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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On January 09 2022 07:06 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2022 03:17 LegalLord wrote:
I've consistently heard about four arguments against hydroelectric from the ostensibly green crowd:
1. Small dams cause all of the same problems to the river while producing a very small fraction of the power output.
2. We shouldn't consider hydroelectric as green because power suppliers are willing to build them anyways, and if we give them credit for being green then that will reduce the amount of solar and wind they're forced to build.
3. They encourage vegetation which makes methane, and methane is bad.
4. They kill the fishies.
I agree with (1) in the same sense that you shouldn't build solar panels in the arctic or wind power in places that aren't windy; renewables undeniably have strong levels of geographic preference. The argument of (2) is the kind of greenwashing manipulation that can fuck right off. And (3) and (4) are very solvable problems that are much less severe than, for example, the infrastructure and rare-metal issues that solar and wind face.
On the other hand, a large dam can provide some of the largest power outputs of any type of power plant that you could construct, and does so while being renewable. It's generally a good idea. Who says 3? All the carbon produced by vegetation was CO2 already. It’s the carbon cycle.
See this hit piece for one example of the claim.
Reservoirs already contribute roughly 1.3% of the world's annual human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, the study finds—about as much as the entire nation of Canada. It also suggests future reservoirs will have a bigger impact than expected, largely because they emit much more methane, a potent warming gas, than once believed. The methane is produced by underwater microbes that feast on the organic matter that piles up in the lake sediments trapped by dams.
I’m sure the phenomenon is real, if dishonestly sold.
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For people who are opposed to nuclear because you live in a fantasy world where renewables can do it all, after how many years of coal would you say "oops, I was wrong"? What kind of a time frame are you attaching? If 5 years go by, and your country is still using gas and coal, will you think "woops, shouldn't have shut down those nuclear plants"?
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Not opposed to nuclear power, but the main problem appears to be that it is more expensive than other options, such as solar and wind power. As a choice, it seems to leave much to be desired as an economical choice. It''s strange but whenever someone seems to be championing nuclear power, that person always seems to be taking a jab at "green" energy. I wonder why this is so?
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On January 09 2022 08:08 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
Not opposed to nuclear power, but the main problem appears to be that it is more expensive than other options, such as solar and wind power. As a choice, it seems to leave much to be desired as an economical choice. It''s strange but whenever someone seems to be championing nuclear power, that person always seems to be taking a jab at "green" energy. I wonder why this is so?
Because people are always like "why use nuclear when you can just build more solar panels" as if the only thing keeping us from running the planet on solar is manufacturing constraints. Solar, wind and hydro should be maxed out in all available situations. We should not have a single drop of unrealized solar/wind/hydro potential. In an enormous number of cases, this still leads to a huge energy deficiency.
The ideal scenario is solar/wind/hydro/nuclear until we figure out cold fusion. This is all just a matter of making it to cold fusion. Once we have that, this all becomes irrelevant and we just use that until we create Dyson Spheres 1000 years later.
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I can see the issues with making new reactors if you're not able to summon the political will to solve your energy problems with a generational investment but that's not the biggest issue we're seeing.
Germany seems to be making the case that coal and russian gas is cleaner, or at least preferable, than nuclear which isn't true by any rationalization.
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On January 09 2022 08:22 Sermokala wrote:
I can see the issues with making new reactors if you're not able to summon the political will to solve your energy problems with a generational investment but that's not the biggest issue we're seeing.
Germany seems to be making the case that coal and russian gas is cleaner, or at least preferable, than nuclear which isn't true by any rationalization.
To further your point:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/
Over the past few decades, however, a series of studies has called these stereotypes into question. Among the surprising conclusions: the waste produced by coal plants is actually more radioactive than that generated by their nuclear counterparts. In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy.
This is why coal plants require rigorous scrubbing systems, to prevent that from being tossed in the air. These scrubbers are very costly to maintain and it is common for audits of coal plants to show their scrubbing is insufficient.
One of the main arguments against nuclear is not trusting capitalism to keep it clean, and yet, coal is demonstrably unclean and significantly more vulnerable to cutting corners.
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Northern Ireland25258 Posts
A consistent, and obviously realistic qualm over certain forms of renewables is their geographic exclusivity, or temporal restrictions.
An obvious, and barely mentioned potential solution is greater integration of electrical grids and wider energy infrastructure across boarders.
