Until the eco-nuts come up with a solution that actually works and is economically feasible, it's all just a pipe dream. Solar and wind have been used to generate power for DECADES, yet there are very few of them. Why?? The land required is huge, no one wants a noisy wind farm in their back yard, solar cells are expensive, and there are very few places that have the space for a solar/thermal conversion plant.
But if it is all so simple, then why do countries with enough solar radiation build expensive and dangerous nuclear power plants, instead of investing in this simple technology? Are there not deserts in the US? Why are Americans not freeing themselves from their oil dependence through solar power? And why has no one really started to exploit the technology?
"After the solar thermal power plants were built in California and Nevada, people lost interest in solar thermal power because fossil fuels became unbeatably cheap," says Müller-Steinhagen. Solar power was neglected even though the US was in the advantageous position, compared to the MENA region, of being a single political entity rather than a conglomerate of countries with differing interests. The US could achieve energy self-sufficiency through solar thermal power plants in the sunny south-west. But it was only recently that scientists writing in the respected magazine Scientific American unveiled a "Solar Grand Plan" for the US.
Once again, the crowd that wants us to cut back our carbon emissions comes up with things we can't do rather than some suggestions. And their alternatives aren't viable for 10 years or more when they finally get all the kinks worked out, or electricity becomes so expensive they become economical.
Solutions are readily available and have been for a long time. From here:
But if it is all so simple, then why do countries with enough solar radiation build expensive and dangerous nuclear power plants, instead of investing in this simple technology? Are there not deserts in the US? Why are Americans not freeing themselves from their oil dependence through solar power? And why has no one really started to exploit the technology?
"After the solar thermal power plants were built in California and Nevada, people lost interest in solar thermal power because fossil fuels became unbeatably cheap," says Müller-Steinhagen. Solar power was neglected even though the US was in the advantageous position, compared to the MENA region, of being a single political entity rather than a conglomerate of countries with differing interests. The US could achieve energy self-sufficiency through solar thermal power plants in the sunny south-west. But it was only recently that scientists writing in the respected magazine Scientific American unveiled a "Solar Grand Plan" for the US.
And they only look expensive when you neglect environmental impact and risks associated with other energy sources, including nuclear.
Even if it were initially more expensive (which it is not), it would still be worth perusing, because only through nuclear energy can we hope to break the bounds of limited energy, create a world of plenty, journey to the stars and beyond.
It seems to me that you are ignorant. Please read this for instance. From the article:
Mankind’s total primary energy supply (TPES) was 433 Ej in 2002, including non-commercial biomass,
equivalent to a continuous power consumption of 13.75 TW. This compares to the solar radiation intercepted by the Earth of 173,000 TW, of which 120,000 TW strike the Earth’s surface (the difference being reflected by the atmosphere directly to the outer space). Solar energy is thus the primary energy source on our planet’s surface – and exceeds 8,700 times our current primary energy supply. In other words, the Earth receives from the sun each hour as much energy as mankind consumes in a year. The IEA projects a TPES of about 688 Ej
in 2030, equivalent to 21.8 TW of power (IEA 2004). Solar energy would still be 5,500 times greater.
And lets be honest here-wind, solar, these techs simply haven't reached the stage where they can replace current tech for the amount of power generation required to allow us to keep even our current lifestyle, much less continue to advance.
Let's try to really be honest like you suggest and admit that solar energy could get rid US and EU of fossil-fuel dependency right now (from here):
But if it is all so simple, then why do countries with enough solar radiation build expensive and dangerous nuclear power plants, instead of investing in this simple technology? Are there not deserts in the US? Why are Americans not freeing themselves from their oil dependence through solar power? And why has no one really started to exploit the technology?
"After the solar thermal power plants were built in California and Nevada, people lost interest in solar thermal power because fossil fuels became unbeatably cheap," says Müller-Steinhagen. Solar power was neglected even though the US was in the advantageous position, compared to the MENA region, of being a single political entity rather than a conglomerate of countries with differing interests. The US could achieve energy self-sufficiency through solar thermal power plants in the sunny south-west.
Solar is great, except it's 10x too expensive and producing the solar cells isn't an especially 'green' process.
