It was blatantly obvious what technology you were stumping for with your lies.
Where is my "lie" in my statement of the question? Do you not agree that coal is the dominant energy source we use now and therefore any alternative should be "better" on every measure to compete? Would you not agree that along with being cheaper, "greener", and as (or more) reliable that safety should be considered? I mean beating coal on every measure is a pretty low bar, really, safety especially.
BTW, I didn't mean to give the same link twice on the "deathprint" citation. The second one was supposed to be from Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/j...
Once we clear the coal bar, then what's next? Wind and solar are being brought up all the time as replacements. Would it not be wise to take a look and make sure that they are wise choices before jumping in with both feet? Most everyone will consider price, CO2 output, and reliability when evaluating energy but few will count the death toll of using these energy sources. If all else is equal then why would we not choose the safest energy? Even if the lives saved is a very small fraction that is something I'd think should come into play, perhaps even if there is a small cost in the other metrics. After all I thought the goal here was to save lives.
If the question is about what to do about the impending collapse of the environment, where everyone dies, and the solution does not include nuclear power then I have to question the sanity of the people that dismiss nuclear power so quickly. If they fear nuclear power more than the extinction of humanity then they have a seriously skewed set of priorities, or are so ignorant of the safety record of nuclear power that they believe widespread use of nuclear power will lead to an extinction level event.
If we are going to discuss "lies" then I'd like to point out the lies of solar being "green". While it is certainly better than coal an honest analysis will often show it's not all that better than natural gas. If used with care and advanced technology I can expect to see natural gas beat out solar in many ways, especially in less than sunny locations like where I live. Solar when compared to wind and hydro just loses miserably in most every case. Sure, solar works great out in space but here on planet Earth solar is not all it's claimed to be. Solar even loses out in most cases to biomass, geothermal, and again natural gas. Solar should not be the first pick, or second, or even third, but the last.
I will say that you're conclusion of natural gas combined cycle leaves out the ability to meet peak power demands, which is most often met with natural gas turbines. If we widen that out to simply "natural gas" then I'd think we met all goals and even some stretch goals, as natural gas is suitable for transportation. While natural gas might not be great for aircraft it is still a great fuel for trains, cars, watercraft, and even rockets to space.
Your complaints on hydro and nuclear are mostly political. While the laws of physics cannot be changed the laws of the land are always open to debate. We can continue to debate the merits of nuclear and hydro in the hopes we will be able to get more access to them as well. In the mean time moving to natural gas is wise, either as a transition to whatever comes next or as the end point.
If taken as a global average, where Chernobyl and Fukushima are included then hydroelectric wins on the "deathprint" metric. Since I assume we've learned out lessons from both, and are not letting engineers from Soviet Russia do the building, then nuclear comes out on top.
Here's an article from GreenPeace that does a different analysis claiming to be more "honest" but still shows nuclear as safe or safer than wind. http://www.greenpeace.org/inte...
The costs metric shows nuclear, natural gas, and geothermal as cheapest. We might want to rule out natural gas on "deathprint" and "carbon footprint". Geothermal is great unless you don't have a place to drill for geothermal. That leaves nuclear. https://www.instituteforenergy...
Another cost analysis shows nuclear cheaper than only coal and solar thermal. Which doesn't help nuclear here but people want reliable power, and so long as it's cheaper than coal I suspect they'd choose that. http://www.renewable-energysou...
Finding a source on energy reliability with a quick Google search was proving to be more difficult than I thought. The best I could find was that same link above on costs where it listed capacity factors. https://www.instituteforenergy...
This use of capacity factor to measure reliability is likely pretty fair for wind, solar, geothermal, nuclear, coal, many forms of natural gas, and biomass, since these are the kinds of energy a utility is going to want to keep up as much as possible for reasons of costs, legal requirements, and such. However this metric really takes a dump on hydro and natural gas turbines since those are kept in reserve to meet peak demands, they are in fact very reliable and that's why they are kept in reserve. With that said, the top of the list includes nuclear and geothermal with capacity factors at 90% or higher. If we account for the peak power technologies of hydro and natural gas turbines we can include those as well.
Let's end with an analysis on carbon footprint, since most people already suspect that fossil fuels lose out big, but let's just take a look at an aggregated "meta-study". http://www.world-nuclear.org/u...
Nuclear, wind, and hydro are effectively tied. PV has more than triple the carbon footprint, but still far better than natural gas. Natural gas being half that of coal might just make it a not so bad choice given it's price, not bad "deathprint", local availability, and reliability.
Best I can tell we have at the top of the list nuclear and maybe natural gas if one considers halving carbon footprint from coal as "good enough". Wind, hydro, and geothermal might beat them out if one has them available nearby. Solar, PV and thermal, are not that great and should be left to off grid situations. Putting solar on the grid only adds to the cost, reduces reliability, and isn't that great on carbon footprint or "deathprint" compared to wind or hydro.
Okay, enough already! I got it. We are all doomed unless we lower our carbon footprint and the reason for out carbon footprint is the burning of coal, petroleum oil, and natural gas.
We'll we can't just turn everything off, that's just asking for death. We can scale back our energy consumption in some ways. We got our LED lights, low flo toilets, four cylinder aluminum cars running on ethanol (which is alcohol abuse in my mind), we got public busing running on natural gas (better than diesel but not best), electric trains, planes(?), and automobiles. Our houses have triple panes and double insulation and not a single pet, heat pump HVAC, and wood burning furnaces. And we are recycling, reducing, and redoing, or something like that. But that's just nibbling about the edges really.
To kill the big beast that is coal and oil we need a rethink. We should look at the goals here: - Provides heat, light, electricity - Cheap as coal - safe as coal - greener than coal, at a minimum, greener than natural gas is great, but getting as close to zero CO2 is best - as reliable as coal - domestically sourced - domestically built, operated, and maintained - available today - did I miss something?
Stretch goals (goals we can strive for beyond having met the main goals): - provides transportation (including to Earth orbit and beyond) - Cheaper than coal - Cheaper than natural gas - Cheaper than wind - Cheaper than solar - even more reliable - safer that coal - safer than wind - not just domestic but locally sourced - did I miss something?
What energy source can meet the most of these points? I know of a few options but I'd like to hear others come up with answers and we can discuss. We hear the term "all the above" when these questions are asked so give me some all the above solutions for the all the above requirements.
Again: which laws of physics or laws of chemistry force me to produce solar cells, batteries, transport them, interconnect them, with a CO2 producing energy source?
I answered your question, nothing. Nothing prevents you from producing solar cells, batteries, etc., from a CO2 neutral energy source. That source of energy currently exists, nuclear fission.
With that out of the way, economics will make it pointless to actually go through the effort of making those solar cells and batteries. Solar cells are currently very expensive considering how much energy they can produce, then adding the storage needed to make that solar energy last through the night will make it even more expensive, meaning solar with storage will be much more expensive than any other power source available to us right now.
