And I don't know anybody who can fit a nuclear reactor onto a car yet.
I don't know anyone making a practical wind or solar powered car either. There certainly aren't any practical airplanes that run on wind and solar power. We saw ships that were powered by wind but they lost out to those powered by coal, diesel, and nuclear.
We can make electric cars that run off the electricity produced from nuclear power. Large ships can be nuclear powered. For everything in between we can synthesize fuels from nuclear power. We've had the technology to synthesize hydrocarbon based fuels for a century now. This process has been shown to be economically feasible in a time and place where petroleum is difficult to obtain. Improve that process and we could make petroleum no longer profitable.
I see no one is taking global warming seriously... Yet.
I will believe that global warming is a serious problem when people start talking about building nuclear power plants again.
I hear them scream from rooftops on how we must have an "all the above" energy policy. Then when nuclear power comes up then it's everything except that. Okay then. If nuclear power is somehow a greater hazard to the world than nuclear power then I'll just wait until someone takes this problem seriously. Either global warming is in fact a real threat and we get nuclear power later, potentially after it's too late to stop it's worst effects, or global warming turns out to be a nothingburger and we all go on happily burning oil and coal.
This spraying water in the air is a nice plan but the guy proposing it even explains that we will still need a plan to stop burning coal. I've not seen any working plans yet that do not include nuclear power. Some people claim future technology will save us but that's not a plan, that's wishful thinking. That's waiting at the port for a ship that might never come.
I have not seen any actual implementations of USB 3.0 with a Mini-B connector, so I'm somewhat curious as to why these even exist.
The mini-USB connectors are not part of the USB 3.x spec, they don't have the number of pins to support the "super speed" data lines. Too bad for anything with a mini-USB connector, they were left behind at USB 2.0.
USB 3 only supports the standard A and B, micro A and B, and USB-C. The A ports and connectors are interchangeable between 1.1, 2.0, and 3.x but the B connectors come in 3.x "wide" and 1.1/2.0 "narrow" variants where the wide connectors will not fit in narrow ports, but narrow connectors will fit in wide ports.
I'd like to see some OS support a USB-C to USB-C data connection between computers other than just Apple. I should be able to push 5, 10, or even 20 Gbps between computers with a simple and cheap USB-C to USB-C peripheral cable, not a $50 specialty cable with a lump in the middle. Apple gets it to work, at 40 Gbps even, with a cable far cheaper than $50.
France has been able to keep both costs and CO2 emissions low with their nuclear power. You want me to believe that we can do better than both Germany and France if only we build more batteries? Batteries don't produce electricity. To get cheap electricity out you have to put even cheaper electricity in, that's to make up for the capital investment in building the batteries and for energy losses in the storage.
Oh, and Germany already has access to ample energy storage. They sell their electricity to their neighbors that have lots of hydro and then buy it back later. They have to sell cheaper than French nuclear and then buy at prices higher than they can produce, that's just how the market works. That won't change with batteries in Germany.
You believe Germany has the technology now to build energy storage that's cheaper than storing energy in a tank of Russian natural gas? Or cheaper than Scandinavian hydro? What's stopping them then? They should be well on their way to telling France and Russia that their energy won't be needed any more. Instead we see them making plans for another natural gas pipeline from Russia.
I disagree. Trump is safely contained within the White House where he can be safely monitored by VPOTUS Pence.
Let's take a look into the Oval Office and see how that's going...
Pence: Mr. President I think you did very well today but we do need to discuss your tweets. You think you can scale back the volume of tweets you send out in any given day? Trump: Of course. I'll get right on that, Mike. P: Are you tweeting right now? T: Maaaaaaybeeeee. P: You think you could perhaps stop until, I don't know, breakfast tomorrow? We can talk about it more then. T: Yeah. Yeah, sure sure. P: I'll see you at breakfast in the Green Room then? As usual? T: Sounds great, Mike. I'll see you in the morning, goodnight. Oh, and how does something from Denny's sound?
Then go on about how renewable energy makes more economic sense than nuclear power. Let's assume that nuclear power is not profitable now. What happens as energy prices continue to rise from government mandates for renewable energy like these? At some point those lines cross and nuclear power becomes profitable again.
Also, it took decades of investment, private and public, in wind and solar energy to bring the price down like it did. This investment included the ability to build prototypes for testing and cost estimation. You think that maybe we could do the same with nuclear power? Build some prototypes of new models so that we can test the technology and economics? As it is now the problem isn't the money, there's lots of private investors willing to put money in nuclear energy. The problem is the Democrats not allowing even the construction of prototypes. Just recently we saw some prototypes getting built because of Trump, Perry, and other Republicans that are taking energy independence seriously. What we get from Democrats is a very unscientific look at the problem. They just throw other people's money at the problem and hope it buys them enough votes for the next election.
You are very correct in that the Democrat distaste for nuclear power predates the GND. That goes all the way back to Carter with his sweaters and solar panels, at least that far back. 40+ years later and we still haven't replaced nuclear power with wind and solar power. I'm guessing in another 40 years it still won't happen.