Please everybody here STOP with this bullshit about solar power necessitating environment unfriendly panels, or cells, or whatever. Let me repeat it one more time, solar power generation does not necessitate any of that shit. Total solar radiation hitting the Earth daily represents about five thousand times the total amount of energy currently consumed by humanity, considering all energy sources including coal, oil, gas, nuclear, renewable, etc. This energy can be very easily and cleanly collected and distributed, it's just a matter of doing it. And it looks expensive only because you neglect the cost associated with the environmental pollution generated by the other forms of energy generation, including nuclear.
The solar panels themselves require a manufacturing process with a significant impact, just as uranium mining does.
Solar thermal energy generation only requires plain mirrors and is very environmental friendly. It is definitely looked poorly upon by the nuke-hugging slashdot crowd, although the true reason for this still eludes me.
For the energy needs of the current and future world, our two forseeable tools are nuclear power and hydro-electric. Nobody likes nuclear because of NIMBY syndrome. Nobody likes hydro-electric because it makes entire ecosystems disappear.
May I ask a genuinely sincere question here? Why does solar thermal energy seem so little loved around here? It looks like a rather cheap and proven technology to me: gather a few mirrors, a bathtub of salt and a steam machine in any sunny area and there you go. Most of this technology has been available to humanity for hundreds of years. There is lots of solar energy to be easily collected. The fuel is readily available, free and the whole thing produces no pollution whatsoever (I'm not talking about solar cells but solar thermal).
How does it compete with nuclear, even with breeders ? Cost and energy spent on mining, purifying/concentrating/preparing the fuel, building the high-technology reactor, maintening safety/security, disposing of the by-products, decommisioning the plant...
The only drawback I can think of is the transportation of the resulting energy, but this also doesn't seem like a big problem to me (high-voltage dc lines, hydrogen as a medium, whatever). I mean, we have been spending in the last decades and we are going to spend in the next few billions and billions of euros and dollars on nuclear research, oil wars, etc, basically in an attempt to find solutions to our growing energy needs. Wouldn't a fraction of this money invested into solar energy solve the question once and for all in the span of a few years?
I'm surprised nobody seems to have mentionned OpenVPN. This is definitely to me the ultimate solution to any and all of these problems. Install an OpenVPN server on the host you want to expose to the outside; give an RSA key to anyone who want to access the site. They'll have to install an OpenVPN client though (very easy). Then they can have total secure access to any service you like on your system, not only remote login (e.g., database access, email, whatever). Nobody else will even be able to see the server (total blackhole).
Am I the only one who has a problem with FC9 ?
on
Fedora 10 Released
·
· Score: 1
Disclaimer: this post is not intended to be a troll. I've been using Unix since about 89, have been a Linux fanboy, although probably not so much anymore, am currently using regularly Fedora, Centos, Suse, Ubuntu and Debian at home and/or at work, and I still kinda enjoy Linux.
However I've upgraded my home box from FC8 to FC9 a few months ago and would like to submit and share a few gripes about FC9, or possibly KDE4, or possibly "Linux for the desktop" in general, not sure which one, only because I need to know whether I am the only one (aka is there something wrong with me ?):
- Dolphin ??? Well I sincerely feel sorry for the guys who developped that. Is this a joke ? Is this a toy app like the little turning turtle in I don't remember which language for the kids ? When I saw it at first I couldn't believe it. Truely. You can't even deinstall it !
Talking about Linux for the desktop: which Linux app does compare, even remotely, to something like Directory Opus ? I use Krusader sometimes on FC9, but most of the time I revert immediately to command prompt. Try right-clicking on "Actions" or whatever in krusader, just to be presented with a screen-long list of meaningless and/or unappropriate actions, none of which seems to work (eg extracting a file from a zip archive)
- A correct image viewer ? I have tried everything I could on Linux and have given up. I use qiv to watch my porn now.
Talking about Linux for the desktop: which Linux app does compare, even remotely, to something like XnView ?
- A correct movie player ? Something like Media Player Classic ? I use mplayer from the command line, anything else "just doesn't work correctly" (tm).
