of here are providing a lot of power - they are doing the peaking to the point that you can see them switch on and off. They are even capable of shutting down individual turbines if they sense a raptor within a couple miles.
What exactly is your hard-on for the once alternative, now turning mainstream power sources? The stuff works, no matter how much you yell at it.
I don't know what's happened to so many Slashdot commenters who can't see beyond the mundane. Has the world beaten you down so much? "Mad" Mike Hughes has just pulled off one of the great "hold my beer" moments in history and you're pissing and moaning about it.
Well, let's just change the narrative instead of complaining about the complainers. I'll start with a Slashdotian "My way is better" rant.
Why this guy decided to use steam was lame. Any amateur rocketeer with a working brain cell would have used something else.
Solid Rocket Boosters FTW!
Steam means you have to have the total energy expenditure all at once since the fuel is actually on the ground, not carried in the body of the rocket.
Any real amateur rocketeer would have produced his own fuel in his garage using aluminum scraps and a file.
That's how I would do it - using my obviously better homemade boosters in a Beowulf cluster of launching glory and magnificence. Now gimme my beer back.
I don't understand, 1900ft? There are buildings taller than that! Why the expense of a rocket? Why not go get on a hot air ballon? The rides are like $40....
Slashdot Mirror
How's the weather in Moscow Boris? Looks like your comrades have approved your post as well. Double ration of vodka for you tonight along with your rubles.
From TFA: "The culprit is a chemical produced in the bean roasting process that is a known carcinogen". Acrylamide in foods, including coffee, appears to be a byproduct of the Maillard reaction (the darker you make your toast, the more acrylamide you consume, for example, and bread crust itself contains acrylamide); it's also found in cigarette smoke, and is the primary source of exposure by smokers. An article about acrylamide points out that it has been part of humanity's diet for as long as we've been cooking our food.
Looks like we'll have to post a warning on our Grills that a nice steak with grill marks is a carcinogen. And lest vegans decide they are exempt, so is that grilled tofu.
And oddly enough, coffee drinkers live longer. https://www.healthline.com/nut...
This one will be overturned quickly.
Why are people downvoting the truth?
Mostly because the Di-Hydrogen Monoxide chestnut is way old. Think of someone mentioning a Beowulf cluster and then hundreds of comments about it.
Damore apparently actively made a significant number of people uncomfortable. That's disrupting the work environment.
Here's an alternative question, made relevant by #metoo.
Years ago on our campus, when the first wave of sexual harassment indoctrinations were going on, the question was asked of the representative of the Women's studies program in charge, "What defines sexual harassment". The answer without a moment's hesitation was "Anything a women says is sexual harassment."
After that bit of definition got around campus, men would actively avoid any unnecessary interactions with women. It was considered a major failure, especially considering that it was the men who were least likely to be a problem for the women who were pulling well away from women. The creeps didn't miss a beat.
Why did this happen? Easy. When you can be destroyed by anything, you are made really uncomfortable, and will make certain to avoid that which has the power to terminate your career. Men who would never dream of harassing or sexually assaulting a woman being pre-judged being made exceedingly uncomfortable. Seems like that would fit your metric as a fireable offense.
Having worked through that period, I only interacted with those women who I knew long enough to trust. Many of us considered the situation as reminiscent of working around radioactive substances with no protective gear. Maybe you'll die, maybe you won't. You'd have no idea if saying hello was going to end your career.
Am I correct that you only support women who are made uncomfortable? Eagerly awaiting how you rationalize the difference.
So, why the hell don't we give the little snowflakes all 4.0 GPA, and just let them declare themselves as whatever they identify as.
Given that grades aren't earned any more, why on esrth are we studying ways for people to learn things - that is not what it is about now. You go to college, attempt to destroy your liver and enjoy the college lifestyle, and get all A's.
99 little bugs in the code. 99 little bugs. Take one down, patch it around. 127 little bugs in the code...
I see a fight brewing as people alternately mod this truth or funny. Can hardly see what this patch breaks.
What kind of Internet connection would you prefer to have it use to download updates? You may trust your local network, but that network's connections to the wider Internet should not be inherently trustworthy. Even if you more or less trust your ISP, do you really know all the networks that packets traverse on their way to the server?
This is like saying that since I cannot personally verify all of the paths any internet connection might take, nothing is trustworthy.
While that isn't incorrect, it is a rabbit hole that ends up with the person never using a computer again.
