All the fervor and energy spent on the Global Warming should be spent in R&D on alternatives to fossil fuels. We have the means and the motive to innovate our way out of the climate crisis, but we need every cent on R&D!! Fossil fuels are intrenched in our society. We can try the political approach, but the sure-fire and ultimate solution is a technological approach.
Start here and make something cheaper goddamit! Innovate, demonstrate and the first innovator to scale effectively will make tens of billions in the process, while the world will get off CO2 faster than any other means.
Cap/Trade and other carbon credit schemes only work if the full force of the national government is behind it, which makes it an extremely weak international solution.
The only *real* solution that will produce a rapid, unequivocal and large-scale shift away from fossil fuels is if there is a direct competitor that is definitively cheaper on it's own in the free market. A true economical alternative that is not dependent on fossil fuels.
Anything less than that will require government intervention, and that requires political will. If there's anything I know about international political will, it's that it is nearly impossible to do anything that global quickly.
Free markets on the other hand, move rapidly.
"The will" is economic at this point. Everyone speaks $$$... if someone offers a cheap alternative to CO2, it will change policies faster than anything else. If people burning coal are loosing money because they decided to invest in fossil fuels, they'll be scrambling as fast as possible to shut down their fossil fuel plants and fire up whatever the cheaper alternative is.
Unless the entire world, or at least the major CO2-emitting countries quickly agree on a universal policy (read Montreal-type Protocol for CFC reduction) the world won't agree on anything. Fossil fuels are the very lifeblood of the modern era, they are the bedrock of our very infrastructure. The likelihood is that something cheaper will come a long well before policy makers decide to legislate their way out of this mess.
It seems the only practical way to get everyone on board is when there's a dollar amount. When the issue is as global and integrated into our daily lives as that of global warming, the only way to make everyone move in another direction is when economics come in to play. The only *real* way to get India, China, the US and all the other large CO2 emitting countries is to push the price of alternative fuels below that of their CO2-emitting counterparts.
From what I can tell, the only way to make a huge, quick reduction in CO2 is to beat it with something cheaper.
There is no one "something" unfortunately. It's a huge mixture of different technologies, but I don't see anything else more motivating that cash, and motivation is something the world lacks when it comes to CO2 reduction...
I remember hearing about the Soviet response to Chernobyl, and how they initially said things were less dangerous than things actually were. It's a survival instinct to run and question something invisible and dangerous. It's safer to be wrong and flee, then be wrong and stay.
The factor isn't just a matter of resources, but also emotional markets.
Let's say a solar panel system on my house will cost 5 years to pay itself. Let's say it will output >80% of its original rating for 20 years.
If I take out a 5 year loan with minimal interest to pay for the solar panel system, all I'm paying for is the interest in the end. The next 15 years give me a net zero electric bill at least and possibly a net profit.
As a consumer that's a helluva deal. One option gives me a guaranteed cost for 20 years. The other option is to fork cash over for the next 20 years.
Assuming the above economics, solar provides a 400% profit over the next 20 years.
The funny thing is, this isn't that far off, and renewable energy conversion technologies are only getting cheaper.
What really needs to happen to decrease use of fossil fuels is for production of fossil fuels to decline either because we exhaust fossil fuels or because the production costs of alternatives go below the production costs of fossil fuels. That might happen eventually, but I doubt that "evenutally" is going to be any time soon - maybe in 50 years.
I think you're underestimating the ingenuity of the alternative energy sector manufacturers. They're producing a conversion technology rather than producing the resource themselves. They give their customers much more than energy, they give their customers some intangible quality that fossil fuel makers can only dream of:
A sense of independence - customers can generate more energy independent of external supply.
One cost - Houses are bought with mortgages, and even if alternative energy converters (solar/wind/etc) are expensive up front they have a guaranteed output/failure rate (like MTBF for harddrives). Coal/oil/natural gas prices are speculated on commodities markets. If a customer has a cost-competitive choice between a guaranteed energy cost over 20 years or having to pray and hope with fossil fuels, they'll invariably take the guaranteed offer.
