tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4989966954446423670.post6541922825444599961..comments2024-03-02T00:44:55.128-08:00Comments on Pleiotropy: Powering the planet with solar energyBjørn Østmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08859177313382114917noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4989966954446423670.post-2701521518648306642009-11-17T10:09:30.558-08:002009-11-17T10:09:30.558-08:00Interesting. I don't really buy comments of t...Interesting. I don't really buy comments of the form "There isn't enough X on the planet.." because people have been saying we will run out of oil for how many decades now? Obviously we will run out at <i>some</i> point, but estimates of the global amount of discoverable resources consistently tend to run wildly low.<br /><br />This calculation about the number of nuclear reactors required to maintain a "business as usual" curve is worrisome though. Although, I would still argue that aggressively moving to nuclear is way better than doing nothing at all... <br /><br />Non-renewable resources don't just suddenly dry up one day -- rather, as they become more scarce, they become more expensive. In fact, if the carbon emissions issue were not a factor, I would argue that there would be nothing at all wrong with continuing on our present course. A gradual monotonic increase in the price of oil is arguably the least painful way to both recalibrate our concept of "business as usual", as well as incentivize the development of alternative energy sources. If there <i>is</i> a viable way of continuing "business as usual", you damn well better believe corporations are going to figure out how to find it when the price of oil starts to become impractical (and if they don't, other people will and will drive the old guard out of business -- yay capitalism!). And if there is no viable way of continuing "business as usual", and we need to lower our standards of living, doing it through a gradual increase in cost is probably less painful than legislating a lower standard of living all at once.<br /><br />It's just that pesky "impending climate disaster" that torpedoes this whole plan... I have no doubt that capitalism's insatiable ability for short-term/local optimization will rapidly uncover the most cost-effective alternative energy source as soon as oil is no longer cost-effective. But of course capitalism falls down hard when it comes to long-term planning and/or global optimization... By the time there is a profit incentive to switch away from oil, the damage will already be done.<br /><br />If we could get people on nuclear, though, even if Lewis's bleak predictions come true, we could at the very least get things on a track where corporations would have a powerful incentive to discover the next best thing, <i>without</i> melting the icecaps on the way there.James Sweethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17212877636980569324noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4989966954446423670.post-55536565935253152952009-11-16T14:16:15.394-08:002009-11-16T14:16:15.394-08:00Lewis does talk about nuclear power. Here's wh...Lewis does talk about nuclear power. Here's what he says:<br /><br /><i>So let’s look at carbon-neutral energy sources. We could go nuclear, which is the only proven technology that we have that could scale to these numbers. We have about 400 nuclear power plants in the world today. To get the 10 terawatts we need to stay on the “business-as-usual” curve, we’d need 10,000 of our current one-gigawatt reactors, and that means we’d have to build one every other day somewhere in the world for the next 50 straight years. I’ve been giving this talk in one version or another for five years—we should have already built on the order of 1,000 new reactors, or double what’s ever been built, just to stay on track. So we’re really behind.<br /><br />Th ere isn’t enough terrestrial uranium on the planet to build them as once-through reactors. We could get enough uranium from seawater, if we processed the equivalent of 3,000 Niagara Falls 24/7 to do the extraction. Which means that the only credible nuclear-energy source today involves plutonium. That’s never talked about by the politicians, but it’s a fact. Forgive my facetiousness, but on some level we should be thanking North Korea and Iran for doing their part to mitigate global warming. We’d need about 10,000 fast-breeder reactors and, by the way, their commissioned lifetime is only 50 years. Th at means that after we choose this route, we’re building one of them every other day, or more rapidly, forever.</i><br /><br />Bleak.<br /><br />I can email you or anyone else the PDF...Bjørn Østmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08859177313382114917noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4989966954446423670.post-30478688781434570422009-11-16T13:20:38.258-08:002009-11-16T13:20:38.258-08:00The PDF does not seem to want to load (I sometimes...The PDF does not seem to want to load (I sometimes get glitchy internet access at work) so I can't check the article, but... what about nuclear? Sure, it's not a permanent solution, but it ought to get us through the next hundred years even with pessimistic estimates; and unlike carbon-based energy sources, it won't make the planet unlivable if we <i>do</i> foolishly keep using it until it runs out.James Sweethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17212877636980569324noreply@blogger.com