At least at home, I have a whole lot of protection. At that wifi spot I go to every morning? Only what is on my computer.
This is why things like https and package signing were invented. As long as the update was properly signed (in this case by Microsoft, but most Linux distributions do the same thing for their packages) and the signature is verified before applying (and this is really important), then it doesn't matter what network it was used to download it.
At least as far as security is concerned. If it downloaded a large amount of data through a cell phone hotspot causing a large bill, that could certainly be a problem!
The mere existence of turning off downloading of updates over metered connection switch on the computer is a symptom of the problem.
What I said is perfectly understood by any proper scientist.
Well Brenda - not everyone here is a scientist. And those of us who are find you to be a tad lacking. As well as making an egregious error in assuming what scientists do or do not know. They are not all fountains of identical knowledge.
But enough of calling you out - let's delve into your writing.
First, it it those people's duty to look up the possible references, if they want to style themselves as, you know, scientists; since this is very old news, and I'm not the one at fault, I won't spend the time required to find the old papers.
Well lookie here! A "proper scientist" who refuses to provide citations! There was a word for people like you around campus.
Unemployed.
I have always maintained that a good scientist or researcher should be able to explain to regular people (reasonably intelligent but ignorant of the matter at hand) what it is they are trying to say, to educate them to at least a minimal level of the subject.
But here you come in like the Grand Maximus lord of science, waving your massive science cock around like a bludgeon, slaying anyone who dares to disagree or even ask for clarification. It is useless, even self destructive as the immediate result is to look upon you as a mental masturbating douchenozzle who is first ridiculed, then laughed at, then ignored.
Even the victims aren't completely blame free. They knew they were trading privacy for all the things Facebook offers. They just didn't realize they were trading all of it.
Yeah - its a hellava thing, and some of us have to be there. FWIW, I obfuscated and completely malformed my data, which is why I suspect I hardly got any of the Facebook/Cambridge Analytic Bullshit. But today, I only check the groups I have to, and haven't been on my page or home for a few months now.
Fortunately, that project is ending soon, and the only thing left is to block the FB scripts on the rest of the net after I kill my account.
He pushed it on people who were made uncomfortable by it.
I wish I could have fired everyone who made me uncomfortable at work.
This is as unnaceptable as screwing a horse. Unless you're another horse of course.
But it's OK to jerk them off and steal their sperm? Humans have a keenly unique sense of what is deemed to be acceptable behavior.
What exactly is your point? This is the most bizzare howaboutism I've ever heard. The closest thing I can pars out of it is that you are standing up for humans screwing horses.
"The decision was issued in light of the company's recent privacy concerns over third-party data mishandling."
There had been no mishandling of data. The data were used in precisely the manner intended by all parties involved, except perhaps those who provided it fully understanding the implications of their decision.
The problem with your blessing of facebook's actions is this. Facebook is in the position of acting as the snitch. If they give people data who are acting illegally, they can be held responsible for the act. If you don't believe this hire a hit man. Give them the address of your significant other, who put no restraints on your giving out their address. Now after the hit man kills you SO, use the excuse you are using for a defense against hiring the hitman.
The problem of course is money. The shakers and movers at facebook have done this before, and they will do it again. The only way they won't, is if they don't have the product to abuse. And we all know who the product is. But you can bet if you continue to use facebook, your data will be sold to whoever they like.
The update situation is ugly, however. It's all 'Windows 10', but are you on 1507? 1803? LSTB? CBB? A device that was supported for Windows 10 (1507) might not work with Windows 10 (1803)
You have a gift for understatement. While I can delay updates for my W10 Pro laptop, I have another inexpensive laptop running W10 Home. I use it at morning breakfast. That's the only place I use it. So last week I went to shut it down in preparation for leaving, and it installed an update. It had been downloading updates over a insecure wifi connection! This is as unnaceptable as screwing a horse. Unless you're another horse of course.
But some how or another, that kind of crap has to stop.
I've seen no cases of Google firing someone for disagreeing with them. Damore was fired because he made a nuisance of himself, pushing his essay on people in a way that could reasonably be foreseen to get out of Google.
Now thst's a fine bit of wordsmithing. His opinion was exactly why he was considered a nuisance. In today's world, where it is considered appropriate to destroy a man because a woman goes on a date with him and doesn't enjoy the evening, yes. Wordsmithing can validate many things. https://www.dailynews.com/2018...