Companies like Apple sell products not just on technological features, but intangible features like "coolness" or "ease of use". "energy independence" and "guaranteed cost" are intangible but factor heavily in one's purchase.
Company A mines coal.
Company B sells solar panels.
Both companies provide products for the electrical generation market.
One company provides the resource, and another provides a conversion technology and not the resource itself.
Both companies are expecting exponential demand growth in the electrical generation market.
Company A's resource is limited and finite. Once it's used up, it's done.
Company B's conversion technology allows an unlimited resource to be tapped.
At some point, Company A's finite resource will cost too much in overhead to keep prices low.
Company B's conversion technology will offer a cost competitive advantage to Company A's energy source.
Company A will panic, drop prices and ramp up production. Their existing customers will hold on, but eye Company B's product as a backup.
Because Company B's conversion technology only gets better with R&D cash from new sales. They ramp up production and features (efficiency), again becoming cheaper than Company A.
Company A really panics, pulls from savings and drops their price further, providing the customers who absolutely require Company A's resource.
By now, the market has realized Company B's business strategy is more sound. They aren't selling a finite resource, they're selling a widget that converts an inexhaustible resource into electricity. Therefore it's company overhead isn't bound by finite laws, but simply how efficient it's manufacturing is. It's a gadget manufacturer, not an energy supplier.
Had to google, that and learned something! It appears biodiesel is at the very bottom of the EROEI list: per this Wikipedia chart. How it's produced will have to change dramatically for it to become economically viable to meet current demand. The only emerging technology that seems to have that potential is algae, in some form or another. Of course it will be another decade at least before those technologies can scale to even begin to meet some demand, so it's still unproven at this point.
You know in a few decades, the Manna from Terra will no-longer be cost effective? Economically there might be plenty of short-term profits to be had, but only a fool would use that kind of thinking for long term planning...
The reason they utterly suck is because their short-term, large-scale economic viability has been almost nonexistent. It's a waiting game to see when fossil fuels become expensive enough that heavy re-development of these alternatives will make sense. The closer we get to that price curve intersection, the more R&D companies will spend to make alternatives suck less.
High temperature linings inside a fusion reactor? Just put together a mammoth, well ran, flush-with-cash R&D program and see some company somewhere invent the breakthrough. If the issue is just finding the right alloy, molecular structure, etc. etc. it simply comes down to how big your R&D and engineering programs are.
You're missing the point. I was really pointing at all Fossil Fuels too.
We'll switch over to alternative fuels long before we run out of Fossil Fuels, simply because they'll be cheaper to produce. A gallon of bio-diesel be cheaper per gallon than petrol diesel at some point, Solar will be cheaper per KWh than burning coal at some point. When that happens, the entire economy will flock over to these alternatives because of price benefits. There will probably be some economic swings as oil/gas/coal producers try to keep competitive, but they're prices will eventually be too high to compete against alternatives.
It's classic supply and demand. When exponential demand meets a finite resource, prices go up. All the alternative fuels are also finite (only so much KWh of sun can be extracted, for example) but they are also renewable. Fossil fuels don't.
Solar is orders of magnitude simpler in technological complexity, but economic return on solar is just starting to happen. Not because of the technology, simply because population is growing and the cheaper black shit is running out.
Same thing with Fusion. Technologically, we have enough engineers and scientists in the world to make it a world-scale Apollo type endeavour and get Fusion to market by 2020-2030.... if we wanted to. But honestly, the economy doesn't want to. Not until it runs out of whatever is cheaper.
I am trying to remember the exact citation, but I remember it is legal to make any item or use any process that's been patented as long as it's not shared and for personal use only. The question is then, does the shape file describing an object legal? I presume so, as long as one doesn't sell or share the object in question.