There's a name for doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result.
Okay Elon, you show us how its done. You make that happen and you can make your pile of cash far larger. In the mean time you have competition from the Japanese that are trying to get it from the ocean. First to get to market wins.
Can't speak for anyone else, but I think about how much devastation follows this unnecessary use of fossil fuels. We could make 100% of our transportation fuel needs from algae grown on seawater by allocating a relatively small portion of desert.
We could also make all of our transportation fuel by hydrocarbon synthesis driven by nuclear fission. This is not new technology. We figured out how to get economically viable energy from fission in the 1950s. We figured out how to synthesize hydrocarbons suitable for use as aircraft fuel since the 1930s. There's been a lot of effort in combining the two by the US Navy but our congresscritters seem more interested in burning money on more failures in solar power projects and electric airplanes.
Well, we could have. Now that climate change is causing feet of snow to fall on Arizona, and the like, it probably wouldn't work so well as it might have.
Right, global warming causes snow in Arizona. Tell me something, what kind of weather or climate event would there have to be to disprove the theory of human caused global warming from burning fossil fuels? If record heat in Arizona proves global warming, and increased snow in Arizona proves global warming, then what would disprove it?
The climate changes, and I can't seem to find anyone to dispute that. If you want me to believe your theory then first I need to see the theory explained in a way that is falsifiable. Then I'd further need to see solutions based on real science and current technology. If you want me to believe that we can grow our fuel in algae ponds in the (snowy) deserts of Arizona then prove the technology as viable. We've proven nuclear fission as viable. We know we can synthesize hydrocarbons, the Nazis flew their fighters off such fuel at the end of WWII. Maybe the economics right now estimates the fuel cost in the $4 to $6 per gallon range for synthesized hydrocarbons, but that's far better than the failed algae fuel experiments so far.
This works. It works now. To make it to market needs only Congress allowing the building of more nuclear power and funding more research in the Navy. In a matter of a few years the Navy will not be adding any carbon into the natural carbon cycle. A few years later the Air Force and Army can join in. In no time this could come to market with no need for new charging stations in parking lots or disposing of the existing vehicles and infrastructure. Every diesel engine in existence becomes zero carbon overnight.
Will algae do that? Perhaps. I know what is holding up synthetic fuels. It is the Democrat "Green New Deal" that denies us access to nuclear power. What's holding up algae fuels? I know what that is too. The laws of physics and economics. We can change the laws of the land, we cannot change the laws of physics and economics.
You quickly run out of the entire world's supply of various types of raw materials (including land) for any scheme you ramp up. This is why nuclear is really the only good option we have or likely will have in our lifetimes.
Yep. Nuclear power will be a major source of energy in our lifetimes. This is precisely because of the material requirements for anything else.
Nuclear power is required not only because of it's low material requirements but also because of it's safety and low CO2 emissions. Personally I believe the CO2 global warming scare is being blown well out of proportion. I will buy into it so long as people look at real facts and figures and conclude as many people in the know have done, we will not achieve a "zero carbon" world without nuclear power.
I put "zero carbon" in quotes because I know some pedantic asshole will point out that large carbon footprint of building a nuclear power plant. It's true, there is a large carbon footprint. But what happens with something as energy dense as uranium there is far more energy output per carbon released than any other "zero carbon" energy source, like wind, solar, or hydro. If wind and solar can be defined as "zero carbon" then so can nuclear fission.
We will run out of wind and sunlight before we run out of uranium and thorium.
What you say is likely true, if we assume that there is a free trade of uranium. A nation with less than friendly relations with much of the world might have trouble getting uranium if their local geology is lacking in uranium. Access to the sea though means a constant supply of uranium at a very constant price. Extraction of uranium at any rate which we could conceive of is nothing compared to the size of the ocean, the concentration of uranium salts in the ocean will not be affected (on any human time frame).
As I recall nations such as India, Iran, and Japan don't have a lot of uranium that they can mine. At least not at the prices you gave. If this process gets to even double the market rate on what many pay now then it can still be viable because of costs due to transport and trade regulations.
There's also some possibility of another spike in uranium. I recall a co-worker being quite excited when he saw uranium prices spike. He was crushed later when he found out why. A mine he had invested in had been flooded with water, some weather event and/or mechanical problem at the site. This put a dent in future expectations of supply and that made uranium prices climb. If there's a technology on uranium extraction from seawater then we will see a ceiling on uranium prices as people build such facilities to back up their terrestrial mining. Oil people do this all the time, they drill for less than ideal oil because they need that well drilled before prices spike. If prices spike and there's no oil to sell then they can't cash in.
Investments in uranium from seawater would certainly happen if a government sees uranium supplies as a national security interest. Governments will invest in this even if the pay off later is little to nothing. Not having to beg others for energy gives a lot more security than investing in more battle tanks and bombers.
I mean, it's cool that you can pull nuclear fuel from the ocean, but it still has to be enriched as presumably aqueous uranium has the same abysmal percentage of U-235 as the terrestrial ores that are already being mined.