An obvious polity that structurally could do this would be the European Union
There are a million political impediments to doing this, but if you want to maximise sources of green energy, pool it. Fund smaller countries to expand green energy beyond their own country’s need.
As I’m personally experiencing at the minute, Britain is bloody windy. It’s not very sunny mind. Much of Southern Europe is rather sunny for large chunks of the year. Iceland has a considerable level of geothermal capacity. And France and now less so Germany has a hefty nuclear capacity.
Etc etc. Britain (I know it’s not part of the EU so don’t quibble :p) may struggle to go full renewable because the efficacy of solar is super limited by our latitude on the globe. Others may not have the requisite geographic features to take advantage of wind, or hydroelectric power
But hey join a club and pool resources and you can, fill gaps.
I recall a proposed giant solar array somewhere in Africa that was proposed as an EU wide energy infrastructure project, although as far as I know it got shelved. But it did ignite a certain enthusiasm in me for projects or such a kind.
I know there are technical problems of implementation and engineering, and the main impediment that you’d essentially need a body the likes of which to my knowledge doesn’t exist. Which isn’t just a state run energy sector, but some kind of multinational state run energy body on a pan-European basis.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Kinda seems like the EU already does that. Obviously physics will bite you in the ass over sufficiently large distances, but it seems like energy produced within Europe gets around to fill in gaps. Africa is a bit further away and the infrastructure for that may end up being really mediocre on cost-benefit, so that being shelved doesn't seem too weird.
The ability for renewables to "fill in the gaps" in the way you're proposing is clearly vastly inferior to "burn a bit more of our chemical fuel of choice" in real-world practicality. No guarantee whatsoever that the sun will shine in Spain if the wind didn't blow in the North Sea. If anything, solar and wind seem to tend to be countercyclical with peak demand seasons.
You could try dabbling in things like hydrogen (inefficient to make via green methods) or biofuel (not sure how green this actually is but it has the greenwashers' seal of approval) to replicate the advantage of burning coal or gas. Jury's still out on the long-term viability of those.
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On January 09 2022 10:30 LegalLord wrote:
Kinda seems like the EU already does that. Obviously physics will bite you in the ass over sufficiently large distances, but it seems like energy produced within Europe gets around to fill in gaps. Africa is a bit further away and the infrastructure for that may end up being really mediocre on cost-benefit, so that being shelved doesn't seem too weird.
The ability for renewables to "fill in the gaps" in the way you're proposing is clearly vastly inferior to "burn a bit more of our chemical fuel of choice" in real-world practicality. No guarantee whatsoever that the sun will shine in Spain if the wind didn't blow in the North Sea. If anything, solar and wind seem to tend to be countercyclical with peak demand seasons.
You could try dabbling in things like hydrogen (inefficient to make via green methods) or biofuel (not sure how green this actually is but it has the greenwashers' seal of approval) to replicate the advantage of burning coal or gas. Jury's still out on the long-term viability of those.
biofuel has the same carbon footprint but comes without needing to ruin ecosystems from extraction. It is a "net benefit" but still vastly inferior to nuclear/solar/wind
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On January 09 2022 10:50 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2022 10:30 LegalLord wrote:
Kinda seems like the EU already does that. Obviously physics will bite you in the ass over sufficiently large distances, but it seems like energy produced within Europe gets around to fill in gaps. Africa is a bit further away and the infrastructure for that may end up being really mediocre on cost-benefit, so that being shelved doesn't seem too weird.
The ability for renewables to "fill in the gaps" in the way you're proposing is clearly vastly inferior to "burn a bit more of our chemical fuel of choice" in real-world practicality. No guarantee whatsoever that the sun will shine in Spain if the wind didn't blow in the North Sea. If anything, solar and wind seem to tend to be countercyclical with peak demand seasons.
You could try dabbling in things like hydrogen (inefficient to make via green methods) or biofuel (not sure how green this actually is but it has the greenwashers' seal of approval) to replicate the advantage of burning coal or gas. Jury's still out on the long-term viability of those. biofuel has the same carbon footprint but comes without needing to ruin ecosystems from extraction. It is a "net benefit" but still vastly inferior to nuclear/solar/wind
Instead you ruin ecosystems for its production. It isn't as if mass plantations of sugar cane for the sole purpose of producing ethanol are sustainable... (or efficient use of land).
