Higher energy costs for Americans are eminent along with worldwide ecological degradation and human right abuses from mining for wind, solar, and EV materials
By Ronald Stein
Ambassador for Energy & Infrastructure, Irvine, California
The social changes with COVID-19 may have been prelude to life with less fossil fuels. With COVID-19 we have seen extensive self-imposed social adjustments to transportation that are very similar to what will be required to live with less fossil fuels in the future, i.e., with virtually no airlines, cruise ships, or automobiles.
The major caveat and benefit to the world’s populations is that the pandemic occurred in the present which allowed the world to take advantage of petroleum derivatives for thousands of products that were not available before 1900. Those “oil” products were a major benefactor to the medical and the communication sectors that supported a worldwide medical attack against COVID-19 and gave businesses the technology to continue operating virtually.
Electricity alone may support a simplifier lifestyle but cannot support the huge energy needs of transportation infrastructures, nor provide the thousands of products that societies demand from those petroleum derivatives that are the foundation of economies around the world.
The focus of America’s climate policies has been toward the energy industry that was virtually non-existent before 1900. Today, America has less than five percent of the world’s population (330 million vs. 8 billion) but targets its energy policies onto an industry that did not exist a century ago.
The oil and gas industry is not just an American business with a few stateside refineries to service the demands of its residents, but an international industry with more than 700 refineries worldwide that service the fuel and product demands of almost 8 billion living on earth.
More important than the various fuels to the world to operate planes, trucks, militaries, construction equipment, merchant ships, cruise ships, and automobiles are the more than 6,000 products that come from the derivatives of crude oil, including every part in solar panels and wind turbines.
Germany tried to step up as a leader on climate change, by phasing out fossil fuels and nuclear, and pioneered a system of subsidies for wind and solar that sparked a global boom in manufacturing those technologies. Today, Germany is failing to meet its climate goals of reducing carbon-dioxide emissions even after spending over $580 billion by 2025 to overhaul its energy systems. Germany’s emissions miss should be a “wake-up call” for governments everywhere.
Today, German households pay almost 50% more for electricity than they did in 2006 as power prices in Germany are now among the highest in Europe. Much of that increase in electricity cost is the Renewable Surcharge that has increased over the same period by 770%. Germany has learned that clean energy is not energy in totality as wind and solar only provide renewable electricity, and more accurately its only intermittent electricity at best. Renewables have also been the primary driver behind the high costs of electricity for residents of Australia and California.
While the shift to reduce America’s oil and gas industry, the United Nations warns that the unintended negative consequences of the shift to the exotic minerals and metals used to produce the parts for industrial wind and solar electricity and electric car batteries are highly concentrated in a small number of countries and their extraction and refinement pose a serious threat to worldwide ecological degradation and heinous human rights abuses.
In addition to the United Nations warning, there are numerous documentaries about the atrocities the workers are put through in the cobalt mines, i.e. actually digging the mines by hand along with horrendous living conditions. Amnesty International has documented children and adults mining cobalt in narrow man-made tunnels along with the exposure to the dangerous gases emitted during the procurement of these rare minerals.
The Democratic Climate Policy projects the prevention of 62,000 premature deaths in America every year by 2050, but the Democrats’ supporting the demise of America’s oil and gas industry should speak up and take accountability for supporting the elimination of the industry that could reverse the annual fatality atrocities occurring in those poor countries. Those underdeveloped locations in the world, mostly from oil and gas starved countries, are experiencing 11 million child deaths every year, mainly from preventable causes of diarrhea, malaria, neonatal infection, pneumonia, preterm delivery, or lack of oxygen at birth.
For those Western politicians, entertainers, and other elites who think climate change is the biggest threat facing mankind, they need to take responsibility and begin to imagine the future atrocities to most of the current world population of 7.7 billion that’s projected to reach 9.8 billion in 2050, and 11.2 billion in 2100. Six out of seven humans alive today live in developing nations. Most of the poor are trying to live in abject poverty but dying by the millions every year.
Those children in poor countries still lack purified drinking water, sewage sanitation, adequate nutrition, reliable electricity (or any at all), adequate health care, i.e., the infrastructures and products we take for granted that are all based on deep earth minerals and fuels. And by the way, adults in those poor countries barely live past 40 years of age.
There are more than two billion people today who are still without reliable electricity and thus forced to burn cow dung and rotted wood for energy. As an example, 600 million Africans do not have electricity, or reliable sources of electricity, to run their hospitals, turn on the lights, or cook their food.
America is taking giant steps toward following Germany’s failed climate goals which should be a wake-up call for governments everywhere, but it appears that America, from California to New York, wants to follow the German failure.
The Democratic Clean Energy Climate policy remains unconcerned with the worldwide ecological degradation and human rights abuses resulting from the mining for exotic minerals and metals that are highly concentrated in a small number of foreign countries that are used to produce parts for industrial wind and solar electricity and EV batteries.
Ronald Stein, P.E. Ambassador for Energy & Infrastructure
Those who forget history (no matter how recent) …….
Seems like today even those who remember history…
Like protesters demanding all kinds of reparations, when they don’t know even the basics of history of the country. If the lives of those Union soldiers weren’t reparations enough, no amount of money ever will be.
“Fondly do we hope ~ fervently do we pray ~ that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue … until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword as was said three thousand years ago so still it must be said ‘the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.'”
Swimming in a goldfish bowl seems to fit the picture
Speaking of gold fishbowls, good old Monty Python comes to mind. Sorry for the digression.
Higher energy costs are also imminent, as well as the abuses.
First make a sentence with ‘imminent’, ‘eminent’, and ‘immanent’ all in it.