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All the fervor and energy spent on the Global Warming should be spent in R&D on alternatives to fossil fuels. We have the means and the motive to innovate our way out of the climate crisis, but we need every cent on R&D!! Fossil fuels are intrenched in our society. We can try the political approach, but the sure-fire and ultimate solution is a technological approach.
Start here and make something cheaper goddamit! Innovate, demonstrate and the first innovator to scale effectively will make tens of billions in the process, while the world will get off CO2 faster than any other means.
Innovate Goddammit!
Cap/Trade and other carbon credit schemes only work if the full force of the national government is behind it, which makes it an extremely weak international solution. The only *real* solution that will produce a rapid, unequivocal and large-scale shift away from fossil fuels is if there is a direct competitor that is definitively cheaper on it's own in the free market. A true economical alternative that is not dependent on fossil fuels. Anything less than that will require government intervention, and that requires political will. If there's anything I know about international political will, it's that it is nearly impossible to do anything that global quickly. Free markets on the other hand, move rapidly.
"The will" is economic at this point. Everyone speaks $$$... if someone offers a cheap alternative to CO2, it will change policies faster than anything else. If people burning coal are loosing money because they decided to invest in fossil fuels, they'll be scrambling as fast as possible to shut down their fossil fuel plants and fire up whatever the cheaper alternative is.
Unless the entire world, or at least the major CO2-emitting countries quickly agree on a universal policy (read Montreal-type Protocol for CFC reduction) the world won't agree on anything. Fossil fuels are the very lifeblood of the modern era, they are the bedrock of our very infrastructure. The likelihood is that something cheaper will come a long well before policy makers decide to legislate their way out of this mess.
It seems the only practical way to get everyone on board is when there's a dollar amount. When the issue is as global and integrated into our daily lives as that of global warming, the only way to make everyone move in another direction is when economics come in to play. The only *real* way to get India, China, the US and all the other large CO2 emitting countries is to push the price of alternative fuels below that of their CO2-emitting counterparts.
From what I can tell, the only way to make a huge, quick reduction in CO2 is to beat it with something cheaper.
There is no one "something" unfortunately. It's a huge mixture of different technologies, but I don't see anything else more motivating that cash, and motivation is something the world lacks when it comes to CO2 reduction...
I remember hearing about the Soviet response to Chernobyl, and how they initially said things were less dangerous than things actually were. It's a survival instinct to run and question something invisible and dangerous. It's safer to be wrong and flee, then be wrong and stay.
Sorry, closer to 300% expected profit because the first 5 years are a wash.
The factor isn't just a matter of resources, but also emotional markets.
Let's say a solar panel system on my house will cost 5 years to pay itself. Let's say it will output >80% of its original rating for 20 years.
If I take out a 5 year loan with minimal interest to pay for the solar panel system, all I'm paying for is the interest in the end. The next 15 years give me a net zero electric bill at least and possibly a net profit.
As a consumer that's a helluva deal. One option gives me a guaranteed cost for 20 years. The other option is to fork cash over for the next 20 years.
Assuming the above economics, solar provides a 400% profit over the next 20 years.
The funny thing is, this isn't that far off, and renewable energy conversion technologies are only getting cheaper.
I think you're underestimating the ingenuity of the alternative energy sector manufacturers. They're producing a conversion technology rather than producing the resource themselves. They give their customers much more than energy, they give their customers some intangible quality that fossil fuel makers can only dream of:
Companies like Apple sell products not just on technological features, but intangible features like "coolness" or "ease of use". "energy independence" and "guaranteed cost" are intangible but factor heavily in one's purchase.
There may be limits on how materials are used today, but that's what R&D is all about.
New, more effective ways of doing things with existing resources/technology.
Unless you got a better theory than Einstein and can prove it, you've proven your ignorance.
Company B sells solar panels.
Both companies provide products for the electrical generation market.
One company provides the resource, and another provides a conversion technology and not the resource itself.