But our unsustainable agricultural practices are a different topic, I guess. Biofuel is carbon neutral, therefore "green".
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On January 09 2022 10:30 LegalLord wrote:
Kinda seems like the EU already does that. Obviously physics will bite you in the ass over sufficiently large distances, but it seems like energy produced within Europe gets around to fill in gaps. Africa is a bit further away and the infrastructure for that may end up being really mediocre on cost-benefit, so that being shelved doesn't seem too weird.
The ability for renewables to "fill in the gaps" in the way you're proposing is clearly vastly inferior to "burn a bit more of our chemical fuel of choice" in real-world practicality. No guarantee whatsoever that the sun will shine in Spain if the wind didn't blow in the North Sea. If anything, solar and wind seem to tend to be countercyclical with peak demand seasons.
You could try dabbling in things like hydrogen (inefficient to make via green methods) or biofuel (not sure how green this actually is but it has the greenwashers' seal of approval) to replicate the advantage of burning coal or gas. Jury's still out on the long-term viability of those.
Yea, the distance is a bottleneck for our modern electrical grids. In Europe's case it's much easier not only due to economic reasons, but also because of the difference in population density, it is somewhat equal across the EU, with Africa it's a bit different - huge distances with almost no people and no infrastructure, especially the ones in a middle (around Sahara) of the continent.
Also agree about uncertainty with the weather/ocean current patterns, considering global warming. In 10 years the most sunny/windy places in Europe might not be the same, and everything we have invested previously - won't work as planned
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On January 09 2022 16:47 Acrofales wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2022 10:50 Mohdoo wrote:On January 09 2022 10:30 LegalLord wrote:
Kinda seems like the EU already does that. Obviously physics will bite you in the ass over sufficiently large distances, but it seems like energy produced within Europe gets around to fill in gaps. Africa is a bit further away and the infrastructure for that may end up being really mediocre on cost-benefit, so that being shelved doesn't seem too weird.
The ability for renewables to "fill in the gaps" in the way you're proposing is clearly vastly inferior to "burn a bit more of our chemical fuel of choice" in real-world practicality. No guarantee whatsoever that the sun will shine in Spain if the wind didn't blow in the North Sea. If anything, solar and wind seem to tend to be countercyclical with peak demand seasons.
You could try dabbling in things like hydrogen (inefficient to make via green methods) or biofuel (not sure how green this actually is but it has the greenwashers' seal of approval) to replicate the advantage of burning coal or gas. Jury's still out on the long-term viability of those. biofuel has the same carbon footprint but comes without needing to ruin ecosystems from extraction. It is a "net benefit" but still vastly inferior to nuclear/solar/wind Instead you ruin ecosystems for its production. It isn't as if mass plantations of sugar cane for the sole purpose of producing ethanol are sustainable... (or efficient use of land). But our unsustainable agricultural practices are a different topic, I guess. Biofuel is carbon neutral, therefore "green".
Don’t get me wrong, biofuels are awful and should not be a part of any country’s long term plans. I’m just saying they end up shitty for different reasons. Wind solar nuclear is always supreme. Ideally just solar and nuclear
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
The major advantage of biofuels is that they're a Certified Greenwasher Approved™ energy source. Significantly better than nucular or hydroelectric which are more sustainable but on the green naughty list for not being good enough. At least it's a chemical fuel, which is better than all that silliness around trying to make giant batteries work in a way that they are incapable of doing.
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Well this is good. All hinges of course on the meeting on the 24th.
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I'm more than okay with Europe being the moderator of the situation going forward as they have the most to lose in this situation.
If Macron can solve the Ukraine question he deserves the noble prize.
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Bot edit.
User was banned for this post.
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Can someone explain the implications here? How much of Ukraine does this represent? If these are separatist parts of Ukraine, would this mean Ukraine can join NATO now?
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So that Putin speech was something....
edit: I'm genuinely curious on how Germany is going to respond to this speech. I mean this was off the wall historical nonsense, but also damning that he believes the Baltics and former countries behind the Iron Curtain should belong to Russia once more.
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Those self-proclaimed republics lay claim to more land than they actually control. This probably means a military invasion.
+ Show Spoiler +
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EPT![[image loading]](https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/6588/production/_122229952_ukraine_rebel_areas_15.12.21_640_2x-nc.png)