The uranium in seawater does in fact have the same isotopic composition as that mined from the dirt. It's this way because the uranium in the water got there by erosion being dissolved as a salt. The uranium does not need to be enriched to be used as fuel, there are heavy water reactors capable of using natural uranium as fuel. Canada has been using natural uranium as fuel for decades, and sold their designs to India, China, and perhaps other nations, from which local variants have been built. This is not new technology and not rare either.
Now figure it out how to enrich it at the same time and watch as the world destroys itself building nukes from ocean water.
By "nukes" I assume you mean nuclear weapons. You do realize what many wars have been fought over, do you not? Resources. People fight over water, fuel, food, and so on. Access to cheap nuclear fission power by extracting uranium from seawater could mean an end to scarcity. Well, there will always be scarcity of something, just not a scarcity of energy. Energy that can be used to produce water, food, shelter, and clothing. That's not saying there won't be wars, people fight for other reasons. Many such people fight because their god tells them to convert or kill. If they were more concerned about live and let live then they'd be far better off and not feel such jealousy of other people having greater wealth, freedom, and generally a better standard of living.
Nuclear energy has as much to do with nuclear weapons as gasoline cars have with napalm. When you gas up your car do you think about how many people could be burned to ash if we used that fuel to bomb cities instead of use it to power the transportation sector of the world? You don't? Maybe that's because peaceful energy is far more valuable than weapons to deny other people of their wealth, property, and lives.
The government cannot legislate energy independence into being. The government cannot change the laws of economics and physics, as much as they might wish it otherwise. If you want electric cars to bring the USA into energy independence then build some better electric cars. There is no other way.
The USA is well on the path to being energy independent already, and became a net petroleum exporter recently. We can reach and keep that independence by keeping the markets open. If the government interferes too much then the laws of physics and economics will veto everything the government mandates.
Subsidies cannot help, they only hobble. There is no giving to electric vehicles without taking from somewhere else. The government is too big, fat, and slow, to decide on any real energy policy. They need only act on setting boundaries on the market and let the people doing the real working and thinking find the best path.
Oh, and where is gas $6/gallon? I took a look at the AAA website and it's under $3/gallon for most of the USA, and under $2.50/gallon for places away from the east and west coasts. I can recall it being around $4.50/gallon once, but that didn't last long.
These things are generally symptoms of permissive building codes and extremely cheap energy.
So you would prefer extremely expensive energy?
Ever heard of Passivhaus?
I'll admit I had to look that up. I've seen similar ideas and they are very expensive to build compared to "permissive building codes" we have now.
There's always a balance here and what I want is energy that is cheap enough that I can keep my open air backyard at a shirtsleeve temp in the middle of a Midwest February snowstorm if I wanted. We can get there if we want. This is nonsense to reach energy efficiency at the cost of all else. Make energy cheap and clean then no one should give a damn on how efficient my house is. Go live your life and I'll live mine.
Building codes should be about the safety of the neighborhood, not how much I spend on energy. I would expect my neighbors to keep their house from being a fire hazard to my house. That means keeping the furnace or wiring from going up in flames, and if the house does burn that it's far back enough from the property line that firefighters can bring their hoses about. There's certainly other things like managing the flow of rain and snow so my house doesn't get water damage, keeping the roads and walks clear for traffic, keep drinking water flowing in and sewage flowing out, and other such things.
If I want to keep my front door open and air condition the neighborhood then that's my problem.
Forget natural gas then. Let's consider a "real solution". An electric car charged up from nuclear power would have far less CO2 emissions than an electric car charged from natural gas, coal, wind, solar, or hydro.
If those behind the Green New Deal were truly interested in reducing CO2 then they would have embraced nuclear power, not demand it be replaced with energy sources with higher CO2 output.
We aren't going to get to a zero CO2 economy without nuclear. There will be no dominance of wind and solar without natural gas to fill in the gaps.
If the concern is reducing CO2 then we'd be talking as much about nuclear power as much as we would about BEVs. Leaving nuclear power out of the Green New Deal tells me that these people are ignorant, stupid, or malicious. I'm not sure which is worse in our leadership.
Did anyone really believe the AIDS story? This is China here. The gene just-so-happens to be cognitive boosting was not a happy accident.
I don't know, I'd think immunity from HIV and similar infections is enough to experiment with this. Maybe they fear biological warfare from those already immune in the West. This immunity was already seen in Germany, likely a happy accident from all the plagues that swept through Europe from its long history of wars and international trade. 10% of Europeans carry this trait but outside of Europe it's rare as hen's teeth. Or maybe not biological warfare but the costs to their nation if they must fight an outbreak where no one has a natural resistance.
Then again maybe they are playing a long game here. With gene editing and natural propagation then maybe they can make a large part of overpopulated China immune. Then they can thin their population of too many mouths to feed, wage biological warfare on the rest of the world, and come out on top for generations after.
This is all assuming that there is some grand conspiracy here and not just a handful of people that want to get their names in the history books.
