The Energy Generation Megathread: Heated Exchanges

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Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

spankmeister posted:

Yeah when crude reaches a high number like $200 a barrel (note: number pulled entirely out of rear end) then shale could be economically viable. But right now we still have more easily accessible sources of crude.

Wikipedia says that with current technology sustained prices above 70-95 USD per barrel makes oil shale profitable. Though possible future tech could drive the break-even price down to $30 USD/barrel.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2012 11:07

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# ¿ May 8, 2024 23:15

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

QuarkJets posted:

That can't be right though, oil barrel prices have been in that range for years. Today it's $86/barrel. American oil companies would be going nuts with oil shale development if oil shale were that profitable at this price range

You are right, I skimmed through the article too quickly and got my phrasing wrong. Shale breaks even not when market price is that much; rather a barrel of shale costs that much to produce so crude needs to cost that or more before shale can start becoming profitable.

# ¿ Oct 27, 2012 04:01

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Kiwi Ghost Chips posted:

There's also the ocean extraction method. Does anyone know what the latest prices for that are?

I vaguely remember the last time this came up in discussion that someone had pegged it at ~$300/unit for salt water extraction which was ~double-ish of what the market price was. I'm at work right now so can't Google too much but I saw a few articles talking about how Oak Ridge came up with some new method of extraction that would bring the current cost down so if I am even close to accurate you can use that as a rough baseline. Maybe on my break I'll find something or I'll just go back to lurking.

# ¿ Apr 15, 2013 20:59

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

EoRaptor posted:

Anybody who told you the first three is a moron who hasn't studied any history, because the same basic reactor design was used at Three Mile Island, which did all of those things. The fourth is true whatever nuclear is doing or not doing. Thing bad -> so other thing must be good, is idiotic.

I am pretty sure that they are referring to how the thread made predictions on things based on information available and then revised along the way. Also having too arfue with people who came in thread basically declaring that this was mecha ~~hitler~~ Chernobyl and refused to listen to actual nuclear engineers trying to educate.

# ¿ Feb 8, 2017 05:51

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

LemonDrizzle posted:

You're too late - hydro is such a well-established technology (it's been around for over a century after all) that essentially everything worth damming in the developed world has already been dammed.

Tangential, but does anyone know if China is close to maxing out its hydro potential, or sub Sahara Africa for that matter?

# ¿ Feb 21, 2017 11:25

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

I've read almost every page of every energy related thread in D&D since the one where the guy came up with spooning your partner at night as an unit of measurement. The subject matter is not my area of study so I've never really had anything to directly contribute to the threads, but I really appreciate all of the regulars explaining their work for the laymen and for also providing a poo poo ton of primary sources that I've checked out over the years, especially the Physics for Future Presidents course from, if I remember right, Berkley.

# ¿ Feb 23, 2017 19:29

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

I'm not really sure where to ask, but since there are industry goons in the thread I feel this is as good as any: anyone know how the DoE has been fairing under Perry? The lack of scandals actually has me more nervous with that slimy gently caress than if he'd already screwed the pooch.

# ¿ Jun 28, 2018 23:54

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Deindustrialzation will kill several billion people. Whatever the way forward is, it ain't that.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2019 23:53

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Harik posted:

The de-industralization futurists talk about is moving the poo poo into space and turning the planet into a nature preserve. Like, 500+ years out, only fit for sci-fi novels.

Baronjutter posted:

I think we're using the term differently. I'm not using it in the anarcho-primitivist sense of regressing to a pre-industrial society. I just mean relocating most of our mining and heavy industry to space while earth can just enjoy the fruits of fully automated luxury space communism. The population could double with people living in platinum-clad hive cities fed by asteroid mining and orbiting solar arrays while our ecological footprint shrinks to a fraction of what is was. Just pure far-future utopian fantasies that keep me going in this hell world. I have to tell my self that'll still be a possibility for our species one day if we can survive capitalism and climate change.

I've been reading too much of the Climate Change Thread, that use makes more sense here.

It is about as likely as any other hail mary, but it is the direction we should probably be heading in, I'll agree to that. Couple of speed bumps between here and there though.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2019 05:00

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Pander posted:

Don't talk to nuke plant employees from the 70s and 80s then. I've heard some stories from former operators.

Essentially "coke lunch breaks" didn't involve soda.