Both companies are expecting exponential demand growth in the electrical generation market. Company A's resource is limited and finite. Once it's used up, it's done.
Company B's conversion technology allows an unlimited resource to be tapped.
At some point, Company A's finite resource will cost too much in overhead to keep prices low.
Company B's conversion technology will offer a cost competitive advantage to Company A's energy source.
Company A will panic, drop prices and ramp up production. Their existing customers will hold on, but eye Company B's product as a backup.
Because Company B's conversion technology only gets better with R&D cash from new sales. They ramp up production and features (efficiency), again becoming cheaper than Company A.
Company A really panics, pulls from savings and drops their price further, providing the customers who absolutely require Company A's resource.
By now, the market has realized Company B's business strategy is more sound. They aren't selling a finite resource, they're selling a widget that converts an inexhaustible resource into electricity. Therefore it's company overhead isn't bound by finite laws, but simply how efficient it's manufacturing is. It's a gadget manufacturer, not an energy supplier.
Had to google, that and learned something! It appears biodiesel is at the very bottom of the EROEI list: per this Wikipedia chart. How it's produced will have to change dramatically for it to become economically viable to meet current demand. The only emerging technology that seems to have that potential is algae, in some form or another. Of course it will be another decade at least before those technologies can scale to even begin to meet some demand, so it's still unproven at this point.
You know in a few decades, the Manna from Terra will no-longer be cost effective? Economically there might be plenty of short-term profits to be had, but only a fool would use that kind of thinking for long term planning...
The reason they utterly suck is because their short-term, large-scale economic viability has been almost nonexistent. It's a waiting game to see when fossil fuels become expensive enough that heavy re-development of these alternatives will make sense. The closer we get to that price curve intersection, the more R&D companies will spend to make alternatives suck less.
Light speed? Who knows.
High temperature linings inside a fusion reactor? Just put together a mammoth, well ran, flush-with-cash R&D program and see some company somewhere invent the breakthrough. If the issue is just finding the right alloy, molecular structure, etc. etc. it simply comes down to how big your R&D and engineering programs are.
BTW, my grammar in my above comment sucks I know lol
We'll switch over to alternative fuels long before we run out of Fossil Fuels, simply because they'll be cheaper to produce. A gallon of bio-diesel be cheaper per gallon than petrol diesel at some point, Solar will be cheaper per KWh than burning coal at some point. When that happens, the entire economy will flock over to these alternatives because of price benefits. There will probably be some economic swings as oil/gas/coal producers try to keep competitive, but they're prices will eventually be too high to compete against alternatives.
It's classic supply and demand. When exponential demand meets a finite resource, prices go up. All the alternative fuels are also finite (only so much KWh of sun can be extracted, for example) but they are also renewable. Fossil fuels don't.
Solar is orders of magnitude simpler in technological complexity, but economic return on solar is just starting to happen. Not because of the technology, simply because population is growing and the cheaper black shit is running out.
Same thing with Fusion. Technologically, we have enough engineers and scientists in the world to make it a world-scale Apollo type endeavour and get Fusion to market by 2020-2030.... if we wanted to. But honestly, the economy doesn't want to. Not until it runs out of whatever is cheaper.
Here is a log of a 3-week experiment using a stand up desk. FYI for comparison.
$21 billion in savings alone would be enough to figure out a solution. I know.... I new agency-wide IT project!!
gives the term "direct to print" a whole new meaning
I am trying to remember the exact citation, but I remember it is legal to make any item or use any process that's been patented as long as it's not shared and for personal use only. The question is then, does the shape file describing an object legal? I presume so, as long as one doesn't sell or share the object in question.
a bit of lemon juice and a swish in the mouth should take care of it.
first we have eye implants powered by lasers, and now this. Science Marches On, tricorders are inevitable.
Researcher Sean Gourley discussed "the mathematics of war"on TED already. Not a new phenomenon, but an interesting extension.