People must also know that the chances of getting HIV by a heterosexual that does not use injections of illegal drugs is as close to zero as statistical analysis will allow. Now that blood donations are screened for HIV there's no longer the risks that there used to be from that. Keep homosexuals and drug abusers from donating blood and we will all be quite safe from this disease.
If one mutation confers HIV resistance, AND higher intelligence... why doesn't everyone have this mutation?
Because it's a fairly recent mutation, on evolutionary scales, and it takes a long time to propagate even when there's a selection advantage against an infectious disease. The Wikipedia article on the gene gives a bit on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
It also sounds like the advantage to intelligence is subtle. There was also not much of an intelligence advantage when much of human society consisted of subsistence farmers. Someone that had an education from those in walking distance, with few able to read, with superstition often being the norm than any real science, and generally a difficult life, there wasn't much to gain from being smarter than the average bear.
It seems that also there is an advantage with having only one of the genes. It might not be as effective against infection or grant as much of an intelligence boost but there is still an advantage. This will slow propagation as they still carry a gene without this CCR5 deletion.
Also, think of a possible heterozygous advantage such as with sickle cell trait. Sickle cell trait is "good" for heterozygous people as the reduction in oxygen flow is minimal, but carries a tolerance for malaria. Homozygous people for sickle cell trait can have a painful and short life without modern medical care. Lacking the sickle trait means nearly certain death where malaria is prevalent, again unless given access to modern medical care. The CCR5 deletion may be advantageous to a point but leave someone vulnerable in another way.
If there is any disadvantage to the CCR5 deletion then it might soon be considered a disease like sickle cell trait is today. Modern medicine has rendered HIV a chronic condition, much like sickle cell trait. It's not a death sentence any more. It's expensive to treat but very survivable. We don't need this gene to survive HIV. If there is any downside to it then that would explain it's slow propagation.
Since the alternative is "nothing backing your power grid", I'd have to say yes.
In most every part of the world the something backing up wind and solar will be natural gas.
It will continue to be natural gas until something as inexpensive and reliable comes along. Batteries will never be as inexpensive and reliable because batteries cannot produce electricity, they only store it. The cost of operation includes the electricity to charge them, and with any overhead from maintenance and energy losses. To get cheap electricity from batteries requires even cheaper electricity put into them.
We'd be far better off "charging" our cars in our garages at night with a natural gas hose than any electrical cord. I see a far brighter future for natural gas vehicles than electric vehicles. They can be filled up at home overnight with a municipal NG supply, or refilled in minutes at a properly equipped roadside filling station. No "range anxiety" because there's plenty of range from tanks in NG vehicles now. They also likely produce less CO2 than burning the natural gas at night in a power plant to charge those electric vehicles, given the losses from the conversion and transmission.
Make a natural gas-electric hybrid and there's all kinds of advantages and options. That includes using the car as an electricity source for the house during an electrical outage.
For a person to charge their car during the day would mean having a place to park all day that was wired for it. A common parking spot is just a 10 foot by 20 foot slab of concrete, very cheap and very low maintenance. Wiring that for charging electric cars means a lot more expense up front and even more to keep it operational, and that (of course) includes the cost of the electricity. Will people be willing to pay for this when they (presumably) already have an operational charger at home?
EV advocates are going to have to pick a lane at some point. It's either we charge the cars during the day and have to lay out all kinds of infrastructure so we can use solar power, or we use the existing infrastructure and charge at night. With a reliable slow and steady energy supply like coal, combined cycle natural gas, or nuclear we can use the wires we have. If we use the intermittent supply of wind and solar then we need wires and batteries to store and distribute the energy. Maybe EVs can be part of that storage and distribution plan but that would require cooperation from the public. People will want some kind of compensation for the use of their cars for the convenience of the utilities.
I'm wondering how the economics works on this. Building the chargers into parking lots will cost money, lots of money. To make that worth the cost to build so that people aren't just charging at home will mean electricity is very expensive. What you describe in having people charge their EVs during the day is a world of energy scarcity. That's not a very bright future, in more than one sense of the word.
My furnace is rated at about 18kW, and I live in Midwest USA. It's natural gas, not electric, but that doesn't matter for the thermal output. My sister lives in "hill country" in the SE USA and she has electric backup heat for when the heat pump and/or wood stove can't keep up, and based on the size of their heat pump I'm guessing it's in the 15kW range. My brother used to live in a house where the natural gas lines couldn't reach, also in Midwest USA, and his electric backup heat was at least 15kW.
So, tell me, what would someone be doing wrong in needing 15kW backup heat? You think that their house is far too large? I'm thinking that this is about right for a small house in northern parts of the USA or a larger house in southern parts of the USA.
Slashdot Mirror
And I don't know anybody who can fit a nuclear reactor onto a car yet.
I don't know anyone making a practical wind or solar powered car either. There certainly aren't any practical airplanes that run on wind and solar power. We saw ships that were powered by wind but they lost out to those powered by coal, diesel, and nuclear.
We can make electric cars that run off the electricity produced from nuclear power. Large ships can be nuclear powered. For everything in between we can synthesize fuels from nuclear power. We've had the technology to synthesize hydrocarbon based fuels for a century now. This process has been shown to be economically feasible in a time and place where petroleum is difficult to obtain. Improve that process and we could make petroleum no longer profitable.