Then make one which all theee are in and can be interchanged.
It will yield different meanings of course.
============
Can do:
“First make a sentence with ‘imminent’, ‘eminent’, and ‘immanent’ all in it.”
“How long have I waited for theee and this moment, Moby, and how long have I sailed after theee, hunting for theee, and now, from hell’s heart I STAB at theee!”
🙂
It’s a slow Friday.
It may be imminent that our eminent English major mosh will enlighten us on the immanent nature of the climastrological eschaton.
Niiiice!
America does not have a Future Energy Plan. They think that they can just continue to spend their way to where electricity will magically be produced in abundance, as you stated Germany is doing.
America has many hundreds of years of good quality coal available. This coal needs to be used to produce America’s electricity. It’s reliable and it makes electricity 24/7/365.
America’s natural gas should be used for building space heating and by industry to process and produce all those products that we consume daily.
America’s oil needs to be used for transportation and be used to produce all those products that need an oil base.
America’s renewable (solar & wind) electricity needs to be connected into it’s own grid network to supply electricity to our up and growing EV market. When the sun goes down and the wind stops blowing and the batteries are out of charge, it’s time to park and wait for more electricity to be produced.
Planning for the future this way will keep America with an abundance of Energy for many years to come.
Agree that grid power will follow economic reality, not political fantasy.
Large coal and nuclear plants will share most of the base load.
Peaking load from whatever energy is regionally economic, NG, hydro, etc.
Transportation fuel is different, it will also follow economic reality, but eventually most transporation will (slowly) evolve into electric. The value of liquid petroleum will escalate as petrochemical feed stock demand increases.
But I think chemical feed stock is too important to the future technology.
Don’t burn it, make it into something useful.
Solar and wind will always be a niche specialty.
That’s the funny thing about dynamic markets. Things are highly economical until they’re not. Things are prohibitively expensive until suddenly they are the lowest cost alternative.
The interests pushing wind and solar understand this, and work to create artificial cost burdens on their competition. That’s not market economics, it’s an indirect form of command economy. So you’re right that without heavy-handed government distortion of markets, wind and solar will always be niche solutions. Taking all the costs into consideration, including all costs externalized to grid customers such as 100% backup capacity and grid upgrade costs, and rejecting bogus “benefits” such as reduced CO2 emissions, these energy capture systems are hopelessly non-competitive.
As far as the need to reserve certain resources for certain purposes, you’re on less solid ground. When the Germans and later the apartheid South Africans were deprived of crude oil due to wartime blockades and sanctions, that did not prevent them from producing gasoline using coal and steam.
It’s more efficient in terms of energy use and process complexity (ultimately cost) to use crude oil as a feedstock because you get energy out breaking down long chains of hydrocarbon, but you need to put energy in to build up longer chains from simpler molecules.
We will never run out of liquid fuels or chemical feedstocks, as long as we have carbon, hydrogen, and energy. The question will be which form of energy storage is more cost-effective and reliable for transportation—batteries or chemical storage. (If, in producing the liquid fuel, you have to put in a large part of the energy that you get out in burning it, then the liquid fuel is just an energy storage system like the battery).
Why this is a question to us now is that we don’t know if it’s possible to create cost-effective batteries for more than a few percent of the world’s autos, before it becomes cost-prohibitive to get the lithium. And of course Li ion batteries are not the only form of battery, just as gasoline refined from crude oil is not the only choice for liquid fuels.
Liquid fuels have certain advantages in reliability and range in certain situations. If you truly never need to drive more than 50km/30 miles on a charge, and you don’t live in a cold climate, then EV may well be the least-cost and most reliable solution for you. That is, provided that you have an option for a short-range vehicle with a cost-effective small battery, and you have a place to park your vehicle where you can charge it overnight. Not every use case will meet those criteria.
So it’s an unknown what the future of transportation fuels will be, but I would bet on diversity.
“America does not have a Future Energy Plan. ”
America has 535 energy plans; one for each member of congress.
gbaikie,
You must have eaten something peculiar to bend your mind.
At least have the decency to flag your words as sci-fi and not possible with known science.
Why did you write this crap? Why did you float it here, where some of us have a reasonable amount of experience with scientific reality?
Impressionable youngsters might read this and wrongly take it as serious.
Do you know that one consequence of widespread readership of Jules Verne books, many adults today have mental pictures of Life below the surface that is unreal, fictional nonsense?
You are spreading educational ignorance. Please stop this harm. Geoff S
–gbaikie,
You must have eaten something peculiar to bend your mind.
At least have the decency to flag your words as sci-fi and not possible with known science–
Well have ever heard of Space Power Satellite. Wiki:
“Space-based solar power (SBSP) is the concept of collecting solar power in outer space and distributing it to Earth. Potential advantages of collecting solar energy in space include a higher collection rate and a longer collection period due to the lack of a diffusing atmosphere, and the possibility of placing a solar collector in an orbiting location where there is no night. A considerable fraction of incoming solar energy (55–60%) is lost on its way through the Earth’s atmosphere by the effects of reflection and absorption. Space-based solar power systems convert sunlight to microwaves outside the atmosphere, avoiding these losses and the downtime due to the Earth’s rotation, but at great cost due to the expense of launching material into orbit. SBSP is considered a form of sustainable or green energy, renewable energy, and is occasionally considered among climate engineering proposals. It is attractive to those seeking large-scale solutions to anthropogenic climate change or fossil fuel depletion (such as peak oil).”