If you want to claim that solar cells will get cheaper and more efficient in the future then that's fine. As it is right now though solar with storage is expensive and has a carbon footprint no better than natural gas. If we wish to reduce our carbon footprint today, and not see our energy prices rise, then we need a mix of nuclear, natural gas, and where appropriate wind, hydro, geothermal. Solar being as expensive as it is, and being reliant on storage or fossil fuels to last through the night, there is no profit or CO2 savings from putting solar power on the grid.
Sure, all commonly used cements used in concrete will absorb CO2 over time. Perhaps I misunderstood the original claim but the implication I got was that it absorbed more than that was used to create it. The lime in cement will slowly turn to limestone as it absorbs CO2 from the air, but this will be no more CO2 than what was cooked out of it after being mined from limestone.
If people want to get CO2 negative cement that's actually affordable then they should to do as that professor proposed, use nuclear power and mine basalt for its lime content.
On top of that, there is a class of concrete that actually ABSORBS CO2 of its surroundings.
Yes, there is such a concrete. It is very expensive and no one would ever consider using it in a large project. It will come up once in a while as a show house where people want to demonstrate a "green" future construction. They often look very posh, will claim having a very small (or even negative) carbon footprint, but very little will be said about how much it costs or if there is any study on the building meeting the CO2 output claims.
I had a conversation with a professor that was studying a way to absorb CO2 from the air by mining basalt and spreading it out over cropland. The claim was the the lime content in the basalt would be a nutrient for the crops and bind with CO2 in the soil. I asked if this would also be a good replacement for current sources of lime used in cement, he said it would. However, the energy requirements of mining this basalt would be much higher than current lime. Current lime is made by mining the much softer limestone (still a hard rock but easier to mine than the granite-like basalt) and "cooking" the limestone in furnaces to drive off the CO2 in the mineral, creating lime. For the mining of basalt to make sense we'd need an energy source that is quite energy dense, works day and night (because once a mine opens they want to keep going), is obviously low in CO2 output, and is cheap enough that it can compete with current lime production. What could that be?
These CO2 absorbing cements are typically made with naturally weathered basalt "sand". This is not very common as the lime will wash out over time if there is any rain. It is very dense so it's not going to be cheap to ship anywhere. As such this lime rich sand exists in just a few desert valleys in the USA. I'm sure it can be found in many other places in the world but the only sources of this in the USA are out in the Rocky Mountains. The basalt rock though is everywhere, it's probably under your feet right now, wherever you are reading this. More accessible outcroppings are quite common.
But if you suddenly make everything out of wood, what's to stop the fire from spreading everywhere?
First, as stated in the article the wood panels are engineered lumber that is very thick. There is very little surface area to the wood used, compared to like what people use in a fireplace or backyard bonfire, so the wood will not burn quickly if the char layer that develops doesn't stop the fire completely.
Second, most every building code I've seen will require a fire resistant layer around structural components. In most houses this is done with sheets of drywall over the wood studs in the wall. Typically 1/2 inch on walls and thicker on ceilings.
My brother was an architect and I remember the topic of the fire rating of doors coming up. Wood doors are actually quite durable in a fire, and those certified as a fire rated door will have a little metal badge on it giving it's fire rating. The goal of a fire rating is not necessarily the survival of the building but the survival of the occupants. So long as the building holds up long enough for people to get out in a fire then it's considered safe for people. A quick Google search tells me a wood fire door will be fire rated for 20 minutes, I assume the thick wood floors that they are using will hold up for much longer.
Remember, these fire ratings are tests under direct exposure to a fire before the door is not considered a barrier to the spread of fire. It's not like the whole building will come down 20 minutes after a fire starts. If a building is large enough, or contains flammable materials, then it's likely to have sprinklers.
In other words, I think they have this figured out.
I recall a prominent global warming alarmist getting kicked out of the group he was in because he advocated the using of wood as a building material, since using wood in this way is an effective carbon sink.
Using wood as a building material only causes deforestation if people don't plant new trees in their place. No one does that since it's not only bad for business, they'd run out of trees, but it's illegal in any place I can think of. If there is a place in the world that allows for clear cutting of trees and not planting new trees in that space then I'll show you a place that lacks any real government.
Using wood for buildings is good for the environment. If you believe that steel and concrete is better then I'll ask you to show me your math. If you believe that we just shouldn't be building new structures then I'll ask you to show me your age. Saying we shouldn't need new office buildings and homes is something that I'd think would come from a child or someone suffering from senility.
If someone knows who that was that advocated using wood as a building material as a carbon sink, and got shunned for it, then I'd appreciate a reply on who that is.
.. because unlike Tesla they can actually build cars. Lots of them.
I seem to recall when some of the big American auto makers were in trouble that Tesla was just waiting for some factories to get sold off so that they could buy them up, and hire all or most of the people that used to work there. Instead they when to Uncle Sam and got a sweet "loan" to keep them afloat. The companies can't build cars. Much of their revenue, last I checked, was in loans for car buyers. Most of their expenses are in the sweet health care deals they make for their workers.
The likes of GM and Chrysler-Dodge-whatever-they-are-hyph-en-ated-with-now aren't car makers any more, they are banks. They buy and sell car loans, buy and sell commodities like steel and rubber, buy and sell stock in auto part suppliers, and underwrite health insurance plans. It's kind of like how McDonald's is in the real estate business. They buy buildings, land, and work out mortgages, and then leave the actual selling of burgers and fries to independent businesses.
I remember seeing on Buick's this little badge on the driver's door about how the frame was built by some other company. It had logo of an old style horse carriage and a established date that indicated that it in fact built horse carriages long ago.
Tesla does much of the same, or did. They buy a lot of parts from a lot of different people, and assemble them into a car. The batteries are made by a subsidiary. I doubt they make the tires. They make the frames now but they didn't always. Had the government not stepped in then Tesla would likely had bought some of those failing GM factories, then fixed them up to make electric cars.
What we got was a big fat bail-out in loans, and then another less obvious bail-out in "cash for clunkers". Keep the government from propping up these dinosaurs of industry. Being "too big to fail" means being too big to succeed. We should have let them fail, it would have been a rough ride for a while but we'd come out better on the other side. Such as getting car makers that know how to make cars again.
I'm reminded of a wise bit from an old soldier, "A GPS unit with a bullet hole in it is junk. A map with a bullet hole in it is still a map."
When you have a lot of fancy equipment on board that require complex procedures to operate you want that stuff written down, often in a place highly visible, quickly accessible, and in a way that is not likely to be obliterated.
Paper is cheap, reasonably durable, and so small and light that a lot of information can be placed upon it. You keep your mission logs, light reading, and other high volume and low priority data on electronic devices. The mission critical stuff is on paper, likely on multiple copies of paper.
Batteries are only needed if you want to store energy in electric form.