So, the mice got a "shine job". Did they pay for the surgery in cigarettes?
I see no one is taking global warming seriously... Yet.
I will believe that global warming is a serious problem when people start talking about building nuclear power plants again.
I hear them scream from rooftops on how we must have an "all the above" energy policy. Then when nuclear power comes up then it's everything except that. Okay then. If nuclear power is somehow a greater hazard to the world than nuclear power then I'll just wait until someone takes this problem seriously. Either global warming is in fact a real threat and we get nuclear power later, potentially after it's too late to stop it's worst effects, or global warming turns out to be a nothingburger and we all go on happily burning oil and coal.
I can wait. Until then I'll leave some reading material.
http://cmo-ripu.blogspot.com/2...
http://www.roadmaptonowhere.co...
https://www.withouthotair.com/
This spraying water in the air is a nice plan but the guy proposing it even explains that we will still need a plan to stop burning coal. I've not seen any working plans yet that do not include nuclear power. Some people claim future technology will save us but that's not a plan, that's wishful thinking. That's waiting at the port for a ship that might never come.
Any excuse will serve a tyrant.
That's fine if you don't like the messenger. Here's what I'd like to know, was anything they said a lie?
You don't like the message so you kill the messenger, that does not change the truth. If they lied then what's the truth? Do you have counterexamples?
I have not seen any actual implementations of USB 3.0 with a Mini-B connector, so I'm somewhat curious as to why these even exist.
The mini-USB connectors are not part of the USB 3.x spec, they don't have the number of pins to support the "super speed" data lines. Too bad for anything with a mini-USB connector, they were left behind at USB 2.0.
USB 3 only supports the standard A and B, micro A and B, and USB-C. The A ports and connectors are interchangeable between 1.1, 2.0, and 3.x but the B connectors come in 3.x "wide" and 1.1/2.0 "narrow" variants where the wide connectors will not fit in narrow ports, but narrow connectors will fit in wide ports.
Is it USB 2 B or not 2 B?
I'd like to see some OS support a USB-C to USB-C data connection between computers other than just Apple. I should be able to push 5, 10, or even 20 Gbps between computers with a simple and cheap USB-C to USB-C peripheral cable, not a $50 specialty cable with a lump in the middle. Apple gets it to work, at 40 Gbps even, with a cable far cheaper than $50.
And this:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/m...
France has been able to keep both costs and CO2 emissions low with their nuclear power. You want me to believe that we can do better than both Germany and France if only we build more batteries? Batteries don't produce electricity. To get cheap electricity out you have to put even cheaper electricity in, that's to make up for the capital investment in building the batteries and for energy losses in the storage.
Oh, and Germany already has access to ample energy storage. They sell their electricity to their neighbors that have lots of hydro and then buy it back later. They have to sell cheaper than French nuclear and then buy at prices higher than they can produce, that's just how the market works. That won't change with batteries in Germany.
You believe Germany has the technology now to build energy storage that's cheaper than storing energy in a tank of Russian natural gas? Or cheaper than Scandinavian hydro? What's stopping them then? They should be well on their way to telling France and Russia that their energy won't be needed any more. Instead we see them making plans for another natural gas pipeline from Russia.
I disagree. Trump is safely contained within the White House where he can be safely monitored by VPOTUS Pence.
Let's take a look into the Oval Office and see how that's going...
Pence: Mr. President I think you did very well today but we do need to discuss your tweets. You think you can scale back the volume of tweets you send out in any given day?
Trump: Of course. I'll get right on that, Mike.
P: Are you tweeting right now?
T: Maaaaaaybeeeee.
P: You think you could perhaps stop until, I don't know, breakfast tomorrow? We can talk about it more then.
T: Yeah. Yeah, sure sure.
P: I'll see you at breakfast in the Green Room then? As usual?
T: Sounds great, Mike. I'll see you in the morning, goodnight. Oh, and how does something from Denny's sound?
Yep, nothing wrong here. Safely contained.
Read this:
https://www.statesman.com/news...
And this:
https://thehill.com/opinion/en...
Then go on about how renewable energy makes more economic sense than nuclear power. Let's assume that nuclear power is not profitable now. What happens as energy prices continue to rise from government mandates for renewable energy like these? At some point those lines cross and nuclear power becomes profitable again.
Also, it took decades of investment, private and public, in wind and solar energy to bring the price down like it did. This investment included the ability to build prototypes for testing and cost estimation. You think that maybe we could do the same with nuclear power? Build some prototypes of new models so that we can test the technology and economics? As it is now the problem isn't the money, there's lots of private investors willing to put money in nuclear energy. The problem is the Democrats not allowing even the construction of prototypes. Just recently we saw some prototypes getting built because of Trump, Perry, and other Republicans that are taking energy independence seriously. What we get from Democrats is a very unscientific look at the problem. They just throw other people's money at the problem and hope it buys them enough votes for the next election.
