Climate Change: Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Climate Change: Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward

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VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Shifty Nipples posted:

I'm on antidepressants, I've done therapy but I'm still massively depressed. Not suicidal though so I guess that counts for something. Is there a thread for wallowing in existential dread?

I suggest daily bike rides (maybe even commuting). I tried the drugs decades ago and had a nasty reaction (super elevated BP). Daily rides keep me somewhat centered.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2018 18:53

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 05:29

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Shifty Nipples posted:

For whatever reason I always feel like I need a destination when I ride my bike, it feels weird to just ride around. But you're right I should ride more.

I'm without any car from Monday to Friday (in LA) so it's bike to work/shopping/dinner etc.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2018 20:19

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

DrNutt posted:

Yeah only Americans feel sad about a massive existential problem that they have little to no personal control over. What selfish assholes.

Hence the biking suggestion. At least by cycling to work, I'm doing something.

And yeah, not eating meat helps both problems too.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2018 20:21

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Happy_Misanthrope posted:

Lament the selfishness of Americans, then in the next post tout the personal responsibility argument, lol

It's complete bullshit. Massive, forced, governmental policy changes is the only thing that will actually matter. It's not a matter of making the right bootstrap choices in consumption on an individual level anymore, we've been past that point for decades.

Yes. Even though I advocate personal action ... mainly because it benefits the person doing it ... we need massive WWII levels of mobilization and regulations to have a shot at living through this.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2018 22:27

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Doorknob Slobber posted:

What can a person do to reduce their foot print by half? Realistically how many people can make the choice do actually loving do those things? I tend to agree with the notion that individual footprint reduction is privileged rich liberal wankology so that they can feel good about themselves while they consume more than most poor people do already simply because poor people can't buy a new iphone/car/computer/whatever every year.

Well, replacing a job that required flying 20+ round trips from San Diego to Baltimore in a year with one that means taking an Amtrak train from north San Diego County to Los Angeles on Monday (back on Friday) and using a bicycle for all transport during the week MAY have lowered my CO2 foot-print a mite.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2018 00:12

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Doorknob Slobber posted:

Realistically speaking wouldn't they just hire someone else who is doing the 20+ round trips on a flight? Did reducing your own individual footprint do a thing that actually made an impact on climate change?

They replaced me with a local at a far lower salary, the daughter of the CEO :-)

So yeah, that helped reduce carbon emissions. And my income in 2017.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 01:17

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Doorknob Slobber posted:

Biking to work is a privilege my friend and not feasible for many people for a variety of reasons, a few I can think of off the top of my head are, being able to live close enough to work, health, weather

I also think the notion that we can individually solve climate change is a trap, specifically spewed out by democratic donors in the mainstream media who literally want to actually do nothing and have demonstrated as such. I've done the less meat thing already to the point where I only eat meat once a week partly because meat is too expensive to make every night, I've been unemployed and poor for so long that my footprint is probably less than most people posting in this thread simply by virtue of not being able to afford otherwise.

Most of the bike commuters I see in LA are people who don't even own (or can afford to own) a car. Not every bike commuter is an executive who hates driving in traffic like me.

Note: Many of the cycling advocates ignore these commuters. Which is sad.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 01:20

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Car Hater posted:

You can't land a battery-powered jetliner, biofuels are a waste of potentially sequestered carbon, planes die or we die, nbd.

Solar Fuels ... liquid fuels based on solar produced hydrogen (electrolysis of water) are probably the best bet.

Electric aircraft may make sense for some general aviation uses, pilot training for one. Not viable for routes more than a few 100 miles until we have massive gains in energy density of batteries.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 01:23

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

latent lunatic posted:

Aren't like half of more of the posters in this thread depression survivors as well?

I'm old but not THAT old.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2018 17:14

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Car Hater posted:

Uranium has a greater energy density than coal, it's a no-brainer.

Not all things have other engineerable solutions, particularly airplanes. As-is we have to reforest an area the size of Australia to survive this century, you're going to starve people to get the biofuels for jumbo jets? Electric cars are an excuse to keep having cars despite them being the worst thing we've ever done, and long range electric passenger planes are not a viable technology.

Fossil fuels are super loving special, not in an emotional or propaganda sense, just basic science.

Bio-fuels (except possible algae-based) are a non-starter for aviation.

Solar fuels (solar panels -> electricity -> hydrogen -> liquid fuel) are a better bet.

# ¿ Oct 22, 2018 23:26

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Monaghan posted:

It'd be nice if it actually managed to stay on budget.

Nuclear Energy is just like Communism, it just hasn't been done right yet.

# ¿ Oct 22, 2018 23:29

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

The Dipshit posted:

Feel free to theorycraft a fossil fuel free world without nuclear power then. The alternative is "solar, wind, and a lead-acid battery the size of Oklahoma", which I don't think we've priced out just yet.

Feel free to pay my excess utility bill to cover the San Onofre "Too Cheap To Meter" Nuke Reactor that SDG&E broke, and while you're at it, please move the waste off my beach and into your backyard.