And:
“Various SBSP proposals have been researched since the early 1970s, but none are economically viable with present-day space launch infrastructure. Some technologists speculate that this may change in the distant future if an off-world industrial base were to be developed that could manufacture solar power satellites out of asteroids or lunar material, or if radical new space launch technologies other than rocketry should become available in the future.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power
Not saying idiots at wiki agree that seems doable at moment. Of course saying that either. I saying it dependent on whether one mine lunar water at low enough cost that it can sold at $500,000 per ton or $500 per kg.
Is 1 million people living on Mars, sci-fi?
If so, here is some sci-fi:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2081&v=bmcr2FaoWoU&feature=emb_logo
Now I wouldn’t call it sci-fi rather it seems to me a bit NASA and Elon Musk centric.
I tend to think if mineable water is found on the Moon {lunar water which could sold as low as $500 per kg] there will be a lot more “global involvement” rather than just Musk and NASA.
10 people living on Mars is sci-fi. 1 million is insanity. How about 1 million living in the far more hospitable Antarctica? To what end?
I have no doubt that our vanity will drive us to send a few people at a time to the surface of Mars—maybe more than once—so that we can check the box, been there, done that. And Elon will be there to milk another government subsidy cow, no doubt.
–Rich Davis July 11, 2020 at 6:03 am
10 people living on Mars is sci-fi. 1 million is insanity. How about 1 million living in the far more hospitable Antarctica? —
I would build a lake on Mars and live in it.
Being underwater on Mars {or Moon} is significantly different
then being underwater on Earth.
In terms of long term goal, I think Martians should want cheaper water on Mars than on Earth.
Earth is water planet, what if Mars was a water planet?
I think Mars could have a lot water underground, but making Mars water planet would be mostly involve getting water from Space. If getting enough water from space to make Mars a water planet, one should be using hydro dam type electrical power generation. And dropping 1 cubic km of water from space over a years time and capturing it’s gravitational energy, that would a lot electrical power.
Of course in some ways this easier to do on our Moon.
But with Mars one could start with something simpler.
So idea hydro power from space, is roughly related to space elevators. And space elevators are hard to do {though much easier than Space elevators for Earth} But start with something that does get even a fraction of the energy, you impact Mars largest mountain: Olympus Mons, wiki:
“The volcano has a height of nearly 22 km” and going crash water so at 20 km elevation, and only get power from the 20 km fall. And Olympus Mons already big crater at summit.
Olympus Mons basically huge gradually slope hill- questionable whether it any of it is steep enough slopes for skiing.
Anyhow, put space rock with a lot water content in Mars orbit, and then drop it on Olympus Mons. And should give hydrodam like you have on Earth. But that way you don’t have make Space Elevators. And you want pretty big space rocks. Now could do this without first putting the rock in Mars orbit. And if moving space rocks, you probably going to use nuclear bombs. And doing such things anywhere around Earthlings, will probably upset the Earthlings.
Hi gbaikie,
Never stop dreaming impossible dreams, I guess.
How do you plan to have liquid water on Mars when the atmospheric pressure is about 600 Pa and the triple point of water is (612 Pa, 0.1C)? It will either freeze or sublime, but can’t exist as a liquid. Up on Olympus Mons, the atmospheric pressure is only about 70 Pa. At the equator the temperature may range from -80C at night to +20C at noon.
But why would we want to do these things even if they were not impossible?
What makes you think people are going to try living on the surface without any kind of protection?
*sigh*
If you’re directing that to me Mark, maybe try reading the comment that I responded to, huh?
Obviously when we send our pointless zillion dollar planetary tourism mission to Mars, there will have to be extensive life support systems. It’s mostly colder than Antarctica with virtually no air and no magnetic field for protection against cosmic rays and no ozone layer for protection against high energy UV. And basically nothing of any value whatsoever that could be done there, that can’t be done a billion times cheaper and easier on earth, other than to take a picture of a human standing on another planet. But absolutely it can be done, and I’m sure that it will be done.
Gbaikie’s plan on the other hand is to crash icy asteroids or comets or something into Olympus Mons to create a lake that can generate hydroelectric power. Then s/he wants to live under the lake. Or maybe it’s another lake, because all those comets crashing in, might be a bit inconvenient for the bottom dwellers. And yet there will be a million people there. I wonder what is the maximum number of people who have ever been on Antarctica at the same time?
So, what makes you think that any of gbaikie’s plan is reasonable?
–Hi gbaikie,
Never stop dreaming impossible dreams, I guess.–
Well what I saying depends what the actual results of exploration, are. It quite possible the Moon doesn’t have mineable water. And it’s possible Mars doesn’t have mineable water.
It’s dependent on political “matters”. I don’t even know we going to explore the Moon and then explore Mars- That was suppose to happen decades ago, and didn’t happen due to political “matters”. As to your questions:
“How do you plan to have liquid water on Mars when the atmospheric pressure is about 600 Pa and the triple point of water is (612 Pa, 0.1C)?”
Water ice on Mars can be a building material.
CO2 ice can also used as “kind of” a building material.
We “mine” Earth atmosphere for O2 and N2 and argon- plus trace gases.
One will probably “mine” Mars thin atmosphere and CO2 and nitrogen, and trace O2- “Carbon Dioxide (CO2) – 95.1% ; Nitrogen (N2) – 2.59% Argon (Ar) – 1.94%; Oxygen (O2) – 0.16%;” And other trace gases.
And could lots of uses for liquid CO2 mined from the Atmosphere- and it become frozen if spray it on Mars. But also a refrigerant.
Earth has lot stuff we as a refrigerant or Earth has easily available stuff to cool with- such just the air and water.