- KDE 4.1 ? What is it with this pannel, is it an exercise in acrobatics ? And those "settings" windows with one, possibly two check boxes ? Not even possible to save a session anymore ? And I waited for 4.1 to come out before migrating because 4.0 was supposed to be bad ! Well it must have been really bad. I still regularly "yum update" in the hope that my desktop will resuscitate but I think I have to admit it's gone now. They really meant it to be this way !
- Wine ? Has anybody been able to install anything meaningful with it ? Like TOAD ? From what I understand Wine is ok to run notepad and that's mostly it.
- X11 ? I was using X11R6 in 93/94 on a Sparc. This was 15 years ago. Lately I tried using a remote screen through a 1Mb/s Internet connection. Forget it. This has nothing to do with bandwidth. I guess X11 is exchanging so many messages between client and server that the network *latency* makes it unusable.
I know there is nothing to complain about, Linux is free, people are spending their free time on it, if I want a nice desktop I can write it myself and so on. And I don't complain. I still use Fedora and am too lazy to install something else at home, I thought and am still thinking about going to Debian with Gnome perhaps, but well...
However when I hear people talking about Linux on the Desktop I'm really surpised. Are we living in the same universe ? Have you ever tried a correctly configured Windows system ? (NLited/Vlited to remove IE/WMP/whatever then Klite Codec Pack + Media Player Classic + Winamp + XnView + Directory Opus + Opera) How can you dream about competing with that with a Linux system ?
Linux is really nice when controling a remote server through Putty. It's nice also for developpement. But for your grandma ? For an average user ? Forget it. Until some big company pours millions and millions of dollars to put together a sound, coherent desktop environment and port the necessary applications it will remain as far as I can tell a pipe dream.
I feel bad in writing that, because I know many people invest lots of time and efforts into Linux, and I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, and I also now that Windows is great mostly because you can have all the apps you want without paying for them and this is wrong, however that's sincerely what I think and I'd like to know how other people feel about it.
Maybe if you try to obtain some kind of military-grade detonation, but I think that to Al-Quaeda et al, obtaining even the worst fizzle ever somewhere down in Manhattan would be amply satisfactory. And to get that you definitely don't need a D-T fusion neutron source, lense-shaped explosives or even probably much calculation or testing at all.
So the main problem for the bad guys is to get their hands on enough reasonably concentrated material. A full-blown, worldwide fuel reprocessing industry, with many trucks and boats crossing land and sea full of such material, would make it very easy for them to steal that, and I think that was one of the reason for which politics decided against fuel reprocessing at the time.
Well I'm actually in favor of oligarchy over democracy in that special case where you can get an oligarch who knows what the hell he's doing. If there was a way to always pick the best person to rule, I'd be a die-hard royalist, or fascist, or whatever.
Not only did they have valid visas but I remember at least one of them had his visa renewed *after* he was killed in the attack.
The gov't is DEFINITELY going to solve those problems.
But Bush has never, ever been an empiricist. To him, the ONLY thing that matters is ideology. If something they did turns south, that simply means that the ideology wasn't pure enough, since to them the ideology is never wrong. This is why nobody likes Bush today, he refuses to ever admit that maybe his ideology isn't perfect, and instead of stopping bad ideas, he just delves into them further.
Man I thought for a while you were talking of Bin Laden !
No. 1Km = one Kelvin meter. 1KW = 1 Kelvin Watt. 1 KB = whatever you want. 1 KN = 1 Kelvin Newton. Please explain me what do exactly those units measure.
thousands of innocent people die in Iraq. Even worse thousands of helpless children die of hunger/stupid diseases/mistreatment/etc all the time. *This* is sad, isn't it ?
Ok, so am I supposed to give to the customer only the source code of the OSS I included, or does my whole project become automatically GPLed and I should disclose the whole source code ?
Pardon my simple question, and I know I could find the answer by carefully reading the GPL FAQ, but still I've never been able to fully understand this one: if I'm a big company and I include some OSS (e.g., MySQL) into a new product I develop and sell to other companies, am I using the OSS or redistributing it, or something else ?
In fact MySQL might not be the best example since it's multi-licenced, let's say some GPL database system.
In other words, does the difference between GPL and BSD only apply when I try to develop a new RDBMS (i.e., distribute modified code), or even when I want to include it, without modification, into an unrelated commercial product ?