Also, not all types of batteries need rare earth minerals.
I won't dispute either claim. I will say that if someone what's an electric vehicle, where the batteries need to be light, small, energy dense, and inexpensive, then it's going to take some materials that are rare. Maybe not technically rare earth elements, but elements that are less common than perhaps aluminum and iron.
The only reason we are discussing the storage of energy is because we have some strange desire to run our cars on sunlight. Let's run our cars on petroleum, natural gas, or synthetic fuel. When and where solar makes sense use it. Don't store the solar energy, just use it so the energy store we have, like tanks of natural gas, hydro dams, and piles of coal, need not be burned. We "store" the solar energy in the stores of energy we didn't use while the sun shined.
Selective enforcement just means picking out the worst offenders for punishment. That's still a mockery of the law, as evidenced by my interstate commutes. The posted speed limit is 70 but unless you are going 75-80 you will be passed by other travelers regularly. The law is not the law at that point. Either post a reasonable speed limit, and enforce it rigorously, or allow the mockery of law to continue.
That applies to all laws. If the federal government wants to claim that marijuana possession is a felony then it needs to be enforced. Not enforcing the law on marijuana possession but enforcing it on other drugs starts to put in the minds of people the idea that maybe possessing heroin and MDMA aren't so bad after all. But then maybe that's the point. I think that there are a lot of people that have grown tired of enforcing laws that only produce revenue, as opposed to enforcing laws that keep the peace.
We used to have "peace officers" but now we have "law enforcement officers". I want my peace officers back.
If a solar panel will pay for itself fairly fast, that means it generates a lot more electricity than was used in its manufacture.
I don't dispute that. Now, go look at what it would take to get 24/7 power from an energy source that produces power for something like 6 to 8 hours per day. That means very large batteries. If one is lucky enough to have access to climate and geography suitable for pumped hydro storage then, congratulations, you just might be able to get your 24/7 electricity with low CO2 and low cost.
One problem I foresee is that the best places for a dam will also get a lot of rain. Rain clouds and solar panels don't go well together.
I emphasized "solar with storage" because without storage solar is next to worthless. A community cannot maintain a modern society with unreliable power. Of the few places where I saw an honest analysis of solar with storage the price was just sky high and the carbon footprint not much better than the far cheaper natural gas.
Again, the carbon footprint of the storage depends on the source of the energy to make the storage. If we have access to reliable low carbon energy, at a price cheap enough to make these batteries worth making, then what do we need solar energy for? At that point we solved the problem without solar collectors.
Unless solar power is considerably cheaper than anything else, and it's not, then there is no economic incentive to use it. In places like Hawaii, where solar is competing with electricity from expensive oil it makes sense, but that's an island without access to cheap coal. The part where solar meets storage is the large tanks of oil, they are "storing" solar energy by not burning the oil.
Lot's of things. They are both expensive, unreliable, and take a lot of land area. Sure, they might be able to cover rooftops with solar panels, and put windmills out in the sea, but that adds to the cost.
A common suggestion to the unreliability problem is spreading out the wind and solar over an area, including underwater cables to friendly nations if that's what it takes. Go look at a map, and read the newspapers, do you see any friendly nations nearby that Japan would want to rely upon for it's energy?
Another suggestion is energy storage. Again this adds to the cost. Pumped hydro storage is quite common as it requires technology that's been proven for at least 100 years. Japan has mountains, but they also have a history of devastating dam breaks from earthquakes. Batteries are very expensive, and have not yet been shown to be economically viable.
What's wrong with wind and solar just boils down to it costing much more than coal, nuclear, or natural gas.
The major issue with seabed methane hydrates is that in the course of mining and production most profitably, much methane will be leaked.
They addressed that in the article. The mining is deep enough that most leakage gets dissolved in the water and consumed by bacteria. There's a reason why it's called "natural" gas, it's a common biological product and there are lots of bacteria that eat it up. They have an economic incentive to reduce leakage, that fuel is worth money. Saying it would be profitable to allow leakage doesn't make sense.
The best way to end a bad law is strict enforcement. If not enforced, like say a speeding limit, then people learn that there is no punishment for breaking the law. If caught then you get people that are indignant on being picked out from the crowd. If the police stop everyone that speeds, then you run the risk of a bunch of angry citizens at the next town hall meeting complaining about the stupid speed limit.
If you want revenue from speeding then you have to enforce it. If enforced consistently then people will obey the limit to avoid the fine, or lobby for a more reasonable speed limit. That goes for all laws. A law cannot exist for the goal of people breaking it for revenue. That breeds contempt for the law as people learn it's true purpose. Paying a fine to make the police go away is just one small step from bribery.
So, you do want all laws obeyed. If some laws are "more equal than others" then you don't have laws any more, you have a rule by men and not by law. I seem to recall some very smart people warning us of a rule by men and the need for law.
Pretty sure they figured out that they should burn it if they can get it. The alternatives are to keep importing coal or build new nuclear. Also, it's not like this is an all or nothing choice here, they can mine this clathrate while also building new nuclear. Importing coal is very hard on their economy, and probably not all that helpful to their air quality.
In the article it looks like they are running into some very real engineering problems in collecting this gas. There is still the question on if they can get the gas in a way that is safe and profitable. If they get that figured out then that will relieve some of the economic burden they have now of importing coal and their aging nuclear power plant fleet.
They are quite likely not using wave power because it's really hard to do. Assuming one is able to find a place with a sufficiently strong and consistent wave action there is still the problem of making turbines that can hold up to constant abrasion of water flows with sand suspended in it. The sand just scours the turbines away, like a sandblaster.
The whole area is part of what's called the Ring of Fire, lots of seismic activity there. They could spend a lot of money trying to build this thing under water to only see it crushed from an underwater landslide. There's lot's of smart people on those islands, and they are pretty desperate for energy, so if they aren't doing it now then I suspect it's because they already considered it unfeasible.
Someone falling into a water tank, or getting buried in gravel, are industrial accidents. They were doing cleanup from damage after an earthquake and tsunami. Things like that happen at any power plant or other industrial site, had it been a coal plant or wind farm we'd still see things like that happen.
The diagnosis of leukemia is not a death, the guy is still alive. He's also got risk factors for leukemia, such as being male, over 40, and of Asian ancestry. No doubt working at a nuclear power plant is a risk factor. Did he smoke? To see this as anything more than an industrial accident means seeing statistically significant radiation caused illnesses. Is this one diagnosis significant? I mean the guy worked at a nuclear power plant, and I assume he did so for years, so it looks like even if this was caused by radiation the threats it poses is contained to the site.
If people want to keep the lights on, shutdown those dangerous aging nuclear power plants, and not end up importing gobs of coal, then Japan needs NEW nuclear power plants. They have about 50 plants, and only 4 or so of the newest ones are currently operating. Start with the oldest of them, tear it down, and put a new one in it's place. Make sure it's got a proper wave wall, seismic SCRAM systems, and can be passively cooled in the event of a catastrophic power loss. In other words, don't repeat the mistakes from Fukushima.