The vacuum of space has no temperature. And Mars atmosphere is close enough to the vacuum of space- the coldness of Mars thin atmosphere will be not very helpful to cool anything. Or specifically one have ice on top of the water on Mars as the weight of ice can give you pressure- though also use structure strength of ice, as dome made ice is both it’s weight and structure strength. Or don’t need a dome, it could be flat roof of ice with column support and air pressure support. Of course with mars gravity ice weighs less or it has higher strength to weight ratio as compared to Earth. Of course true all material- you make longer bridge on Mars as compared to on Earth {as bridges are largely about their weight}
“It will either freeze or sublime, but can’t exist as a liquid. Up on Olympus Mons, the atmospheric pressure is only about 70 Pa. At the equator the temperature may range from -80C at night to +20C at noon.”
So the top of lake freezes. Mars dirt can warm to +20 C, cold ice should remain quite cold. As far as evaporation, all water and ice on earth is always evaporating. One argue it evaporate more on Mars. But if mars is water planet it will be more wet, and will evaporate less as compared it’s current state of being very, very dry.
But in terms Olympus Mons, I was thinking distant future.
But I think we could start with lakes on Mars, and such the lakes would at much lower elevation than Olympus Mons.
But part having lakes is related to idea on having regional wetness to Mars. Earth of of course has big region of wettest, that we call the tropics. Though within the large tropical zone, there also some very dry deserts. So, roughly put lakes in Mars tropical zones. And one starts with one lake. And where is lake is depends where is the cheapest mineable water. Or where there is cheapest mineable water would trump all other consideration. Or somewhere in Mars tropical zone, would nice. But it seems cheapest and most abundant water is a pretty strong controlling factor.
Musk seems to think he knows where to put a Mars town {city}- and I don’t know that.
Water important in terms growing stuff, and residential uses, but another thing water earth is used for is for energy production. And can run nuclear reactors on mars without using water, it’s would cheaper to use water. Plus heated “waste water” is useful.
OK fine, gbaikie. Let me accept for the sake of argument that with a near infinite amount of resources, icy asteroids or comets could be brought into orbit around Mars. Or that there might be water that can be mined on Mars.
But the question I’m really asking is “Why?”
What is the benefit of doing any of this?
Even if I accept that it’s worthwhile to be able to say we explored the surface with more than our machines, even if I accept that humans might be able perform some experiments better than robots, why would we ever need more than a few dozen people on Mars, temporarily?
–Rich Davis July 11, 2020 at 5:20 pm
OK fine, gbaikie. Let me accept for the sake of argument that with a near infinite amount of resources, icy asteroids or comets could be brought into orbit around Mars. Or that there might be water that can be mined on Mars.–
Ok we are both accepting it for the sake of argument.
–But the question I’m really asking is “Why?”–
World peace. Freedom. Etc.
–What is the benefit of doing any of this?
Even if I accept that it’s worthwhile to be able to say we explored the surface with more than our machines, even if I accept that humans might be able perform some experiments better than robots, why would we ever need more than a few dozen people on Mars, temporarily?–
Well, my plan. Would be send 3 crew, than add another 3 crew, and when next crew of 3 arrived, send back 3 crew.
And maybe work up dozen crew on Mars at any given time.
And use lots of robots- when you have the crew on Mars.
Musk wants send a lot paying passengers to Mars.
I am not NASA or Musk.
One advantage of Musk plan, is NASA doesn’t need to send any government crew. If Musk send people. NASA can focus on sending robots which can operated by people Musk sends.
And that could be cost saving to US tax payer.
And a problem I was trying to deal with is problem sending NASA crew anywhere as dangerous as going to Mars.
My solution was to spend more money on sending NASA crew to Mars so that one could have shorter transit times getting to Mars.
But your question is why live on Mars. My answer is it could be better planet to live on {for some people}.
Or same reason some people live in Kansas- apparently they like Kansas.
And Mars is better better planet in the sense of various “objective standards”.
Now, we don’t know what health effects related to living on 1/3 gravity world. Since don’t know, it’s possibly there mostly good health effects. Though I tend imagine there bad effects and some bad effect may require long time to become more obvious. But I could say similar things about climbing Mt Everest. Or actually I believe there are apparently various known bad health effects from climbing Mt Everest.
And “Approximately 800 people attempt to climb Everest annually.”
Have no desire to climb Everest- even if it was easier. And even there wasn’t the high chance of death or injury.
And there possibility there is Mars life which might prohibit any one from living on Mars.
NASA and even the Mars fans seem excited about the prospects of there being alien life on Mars.
I agree Glenn:
https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/moon-mars/a3778/4294346/
But as problem with 1/3 gee living, maybe there is something wonderful about having alien life on Mars.
I think maybe one could make alien life on Mars.
Or recreate Earth extinct life on Mars. I would rather dinosaurs were made on Mars, rather than on Earth. That also goes for the new and improved super colliders {though could effect the entire Universe- which is bad}
Gbaikie, Before considering the effects of 1/3 g, there are a few other minor considerations you might want to acquaint yourself with before booking a stay on Mars. If you’re an organism that likes an oxygen-free, bone dry atmosphere at near vacuum, and thrives with unfiltered solar UV and cosmic radiation, and you’re comfortable spending every night at temperatures near or even far below the lowest temperatures that have ever been measured on earth, then Mars might just be a better planet for you than earth.
If you’re looking for world peace, that’s admirable, but I’m not seeing any connection to world peace in this.
There’s only one planet with the unique conditions to allow for human life anywhere that could be reached in a human lifetime with technology 100 times better than currently available. So world peace is pretty important, if survival of the human species matters.
“If you’re an organism that likes an oxygen-free, bone dry atmosphere at near vacuum, and thrives with unfiltered solar UV and cosmic radiation, and you’re comfortable spending every night at temperatures near or even far below the lowest temperatures that have ever been measured on earth, then Mars might just be a better planet for you than earth.”