I'm also ignoring the slight problem of actually accelerating at 1g continuously for 20+ years. Well I for one have been doing that for much more than 20 years. Haven't got much far away though...
Slashdot Mirror
Until the eco-nuts come up with a solution that actually works and is economically feasible, it's all just a pipe dream. Solar and wind have been used to generate power for DECADES, yet there are very few of them. Why?? The land required is huge, no one wants a noisy wind farm in their back yard, solar cells are expensive, and there are very few places that have the space for a solar/thermal conversion plant.
Or rather (from here:
But if it is all so simple, then why do countries with enough solar radiation build expensive and dangerous nuclear power plants, instead of investing in this simple technology? Are there not deserts in the US? Why are Americans not freeing themselves from their oil dependence through solar power? And why has no one really started to exploit the technology?
"After the solar thermal power plants were built in California and Nevada, people lost interest in solar thermal power because fossil fuels became unbeatably cheap," says Müller-Steinhagen. Solar power was neglected even though the US was in the advantageous position, compared to the MENA region, of being a single political entity rather than a conglomerate of countries with differing interests. The US could achieve energy self-sufficiency through solar thermal power plants in the sunny south-west. But it was only recently that scientists writing in the respected magazine Scientific American unveiled a "Solar Grand Plan" for the US.
Once again, the crowd that wants us to cut back our carbon emissions comes up with things we can't do rather than some suggestions. And their alternatives aren't viable for 10 years or more when they finally get all the kinks worked out, or electricity becomes so expensive they become economical.
Solutions are readily available and have been for a long time. From here:
But if it is all so simple, then why do countries with enough solar radiation build expensive and dangerous nuclear power plants, instead of investing in this simple technology? Are there not deserts in the US? Why are Americans not freeing themselves from their oil dependence through solar power? And why has no one really started to exploit the technology?
"After the solar thermal power plants were built in California and Nevada, people lost interest in solar thermal power because fossil fuels became unbeatably cheap," says Müller-Steinhagen. Solar power was neglected even though the US was in the advantageous position, compared to the MENA region, of being a single political entity rather than a conglomerate of countries with differing interests. The US could achieve energy self-sufficiency through solar thermal power plants in the sunny south-west. But it was only recently that scientists writing in the respected magazine Scientific American unveiled a "Solar Grand Plan" for the US.
And they only look expensive when you neglect environmental impact and risks associated with other energy sources, including nuclear.
Even if it were initially more expensive (which it is not), it would still be worth perusing, because only through nuclear energy can we hope to break the bounds of limited energy, create a world of plenty, journey to the stars and beyond.
It seems to me that you are ignorant. Please read this for instance. From the article:
Mankind’s total primary energy supply (TPES) was 433 Ej in 2002, including non-commercial biomass, equivalent to a continuous power consumption of 13.75 TW. This compares to the solar radiation intercepted by the Earth of 173,000 TW, of which 120,000 TW strike the Earth’s surface (the difference being reflected by the atmosphere directly to the outer space). Solar energy is thus the primary energy source on our planet’s surface – and exceeds 8,700 times our current primary energy supply. In other words, the Earth receives from the sun each hour as much energy as mankind consumes in a year. The IEA projects a TPES of about 688 Ej in 2030, equivalent to 21.8 TW of power (IEA 2004). Solar energy would still be 5,500 times greater.
And lets be honest here-wind, solar, these techs simply haven't reached the stage where they can replace current tech for the amount of power generation required to allow us to keep even our current lifestyle, much less continue to advance.
Let's try to really be honest like you suggest and admit that solar energy could get rid US and EU of fossil-fuel dependency right now (from here):
But if it is all so simple, then why do countries with enough solar radiation build expensive and dangerous nuclear power plants, instead of investing in this simple technology? Are there not deserts in the US? Why are Americans not freeing themselves from their oil dependence through solar power? And why has no one really started to exploit the technology?
"After the solar thermal power plants were built in California and Nevada, people lost interest in solar thermal power because fossil fuels became unbeatably cheap," says Müller-Steinhagen. Solar power was neglected even though the US was in the advantageous position, compared to the MENA region, of being a single political entity rather than a conglomerate of countries with differing interests. The US could achieve energy self-sufficiency through solar thermal power plants in the sunny south-west.