If they can't have coal, or mine this clathrate, or build new nuclear, then it's lights out. It's a tiny island nation with a lot of people, they simply cannot rely on wind, sun, and water for their energy. I suggest building new nuclear.
It's when a bunch of top level managers get together only to end up assimilated into the collective. A Borg-board, or Bord.
Thankfully the lack of mental power means that even with a collective mind there's not enough mental capacity for the super-organism to live long. If you find yourself attacked by a Bord then give it a logic puzzle that will overwhelm it. Most any shampoo bottle will do. The organism will get stuck in a "Lather. Rinse. Repeat." loop and stop the attack. This will also speed it's inevitable death as it starves from a lack of knowing when to stop for food.
Ah, I see my favorite forum stalker is back. Still using insults, bad typing/spelling, and no citations, in his posts.
Tell me something, what is the carbon footprint of solar with storage? I lost my references so I sadly cannot provide my citations until I find them again. If solar with storage does in fact have a lower carbon footprint than natural gas then you have something to refute my claim, no?
Care to explain which law of ohysics or chemistry causes that?
It's more than just "ohysics" and chemistry but we'll start there. Making solar collectors and batteries takes a lot of energy, not much way around that, and currently that means burning a lot of coal to get that energy. Perhaps in the future we will have an energy infrastructure in the future that does not release so much CO2 to make the solar collectors and batteries but until then this means solar with storage has the carbon footprint of natural gas. One way to lower CO2 for making batteries right now is to use natural gas, because if we only cut CO2 output in half then at least we can save on money. Another is to use nuclear power, even with the need for natural gas for peak loads it's better than solar with storage on CO2 output and cost. Lastly we can spend piles of money on building solar with storage in the hope prices come down and someday, perhaps decades later, we have enough solar and storage that we hit a tipping point where we are actually lowering our CO2 output.
This "law" that keeps solar with storage from saving on CO2 is economics. If we have batteries that are cheap enough to use on a grid scale then the utilities aren't going to use expensive solar to charge them up, they are going to use cheap and reliable coal, nuclear, and natural gas. If there is savings on CO2 from solar with storage then the savings comes from the storage, not the solar. Running natural gas boilers uses 1/3 to 1/2 of the fuel for the same energy output as turbines. We'd save on costs and CO2 by combining natural gas with storage. Using coal with storage means getting to use real cheap coal and still being able to load follow with the storage, no expensive turbines needed. Coal with storage might not save on CO2 output but electricity would get real cheap. Combining nuclear with storage means CO2 output lower than solar, costs lower than solar, and no reliance on expensive CO2 spewing natural gas turbines either. Add some cheap wind anywhere in this and prices stay low because wind is cheap so long as people choose their locations wisely, and CO2 will still be low.
The CO2 footprint of the storage is all based on the source of the energy to make it. It's a bit of a catch-22. We can't use solar to make batteries with a low CO2 output because without low CO2 batteries solar is just a proxy for cheap natural gas and coal, meaning it's not "carbon free" in the least. If we use nuclear to make those batteries then solar not only looks redundant, since there's no cost or CO2 savings on throttling nuclear down when the sun shines, but once the batteries are made, which are required to make solar reliable, then you have batteries to allow nuclear to load follow.
If we could just leap into solar with storage then it might, maybe, perhaps, make sense economically and in reducing CO2 but to get there means transitioning to nuclear or natural gas. Once that infrastructure of natural gas, nuclear, and batteries exist then solar power offers nothing.
Maybe if solar got real cheap, and I mean something like 1/3 the price of nuclear and natural gas, then solar with storage might make sense. But solar is not 1/3 the price of nuclear and natural gas. It's more like double or triple.
I've been to a hospital where all the keyboards have some kind of ID card slot on them. I'll see staff sit down, presumably type in a password, and get their screen. If the keyboard is smart enough, and a matching driver written, then the communication on the USB wire can be encrypted with a key in the ID card. At a minimum the systems on the university could be configured to not allow login without that ID card. I assume that there would have to be a backup plan for cases of broken hardware, lost ID card, and such so that it doesn't keep instructors completely out for the lecture. Maybe have to call the IT desk to ask for an override. Do they still put telephones in lecture halls, or will the instructors not have to be so absent minded to not lose their ID and cell phone at the same time?
Epoxy would work to keep out a lot of tampering but I'd think one of those locking equipment boxes would be much less costly in the long run. Computers with epoxy on the USB ports would have no resale value, and would be difficult to repair in many cases.
and when it get's to hot and the door needs to be open all the time?
Use a screened door, add a ventilation fan, etc. I did IT support for a prison and I got to see how they locked down the systems to keep the prisoners (and some of the staff) from messing with the hardware. There are standard electronics cases that were nice looking, very solid, and easy to lock/unlock on three or four sides for access. Most have screened sides for airflow, and all of them have the option for ventilation fans. This university is a state facility and so, like the software issues, have access to cheap skilled labor to fabricate their own. I assume this cheap labor includes those prisoners working in the welding shop, likely right next to where they stamp out the license plates. My brother in law got to see the inside of some similar prison workshops to the ones I saw, this seems pretty common state to state.
Also, I've seen computers used in typical university classrooms, they aren't that big. The podium is typically a box that's something like 4' H x 2' W x 2' D. Even a large tower from ages ago could be put in there and keep cool with not much more than a air slot at top and bottom for convection. Now the computers are smaller than a typical chemistry text, consumes something like 70 watts, and still packs a quad core 64-bit 3 GHz processor.
I'd be more concerned about them using a crappy lock that can be opened with a pen cap and a paperclip. Or, more likely, leaving them unlocked because some old professor wants to keep using the lectures from decades ago he has on a CD-R disc and demands that the door remain unlocked so he has access to the optical drive and doesn't have to bother with remembering where his personal files exist on the network.
I've seen many lecture halls with the A/V equipment nicely laid out in a 19 inch rack on the wall, on the podium will be a fancy touch screen control for lights, lowering the projector screen, controlling the window blinds, selecting the video source, etc. These things had to cost a lot of money to buy and install. But the computer will look like it was vomited on the podium, where nothing is laid out right, nothing secured, and often times buggy as hell. I can only assume this place did the same. Perhaps not as bad but given the ease with which they were "hacked" there was little thought to physical security of the PC.
Slashdot Mirror
It was blatantly obvious what technology you were stumping for with your lies.
Where is my "lie" in my statement of the question? Do you not agree that coal is the dominant energy source we use now and therefore any alternative should be "better" on every measure to compete? Would you not agree that along with being cheaper, "greener", and as (or more) reliable that safety should be considered? I mean beating coal on every measure is a pretty low bar, really, safety especially.