This is where we have come to - I'm certain that Mr Ansari made a nuisance of himself - eve if he broke no laws - but he needs destroyed because he was a nuisance and she didn't enjoy thd evening. This is not debateable in today's world.
Wordsmithing can validate many things even when completely wrong. But it's your narrative, and your ideology is strong and impervious, if my other conversations with you bear any resemblance of your actual opinions.
I don';t see why you think this is primarily a feminist thing. The more vocal opponents to porn tend to be evangelicals and people appealing to them.
They become the strange bedfellows. And remember, I'm only talking about sex negative feminists. And there might be connection with who thinks who should access the pr0n as well, as many of my search results were from same sex pages on tumblr. I'm not at all certain about the last, but tumblr has a large community of 3rd wave feminists and same sex women. Youtube is largely male - but I think that they are working on changing that.
Sex positive feminists have no issue with pornography. But they aren't the ones doing the yelling. My wife knows some strippers, and rather than fit the stereotype of the damaged woman with the daddy issues, they are no one's fools, and actually rather strong women. Sex positive feminists in fact. Interesting thing is, they do not hate men.
The present day culture at Google and Youtube is sex negative in the aspect that the assumption is that any disagreement with their narrative is somehow destructive to women, so it must be eliminated. Actual strong women laugh at such a sexist opinion that women are mentally unstable and easily destroyed. Because yes, third wave feminists and theor sycophants are some of the most sexist people ever put on this earth.
And just as an example of this... while I stand up for strong women - I would be fired for my opinion if I worked at Google. My opinion is not allowed there. My opinion is terribley damaging to women in their sexist bigoted narrative. Women are too weak - hey believe.
This Ted talk is so f-ing sane that it should be mandatory viewing for all of the people participating in the discussion.
There are some pretty wicked assumptions in all of that. While I wasn't speaking of gasoline specifically, I was speaking of electrical generation. And here's the rub.
The assumptions are rather rigid. While none of us can predict with 100 percent accuracy exactly how the future will pan out, but aoow me to take a stab at what I consider some errors. Why on earth would we decide to produce biofuels via old school farming? Might biofuel from algae be practical? You'll probably note that after a promising start, a lot of the companies pulled back from algae biofuel. At which point I'll point out that battery technology of today was considered impossible by engineers I worked with in the 1970's. Not being feasible now does not mean never feasible.
As well - he seems to assume that the only way to be really efficient is for people to revert to pre-industrial levels. Sorry, none of this requires a lifelstyle change. I pay only a bit more than than my neighbors for electricity, even though the ones on the north side are only there a couple days a month and presumably hardly use any electricity.
I have a spa too. I bought an efficient one, I insulated my place over the good quality insulation that is already there. I converted to a 99 percent efficient gas furnace which extracts so much heat from the natgas that it's chimney is a 2 inch PVC pipe. I have all LED lights in the house. No lifestyle changes at all, and an arguably better lifestyle than my neighbors
Now yes if we use a supply only setup that uses a paradigm that only present methods are allowable, that it is not possible to produce energy more efficiently and that any changes on the consumer end will result in markedly lowered standard of living - you are 100 percent correct - this is not possible. We might as well just use up the petroleum and move back to the caves. Because nothing is as good, and nothing will ever be as good.
But even the level with alternatives we are at now was considered completely impossible 50 years ago. I was doing it more for solar -- if we completely filled the median strip of most US interstates with solar panels (or imagine making the road surface itself out of drivable solar panels) would it be enough to power 100% of the traffic on those roads?
Well, to be certain, modern medians won't be accessible because they are constructed a specific way for safety, whereas a car in an accident will be more likely to end up coming to rest in the median rather than in the middle of the opposite lane. So the idea isn't worth pursuing other than as a BOTE exercise.
But I also did it for biofuels. The problem is that nobody pays the slightest attention to the scaling issues. One gallon of gasoline (for example) is IIRC 34 kWh. To "fill a car with gasoline" (say, a 20 gallon tank) is roughly 700 kWh. This is somewhere between half and a third the ENTIRE CAPACITY of a 16 kW premium cell array pretty much covering my SW facing roof for a MONTH.
Come on now, your idea that no one is paying the slightest attention to scaling is patting yourself on the back a bit too hard. Yes, there is nothing like the energy density of Gasoline and diesel fuel 116,090 and 128,488 BTU/gal respectively. But what are we going to do with that now? Simply say well, they are the best, so when we use most of it up, we'll fold the tents and go die? We have what we have - or are you arguing for nuc reactors in cars?