That was most of the 70s-80s.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2019 21:51

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

I can't imagine anyone was suggesting you take the reactor designs that are meant for a ship and use that for grid. More that you take the technical expertise in both fabrication and management and use it to deploy reactors appropriate for the task.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2020 01:22

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Probably buy now and hold til later strategy.

# ¿ Nov 24, 2020 00:00

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

The true cost of improperly sited equipment. A tale as old as time.

# ¿ Jul 13, 2021 05:10

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Wibla posted:

Of course it was.

Now lets watch them do absolutely nothing about it

Oh they'll do something about it, it just won't be what we want. It'll be to artificially generate windfalls like that in the future on demand.

# ¿ Jul 16, 2021 22:51

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Phanatic posted:

What do you mean? You're suggesting that Congress basically designate a bunch of pseudocongressmen who act just like Congress and have the authority to write bills and budgets and things to give the actual Congressmen a break from time to time?

That would really, seriously, violate the poo poo out of the Constitution. Congress can't delegate legislative authority to other entities.

Those cabinet officials head Executive agencies. No, Congress could not require their firings to require Congressional approval, that's a clear violation of separation of powers. For not-cabinet officials, there's no single answer, and the question is Constitutionally fraught. See Collins v. Yellin and Seila Law v. CFPB.

I thought you were doing a setup for an ALEC bit, owell.

# ¿ Nov 3, 2021 22:19

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Dante80 posted:

They are a traditional nuclear disarmament org. Why would they give a gently caress about carbon/methane emissions? Especially when one of their stated goals is the closure of the nuclear power industry?

Elimination of British nuclear weapons and global abolition of nuclear weapons
Cancellation of Trident by the British government. And policy not to replace or enhance Trident nor develop, purchase or deploy other nuclear weapons or allow the deployment of any foreign nuclear weapons on British soil or in British waters.
An all encompassing Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty is agreed.
Implementation of an arms conversion policy by the British government
Immediate negotiations leading swiftly to the rapid, timetabled abolition of nuclear forces worldwide and the conclusion of a Nuclear Weapons Convention
Prevention and cessation of wars in which the nuclear weapons of Britain or other countries might be used
Abolition of other threats of mass destruction or indiscriminate effect
Full international compliance with agreed Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC)
A strengthened Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) agreed
Global abandonment of space weapons and missile defence programmes. An international agreement on the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space
Implementation of a ban on the manufacture, testing and use of Depleted Uranium weapons
Nuclear-free, less militarised and more secure Europe
Extension of the influence, resources and funding of the Organisation for Security and Co- Operation on Europe (OSCE)
No military nuclearisation of the European Union
Withdrawal of all US military bases and nuclear weapons from Europe and no nuclear or other expansion of NATO
Formal Nuclear Weapon-Free Zones in Europe established.
Britain withdrawn from NATO and all foreign military bases on British soil closed.
The closure of the nuclear power industry
Prevention of new build nuclear power stations and replacement of nuclear by universally acceptable sustainable energy technologies
Establishment of safe policies on nuclear waste storage and on re- use of contaminated land transport of plutonium and depleted uranium
Independent control and verification of plutonium, uranium and depleted uranium stocks.

Well for starters they specifically say they want nuclear plants to be replaced with sustainable energy and if they actually gave a poo poo about that then they'd be concerned about all of the not sustainable and dirty generation that 100% of the time replaces nuclear power in the form of natgas, mostly.

# ¿ Nov 23, 2021 04:29

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Has there been any publicly released data from animals collected outside the Chernobyl zone but near by it that tracks the amount of Cesium et al is present in their systems? I imagine for the most part unless you have a migratory species that regularly passes directly through the zone the spill over would not be too much.

Or if the animals had particularly large ranges that had some percent overlap with the zone.

# ¿ Nov 23, 2021 22:03

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

silence_kit posted:

Whenever you make these kinds of analogies for boondoggle science and engineering projects with dubious social benefit, you are implicitly wildly misrepresenting the challenges and benefits of the project.

E.g. no, funding fusion research isn’t the same thing as funding a hyper-applied program for The Ultimate Weapon in the middle of a great World War. No, building a base on Mars isn’t the same thing as white Americans settling in Coastal California, one of the best climates and productive areas in the world, etc.