BTW, I didn't mean to give the same link twice on the "deathprint" citation. The second one was supposed to be from Forbes.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/j...
Once we clear the coal bar, then what's next? Wind and solar are being brought up all the time as replacements. Would it not be wise to take a look and make sure that they are wise choices before jumping in with both feet? Most everyone will consider price, CO2 output, and reliability when evaluating energy but few will count the death toll of using these energy sources. If all else is equal then why would we not choose the safest energy? Even if the lives saved is a very small fraction that is something I'd think should come into play, perhaps even if there is a small cost in the other metrics. After all I thought the goal here was to save lives.
If the question is about what to do about the impending collapse of the environment, where everyone dies, and the solution does not include nuclear power then I have to question the sanity of the people that dismiss nuclear power so quickly. If they fear nuclear power more than the extinction of humanity then they have a seriously skewed set of priorities, or are so ignorant of the safety record of nuclear power that they believe widespread use of nuclear power will lead to an extinction level event.
If we are going to discuss "lies" then I'd like to point out the lies of solar being "green". While it is certainly better than coal an honest analysis will often show it's not all that better than natural gas. If used with care and advanced technology I can expect to see natural gas beat out solar in many ways, especially in less than sunny locations like where I live. Solar when compared to wind and hydro just loses miserably in most every case. Sure, solar works great out in space but here on planet Earth solar is not all it's claimed to be. Solar even loses out in most cases to biomass, geothermal, and again natural gas. Solar should not be the first pick, or second, or even third, but the last.
An excellent analysis, thank you.
I will say that you're conclusion of natural gas combined cycle leaves out the ability to meet peak power demands, which is most often met with natural gas turbines. If we widen that out to simply "natural gas" then I'd think we met all goals and even some stretch goals, as natural gas is suitable for transportation. While natural gas might not be great for aircraft it is still a great fuel for trains, cars, watercraft, and even rockets to space.
Your complaints on hydro and nuclear are mostly political. While the laws of physics cannot be changed the laws of the land are always open to debate. We can continue to debate the merits of nuclear and hydro in the hopes we will be able to get more access to them as well. In the mean time moving to natural gas is wise, either as a transition to whatever comes next or as the end point.
Saying "safer than wind" or "safer than solar" is "trolling".
Perhaps. By the way the answer is "nuclear fission".
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/...
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/...
If taken as a global average, where Chernobyl and Fukushima are included then hydroelectric wins on the "deathprint" metric. Since I assume we've learned out lessons from both, and are not letting engineers from Soviet Russia do the building, then nuclear comes out on top.
Here's an article from GreenPeace that does a different analysis claiming to be more "honest" but still shows nuclear as safe or safer than wind. http://www.greenpeace.org/inte...
The costs metric shows nuclear, natural gas, and geothermal as cheapest. We might want to rule out natural gas on "deathprint" and "carbon footprint". Geothermal is great unless you don't have a place to drill for geothermal. That leaves nuclear.
https://www.instituteforenergy...
Another cost analysis shows nuclear cheaper than only coal and solar thermal. Which doesn't help nuclear here but people want reliable power, and so long as it's cheaper than coal I suspect they'd choose that.
http://www.renewable-energysou...
Finding a source on energy reliability with a quick Google search was proving to be more difficult than I thought. The best I could find was that same link above on costs where it listed capacity factors.
https://www.instituteforenergy...
This use of capacity factor to measure reliability is likely pretty fair for wind, solar, geothermal, nuclear, coal, many forms of natural gas, and biomass, since these are the kinds of energy a utility is going to want to keep up as much as possible for reasons of costs, legal requirements, and such. However this metric really takes a dump on hydro and natural gas turbines since those are kept in reserve to meet peak demands, they are in fact very reliable and that's why they are kept in reserve. With that said, the top of the list includes nuclear and geothermal with capacity factors at 90% or higher. If we account for the peak power technologies of hydro and natural gas turbines we can include those as well.
Let's end with an analysis on carbon footprint, since most people already suspect that fossil fuels lose out big, but let's just take a look at an aggregated "meta-study".
http://www.world-nuclear.org/u...
Nuclear, wind, and hydro are effectively tied. PV has more than triple the carbon footprint, but still far better than natural gas. Natural gas being half that of coal might just make it a not so bad choice given it's price, not bad "deathprint", local availability, and reliability.
Best I can tell we have at the top of the list nuclear and maybe natural gas if one considers halving carbon footprint from coal as "good enough". Wind, hydro, and geothermal might beat them out if one has them available nearby. Solar, PV and thermal, are not that great and should be left to off grid situations. Putting solar on the grid only adds to the cost, reduces reliability, and isn't that great on carbon footprint or "deathprint" compared to wind or hydro.
Okay, enough already! I got it. We are all doomed unless we lower our carbon footprint and the reason for out carbon footprint is the burning of coal, petroleum oil, and natural gas.
We'll we can't just turn everything off, that's just asking for death. We can scale back our energy consumption in some ways. We got our LED lights, low flo toilets, four cylinder aluminum cars running on ethanol (which is alcohol abuse in my mind), we got public busing running on natural gas (better than diesel but not best), electric trains, planes(?), and automobiles. Our houses have triple panes and double insulation and not a single pet, heat pump HVAC, and wood burning furnaces. And we are recycling, reducing, and redoing, or something like that. But that's just nibbling about the edges really.
To kill the big beast that is coal and oil we need a rethink. We should look at the goals here:
- Provides heat, light, electricity
- Cheap as coal
- safe as coal
- greener than coal, at a minimum, greener than natural gas is great, but getting as close to zero CO2 is best
- as reliable as coal
- domestically sourced
- domestically built, operated, and maintained
- available today
- did I miss something?
Stretch goals (goals we can strive for beyond having met the main goals):
- provides transportation (including to Earth orbit and beyond)
- Cheaper than coal
- Cheaper than natural gas
- Cheaper than wind
- Cheaper than solar
- even more reliable
- safer that coal
- safer than wind
- not just domestic but locally sourced
- did I miss something?
What energy source can meet the most of these points? I know of a few options but I'd like to hear others come up with answers and we can discuss. We hear the term "all the above" when these questions are asked so give me some all the above solutions for the all the above requirements.
Again: which laws of physics or laws of chemistry force me to produce solar cells, batteries, transport them, interconnect them, with a CO2 producing energy source?
I answered your question, nothing. Nothing prevents you from producing solar cells, batteries, etc., from a CO2 neutral energy source. That source of energy currently exists, nuclear fission.
With that out of the way, economics will make it pointless to actually go through the effort of making those solar cells and batteries. Solar cells are currently very expensive considering how much energy they can produce, then adding the storage needed to make that solar energy last through the night will make it even more expensive, meaning solar with storage will be much more expensive than any other power source available to us right now.