You are very correct in that the Democrat distaste for nuclear power predates the GND. That goes all the way back to Carter with his sweaters and solar panels, at least that far back. 40+ years later and we still haven't replaced nuclear power with wind and solar power. I'm guessing in another 40 years it still won't happen.
There's a name for doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result.
we have the asteroids to mine
much easier
Okay Elon, you show us how its done. You make that happen and you can make your pile of cash far larger. In the mean time you have competition from the Japanese that are trying to get it from the ocean. First to get to market wins.
Can't speak for anyone else, but I think about how much devastation follows this unnecessary use of fossil fuels. We could make 100% of our transportation fuel needs from algae grown on seawater by allocating a relatively small portion of desert.
We could also make all of our transportation fuel by hydrocarbon synthesis driven by nuclear fission. This is not new technology. We figured out how to get economically viable energy from fission in the 1950s. We figured out how to synthesize hydrocarbons suitable for use as aircraft fuel since the 1930s. There's been a lot of effort in combining the two by the US Navy but our congresscritters seem more interested in burning money on more failures in solar power projects and electric airplanes.
Well, we could have. Now that climate change is causing feet of snow to fall on Arizona, and the like, it probably wouldn't work so well as it might have.
Right, global warming causes snow in Arizona. Tell me something, what kind of weather or climate event would there have to be to disprove the theory of human caused global warming from burning fossil fuels? If record heat in Arizona proves global warming, and increased snow in Arizona proves global warming, then what would disprove it?
The climate changes, and I can't seem to find anyone to dispute that. If you want me to believe your theory then first I need to see the theory explained in a way that is falsifiable. Then I'd further need to see solutions based on real science and current technology. If you want me to believe that we can grow our fuel in algae ponds in the (snowy) deserts of Arizona then prove the technology as viable. We've proven nuclear fission as viable. We know we can synthesize hydrocarbons, the Nazis flew their fighters off such fuel at the end of WWII. Maybe the economics right now estimates the fuel cost in the $4 to $6 per gallon range for synthesized hydrocarbons, but that's far better than the failed algae fuel experiments so far.
Here's an explanation of this seawater to aviation fuel Navy project in under 15 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
This works. It works now. To make it to market needs only Congress allowing the building of more nuclear power and funding more research in the Navy. In a matter of a few years the Navy will not be adding any carbon into the natural carbon cycle. A few years later the Air Force and Army can join in. In no time this could come to market with no need for new charging stations in parking lots or disposing of the existing vehicles and infrastructure. Every diesel engine in existence becomes zero carbon overnight.
Will algae do that? Perhaps. I know what is holding up synthetic fuels. It is the Democrat "Green New Deal" that denies us access to nuclear power. What's holding up algae fuels? I know what that is too. The laws of physics and economics. We can change the laws of the land, we cannot change the laws of physics and economics.
You quickly run out of the entire world's supply of various types of raw materials (including land) for any scheme you ramp up. This is why nuclear is really the only good option we have or likely will have in our lifetimes.
Yep. Nuclear power will be a major source of energy in our lifetimes. This is precisely because of the material requirements for anything else.
This web page shows some numbers to back that up: http://cmo-ripu.blogspot.com/2...
Nuclear power is required not only because of it's low material requirements but also because of it's safety and low CO2 emissions. Personally I believe the CO2 global warming scare is being blown well out of proportion. I will buy into it so long as people look at real facts and figures and conclude as many people in the know have done, we will not achieve a "zero carbon" world without nuclear power.
I put "zero carbon" in quotes because I know some pedantic asshole will point out that large carbon footprint of building a nuclear power plant. It's true, there is a large carbon footprint. But what happens with something as energy dense as uranium there is far more energy output per carbon released than any other "zero carbon" energy source, like wind, solar, or hydro. If wind and solar can be defined as "zero carbon" then so can nuclear fission.
We will run out of wind and sunlight before we run out of uranium and thorium.
What you say is likely true, if we assume that there is a free trade of uranium. A nation with less than friendly relations with much of the world might have trouble getting uranium if their local geology is lacking in uranium. Access to the sea though means a constant supply of uranium at a very constant price. Extraction of uranium at any rate which we could conceive of is nothing compared to the size of the ocean, the concentration of uranium salts in the ocean will not be affected (on any human time frame).
As I recall nations such as India, Iran, and Japan don't have a lot of uranium that they can mine. At least not at the prices you gave. If this process gets to even double the market rate on what many pay now then it can still be viable because of costs due to transport and trade regulations.
There's also some possibility of another spike in uranium. I recall a co-worker being quite excited when he saw uranium prices spike. He was crushed later when he found out why. A mine he had invested in had been flooded with water, some weather event and/or mechanical problem at the site. This put a dent in future expectations of supply and that made uranium prices climb. If there's a technology on uranium extraction from seawater then we will see a ceiling on uranium prices as people build such facilities to back up their terrestrial mining. Oil people do this all the time, they drill for less than ideal oil because they need that well drilled before prices spike. If prices spike and there's no oil to sell then they can't cash in.