Wrong thread.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2022 15:16

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

CommieGIR posted:

Yeah, dead and very buried.

Especially when the IPCC and others are going "Actually, Fission is great as a way to fight emissions AND enable growth and reflects well on countries cutting their emissions"

Its like: Guys, we have the technology. Yes its expensive. Yes, it requires strong regulation, but its here. And combined with renewables it could make a major impact.

Yes but have you considered the fortunes of coal barons who have family as members of Congress?

# ¿ Apr 5, 2022 22:05

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

This looks like it will be totally even handed and cover the actual risks and actual damages and lasting effects and not just trying to cash in on HBO's Chernobyl.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAOIH8HRdDo

# ¿ May 2, 2022 21:27

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Now let's add another Houston to the grid over the next three years in the form of crypto mining operations.

# ¿ May 10, 2022 04:33

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

PhazonLink posted:

going from the gbs buttcoin thread, there seems to be a minor butt implosion with a stable coin, this probably wont mean any thing bad for butts medium or long term, but who knows.

Yeah I have no particular insight on that, ERCOT (iirc) was forecasting about another Houston's worth of energy demand once Abbott finishes luring in all the crypto miners and unless there is something particularly unique about this implosion the scam will bounce back eventually.

# ¿ May 10, 2022 15:45

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

It is the most American thing ever that we will rather go full coal ahead than admit we were wrong and build one nuclear plant.

# ¿ Jun 16, 2022 17:20

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Phanatic posted:

Nuclear is too expensive.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...-twitter-energy

"A scorching heat wave is pushing the Texas grid to the brink. Power demand is surging as people crank up air conditioners. But meanwhile, wind speeds have fallen to extremely low levels, and that means the state’s fleet of turbines is at just 8% of their potential output."

The problem is thermal generation, as always.

zoux posted:

The projected demand has now inched down inside of the supply curve so we should be ok today. There is something like 12 gw off line (thermal) today so dunno if it's gonna be back by tomorrow. It's not supposed to be as hot tomorrow.

https://twitter.com/douglewinenergy/status/1546493403147472896

# ¿ Jul 11, 2022 21:07

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Electric Wrigglies posted:

Ok, but if you had a wind grid and this is at night (so you didn't have the thermal problem from probably using old coal plants being operated in load following), currently using 75 GW of demand and 8% of capacity plus 20 % reserve means you need that is evidently needed plus count on 10% of windfarms offline for maintenance gives 75*1.25/8*100/90*100 = ~1,300 GW of installed windfarms. Assume new 8 MW units, you need around 162,000 of them. Assuming 30 year life that means a cheeky 5,400 k wind mills to be installed a year. ~5k if you assumed 100% availability. 4k if you assumed no reserve.

Is 8% a 1 in 10 year event, a 1 in 100 year event, maybe it is not even the worst wind stats for the week? I don't know but when you bake in no hydrocarbon backup and you go full intermittent supply (no gas peaker and assuming hydro is mostly tapped out rather than committing to inundating huge tracts of wonderful vegetation) you gotta think in terms of foreseeable situations and 8% wind capacity at night seems to be that. Will wind get more reliable with more installed (maybe if you spread the geographical area) or less (because the best spots are well and truly taken when you locate windmills 130k through 160k )?

Doing it with batteries to half the wind power installation needed would need like 100 billion dollars worth every how many years a battery lasts?

E) on the nuclear power station cost, how much harder should it be over a coal thermal? The temperature/pressures are not higher in a nuclear plant from what I understand so coal plants should be a good guide for what nuclear should cost without so much resistance.

I don't understand the point you're trying to make in relation to what happened. All energy inputs had a forecasted amount of power they were expecting to contribute to the grid yesterday. Wind was providing just about near the forecasted amount meaning it was operating as intended. The big shortfall in power from forecasted levels was the 12GW of coal and gas that failed to produce when it was expected to.

I don't really see the point in discussing a hypothetical all wind Texas grid because one, it wouldn't ever happen and two, I think that'd be a stupid idea.

Phanatic posted:

It's almost like backstopping wind and solar with a power plant technology that hovers around 97% of nameplate capacity is a good idea.

Basically this.

e: also third point I forgot to mention, blaming wind is just the same dumb bullshit Abbott and co. already did last time during the winter storm when the gas infrastructure started freezing because they did gently caress all to prepare for another winter storm after they got hosed the last last time back in 2010 (2011?).