If you want to claim that solar cells will get cheaper and more efficient in the future then that's fine. As it is right now though solar with storage is expensive and has a carbon footprint no better than natural gas. If we wish to reduce our carbon footprint today, and not see our energy prices rise, then we need a mix of nuclear, natural gas, and where appropriate wind, hydro, geothermal. Solar being as expensive as it is, and being reliant on storage or fossil fuels to last through the night, there is no profit or CO2 savings from putting solar power on the grid.
Hah! I got by with only $140M for the cartridge and the shipping was FREE! Take that NASA!
Sure, all commonly used cements used in concrete will absorb CO2 over time. Perhaps I misunderstood the original claim but the implication I got was that it absorbed more than that was used to create it. The lime in cement will slowly turn to limestone as it absorbs CO2 from the air, but this will be no more CO2 than what was cooked out of it after being mined from limestone.
If people want to get CO2 negative cement that's actually affordable then they should to do as that professor proposed, use nuclear power and mine basalt for its lime content.
On top of that, there is a class of concrete that actually ABSORBS CO2 of its surroundings.
Yes, there is such a concrete. It is very expensive and no one would ever consider using it in a large project. It will come up once in a while as a show house where people want to demonstrate a "green" future construction. They often look very posh, will claim having a very small (or even negative) carbon footprint, but very little will be said about how much it costs or if there is any study on the building meeting the CO2 output claims.
I had a conversation with a professor that was studying a way to absorb CO2 from the air by mining basalt and spreading it out over cropland. The claim was the the lime content in the basalt would be a nutrient for the crops and bind with CO2 in the soil. I asked if this would also be a good replacement for current sources of lime used in cement, he said it would. However, the energy requirements of mining this basalt would be much higher than current lime. Current lime is made by mining the much softer limestone (still a hard rock but easier to mine than the granite-like basalt) and "cooking" the limestone in furnaces to drive off the CO2 in the mineral, creating lime. For the mining of basalt to make sense we'd need an energy source that is quite energy dense, works day and night (because once a mine opens they want to keep going), is obviously low in CO2 output, and is cheap enough that it can compete with current lime production. What could that be?
These CO2 absorbing cements are typically made with naturally weathered basalt "sand". This is not very common as the lime will wash out over time if there is any rain. It is very dense so it's not going to be cheap to ship anywhere. As such this lime rich sand exists in just a few desert valleys in the USA. I'm sure it can be found in many other places in the world but the only sources of this in the USA are out in the Rocky Mountains. The basalt rock though is everywhere, it's probably under your feet right now, wherever you are reading this. More accessible outcroppings are quite common.
But if you suddenly make everything out of wood, what's to stop the fire from spreading everywhere?
First, as stated in the article the wood panels are engineered lumber that is very thick. There is very little surface area to the wood used, compared to like what people use in a fireplace or backyard bonfire, so the wood will not burn quickly if the char layer that develops doesn't stop the fire completely.
Second, most every building code I've seen will require a fire resistant layer around structural components. In most houses this is done with sheets of drywall over the wood studs in the wall. Typically 1/2 inch on walls and thicker on ceilings.
My brother was an architect and I remember the topic of the fire rating of doors coming up. Wood doors are actually quite durable in a fire, and those certified as a fire rated door will have a little metal badge on it giving it's fire rating. The goal of a fire rating is not necessarily the survival of the building but the survival of the occupants. So long as the building holds up long enough for people to get out in a fire then it's considered safe for people. A quick Google search tells me a wood fire door will be fire rated for 20 minutes, I assume the thick wood floors that they are using will hold up for much longer.
Remember, these fire ratings are tests under direct exposure to a fire before the door is not considered a barrier to the spread of fire. It's not like the whole building will come down 20 minutes after a fire starts. If a building is large enough, or contains flammable materials, then it's likely to have sprinklers.
In other words, I think they have this figured out.
I recall a prominent global warming alarmist getting kicked out of the group he was in because he advocated the using of wood as a building material, since using wood in this way is an effective carbon sink.
Using wood as a building material only causes deforestation if people don't plant new trees in their place. No one does that since it's not only bad for business, they'd run out of trees, but it's illegal in any place I can think of. If there is a place in the world that allows for clear cutting of trees and not planting new trees in that space then I'll show you a place that lacks any real government.
Using wood for buildings is good for the environment. If you believe that steel and concrete is better then I'll ask you to show me your math. If you believe that we just shouldn't be building new structures then I'll ask you to show me your age. Saying we shouldn't need new office buildings and homes is something that I'd think would come from a child or someone suffering from senility.
If someone knows who that was that advocated using wood as a building material as a carbon sink, and got shunned for it, then I'd appreciate a reply on who that is.
.. because unlike Tesla they can actually build cars. Lots of them.
I seem to recall when some of the big American auto makers were in trouble that Tesla was just waiting for some factories to get sold off so that they could buy them up, and hire all or most of the people that used to work there. Instead they when to Uncle Sam and got a sweet "loan" to keep them afloat. The companies can't build cars. Much of their revenue, last I checked, was in loans for car buyers. Most of their expenses are in the sweet health care deals they make for their workers.
The likes of GM and Chrysler-Dodge-whatever-they-are-hyph-en-ated-with-now aren't car makers any more, they are banks. They buy and sell car loans, buy and sell commodities like steel and rubber, buy and sell stock in auto part suppliers, and underwrite health insurance plans. It's kind of like how McDonald's is in the real estate business. They buy buildings, land, and work out mortgages, and then leave the actual selling of burgers and fries to independent businesses.
I remember seeing on Buick's this little badge on the driver's door about how the frame was built by some other company. It had logo of an old style horse carriage and a established date that indicated that it in fact built horse carriages long ago.
Tesla does much of the same, or did. They buy a lot of parts from a lot of different people, and assemble them into a car. The batteries are made by a subsidiary. I doubt they make the tires. They make the frames now but they didn't always. Had the government not stepped in then Tesla would likely had bought some of those failing GM factories, then fixed them up to make electric cars.
What we got was a big fat bail-out in loans, and then another less obvious bail-out in "cash for clunkers". Keep the government from propping up these dinosaurs of industry. Being "too big to fail" means being too big to succeed. We should have let them fail, it would have been a rough ride for a while but we'd come out better on the other side. Such as getting car makers that know how to make cars again.
I'm reminded of a wise bit from an old soldier, "A GPS unit with a bullet hole in it is junk. A map with a bullet hole in it is still a map."
When you have a lot of fancy equipment on board that require complex procedures to operate you want that stuff written down, often in a place highly visible, quickly accessible, and in a way that is not likely to be obliterated.
Paper is cheap, reasonably durable, and so small and light that a lot of information can be placed upon it. You keep your mission logs, light reading, and other high volume and low priority data on electronic devices. The mission critical stuff is on paper, likely on multiple copies of paper.
Who prints photos anymore?
Wow, you must be lonely.