Investments in uranium from seawater would certainly happen if a government sees uranium supplies as a national security interest. Governments will invest in this even if the pay off later is little to nothing. Not having to beg others for energy gives a lot more security than investing in more battle tanks and bombers.
I mean, it's cool that you can pull nuclear fuel from the ocean, but it still has to be enriched as presumably aqueous uranium has the same abysmal percentage of U-235 as the terrestrial ores that are already being mined.
The uranium in seawater does in fact have the same isotopic composition as that mined from the dirt. It's this way because the uranium in the water got there by erosion being dissolved as a salt. The uranium does not need to be enriched to be used as fuel, there are heavy water reactors capable of using natural uranium as fuel. Canada has been using natural uranium as fuel for decades, and sold their designs to India, China, and perhaps other nations, from which local variants have been built. This is not new technology and not rare either.
Now figure it out how to enrich it at the same time and watch as the world destroys itself building nukes from ocean water.
By "nukes" I assume you mean nuclear weapons. You do realize what many wars have been fought over, do you not? Resources. People fight over water, fuel, food, and so on. Access to cheap nuclear fission power by extracting uranium from seawater could mean an end to scarcity. Well, there will always be scarcity of something, just not a scarcity of energy. Energy that can be used to produce water, food, shelter, and clothing. That's not saying there won't be wars, people fight for other reasons. Many such people fight because their god tells them to convert or kill. If they were more concerned about live and let live then they'd be far better off and not feel such jealousy of other people having greater wealth, freedom, and generally a better standard of living.
Nuclear energy has as much to do with nuclear weapons as gasoline cars have with napalm. When you gas up your car do you think about how many people could be burned to ash if we used that fuel to bomb cities instead of use it to power the transportation sector of the world? You don't? Maybe that's because peaceful energy is far more valuable than weapons to deny other people of their wealth, property, and lives.
No more subsidies!!
The government cannot legislate energy independence into being. The government cannot change the laws of economics and physics, as much as they might wish it otherwise. If you want electric cars to bring the USA into energy independence then build some better electric cars. There is no other way.
The USA is well on the path to being energy independent already, and became a net petroleum exporter recently. We can reach and keep that independence by keeping the markets open. If the government interferes too much then the laws of physics and economics will veto everything the government mandates.
Subsidies cannot help, they only hobble. There is no giving to electric vehicles without taking from somewhere else. The government is too big, fat, and slow, to decide on any real energy policy. They need only act on setting boundaries on the market and let the people doing the real working and thinking find the best path.
Oh, and where is gas $6/gallon? I took a look at the AAA website and it's under $3/gallon for most of the USA, and under $2.50/gallon for places away from the east and west coasts. I can recall it being around $4.50/gallon once, but that didn't last long.
These things are generally symptoms of permissive building codes and extremely cheap energy.
So you would prefer extremely expensive energy?
Ever heard of Passivhaus?
I'll admit I had to look that up. I've seen similar ideas and they are very expensive to build compared to "permissive building codes" we have now.
There's always a balance here and what I want is energy that is cheap enough that I can keep my open air backyard at a shirtsleeve temp in the middle of a Midwest February snowstorm if I wanted. We can get there if we want. This is nonsense to reach energy efficiency at the cost of all else. Make energy cheap and clean then no one should give a damn on how efficient my house is. Go live your life and I'll live mine.
Building codes should be about the safety of the neighborhood, not how much I spend on energy. I would expect my neighbors to keep their house from being a fire hazard to my house. That means keeping the furnace or wiring from going up in flames, and if the house does burn that it's far back enough from the property line that firefighters can bring their hoses about. There's certainly other things like managing the flow of rain and snow so my house doesn't get water damage, keeping the roads and walks clear for traffic, keep drinking water flowing in and sewage flowing out, and other such things.
If I want to keep my front door open and air condition the neighborhood then that's my problem.
Forget natural gas then. Let's consider a "real solution". An electric car charged up from nuclear power would have far less CO2 emissions than an electric car charged from natural gas, coal, wind, solar, or hydro.
If those behind the Green New Deal were truly interested in reducing CO2 then they would have embraced nuclear power, not demand it be replaced with energy sources with higher CO2 output.
We aren't going to get to a zero CO2 economy without nuclear. There will be no dominance of wind and solar without natural gas to fill in the gaps.
If the concern is reducing CO2 then we'd be talking as much about nuclear power as much as we would about BEVs. Leaving nuclear power out of the Green New Deal tells me that these people are ignorant, stupid, or malicious. I'm not sure which is worse in our leadership.
Did anyone really believe the AIDS story? This is China here. The gene just-so-happens to be cognitive boosting was not a happy accident.
I don't know, I'd think immunity from HIV and similar infections is enough to experiment with this. Maybe they fear biological warfare from those already immune in the West. This immunity was already seen in Germany, likely a happy accident from all the plagues that swept through Europe from its long history of wars and international trade. 10% of Europeans carry this trait but outside of Europe it's rare as hen's teeth. Or maybe not biological warfare but the costs to their nation if they must fight an outbreak where no one has a natural resistance.