Dameius fucked around with this message at 03:02 on Jul 13, 2022

# ¿ Jul 13, 2022 01:59

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Electric Wrigglies posted:

Without gas, coal or nuclear, what else do you have at night?

Solar thermal (which has storage) has a similar cost profile to nuclear according to that levelised cost presso linked earlier (which means its ruled out on cost grounds, evidently). There is hydro but it is generally ruinous for the ecosystems you install it in so to be avoided in general and I am not sure of the scope for hydro to cover all in Texas anyway. I already mentioned batteries.

Wind is clearly one of the better renewable techs that have been rolled out, it has pretty minimal environmental impact and safety stats not that far behind nuclear (and hopefully improve as institutional knowledge on installing the things improves) and the cost (not considering storage) is great and scalable at the scales utilised to date. The issue is storage and battery tech has not had the orders of magnitude reduction in costs (as much as they have reduced) for wholesale deployment. This is being covered up by building gas peaker plants and extending the life of old coal plants to date but something has to change sooner rather than later.

We should have as much nuclear as possible intermixed with wind and solar and zero coal and gas. But I'm still confused on how what you're saying connects to the topic at hand, which is the failure of coal and gas power impacting the Texas grid.

Meanwhile today is another day where the Texas power grid has an unexplained by Abbott gap in the power inputs from coal and gas while the other energy sources are matching their forecasted levels:

https://twitter.com/douglewinenergy/status/1547217843871252480?s=20&t=e2_1nJ4qTDTFIVOhuPcG7Q

# ¿ Jul 13, 2022 16:17

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Also isn't it the case that if we wanted to dam it, we already have?

Not really a growth sector to meet our energy needs.

# ¿ Jul 19, 2022 13:00

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

If we are going zero fossil fuel economy that would involve also replacing every joule of energy we currently use in every ICE everywhere, not just cars with electric motors. And we need to have completed this conversion about 20 years ago, so basically as fast as we can possibly do it.

For people who say we don't need nuclear power, how are we going to account for that additional demand on energy generation when we are already seeing that a no fossil/no nuclear hydro/wind/solar with some kind of energy storage plan is struggling to provide full grid power today at today's requirements without gas and coal backstopping it?

# ¿ Jul 21, 2022 15:41

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

silence_kit posted:

If you meant “on demand” instead of “demand on” here, nuclear is pretty uneconomical for that task. When you run a nuclear power plant at full capacity, it generates very expensive electricity because the power plant was built at great cost. When you hold the nuclear power plant in reserve, and run it only when needed to fill the gaps (at partial capacity), you’re making what was already very expensive electricity even more expensive.

No I mean we have to replace the entirety of the gasoline for internal combustion engine infrastructure over to our grid if we want to go zero carbon. Which means our energy generation grid will need to produce even more power on top of what it would need to do just to keep up with "normal" growth.

Currently we have nowhere in the world that has hydro/solar/wind only grids that can operate without the backstopping of carbon generation in the form of coal or gas.

My question is, how do you propose we deal with this extra demand on our energy grid from converting every internal combustion engine over to electric motors without nuclear in the mix?

# ¿ Jul 21, 2022 16:37

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

silence_kit posted:

I’m confused. What’s your complaint here? That it is impossible to power the world with only wind and solar? That the buildout of wind and solar isn’t instant and free?

I don't have a complaint. I have a question.

Dameius posted:

My question is, how do you propose we deal with this extra demand on our energy grid from converting every internal combustion engine over to electric motors without nuclear in the mix?

# ¿ Jul 21, 2022 18:28

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

mediaphage posted:

Goon methane production

But we're a dead gay comedy forum which means we'd be just another fossil fuel ruining the planet.

# ¿ Jul 21, 2022 18:49

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

silence_kit posted:

I feel like I’m in some kind of initiation ritual and am being told to recite an oath so I can join La Cosa Nostra or a cult or something.

Nuclear power is dying in the US. Nuclear power plants generate very expensive electricity, and in a hypothetical future world where intermittent renewables generate a large fraction of the US’ electricity, nuclear power plants would be forced to run at lower and lower capacity factors, making what was already expensive nuclear electricity even more expensive.

I don't care, that's not what I'm asking you.