That's great to use that kind of fusion power but it has a nasty habit of "going down for maintenance" every day.
If you can figure out how to keep that energy flowing 24/7 then you might have an argument. Otherwise it's more of a novelty.
Batteries are only needed if you want to store energy in electric form.
Also, not all types of batteries need rare earth minerals.
I won't dispute either claim. I will say that if someone what's an electric vehicle, where the batteries need to be light, small, energy dense, and inexpensive, then it's going to take some materials that are rare. Maybe not technically rare earth elements, but elements that are less common than perhaps aluminum and iron.
The only reason we are discussing the storage of energy is because we have some strange desire to run our cars on sunlight. Let's run our cars on petroleum, natural gas, or synthetic fuel. When and where solar makes sense use it. Don't store the solar energy, just use it so the energy store we have, like tanks of natural gas, hydro dams, and piles of coal, need not be burned. We "store" the solar energy in the stores of energy we didn't use while the sun shined.
Selective enforcement just means picking out the worst offenders for punishment. That's still a mockery of the law, as evidenced by my interstate commutes. The posted speed limit is 70 but unless you are going 75-80 you will be passed by other travelers regularly. The law is not the law at that point. Either post a reasonable speed limit, and enforce it rigorously, or allow the mockery of law to continue.
That applies to all laws. If the federal government wants to claim that marijuana possession is a felony then it needs to be enforced. Not enforcing the law on marijuana possession but enforcing it on other drugs starts to put in the minds of people the idea that maybe possessing heroin and MDMA aren't so bad after all. But then maybe that's the point. I think that there are a lot of people that have grown tired of enforcing laws that only produce revenue, as opposed to enforcing laws that keep the peace.
We used to have "peace officers" but now we have "law enforcement officers". I want my peace officers back.
If a solar panel will pay for itself fairly fast, that means it generates a lot more electricity than was used in its manufacture.
I don't dispute that. Now, go look at what it would take to get 24/7 power from an energy source that produces power for something like 6 to 8 hours per day. That means very large batteries. If one is lucky enough to have access to climate and geography suitable for pumped hydro storage then, congratulations, you just might be able to get your 24/7 electricity with low CO2 and low cost.
One problem I foresee is that the best places for a dam will also get a lot of rain. Rain clouds and solar panels don't go well together.
I emphasized "solar with storage" because without storage solar is next to worthless. A community cannot maintain a modern society with unreliable power. Of the few places where I saw an honest analysis of solar with storage the price was just sky high and the carbon footprint not much better than the far cheaper natural gas.
Again, the carbon footprint of the storage depends on the source of the energy to make the storage. If we have access to reliable low carbon energy, at a price cheap enough to make these batteries worth making, then what do we need solar energy for? At that point we solved the problem without solar collectors.
Unless solar power is considerably cheaper than anything else, and it's not, then there is no economic incentive to use it. In places like Hawaii, where solar is competing with electricity from expensive oil it makes sense, but that's an island without access to cheap coal. The part where solar meets storage is the large tanks of oil, they are "storing" solar energy by not burning the oil.
What's wrong with wind and solar?
Lot's of things. They are both expensive, unreliable, and take a lot of land area. Sure, they might be able to cover rooftops with solar panels, and put windmills out in the sea, but that adds to the cost.
A common suggestion to the unreliability problem is spreading out the wind and solar over an area, including underwater cables to friendly nations if that's what it takes. Go look at a map, and read the newspapers, do you see any friendly nations nearby that Japan would want to rely upon for it's energy?
Another suggestion is energy storage. Again this adds to the cost. Pumped hydro storage is quite common as it requires technology that's been proven for at least 100 years. Japan has mountains, but they also have a history of devastating dam breaks from earthquakes. Batteries are very expensive, and have not yet been shown to be economically viable.
What's wrong with wind and solar just boils down to it costing much more than coal, nuclear, or natural gas.
The major issue with seabed methane hydrates is that in the course of mining and production most profitably, much methane will be leaked.
They addressed that in the article. The mining is deep enough that most leakage gets dissolved in the water and consumed by bacteria. There's a reason why it's called "natural" gas, it's a common biological product and there are lots of bacteria that eat it up. They have an economic incentive to reduce leakage, that fuel is worth money. Saying it would be profitable to allow leakage doesn't make sense.
The best way to end a bad law is strict enforcement. If not enforced, like say a speeding limit, then people learn that there is no punishment for breaking the law. If caught then you get people that are indignant on being picked out from the crowd. If the police stop everyone that speeds, then you run the risk of a bunch of angry citizens at the next town hall meeting complaining about the stupid speed limit.
If you want revenue from speeding then you have to enforce it. If enforced consistently then people will obey the limit to avoid the fine, or lobby for a more reasonable speed limit. That goes for all laws. A law cannot exist for the goal of people breaking it for revenue. That breeds contempt for the law as people learn it's true purpose. Paying a fine to make the police go away is just one small step from bribery.
So, you do want all laws obeyed. If some laws are "more equal than others" then you don't have laws any more, you have a rule by men and not by law. I seem to recall some very smart people warning us of a rule by men and the need for law.
Pretty sure they figured out that they should burn it if they can get it. The alternatives are to keep importing coal or build new nuclear. Also, it's not like this is an all or nothing choice here, they can mine this clathrate while also building new nuclear. Importing coal is very hard on their economy, and probably not all that helpful to their air quality.
In the article it looks like they are running into some very real engineering problems in collecting this gas. There is still the question on if they can get the gas in a way that is safe and profitable. If they get that figured out then that will relieve some of the economic burden they have now of importing coal and their aging nuclear power plant fleet.
Japan should be burning this flammable ice.
They are quite likely not using wave power because it's really hard to do. Assuming one is able to find a place with a sufficiently strong and consistent wave action there is still the problem of making turbines that can hold up to constant abrasion of water flows with sand suspended in it. The sand just scours the turbines away, like a sandblaster.
The whole area is part of what's called the Ring of Fire, lots of seismic activity there. They could spend a lot of money trying to build this thing under water to only see it crushed from an underwater landslide. There's lot's of smart people on those islands, and they are pretty desperate for energy, so if they aren't doing it now then I suspect it's because they already considered it unfeasible.
Someone falling into a water tank, or getting buried in gravel, are industrial accidents. They were doing cleanup from damage after an earthquake and tsunami. Things like that happen at any power plant or other industrial site, had it been a coal plant or wind farm we'd still see things like that happen.
The diagnosis of leukemia is not a death, the guy is still alive. He's also got risk factors for leukemia, such as being male, over 40, and of Asian ancestry. No doubt working at a nuclear power plant is a risk factor. Did he smoke? To see this as anything more than an industrial accident means seeing statistically significant radiation caused illnesses. Is this one diagnosis significant? I mean the guy worked at a nuclear power plant, and I assume he did so for years, so it looks like even if this was caused by radiation the threats it poses is contained to the site.