As to your assertion, one solution is to implement large-scale wind and solar and a smart grid to minimize the need for storage. Heck there are towns in Texas offering free electricity at night from their excess wind power. The potential wind energy in the mainland USA is something like 40x our total consumption.

As to the USA nuclear industry, we can't wait 20-30 years for plants that somehow never quite get running BUT I would like to see existing plants kept online until we replace all the coal and natural gas plants.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 00:18

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

StabbinHobo posted:

this is indistinguishable from parody: http://carbon.ycombinator.com/desert-flooding/

The Salton Sea V2.0

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 21:19

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

The Dipshit posted:

Lol, sure, IIRC the NREL estimations still leave us needing to store electricity production capacity of the US for 2-3 days even with all the smart grid work. So, 10 million megawatt hours, give ourselves a safety factor of 2 using a 3 day assumption, so 60 million megawatt hours, which means that if we use a 1kWh deep cycle battery with, oh say about 50% of the cycle depth to keep it living as long as possible, we'll need.... 60,000,000,000,000 Wh translates to 120 billion deep cycle batteries at roughly 20 kg of lead would be, oh ~ 2 million metric tons, which would be *checks notes* about 200 times the world production of lead, needing to be recycled/replaced every 5-7 years or so, just for the US's needs. Feel free to check my math it's late here and maybe I missed something, adjust the assumptions down, or whatever. And before you ask, I'm pretty sure any other battery technology is not cheaper, nor would I expect any of them to get cheaper anytime soon enough to matter. Wanna guess how much you'll pay in this scenario? Heck, replace this with a series of cranes and concrete blocks like has been floating around recently, it's still sobering.

Of course, this does absolutely nothing for the entire transportation network, which is a whole 'nother kettle of worms, and about 1/3 our total energy consumption.

And Yeah, I'm fine with the waste in my backyard, or ideally Yucca mountain, since I used to work at the US's strategic reserve of nuclear materials. I'm used to being around all the weapons grade stuff for my job, and I'm fine. I know the whole "radiation!!" thing is part and parcel of creating an aversion to using nuclear weapons, but I can hope that at least on D&D a person can do a simple, sober analysis of it all.

Like, I get it, nuclear power is squicky or whatever, but this isn't a video game. It's either nuclear or your kids/grandkids living a pastoral life, presuming they survive the crunch coming and don't get killed or eaten as fattened food. Please listen to this DOE nerd. We don't make these statements flippantly.

Lead Batteries. 1995 wants it's technology back.

Don't try to pull "appeal to authority" with me or I'll have to whip out my Ivy League Physics Credentials.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 21:22

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

The Dipshit posted:

Feel free to choose your alternative technology, check out the masses of elemental Li involved and price it out, or be called a stupid idiot who can't frame a basic, order of magnitude appraisal of the situation. Old storage tech is almost universally cheapest, and I'm doing back of envelope calculations. There is no storage method I can think of that is cheaper, which is where you'd want to be for storage of intermitted power, going by NRELs work, people who I know and have worked with from time to time.

Also, a Physics major undergraduate degree is pretty lol-worthy. Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward.

Sorry, only a masters ... got recruited by a software company out of graduate school.

Anyway, I don't even think batteries make sense on a large scale. What I do know is that the US Nuclear Industry has failed to deliver on its promises. Even with store, wind&solar are now the lowest cost solutions (as long as you don't hide expenses that taxpayers end up covering).

What's more relevant in my background is running companies. I can look at the history of nuclear projects and draw realistic conclusions.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 21:41

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

The Dipshit posted:

Ah, I see, this is the problem of an old man seeing things from the perspective he is comfortable from. The problem of global warming is fundamentally a physics/engineering problem, not a business problem. Businesses have the unspoken goal of externalize ALL COSTS, while nuclear (rightfully) is regulated away from doing that, and then some (see earlier comment about the NRC, they really DO suck).

Until grid penetration of intermittent power reaches ~30%, renewable power won't be too big of a stablity problem (as long as the people running the grid are allowed to manage your washer/dryer/other big electricity hogs), but after that, storage becomes a massive, massive problem.
Kroposki is a pretty cool dude, and while I'd disagree with some of his modeling, he's got a lot to talk about.

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68349.pdf should be generally readable.

Like I said before, 25-50% has pretty much gotta be nuclear, maybe more for CCS since renewable power isn't really good for thermal power.

also, check out this: http://calculators.energy.utexas.edu/lcoe_map/#/county/tech and change the nuclear cost from 8000/kW (lol) to the poster child of "Stupid nuclear power failures" Olkiluto-3, which is about 5500/kW. Solar and wind are good, but they don't work everywhere.

Most of my skepticism is driven by what has happened with projects in the USA.