Dameius posted:

My question is, how do you propose we deal with this extra demand on our energy grid from converting every internal combustion engine over to electric motors without nuclear in the mix?

# ¿ Jul 22, 2022 13:54

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Isn't it still the case that we don't have pre-approved reactor designs and every new plant must be treated as if coming to us fully formed in a vacuum rather than taking this already known and regulation approved reactor design and putting it into this other kind of geography than the last one?

If we wanted to stamp out a bunch of plants then settling on one or two or three reactor designs with some bolt in solutions for cooling and storage and stuff that can be interchanged based on constraints of the geography of the plant location could really speed things up.

If the industry is already exceptionally highly regulated than with sufficient motivation those regulations could be reworked to streamline the build and run process without really making any sacrifices to safety.

# ¿ Jul 23, 2022 16:36

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Discendo Vox posted:

There are standardized plant designs, which are certified for 15 years and then undergo cyclic review and renewal.
https://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/design-cert.html

Obviously I haven't spent a huge amount of time on the site but just clicking through a few things its good that the reactor design and site process are independent of each other.

This is where I am probably going to get the most divergent from reality in want vs possible but I feel like it'd be more streamlined if the government provided the pre-approved designs and even possible sites to put them rather than waiting for private industry to apply.

Though if we're going full pie in the sky best possible reaction to climate change re: generation we should nationalize the whole drat thing and build out like its a war effort for survival (because it is).

# ¿ Jul 23, 2022 17:06

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Dante80 posted:

Thanks for the two links guys.

Avast is flagging this one all over the place. Is this just a matter of lolavast?

Who knows why it is on their blacklist. Maybe Avast is in on the anti-nuke conspiracy :tinfoil:

Anyways here is the article:

James Lovelock posted:

Nuclear power is the only green solution

We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources, writes James Lovelock – civilisation is in imminent danger. Published in The Independent, 24 May 2004.

Sir David King, the Government’s chief scientist, was far-sighted to say that global warming is a more serious threat than terrorism. He may even have underestimated, because, since he spoke, new evidence of climate change suggests it could be even more serious, and the greatest danger that civilisation has faced so far.

Most of us are aware of some degree of warming; winters are warmer and spring comes earlier. But in the Arctic, warming is more than twice as great as here in Europe and in summertime, torrents of melt water now plunge from Greenland’s kilometre-high glaciers. The complete dissolution of Greenland’s icy mountains will take time, but by then the sea will have risen seven metres, enough to make uninhabitable all of the low lying coastal cities of the world, including London, Venice, Calcutta, New York and Tokyo. Even a two metre rise is enough to put most of southern Florida under water.

The floating ice of the Arctic Ocean is even more vulnerable to warming; in 30 years, its white reflecting ice, the area of the US, may become dark sea that absorbs the warmth of summer sunlight, and further hastens the end of the Greenland ice. The North Pole, goal of so many explorers, will then be no more than a point on the ocean surface.

Not only the Arctic is changing; climatologists warn a four-degree rise in temperature is enough to eliminate the vast Amazon forests in a catastrophe for their people, their biodiversity, and for the world, which would lose one of its great natural air conditioners.

The scientists who form the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reported in 2001 that global temperature would rise between two and six degrees Celsius by 2100. Their grim forecast was made perceptible by last summer’s excessive heat; and according to Swiss meteorologists, the Europe-wide hot spell that killed over 20,000 was wholly different from any previous heat wave. The odds against it being a mere deviation from the norm were 300,000 to one. It was a warning of worse to come.

What makes global warming so serious and so urgent is that the great Earth system, Gaia, is trapped in a vicious circle of positive feedback. Extra heat from any source, whether from greenhouse gases, the disappearance of Arctic ice or the Amazon forest, is amplified, and its effects are more than additive. It is almost as if we had lit a fire to keep warm, and failed to notice, as we piled on fuel, that the fire was out of control and the furniture had ignited. When that happens, little time is left to put out the fire before it consumes the house. Global warming, like a fire, is accelerating and almost no time is left to act.

So what should we do? We can just continue to enjoy a warmer 21st century while it lasts, and make cosmetic attempts, such as the Kyoto Treaty, to hide the political embarrassment of global warming, and this is what I fear will happen in much of the world. When, in the 18th century, only one billion people lived on Earth, their impact was small enough for it not to matter what energy source they used.