If people want to keep the lights on, shutdown those dangerous aging nuclear power plants, and not end up importing gobs of coal, then Japan needs NEW nuclear power plants. They have about 50 plants, and only 4 or so of the newest ones are currently operating. Start with the oldest of them, tear it down, and put a new one in it's place. Make sure it's got a proper wave wall, seismic SCRAM systems, and can be passively cooled in the event of a catastrophic power loss. In other words, don't repeat the mistakes from Fukushima.
If they can't have coal, or mine this clathrate, or build new nuclear, then it's lights out. It's a tiny island nation with a lot of people, they simply cannot rely on wind, sun, and water for their energy. I suggest building new nuclear.
What is a Bord?
It's when a bunch of top level managers get together only to end up assimilated into the collective. A Borg-board, or Bord.
Thankfully the lack of mental power means that even with a collective mind there's not enough mental capacity for the super-organism to live long. If you find yourself attacked by a Bord then give it a logic puzzle that will overwhelm it. Most any shampoo bottle will do. The organism will get stuck in a "Lather. Rinse. Repeat." loop and stop the attack. This will also speed it's inevitable death as it starves from a lack of knowing when to stop for food.
How can you be such an idiot? It is beyon me!
Ah, I see my favorite forum stalker is back. Still using insults, bad typing/spelling, and no citations, in his posts.
Tell me something, what is the carbon footprint of solar with storage? I lost my references so I sadly cannot provide my citations until I find them again. If solar with storage does in fact have a lower carbon footprint than natural gas then you have something to refute my claim, no?
Care to explain which law of ohysics or chemistry causes that?
It's more than just "ohysics" and chemistry but we'll start there. Making solar collectors and batteries takes a lot of energy, not much way around that, and currently that means burning a lot of coal to get that energy. Perhaps in the future we will have an energy infrastructure in the future that does not release so much CO2 to make the solar collectors and batteries but until then this means solar with storage has the carbon footprint of natural gas. One way to lower CO2 for making batteries right now is to use natural gas, because if we only cut CO2 output in half then at least we can save on money. Another is to use nuclear power, even with the need for natural gas for peak loads it's better than solar with storage on CO2 output and cost. Lastly we can spend piles of money on building solar with storage in the hope prices come down and someday, perhaps decades later, we have enough solar and storage that we hit a tipping point where we are actually lowering our CO2 output.
This "law" that keeps solar with storage from saving on CO2 is economics. If we have batteries that are cheap enough to use on a grid scale then the utilities aren't going to use expensive solar to charge them up, they are going to use cheap and reliable coal, nuclear, and natural gas. If there is savings on CO2 from solar with storage then the savings comes from the storage, not the solar. Running natural gas boilers uses 1/3 to 1/2 of the fuel for the same energy output as turbines. We'd save on costs and CO2 by combining natural gas with storage. Using coal with storage means getting to use real cheap coal and still being able to load follow with the storage, no expensive turbines needed. Coal with storage might not save on CO2 output but electricity would get real cheap. Combining nuclear with storage means CO2 output lower than solar, costs lower than solar, and no reliance on expensive CO2 spewing natural gas turbines either. Add some cheap wind anywhere in this and prices stay low because wind is cheap so long as people choose their locations wisely, and CO2 will still be low.
The CO2 footprint of the storage is all based on the source of the energy to make it. It's a bit of a catch-22. We can't use solar to make batteries with a low CO2 output because without low CO2 batteries solar is just a proxy for cheap natural gas and coal, meaning it's not "carbon free" in the least. If we use nuclear to make those batteries then solar not only looks redundant, since there's no cost or CO2 savings on throttling nuclear down when the sun shines, but once the batteries are made, which are required to make solar reliable, then you have batteries to allow nuclear to load follow.
If we could just leap into solar with storage then it might, maybe, perhaps, make sense economically and in reducing CO2 but to get there means transitioning to nuclear or natural gas. Once that infrastructure of natural gas, nuclear, and batteries exist then solar power offers nothing.
Maybe if solar got real cheap, and I mean something like 1/3 the price of nuclear and natural gas, then solar with storage might make sense. But solar is not 1/3 the price of nuclear and natural gas. It's more like double or triple.
I've been to a hospital where all the keyboards have some kind of ID card slot on them. I'll see staff sit down, presumably type in a password, and get their screen. If the keyboard is smart enough, and a matching driver written, then the communication on the USB wire can be encrypted with a key in the ID card. At a minimum the systems on the university could be configured to not allow login without that ID card. I assume that there would have to be a backup plan for cases of broken hardware, lost ID card, and such so that it doesn't keep instructors completely out for the lecture. Maybe have to call the IT desk to ask for an override. Do they still put telephones in lecture halls, or will the instructors not have to be so absent minded to not lose their ID and cell phone at the same time?
Epoxy would work to keep out a lot of tampering but I'd think one of those locking equipment boxes would be much less costly in the long run. Computers with epoxy on the USB ports would have no resale value, and would be difficult to repair in many cases.
and when it get's to hot and the door needs to be open all the time?
Use a screened door, add a ventilation fan, etc. I did IT support for a prison and I got to see how they locked down the systems to keep the prisoners (and some of the staff) from messing with the hardware. There are standard electronics cases that were nice looking, very solid, and easy to lock/unlock on three or four sides for access. Most have screened sides for airflow, and all of them have the option for ventilation fans. This university is a state facility and so, like the software issues, have access to cheap skilled labor to fabricate their own. I assume this cheap labor includes those prisoners working in the welding shop, likely right next to where they stamp out the license plates. My brother in law got to see the inside of some similar prison workshops to the ones I saw, this seems pretty common state to state.
Also, I've seen computers used in typical university classrooms, they aren't that big. The podium is typically a box that's something like 4' H x 2' W x 2' D. Even a large tower from ages ago could be put in there and keep cool with not much more than a air slot at top and bottom for convection. Now the computers are smaller than a typical chemistry text, consumes something like 70 watts, and still packs a quad core 64-bit 3 GHz processor.
I'd be more concerned about them using a crappy lock that can be opened with a pen cap and a paperclip. Or, more likely, leaving them unlocked because some old professor wants to keep using the lectures from decades ago he has on a CD-R disc and demands that the door remain unlocked so he has access to the optical drive and doesn't have to bother with remembering where his personal files exist on the network.
I've seen many lecture halls with the A/V equipment nicely laid out in a 19 inch rack on the wall, on the podium will be a fancy touch screen control for lights, lowering the projector screen, controlling the window blinds, selecting the video source, etc. These things had to cost a lot of money to buy and install. But the computer will look like it was vomited on the podium, where nothing is laid out right, nothing secured, and often times buggy as hell. I can only assume this place did the same. Perhaps not as bad but given the ease with which they were "hacked" there was little thought to physical security of the PC.