You can’t survive living in Kansas without some thing acting as a house.
If you in spacesuit on Mars, the spacesuit will require some thing to keep person cool. Coldness is not issue in regards to people in spacesuit or living in a house on Mars.
The coldness of Kansas is more issue if in spacesuit or living in a house in Kansas. But in terms of difference of Mars vs Kansas, Mars has solar weather as problem, ie, solar flares, which are not things which any effect upon you in Kansas. But you can get tornadoes in Kansas, and dust devils on Mars are not as much of problem on Mars.
Btw if you are living in lake, one can go “outside” in the sunlight {within the lake} without spacesuit/pressure suit and the solar flares will not effect you.
“If you’re looking for world peace, that’s admirable, but I’m not seeing any connection to world peace in this.”
It might be hard to see, give it another look.
–There’s only one planet with the unique conditions to allow for human life anywhere that could be reached in a human lifetime with technology 100 times better than currently available. So world peace is pretty important, if survival of the human species matters.–
If looking planet which evolve life, it might evolve life, that life could be very dangerous to alien lifeform, we call human.
Or Earth would be very dangerous to space aliens. Or if the Space Alien is a biological creature, it probably should wear some kind protective clothing/gear if it lands on Earth.
Or ignore the humans {they are somewhat harmless, and the dominate life form on Earth is microbial which the human as well as all other larger lifeforms is mostly comprised of and a host to- Btw, we going to be forced to bring our microbial life to Mars or anywhere humans go- and we must keep it healthy}.
Maybe should make list of “it could be better planet to live on”.
Hopeful Mars is lifeless.
If so, and have some crazy religions which worried about stepping insect or something. Mars has no insects to accidentally step on. And any insects will be limited to certain areas which one could avoid. And includes a lot stuff, like maybe no mosquitoes or dog shit to step on.
And includes nothing you are directly connected to is going to lead any kind species extinction. And as mention one cause once extinct life to one again be living. Could do preservation of any and all life on Earth.
If you are geologist obviously Mars could be great place to live. Such comparative geology will do lot to advance understanding of Earth geology. Astronomy obviously has advantages on Mars. If interested doing sports- Mars environment will provide new avenues of sport events.
Human with wings could fly and sports in general could more three dimensional compared Earth sports.
The water environment is more expanded as compared to Earth- due less gravity and have distance 3 times greater in terms dealing with getting the bends.
Obviously advantage of Mars is far easy to leave the planet than Earth is. And Earth strong gravity has significant amount of gravity loss. Or avoid or reduce gravity loss require rocket vehicles to get orbital height as quickly as possible. Which related to why blast off and will reach 3 or more gees of acceleration. Or if limited the amount acceleration to say 1 gee or less, one will have a lot more gravity loss. Wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_drag
“In astrodynamics and rocketry, gravity drag (or gravity losses) is a measure of the loss in the net performance of a rocket while it is thrusting in a gravitational field. In other words, it is the cost of having to hold the rocket up in a gravity field.” Or if hovering rocket above ground- it’s all gravity loss.
Or hovering rocket above the ground of Mars requires less power or has less gravity loss.
Anyhow on Mars one can limit acceleration to 1 gee and have about 1/2 Earth’s gravity loss as Earth has when rockets are required reach around 3 gee.
If shoot things into space with cannon or any mass driver, you would zero gravity loss with Earth or with Mars. Though if mass driver has high gees for up distance of 10 or 20 seconds, there some gravity loss in the 10 or 20 seconds of acceleration {though it matters very little}
Anyways Earth thick atmosphere is quite barrier in regards the orbital speed of earth 7.8 km/sec, in terms using mass driver which could add a lot velocity, whereas Mars thin atmosphere and Mars low orbital [or escape velocity] a lot less of barrier {less air drag}.
What does it mean. Single Stage reusable rockets have the holy grail which never been achieve with Earth. And are very easy to do in regards to Mars.
A problem with Earth sub-orbital travel is gravity loss, high velocity need to go any longer distance and the re-entry velocity.
With Mars sub-orbital travel is quite easy. Though with Earth suborbital travel, of “less than 1 hour from anywhere to anywhere on Earth”, with Mars it’s, less 2 hours to anywhere on Mars {due to the lower velocity].
In terms of airplane, airplane are largely about gravity loss, so airplanes also easier and faster on Mars, also. {though you don’t get the free oxygen like do with Earth}. Balloons works better on Mars {Though hot air balloon on earth also get free oxygen- so hot air balloons probably don’t work well on Mars].
Or there is the advantage of Earth of having the free oxygen in atmosphere. There is also advantage of Earth of using the ocean for transportation purposes. But this advantage is related to be able to move stuff with enormous weight. Ships are the most massive vehicles and can carry the most massive loads.
Trains are similar.
And with things weighing 1/3rd, Mars trains could be better than Earth ocean ships. Though one could have canals on Mars:) – then have more massive ships and more massive cargo- without the ocean storms. And have electric powered
ships.
Other things like you can dig deeper on Mars. No floods, which kill a lot people and destroy property on Earth. No tectonic activity- lack of volcanoes and earthquakes. No pandemics from China. No wars. Etc.
I’ll let you have the last 10,000) words, gbaikie. Dream on.
“America does not have a Future Energy Plan.”
US is going to explore the Moon. That’s a energy plan.
By 2100 1/2 energy used by all humans could generated in space.
The Moon is a good location to generate nuclear energy and good place to store nuclear waste from lunar nuclear power generation, and store nuclear waste from nuclear energy generation done anywhere on Earth.
