This one of the few good uses for hydrogen fuel that I've seen other than rockets. However, I suspect it will be too loud for passenger traffic. The Concorde was notoriously noisy, even aside from the sonic booms it created.
There are few flights long enough for this to be worthwhile, especially if the courts limit the areas they can travel at transonic speeds. At the least, I would want government involvement minimized.
Contrary to that 2007 article, the variations in the Sun's output is not noticeably warming the Earth nor, presumably, Mars. In a few hundred millions of years it will, but that's longer than I want to wait.
The idea here is probably to release the carbon dioxide and water vapor frozen at the poles. The problem is I don't think that there is enough carbon dioxide there, and without massive amounts of carbon dioxide the water will freeze right out. I think the only possibility is to release a tailored mix of long lived gasses that will warm Mars as much as possible.
Mars can't possibly be kept warm without help. Many of the greenhouse gasses will break down eventually, and the solar wind will strip off even carbon dioxide. I suspect the rates of loss are such that they can be made up by an active society without too much difficultly.
The dead plants will rot and slowly turn to soil. Some of the carbon will be trapped in the soil and slowly over time go deeper and deeper. The coal and oil burned today are mostly rainforests plants and they grew like 300 million years ago
The microbes of 300 million years ago were still not very good at breaking down wood. They've become better since then. The rate of coal formation has dropped dramatically. That would be fine if we weren't digging up and burning so much coal.
I think we should reduce carbon output and I think nuclear power could be useful, provided that plant developers post a bond to cover the decommissioning costs.
A fee for decommissioning is imposed on each kWh of electricity sent out by domestic nuclear plants. We're not exactly sure how much it should be, since most plants are still operating, but the mechanism is there.
Cobal is a heavy metal. From my link in my first reply:
COBALT POISONING
Cobalt, used in making jet engines, may cause nausea, vomiting, lack of appetite (anorexia), ear ringing (tinnitus), nerve damage, respiratory diseases, an unusually large thyroid gland (goiter), and/or heart and/or kidney damage.
I was quite surprised a few years ago when I read that iron was a heavy metal, especially considering how important it is for red blood cells, but I looked it up and it was.
Aluminum is not a heavy metal, and I never claimed it was.
The only aluminum containing batteries used in cars that I know of use Panasonic's NCA chemistry. The N stands for nickel. Cobalt is another heavy metal I forgot to mention.
Yes, recycling is much more about the nickel or cobalt than the lithium.
Tesla's solar power promise is more of a gimmick than anything else, but at least it does no harm.
It's hard to find a lithium ion battery that doesn't contain Li, Fe or Mn, all of which are heavy metals for the purposes of this discussion. They are not as bad as lead, though.
So, Florida is already being adversely impacted by the THREE INCH increase in sea level since WORLD WAR ONE?!?
It's three inches since 1992. Not that that's so terrible - unless you live somewhere like South Florida. It looks like they might get hit by a small hurricane in the next few days.
Seriously, isn't everyone tired of this BS by now?
The sea level rise is expect to accelerate and go up over three feet in the next 100 years. Still, that's not going to drown anybody. Sea level rise is annoying, but it gets far too much attention.
Droughts and ocean acidification are scarier. I don't know where it will dry out or what problems the acidification will cause, but doing an experiment on our environment is not a sane way to find out.
The FCC appears to have no jurisdiction. That doesn't stop people from complaining, but it sure ought to stop any FCC action. Congress might try to do something, and might even succeed, though I think it should be unconstitutional.
Most Slashdot readers are of a libertarian bent, so they don't like regulations.
Those who do are generally smart, and they know there is no basis for regulation here.
But, indeed, many of us don't think Time Warner has free speech rights, just like it can't vote. I've seen no consensus on exactly how that would work, though.
We're talking a charge density that could potentially take a car over a thousand miles instead of a hundred or two at current battery weight.
That would be from increasing energy density. Better power density could improve the 0-60 time. Of course, charge rate and power density are usually correlated, one being the rate energy goes into the battery, the other the rate it goes out.
As a highly-taxed driver (gas and registration), I'm getting rather tired of cyclists requesting more and more road upgrades despite them not paying even a small share of the costs for those upgrades.
I know! And what about all those leeching pedestrians? Sidewalks don't just appear! Plus pedestrians slow me down when I'm in a hurry! We should require registration to walk in the city!:-)
I could sort of understand that once, but it happened again when Firefox next updated; so I remove Yahoo from the search options. Perhaps they've fixed that by now.