But with six billion, and growing, few options remain; we can not continue drawing energy from fossil fuels and there is no chance that the renewables, wind, tide and water power can provide enough energy and in time. If we had 50 years or more we might make these our main sources. But we do not have 50 years; the Earth is already so disabled by the insidious poison of greenhouse gases that even if we stop all fossil fuel burning immediately, the consequences of what we have already done will last for 1,000 years. Every year that we continue burning carbon makes it worse for our descendants and for civilisation.

Worse still, if we burn crops grown for fuel this could hasten our decline. Agriculture already uses too much of the land needed by the Earth to regulate its climate and chemistry. A car consumes 10 to 30 times as much carbon as its driver; imagine the extra farmland required to feed the appetite of cars.

By all means, let us use the small input from renewables sensibly, but only one immediately available source does not cause global warming and that is nuclear energy. True, burning natural gas instead of coal or oil releases only half as much carbon dioxide, but unburnt gas is 25 times as potent a greenhouse agent as is carbon dioxide. Even a small leakage would neutralise the advantage of gas.

The prospects are grim, and even if we act successfully in amelioration, there will still be hard times, as in war, that will stretch our grandchildren to the limit. We are tough and it would take more than the climate catastrophe to eliminate all breeding pairs of humans; what is at risk is civilisation. As individual animals we are not so special, and in some ways are like a planetary disease, but through civilisation we redeem ourselves and become a precious asset for the Earth; not least because through our eyes the Earth has seen herself in all her glory.

There is a chance we may be saved by an unexpected event such as a series of volcanic eruptions severe enough to block out sunlight and so cool the Earth. But only losers would bet their lives on such poor odds. Whatever doubts there are about future climates, there are no doubts that greenhouse gases and temperatures both are rising.

We have stayed in ignorance for many reasons; important among them is the denial of climate change in the US where governments have failed to give their climate scientists the support they needed. The Green lobbies, which should have given priority to global warming, seem more concerned about threats to people than with threats to the Earth, not noticing that we are part of the Earth and wholly dependent upon its well being. It may take a disaster worse than last summer’s European deaths to wake us up.

Opposition to nuclear energy is based on irrational fear fed by Hollywood-style fiction, the Green lobbies and the media. These fears are unjustified, and nuclear energy from its start in 1952 has proved to be the safest of all energy sources. We must stop fretting over the minute statistical risks of cancer from chemicals or radiation. Nearly one third of us will die of cancer anyway, mainly because we breathe air laden with that all pervasive carcinogen, oxygen. If we fail to concentrate our minds on the real danger, which is global warming, we may die even sooner, as did more than 20,000 unfortunates from overheating in Europe last summer.

I find it sad and ironic that the UK, which leads the world in the quality of its Earth and climate scientists, rejects their warnings and advice, and prefers to listen to the Greens. But I am a Green and I entreat my friends in the movement to drop their wrongheaded objection to nuclear energy.

Even if they were right about its dangers, and they are not, its worldwide use as our main source of energy would pose an insignificant threat compared with the dangers of intolerable and lethal heat waves and sea levels rising to drown every coastal city of the world. We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilisation is in imminent danger and has to use nuclear – the one safe, available, energy source – now or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet.

# ¿ Aug 5, 2022 20:46

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Owling Howl posted:

You can have 100+m diameter rock pistons anywhere though so

His Divine Shadow posted:

Something tells me this will be atocious in terms of resources (concrete, steel, etc) to kWh.

Literally anything else other than nuclear, no matter the cost/feasibility.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2022 18:10

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Sounds like communism to me.

# ¿ Sep 14, 2022 21:12

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

VideoGameVet posted:

Good thing they aren't leaking Natural Gas at all those fracking sites.

Hey now don't be so biased.

They're also leaking methane down the entire length of the pipeline too.

# ¿ Oct 4, 2022 00:21

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Raenir Salazar posted:

There's a quantum entanglement joke in there somewhere but I'm uncertain until someone makes it.

Don't worry about it, the joke collapsed into an awful punchline when a goon told it.

# ¿ Dec 14, 2022 21:52

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# ¿ May 8, 2024 23:15

Dameius: Apr 3, 2006

Finally, we can get the fabled clean fracking.

# ¿ Jan 1, 2023 01:43

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