The lunar polar region is good place to harvest solar energy. One can get more solar energy per square meter area and one make solar power grid which encircles the small lunar polar region that provide constant supply of electrical from solar energy.
The cost/price of electrical power is expensive in space because it’s expensive to ship stuff from the Earth surface into Space.
Roughly speaking one get to point where one make stuff on the Moon so don’t need to ship stuff from Earth.
Or one needs an Industrial Revolution on the Moon.
A problem with poor nations in world is primarily relate to their lack of electrical power and having cheaper electrical power.
And one say the Moon is similar to a poor nation- it currently has lack of electrical power and electrical power is currently very costly.
So the moon needs to grow the amount of electrical power which available and have competition in lunar electrical market to drive the price of electrical power down.
To do this REQUIRES that there is mineable lunar water. Mineable lunar water means one buy as much lunar water that “you want” at about $500 per kg. But also when enough demand of lunar water in say 10 years in the future, lunar water price will cheaper than $500 per kg. And by 2100 AD one could expect lunar water price to be about $1 per kg {or less}.
In addition to being able to buy lunar water, one needs the capable to buy relatively cheap lunar electrical power. Relatively cheap lunar electrical power might as high as $100 per kw hour. Which about 1000 times more than electrical power on Earth. But can buy the electrical power whenever you need it and get lunar water for $500 per kg, one make very cheap lunar rocket fuel. Or a lot cheaper than earth’s rocket fuel shipped to lunar surface. But as with lunar water, there likewise need expectation of cheaper lunar electrical power in the future, say within 10 years. And again it will require competition to drive these prices down. And by 2100 AD, one might expect lunar electrical power to be less than $1 per kw hour.
But by say 2040 AD with such lower prices and continuing expectation of even further lower of all prices of everything. Lunar rocket fuel going a lot cheaper and could be exporting lunar rocket fuel everywhere in space.
But electrical market which the rocket fuel making created, will lower the cost to do anything on Moon. So making lunar metals and manufacturing stuff made from these metals. And one those metals would be silicon, and making pure silicon in lunar vacuum and low gravity environment.
Pure silicon is fairly expensive of Earth, and well before 2100 AD, one being able to pure silicon cheaper than earth prices of pure silicon. But by 2040 AD, lunar pure silicon can be cheaper than price of earth silicon shipped the Moon. And some point in future, lunar pure silicon can be shipped to earth at price cheaper than Earth can make pure silicon. But before the time, one will making Earth orbit Solar power satellites from the Moon.
But to ship electrical power to Earth, one needs cheaper electrical power in space. And if you have cheaper electrical power in space. Industry will move to space to make stuff, the ship to Earth {it’s currently cheap to get things to earth surface from space {and will get even cheaper in future}.
So in future one can have a car built in space and delivered to your driveway.
You have houses delivered to vacant lot. Anything- except food. Food will be grown on Mars, but unlikely cheaper than food grown on Earth {if include shipping cost from Mars}. But some distant point in future, one could be shipping water from Space to Earth. {There a lot water in space.}
America does not yet have a planned economy, Sid. Why do we need a plan? That implies that the free market does not work. It also implies that even if a country really needed a plan, that it would be government best suited to making such a plan. (Rather than government that could be counted on to screw up such an endeavor at every turn and in every detail).
Maybe we could learn from history? Let’s go back and consider America’s first Five Year Plan for Energy from 1920. Oh right, the only country that had central planning back then was the Soviet Union. That must be the explanation for the vast difference in outcomes between the two 20th Century superpowers. Now, fast forward a century. Isn’t it a tragedy that the US is repeating the mistake from 1920 and is still not embracing the scientific future of Five-Year Plans? Now that the Soviet Union has proven how well central planners can model the economy and bring about prosperity for all, who would be so perverse as to reject planning?
(Ok technically the first Five-Year plan started in 1928, so perhaps we still have 8 years to save the economy, somebody check with Comrade AOC).
The bombastic Biden recently declared we only have 9 years before global warming becomes irreversible. Any idea where the 9 year deadline came from? Is he trying to say it will take 2 terms of Marxist leadership to fix a problem that doesn’t exist as his 8-year plan destroys the economy beyond repair in the process? This is central planning with the implicit goal of destroying the economy.
Although, if mindlessness driven by the unwarranted hate of a white male President and the ‘deplorables’ who voted against an crooked woman leads to a Biden win, the stock market will drop below its recent lows and the economy will crash before he even gets into office, much as it did when it became clear to Wall Street that Obama was going to be the next President. Add the New Green Disaster on top of this, and we will see America’s wealth get sucked dry as jobs disappear, deficits skyrocket, retirement savings become worthless and American exceptionalism all but disappears.
“but it appears that America, from California to New York, wants to follow the German failure.”
No. It is ignorant and corrupt Democrats here in the US that want to lead the Western world in a Socialist Hell. Their vision is a feudal society based on two classes, a ruling elite class with their billionaire backers that can afford whatever they like, and then the rest – a peasant class told what they can have and when they can have it.
Grooming that peasant class started with everyone gets a trophy in elementary school, because it feels bad to loose. It ‘educates’ away the will to do better or find something you can excel at. Our competitive drive is why America has done so well and when you take that away, America will fail.
“because it feels bad to loose.”
Loose what? bowels?
Fortunately the English language is never consistent and may not be accused of have a little mind!
Why do we have multiple spellings for the same sounds, and letters that change their sound randomly, or allegedly based on their placement? It should be luuz and luus, not lose and loose.