There is no such thing as an indefinitely sustainable power source.
Yes there is.
True, but go ahead and name a single form of energy that's doesn't require mining.
Are you kidding? Have you ever heard of solar power?
Solar is great, except it's 10x too expensive and producing the solar cells isn't an especially 'green' process.
Please everybody here STOP with this bullshit about solar power necessitating environment unfriendly panels, or cells, or whatever. Let me repeat it one more time, solar power generation does not necessitate any of that shit. Total solar radiation hitting the Earth daily represents about five thousand times the total amount of energy currently consumed by humanity, considering all energy sources including coal, oil, gas, nuclear, renewable, etc. This energy can be very easily and cleanly collected and distributed, it's just a matter of doing it. And it looks expensive only because you neglect the cost associated with the environmental pollution generated by the other forms of energy generation, including nuclear.
The solar panels themselves require a manufacturing process with a significant impact, just as uranium mining does.
Solar thermal energy generation only requires plain mirrors and is very environmental friendly. It is definitely looked poorly upon by the nuke-hugging slashdot crowd, although the true reason for this still eludes me.
For the energy needs of the current and future world, our two forseeable tools are nuclear power and hydro-electric. Nobody likes nuclear because of NIMBY syndrome. Nobody likes hydro-electric because it makes entire ecosystems disappear.
May I ask a genuinely sincere question here? Why does solar thermal energy seem so little loved around here? It looks like a rather cheap and proven technology to me: gather a few mirrors, a bathtub of salt and a steam machine in any sunny area and there you go. Most of this technology has been available to humanity for hundreds of years. There is lots of solar energy to be easily collected. The fuel is readily available, free and the whole thing produces no pollution whatsoever (I'm not talking about solar cells but solar thermal).
How does it compete with nuclear, even with breeders ? Cost and energy spent on mining, purifying/concentrating/preparing the fuel, building the high-technology reactor, maintening safety/security, disposing of the by-products, decommisioning the plant...
The only drawback I can think of is the transportation of the resulting energy, but this also doesn't seem like a big problem to me (high-voltage dc lines, hydrogen as a medium, whatever). I mean, we have been spending in the last decades and we are going to spend in the next few billions and billions of euros and dollars on nuclear research, oil wars, etc, basically in an attempt to find solutions to our growing energy needs. Wouldn't a fraction of this money invested into solar energy solve the question once and for all in the span of a few years?
I'm surprised nobody seems to have mentionned OpenVPN. This is definitely to me the ultimate solution to any and all of these problems. Install an OpenVPN server on the host you want to expose to the outside; give an RSA key to anyone who want to access the site. They'll have to install an OpenVPN client though (very easy). Then they can have total secure access to any service you like on your system, not only remote login (e.g., database access, email, whatever). Nobody else will even be able to see the server (total blackhole).
Disclaimer: this post is not intended to be a troll. I've been using Unix since about 89, have been a Linux fanboy, although probably not so much anymore, am currently using regularly Fedora, Centos, Suse, Ubuntu and Debian at home and/or at work, and I still kinda enjoy Linux.
However I've upgraded my home box from FC8 to FC9 a few months ago and would like to submit and share a few gripes about FC9, or possibly KDE4, or possibly "Linux for the desktop" in general, not sure which one, only because I need to know whether I am the only one (aka is there something wrong with me ?):
- Dolphin ??? Well I sincerely feel sorry for the guys who developped that. Is this a joke ? Is this a toy app like the little turning turtle in I don't remember which language for the kids ? When I saw it at first I couldn't believe it. Truely. You can't even deinstall it !
Talking about Linux for the desktop: which Linux app does compare, even remotely, to something like Directory Opus ? I use Krusader sometimes on FC9, but most of the time I revert immediately to command prompt. Try right-clicking on "Actions" or whatever in krusader, just to be presented with a screen-long list of meaningless and/or unappropriate actions, none of which seems to work (eg extracting a file from a zip archive)
- A correct image viewer ? I have tried everything I could on Linux and have given up. I use qiv to watch my porn now.