Then again maybe they are playing a long game here. With gene editing and natural propagation then maybe they can make a large part of overpopulated China immune. Then they can thin their population of too many mouths to feed, wage biological warfare on the rest of the world, and come out on top for generations after.
This is all assuming that there is some grand conspiracy here and not just a handful of people that want to get their names in the history books.
People must also know that the chances of getting HIV by a heterosexual that does not use injections of illegal drugs is as close to zero as statistical analysis will allow. Now that blood donations are screened for HIV there's no longer the risks that there used to be from that. Keep homosexuals and drug abusers from donating blood and we will all be quite safe from this disease.
If one mutation confers HIV resistance, AND higher intelligence... why doesn't everyone have this mutation?
Because it's a fairly recent mutation, on evolutionary scales, and it takes a long time to propagate even when there's a selection advantage against an infectious disease. The Wikipedia article on the gene gives a bit on this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
It also sounds like the advantage to intelligence is subtle. There was also not much of an intelligence advantage when much of human society consisted of subsistence farmers. Someone that had an education from those in walking distance, with few able to read, with superstition often being the norm than any real science, and generally a difficult life, there wasn't much to gain from being smarter than the average bear.
It seems that also there is an advantage with having only one of the genes. It might not be as effective against infection or grant as much of an intelligence boost but there is still an advantage. This will slow propagation as they still carry a gene without this CCR5 deletion.
Also, think of a possible heterozygous advantage such as with sickle cell trait. Sickle cell trait is "good" for heterozygous people as the reduction in oxygen flow is minimal, but carries a tolerance for malaria. Homozygous people for sickle cell trait can have a painful and short life without modern medical care. Lacking the sickle trait means nearly certain death where malaria is prevalent, again unless given access to modern medical care. The CCR5 deletion may be advantageous to a point but leave someone vulnerable in another way.
If there is any disadvantage to the CCR5 deletion then it might soon be considered a disease like sickle cell trait is today. Modern medicine has rendered HIV a chronic condition, much like sickle cell trait. It's not a death sentence any more. It's expensive to treat but very survivable. We don't need this gene to survive HIV. If there is any downside to it then that would explain it's slow propagation.
Since the alternative is "nothing backing your power grid", I'd have to say yes.
In most every part of the world the something backing up wind and solar will be natural gas.
It will continue to be natural gas until something as inexpensive and reliable comes along. Batteries will never be as inexpensive and reliable because batteries cannot produce electricity, they only store it. The cost of operation includes the electricity to charge them, and with any overhead from maintenance and energy losses. To get cheap electricity from batteries requires even cheaper electricity put into them.
We'd be far better off "charging" our cars in our garages at night with a natural gas hose than any electrical cord. I see a far brighter future for natural gas vehicles than electric vehicles. They can be filled up at home overnight with a municipal NG supply, or refilled in minutes at a properly equipped roadside filling station. No "range anxiety" because there's plenty of range from tanks in NG vehicles now. They also likely produce less CO2 than burning the natural gas at night in a power plant to charge those electric vehicles, given the losses from the conversion and transmission.
Make a natural gas-electric hybrid and there's all kinds of advantages and options. That includes using the car as an electricity source for the house during an electrical outage.
For a person to charge their car during the day would mean having a place to park all day that was wired for it. A common parking spot is just a 10 foot by 20 foot slab of concrete, very cheap and very low maintenance. Wiring that for charging electric cars means a lot more expense up front and even more to keep it operational, and that (of course) includes the cost of the electricity. Will people be willing to pay for this when they (presumably) already have an operational charger at home?
EV advocates are going to have to pick a lane at some point. It's either we charge the cars during the day and have to lay out all kinds of infrastructure so we can use solar power, or we use the existing infrastructure and charge at night. With a reliable slow and steady energy supply like coal, combined cycle natural gas, or nuclear we can use the wires we have. If we use the intermittent supply of wind and solar then we need wires and batteries to store and distribute the energy. Maybe EVs can be part of that storage and distribution plan but that would require cooperation from the public. People will want some kind of compensation for the use of their cars for the convenience of the utilities.
I'm wondering how the economics works on this. Building the chargers into parking lots will cost money, lots of money. To make that worth the cost to build so that people aren't just charging at home will mean electricity is very expensive. What you describe in having people charge their EVs during the day is a world of energy scarcity. That's not a very bright future, in more than one sense of the word.
I was thinking more about the movie Gattaca.
My furnace is rated at about 18kW, and I live in Midwest USA. It's natural gas, not electric, but that doesn't matter for the thermal output. My sister lives in "hill country" in the SE USA and she has electric backup heat for when the heat pump and/or wood stove can't keep up, and based on the size of their heat pump I'm guessing it's in the 15kW range. My brother used to live in a house where the natural gas lines couldn't reach, also in Midwest USA, and his electric backup heat was at least 15kW.
So, tell me, what would someone be doing wrong in needing 15kW backup heat? You think that their house is far too large? I'm thinking that this is about right for a small house in northern parts of the USA or a larger house in southern parts of the USA.
What of the donor safety?