If I bought a roof-covering array and used it for nothing but running two cars for the month, with NO long trips, I'd be barely breaking even. It would, however, on average cover my electrical bill.
So far, there just isn't a good replacement for gasoline in energy density and (the thing nobody thinks of) POWER density.
Sigh, c
That is for just the panels. Payback is just under 5 when you consider the rest of the system and inverters need replacement about every 10 years.
Even at 5 years, it's pretty good. I would hope that they'd wait for a failure before simply replacing them instead of cluttering landfills or some third world recycling dump with perfectly good electronics.
I have some small solar installs that aren't showing any signs of deterioration after 10 years now. They're used for powering radios. The batteries (gel cels) get rotated out, then used for other purposes before failure and recycling. Its difficult to determine any payback for that, because traditionally generated power simply isn't available for that use. If I had to design a difficult to access system with extreme life, I'd probably go with Solar/Nickel-Iron batteries.
If cost is no object, then yes, it is possible that we can power the country with wind and solar. However, it is not currently cost effective and will not likely be cost effective for a very long time.
Solar electricity generation is highly inefficient.
If it were cost effective, we'd all be doing it. Same goes with electric cars.
That's a load of horse manure. Solar energy and Wind energy are currently cheaper than coal and are about to beat gas for electricity production.
I live in coal country, where the coal fired plants are a few miles from the mines. The cost of production has to be about as low as coal can go. Yet they are aging out. Our friend who thinks it is too expensive to produce solar or wind needs to research out the costs of new turbines.
So here in the place when coal should blow out other forms of generating power - it isn't.
But we are still meeting demand for power. Wind power is carrying the load, providing the electricity.
And for individual houses, solar is becoming significantly cheaper. If you build new outside of a development, and need to run power lines to your new house, you'll find that the cost of running those poles and lines will be higher than a solar install in many cases - with no payback period.
So the haters - probably a group of frustrated nuclearphiles and those who cannot handle change can yell all they want. This is happening, and t is happening now.
Depends on where you live. In Phoenix, $4160 of solar panel will produce roughly $1432 of electricity/year.
Plug in numbers here:
http://pvwatts.nrel.gov/pvwatt...
I used retail pricing here: https://sunelec.com/home/
Damn, they used to talk about payback in 15 years, not in 3.
I've found that many of the payback points to be outlandishly pessimistic. My costs for installing extra installation and changing to natgas for heating paid off in just a few years, when the "experts" were telling me no less than 10.
My biggest issue with going totally solar at home is that I have a spa, which even with a very efficient unit would stress the storage batteries. But I'm expecting even that barrier will fall, sooner rather than later.
Too bad you only get to generate solar for - at most - 12 hours a day, and a conservative estimate for wind is about the same...
Many of the same solutions that are used by traditional power sources are also applicable in the case of solar. And then there is wind.
At present, we can power houses and buildings via solar, and all of the wind turbines popping up just north of here are providing a lot of power - they are doing the peaking to the point that you can see them switch on and off. They are even capable of shutting down individual turbines if they sense a raptor within a couple miles.
What exactly is your hard-on for the once alternative, now turning mainstream power sources? The stuff works, no matter how much you yell at it.
Uber has the technology already developed to punish jaywalkers.
Damn, that's brutal! Funniest thing I've read today.
I don't know what's happened to so many Slashdot commenters who can't see beyond the mundane. Has the world beaten you down so much? "Mad" Mike Hughes has just pulled off one of the great "hold my beer" moments in history and you're pissing and moaning about it.
Well, let's just change the narrative instead of complaining about the complainers. I'll start with a Slashdotian "My way is better" rant.
Why this guy decided to use steam was lame. Any amateur rocketeer with a working brain cell would have used something else.
Solid Rocket Boosters FTW!
Steam means you have to have the total energy expenditure all at once since the fuel is actually on the ground, not carried in the body of the rocket.
Any real amateur rocketeer would have produced his own fuel in his garage using aluminum scraps and a file.
That's how I would do it - using my obviously better homemade boosters in a Beowulf cluster of launching glory and magnificence. Now gimme my beer back.
I don't understand, 1900ft? There are buildings taller than that! Why the expense of a rocket? Why not go get on a hot air ballon? The rides are like $40....
He's trying to get a reality show with Octomom.
So what you are saying is Idaho suffers from an epidemic of premature ejaculation?
that's the secret behind their great potatoes.