I can't recall the last stop light like that I saw. In modern installations you turn left when you have a left arrow, and at those times pedestrians are not crossing the street.
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This one of the few good uses for hydrogen fuel that I've seen other than rockets. However, I suspect it will be too loud for passenger traffic. The Concorde was notoriously noisy, even aside from the sonic booms it created.
There are few flights long enough for this to be worthwhile, especially if the courts limit the areas they can travel at transonic speeds. At the least, I would want government involvement minimized.
No, the orbit eventually decays.
Contrary to that 2007 article, the variations in the Sun's output is not noticeably warming the Earth nor, presumably, Mars. In a few hundred millions of years it will, but that's longer than I want to wait.
The idea here is probably to release the carbon dioxide and water vapor frozen at the poles. The problem is I don't think that there is enough carbon dioxide there, and without massive amounts of carbon dioxide the water will freeze right out. I think the only possibility is to release a tailored mix of long lived gasses that will warm Mars as much as possible.
Mars can't possibly be kept warm without help. Many of the greenhouse gasses will break down eventually, and the solar wind will strip off even carbon dioxide. I suspect the rates of loss are such that they can be made up by an active society without too much difficultly.
The microbes of 300 million years ago were still not very good at breaking down wood. They've become better since then. The rate of coal formation has dropped dramatically. That would be fine if we weren't digging up and burning so much coal.
A fee for decommissioning is imposed on each kWh of electricity sent out by domestic nuclear plants. We're not exactly sure how much it should be, since most plants are still operating, but the mechanism is there.
Cobal is a heavy metal. From my link in my first reply:
I was quite surprised a few years ago when I read that iron was a heavy metal, especially considering how important it is for red blood cells, but I looked it up and it was.
Aluminum is not a heavy metal, and I never claimed it was.
The only aluminum containing batteries used in cars that I know of use Panasonic's NCA chemistry. The N stands for nickel. Cobalt is another heavy metal I forgot to mention.
Yes, recycling is much more about the nickel or cobalt than the lithium.
Tesla's solar power promise is more of a gimmick than anything else, but at least it does no harm.
Sorry, I meant Ni, not Li.
It's hard to find a lithium ion battery that doesn't contain Li, Fe or Mn, all of which are heavy metals for the purposes of this discussion. They are not as bad as lead, though.
For now, Antarctica is losing much less ice than Greenland.
It's three inches since 1992. Not that that's so terrible - unless you live somewhere like South Florida. It looks like they might get hit by a small hurricane in the next few days.
The sea level rise is expect to accelerate and go up over three feet in the next 100 years. Still, that's not going to drown anybody. Sea level rise is annoying, but it gets far too much attention.
Droughts and ocean acidification are scarier. I don't know where it will dry out or what problems the acidification will cause, but doing an experiment on our environment is not a sane way to find out.
The FCC appears to have no jurisdiction. That doesn't stop people from complaining, but it sure ought to stop any FCC action. Congress might try to do something, and might even succeed, though I think it should be unconstitutional.
Most Slashdot readers are of a libertarian bent, so they don't like regulations.
Those who do are generally smart, and they know there is no basis for regulation here.
But, indeed, many of us don't think Time Warner has free speech rights, just like it can't vote. I've seen no consensus on exactly how that would work, though.
Which just means their is a limit to how rapidly you can send stuff up. Stay under that limit and you're fine.
Not at all. Sending stuff up the elevator just slows the Earth down slightly.
Matching the orbit to bring material safely down sounds expensive, too.
The Democrat should win in California anyway. If Hillary gets the nomination I'll find some third party to vote for.
Which appears to be referred to in the article as "power density". Disappointing.
That would be from increasing energy density. Better power density could improve the 0-60 time. Of course, charge rate and power density are usually correlated, one being the rate energy goes into the battery, the other the rate it goes out.
While charge time is important, the power density is already fine (but they are related). Increased energy density would also be desirable.
Really? Even with the smiley you can't tell I was being sarcastic?
I know! And what about all those leeching pedestrians? Sidewalks don't just appear! Plus pedestrians slow me down when I'm in a hurry! We should require registration to walk in the city! :-)
I could sort of understand that once, but it happened again when Firefox next updated; so I remove Yahoo from the search options. Perhaps they've fixed that by now.
I can't recall the last stop light like that I saw. In modern installations you turn left when you have a left arrow, and at those times pedestrians are not crossing the street.