What miscreant came up with silent e and long vowels? And what on earth is the silent e on the end of loose supposed to be doing? Rather than indicating a long vowel sound, apparently it signifies that the s remains unvoiced, preventing it from turning into a z as s is wont to do. If we accept the insanity that “oo” should not be like “oh” and instead should be like a long u sound without its mysterious y sound (yuu), then “loose” would be pronounced luuz like (lose).
Oh wait, that depends on whether the s is an s or a z. What is the rule for voicing or not voicing consonants, eggzaktly? Inconsistent, I suppoze? And if we accept the hegemony of the silent e, and the voicing of s into z, then “lose” should be pronounced like the Home Depot competitor (Lowe’s).
Exactly, exactly, Joel. It makes me very angry to see the historical direction we are heading into. It makes me feel an even greater sense of urgency to vote in November and to eviscerate the Democrats politically (as was done, in part, in 2010 – but we need to finish the job somehow this time).
“eminent”?
“imminent”?
I was going to say the same thing.
”Americans are eminent”
Sounds about right, you guys have helped us win a war or two over the years.
off subject- but, an interesting article I saw on MSN News: “Climate economics Nobel may do more harm than good” at https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/climate-economics-nobel-may-do-more-harm-than-good/ar-BB16opGr
“Leading scientists and economists, however, say there is another impediment to climate action that merits closer scrutiny: the profoundly influential work of 2018 Nobel economics laureate William J. Nordhaus.”
With some comments by Mickey Mann.
Newsom lives in a Dream World along with his Hollywood Friends and all the CALPERS and CALSTRS employees. They think they will always get paid and pensioned but Reality always wins. Soon no one will be left to pay the taxes.
It’s playing out like that in Seattle right now.
Very nice, useful and scary article.
This article may help me explaining to my older brother why windmills are contra productive. For 20 years I have had no success explaining it to him, despite I have a degree in electronic engineering and have worked for several years in the R&D department of Vestas A/S in the 1980’s.
Cold technical fact does not bite the salon communists, where as human death toll and human suffering may be more convincing. – I should have studied psychology instead!
For those interested, there is an online version of “Das Leben der Anderen” with English subtitles:
youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBUHU2BdLOY
No, at least when it comes down to the tens to hundreds of millions died under Stalin and Mao salon communists don’t care at all.
Well, eugenics was popularized in western universities – more sterilizations in progressive California than anywhere in the country – and their role in the Holocaust has since been white-washed out by academia – so it’s not surprising that the modern democrats would again be pushing similar policies – on a much grander scale, this time – and again under the auspice of saving the world – the phony high-moral ground.
All I’ve got to say is that, when they get to Hell, I hope the Devil gives them the personal attention they deserve.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York, Gov. Phil Murphy of New Jersey, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, and Gov. Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania pushing COVID-19+ patients into nursing homes filled with vulnerable elderly was effectively an experiment in population control to see what they could get away with.
They succeeded in demonstrating they could k1ll ten of thousands of elderly without repercussions as long as the media looked away.
The Goebbels-media is an invaluable part of their assault on this country – without it, they would have been toast long ago.
Just imagine what an honest press would do to today’s crop of democrats.
Progress is an [unqualified] monotonic process or set of beliefs.
The worm is turning (or something like that).
It also seems to me that James Hansen has called renewables a crock and has advocated for nuclear energy. As far as I can tell, more and more people are concluding that nuclear is the only way to go if we really want to get rid of fossil fuels.
If CAGW is just a club the left uses to beat the population into submission, the adoption of nuclear energy will make CAGW useless for that purpose. In that case, I look forward to CAGW fading and going away. Maybe in ten or twenty years common sense will prevail and some of the worst fraudsters will end up in jail.
On Scott Adams’ podcast today Michael Shellenberger was complaining about being censored. It seems that his book is a best seller anyway. It’s going to be a huge red pill for lots of folks.
So many sheeple are living in the Now. What happened some 36 years ago is not relevant to them, because the Now they are living in has no similarity to what for example plays out in the Oscar winning German movie “Das Leben der Anderen” (something like “The Life of the Others”) about Stasi in Berlin 1984.
Even things that are going on in the cobalt mines is best swiped under the carpet, despite it is the Now – it is on the other side of the planet, the children in the mines are not hanging out in FB in English or at all, and we need to live with the suffering and hostility, in order to show we intent to save the same planet James Bond has saved countless times.
California preens over its panels and pinwheels which effectively shutdown at sundown…that’s when all the Tesla owners plug in to re-charge overnight using electricity from Utah. The plant is coal fired…bravo
And nuclear from AZ, and hydro from NV. Cal’s virtue signaling is driving-up electricity rates in neighboring states. The neighboring states need to refuse new grid interconnects until Cal commits to building more instate baseload power generation plants. They can Import LNG if they have to, however, just get it done.
One constant with socialists. They are always convinced that THIS TIME, it will work.
Nice article, Ronald Stein, but I take exception to your phrase in the second-to-last paragraph: “. . . but it appears that America, from California to New York, wants to follow the German failure.”
It is not the general populace that want to follow these obviously-failed German policies, but rather the head-in-the-sand libtard politicians that think they know what is best for everyone and exercise whatever powers they have to do such . . . you know the type: “don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind is already made up.”
Oh, to be green, again.
Unlike “the prevention of 62,000 [hypothetical] premature deaths” I am one of the postmature survivors who knew two generations ago, with smaller populations, that without petroleum products we would starve. The aged always complain about the loss of history, but so far this millennium has set a new record.
For comparative purposes, 62,000 is about a month of abortions in the U.S.
From the article: “Today, German households pay almost 50% more for electricity than they did in 2006 as power prices in Germany are now among the highest in Europe.”
That’s what is in the future for all those who go down this road.