Maybe we should have let Rickover run the civilian programs too.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 22:34

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

The Dipshit posted:

Jimmy Carter killed the nuclear power industry after he split the AEC into the DOE (Where we mostly work on nuclear warheads omnicide and general energy R&D) and the NRC which took over civilian nuclear power, which was promptly turned into the "don't approve anything, drag permitting process out" game, and I presume that was from regulatory capture by competing industries such as the traditional fossil fuel power generation people who never were told to wipe their asses, much less take responsibility for their radioactive emissions. Like take a look at cost overruns from 1976 onward for nuclear power and you'll see a stark before/after line for it, it's pretty nuts.

Ironic considering what Carter did in the Navy.

# ¿ Oct 25, 2018 01:27

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

tsa posted:

lol

Can you provide cost&time estimates for nuclear vs solar and wind?

Please have this on my desk by end of work on Monday.

Thank you.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2018 20:11

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

starkebn posted:

you don't like hydro? how about a couple of these things at every town?

https://qz.com/1355672/stacking-concrete-blocks-is-a-surprisingly-efficient-way-to-store-energy/

When they demolished the Akasaka Prince Hotel in Tokyo in 2013 (where I used to stay in the late 80's, early 90's) they used equipment that recovered energy in a similar manner as described in your link.

https://www.wired.com/2013/01/japan-building-demolition/

A Japanese construction company is using giant jacks and electricity-generating cranes to dismantle a high-rise tower in Tokyo, floor by floor.

----

I looked into this idea, digging a hole and hanging weights via pullies, and you need a lot of depth and a very heavy weight to store much energy.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2018 17:21

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

The Dipshit posted:

Happy thoughts, desalination will probably be much, much less energy intensive than it is currently. People are doing cute things with graphene oxide as a filter material and that stuff is cheap as dirt.

Dean Kamen's design recovers much of the energy of distillation. There's also "solar stills", cutting out the middleman by directly using solar to distill water.

# ¿ Nov 7, 2018 19:24

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Conspiratiorist posted:

Syria is already a Mad Max hellhole prompted (arguably, granted) by Climate Change. Your personal experience will depend strongly on your region and your own socioeconomic resilience.

But even if you're solidly third quintile in a non-failed state, fact is conditions you'll be looking at in 30 years will be very different from what they're now. Not just a matter of "oh yeah, the economy is in the dumps, unemployment is high and wages low, I can't afford my hobbies" like people remember from 2008, but more along the lines of "logistics and infrastructure are breaking down left and right, the country is barely holding itself together" ala the USSR in the 80s.

Don't think Mad Max, think Interstellar.

I vote "Don't think Mad Max, think Interstellar" as the new thread title.

# ¿ Nov 9, 2018 17:07

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

AceOfFlames posted:

I'm just waiting for a goddamned universal voluntary euthanasia movement. Like, you go to a room, they give you a nice painless injection, the government pays for your funeral and gives some money to charity in exchange for your noble sacrifice and your loved ones celebrate the fact that you are no longer in pain.

I feel like all these articles telling us how screwed we are are in fact people clamoring for the same but no one wants to ACTUALLY propose that because you'd get chucked in a mental institution. So instead we are left with this ridiculous situation that is akin to being trapped in a cage bringing slowly dipped towards a vat of acid with a bunch of people. Everyone keeps screaming about how the a I'd is there, there's nothing we can do,and what a horrible and painful death it will be. But the minute you suggest that people start strangling each other in their sleep or hanging themselves with their shoelaces since it hurts less than the acid, everyone immediately goes "NO! You have so much to live for in this acid cage!" "How can you be so selfish to not want to die horribly along side me? Sure, I will not even talk to you this whole time but your mere PRESENCE is so soothing!" "You are a coward! A REAL man would punch the acid, since dying fighting a worthless battle is the HONORABLE thing to do!" all in a selfish attempt to make themselves feel better about having "saved" someone.

I mean gently caress, I can't avoid climate news no matter what I do. RockPaperShotgun, Polygon, Av Club, Gizmodo, Waypoint, ALL of them can't go for a week without some thinkpiece related to our political and climate Doom. If even hobby sites are infected by doomsaying, the gently caress am I supposed to do? Stare at a wall all day?

You have seen the film Soylent Green, haven't you?

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

I saw this film when it was released in 1973. Never thought I would end up experiencing that sort of world, but I guess it's going to happen.

Climate Change: It's PEEPLE!

VideoGameVet fucked around with this message at 18:59 on Nov 15, 2018

# ¿ Nov 15, 2018 18:56

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Rime posted:

Well hell thread, I just took a contract building the biggest wind turbines in North America for the foreseeable future, I start next month. How many to offset my lifetime carbon budget?

Depends. Do you eat meat? Drive to work? Take a lot of airline flights?

# ¿ Nov 16, 2018 04:04

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 05:29

VideoGameVet: May 14, 2005; It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion. It is by the juice of Java that pedaling acquires speed, the teeth acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my bike in motion.

Rime posted:

You haven't lived until you've seen a herd of free range turbine blades threshing their way across the prairies. Still wakes me up at night.

E: I looked it up, this farm is projected to displace 850,000t of carbon emissions a year. Not bad.

Most cost effective system there is. Awesome.

# ¿ Nov 16, 2018 05:53

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Climate Change: Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward

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