Talking about Linux for the desktop: which Linux app does compare, even remotely, to something like XnView ?
- A correct movie player ? Something like Media Player Classic ? I use mplayer from the command line, anything else "just doesn't work correctly" (tm).
- KDE 4.1 ? What is it with this pannel, is it an exercise in acrobatics ? And those "settings" windows with one, possibly two check boxes ? Not even possible to save a session anymore ? And I waited for 4.1 to come out before migrating because 4.0 was supposed to be bad ! Well it must have been really bad. I still regularly "yum update" in the hope that my desktop will resuscitate but I think I have to admit it's gone now. They really meant it to be this way !
- Wine ? Has anybody been able to install anything meaningful with it ? Like TOAD ? From what I understand Wine is ok to run notepad and that's mostly it.
- X11 ? I was using X11R6 in 93/94 on a Sparc. This was 15 years ago. Lately I tried using a remote screen through a 1Mb/s Internet connection. Forget it. This has nothing to do with bandwidth. I guess X11 is exchanging so many messages between client and server that the network *latency* makes it unusable.
I know there is nothing to complain about, Linux is free, people are spending their free time on it, if I want a nice desktop I can write it myself and so on. And I don't complain. I still use Fedora and am too lazy to install something else at home, I thought and am still thinking about going to Debian with Gnome perhaps, but well...
However when I hear people talking about Linux on the Desktop I'm really surpised. Are we living in the same universe ? Have you ever tried a correctly configured Windows system ? (NLited/Vlited to remove IE/WMP/whatever then Klite Codec Pack + Media Player Classic + Winamp + XnView + Directory Opus + Opera) How can you dream about competing with that with a Linux system ?
Linux is really nice when controling a remote server through Putty. It's nice also for developpement. But for your grandma ? For an average user ? Forget it. Until some big company pours millions and millions of dollars to put together a sound, coherent desktop environment and port the necessary applications it will remain as far as I can tell a pipe dream.
I feel bad in writing that, because I know many people invest lots of time and efforts into Linux, and I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, and I also now that Windows is great mostly because you can have all the apps you want without paying for them and this is wrong, however that's sincerely what I think and I'd like to know how other people feel about it.
Grunt grunt grunt. Troll troll.
Maybe if you try to obtain some kind of military-grade detonation, but I think that to Al-Quaeda et al, obtaining even the worst fizzle ever somewhere down in Manhattan would be amply satisfactory. And to get that you definitely don't need a D-T fusion neutron source, lense-shaped explosives or even probably much calculation or testing at all.
So the main problem for the bad guys is to get their hands on enough reasonably concentrated material. A full-blown, worldwide fuel reprocessing industry, with many trucks and boats crossing land and sea full of such material, would make it very easy for them to steal that, and I think that was one of the reason for which politics decided against fuel reprocessing at the time.
_Renewable energy_ is the way of the future. Cue nuclear energy fanboys flames in 3.. 2.. 1..
Except the summary is talking about deuterium (1P + 2N). AFAIK "cold" fusion means only that, i.e., no tremendously high temperatures.
Not only did they have valid visas but I remember at least one of them had his visa renewed *after* he was killed in the attack. The gov't is DEFINITELY going to solve those problems.
Does waterboarding a fish count as torture ?
No. 1Km = one Kelvin meter. 1KW = 1 Kelvin Watt. 1 KB = whatever you want. 1 KN = 1 Kelvin Newton. Please explain me what do exactly those units measure.
Never hit someone with glasses. Hit him with a baseball bat.
I don't have IE and my OS is perfectly functional. It's called nLite Windows, you see... (Well I sometimes also dual boot Linux).
thousands of innocent people die in Iraq. Even worse thousands of helpless children die of hunger/stupid diseases/mistreatment/etc all the time. *This* is sad, isn't it ?
Ok, so am I supposed to give to the customer only the source code of the OSS I included, or does my whole project become automatically GPLed and I should disclose the whole source code ?
In fact MySQL might not be the best example since it's multi-licenced, let's say some GPL database system.
In other words, does the difference between GPL and BSD only apply when I try to develop a new RDBMS (i.e., distribute modified code), or even when I want to include it, without modification, into an unrelated commercial product ?