Fortunately, it seems many subsidies for Windmills and Industrial Solar, in the United States, are being stopped.
It’s the opinion of many that Windmills and Industrial Solar cannot make it in the market on their own, without subsidies. We shall see.
I think it was Warren Buffet who said the reason he invested in Windmills was because of the subsidies.
Windmills and ground-based Industrial Solar are pipe dreams. Very expensive pipedreams. But that’s all the Alarmists have to offer since they exclude the only real viable alternative: nuclear energy. So they go along pretending Windmills and Industrial Solar can power the world. They can’t.
One thing to mention about the German situation is, we have neighbours that are willing and able to sell us energy when we, sometimes desperately, need it. France with Nuclear, Poland with Coal. and wenn we have a surplus, we pay scandinavia, austria and switzerland to store it. In the night we we pay than to get this energy back. In US you don’t have that context. Maybe some states may arrange a situation where that works…
A lot of people expect we will entirely retire from producing fossil fuel. I don’t really see that happening. People are not going to allow synthetic products obtained primarily from oil to be banned. We are not going to move to cotton, hemp, wool, and leather clothes, just no way.
BUT, if we do, what are we going to do with all the byproducts that refiners will end up with. You won’t be allowed to simply flare them, otherwise why not just keep using them as we do today.
“The Democratic Clean Energy Climate policy remains unconcerned with the worldwide ecological degradation and human rights abuses resulting from the mining for exotic minerals and metals”
This standard argument against renewable energy is flawed.
Please see
https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/06/22/child-labor-in-the-drc-and-climate-change/
Well let’s see, the Bloomberg article linked to is from 2018. Germany will actually be substantially closer to meeting the targets than suggested by the end of 2020, the target date, or actually have met them:
Reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40%
https://www.dw.com/en/climate-change-germany-cuts-carbon-emissions-by-63-in-2019/a-52791753
“With the exception of the 2009 global economic crisis, Germany’s emissions reduction in 2019 was the country’s largest annual decline since 1990. Compared to then, Germany has already reduced its emissions 35.7%.”
And the 2020 reduction – with a record level of renewables even before the virus – must push that further by end 2020.
Reduce primary energy consumption by 20%
https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/indicator-primary-energy-consumption
“Overall, primary energy consumption in Germany has been decreasing. Between 1990 and 2019, it fell by 14 %.2”
So a 5% miss by end 2020 (reduction running around 1% a year)
Finally, Germany will hit its share of renewables in energy consumption target this year:
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/germany-marks-first-ever-quarter-more-50-pct-renewable-electricity
“The numbers, combined with increased renewable generation in 2019, put Germany on track to meet its 2020 target for increasing renewables’ share of total energy consumption (which includes not just electricity, but refers to all energy, for example fossil fuels used in transport and heating).”
Yes, Germany will miss 2 of its ambitious targets… but not by much. And it is still ramping up renewables…
Even before the virus it got a 52% share of electricity from renewables Q1 2020
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/germany-marks-first-ever-quarter-more-50-pct-renewable-electricity
and those bills? The renewables surcharge on German electricity bills is falling slightly as a percentage, now 21%. It has been cut slightly a couple of times in recent years.
” (bills are) about 78 percent higher in nominal terms than the level of 1998, but the increase falls to 33 percent in real terms, meaning if adjusted for inflation.”
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/what-german-households-pay-power#:~:text=In%202019%2C%20the%20monthly%20electricity%20bill%20for%20an,falls%20to%2033%20percent%20if%20adjusted%20for%20inflation.
Check the article for German attitudes to power pricing. In short they don’t find it an issue. They use less than a third of the power an equivalent US household does.
Germany’s grid would have collapsed years ago if they weren’t connected to the European grid.
Griff always manages to avoid that fact in his odes to useless power.
Odd silence on BlackRock, the worlds largest hedge fund, who announced with then Bank of England Mark Carney at Jackson Hole last August, that global finance is going exclusively green, meaning no infrastructure or energy without a green finance green light. Carney now heads up the UN green finance initiative.
That policy just happens to originate in London, as did Germany’s Great Transformation, the author of which is Dr. Schellnhuber, CBE awarded personally by the Queen in 2004, of the Potsdam Climate Institute.
This good Dr. is also the author of the Pope’s medieval mummery known as “Laudato Si”.
And the Russiagate hoax, precisely identified by Trump last night, is also a London concoction – note “ex-” MI6 Christopher Steele found guilty of fabrication in a London Court yesterday. This very same Steele is now the Chinagate hoaxer, never mind US Dems et al.
So why the American blindspot for its only sworn enemy, the British Empire? It sure hobbles clear thinking.
Not to forget the EU – Commission chief van der Leyen is a London School of Economics PhD. The Commission is going full hog green.
von der Leyen is an M.D. though she never practised. She was totally efficient in destroying the German Army as a secretary of defence including a corruption scandal with deleted SMS, emails and files.
Incredible – I just saw she had to live in hiding in London, attending the LSE. I wonder what that experience effected….
Anyway it looks like EU mesmerism, ironically made in pre-Brexit U.K….
The scandal there is the EU Defense Union. The British Army has been hollowed out too. The cover noise is “EU Army”, a cover for complete integration, Brexit or not.
http://www.lse.ac.uk/News/Latest-news-from-LSE/2019/g-July-2019/LSE-alumna-Ursula-von-der-Leyen-elected-EU-Commission-head
Flash – just in.
Labor Department To BlackRock: The Law Requires You Maximize Financial Returns, Not De-Carbonization.
Forbes carries a report on this. Whether Larry Fink running $7 trillion with complete control of the FED’s assets will flout this is another question.