Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
I’ve written before about the insanity of the “Net-Zero By 2050” push in a post called “Bright Green Impossibilities“. Today I thought I’d talk about a different impossibility, that of changing all of our land-based transportation (light vehicles, plus our buses and heavy trucks) to being battery powered.
Here’s how I went about it. I use the computer language R for my calculations. I used a few functions to do my conversions, as follows:
# joules to watt-hours
j2whr=function(x) x*0.0002777777777
# gallons of gas to kilowatt-hours
galgas2kwh=function(gal) gal*j2wh(130927880)/1000
# gallons of diesel to kilowatt-hours
galdiesel2kwh=function(gal) gal*j2wh(146765930)/1000
# calculates the months from now to some future date
monthstodate=function(thedate) {
if (is.double(thedate)) thedate = paste0(thedate,"-01-01")
as.double(as.Date(thedate)-Sys.Date())/(365.25/12)
}
# terawatt-hours per year used to gigawatts generation needed
twh2gw=function(twh,peakfactor=2,capfactor=1,transmission=.95) (twh/hrsperyear*1e3*peakfactor)/capfactor/transmission
The first function converts joules to watt-hours. The next two convert gallons of diesel and gasoline to their energy content in kilowatt-hours.
The next function calculates the number of months until some date in the future. And the final function converts terawatt-hours of electricity used in a year to the amount of gigawatts of generation needed. It takes into account
• a peak factor to account for the fact that peak usage needs to be covered and is generally about twice average usage.
• a capacity factor to cover downtimes for maintenance, and
• a transmission loss factor.
Then I went and got the figures for the number of miles driven and gallons of fuel used in the US in 2017 from the US Department of Transportation. Now, it’s very likely that by 2050 many more miles will be driven … how many? Well, this document says about 50% – 60% more miles, so I’ll use 40% as a conservative number.
With that in hand, here are my calculations. We can’t just divide total miles driven by electric vehicle miles per kilowatt-hour, because we need to figure in the trucks and buses as well. So the first part of my calculation is to figure out the difference between the energy used per mile for light cars and that used for trucks.
In the following, the lines starting with “>” and a hashmark are comments, the lines starting with just “>” are instructions to the computer, and the lines starting with the “[1]” are the computer output.
> # miles driven light cars/trucks > (light_miles=2877378e6) [1] 2.877378e+12 > # miles driven heavy trucks > (heavy_miles=297593e6) [1] 2.97593e+11 > # gallons gas light vehicles > (light_gal=129178914e3) [1] 1.291789e+11 > # gallons diesel heavy trucks > (heavy_gal=45963416e3) [1] 4.596342e+10 > # kwh in gas used, light vehicles > (light_kwh=galgas2kwh(light_gal)) [1] 4.698089e+12 > # kwh in diesel used, trucks > (heavy_kwh=galdiesel2kwh(heavy_gal)) [1] 1.873851e+12 > # miles per kwh light vehicles > (light_mpkwh=light_miles/light_kwh) [1] 0.6124571 > # miles per kwh trucks > (heavy_mpkwh=heavy_miles/heavy_kwh) [1] 0.1588136 > # extra kwh for trucks > (truckextra=light_mpkwh/heavy_mpkwh) [1] 3.856453
OK, so that’s the first part. Heavy trucks use about 3.9 times the energy per mile as light cars.
Next, we need to calculate the amount of electricity we’ll need. The wall-to-wheels efficiency of light electric cars is about 2.5 miles per kilowatt-hour. Note that this is less than the battery-to-wheels efficiency because of losses in the transformer used to charge the battery and the losses in the battery itself in the form of heat.
> # electric vehicle miles per kilowatt-hour > (ev_milesperkwh=2.5) [1] 2.5
From this point, we need to divide the estimated miles driven in 2050 by the relevant miles per kilowatt-hour to get the total power needed.
> # kwh needed, electric light vehicles > (light_kwh=light_miles*milesinc/ev_milesperkwh) [1] 1.611332e+12 > # kwh needed, electric heavy vehicles > (heavy_kwh=heavy_miles*milesinc*truckextra/ev_milesperkwh) [1] 6.426858e+11 > # total terawatthours needed/yr > (tot_twh=(light_kwh+heavy_kwh)/1e9) [1] 2254.018
So we’ll need ~ 2,250 terawatt-hours of electricity per year to move the people and the goods around. And how much new generation will this require? Well, by comparison, the US currently uses about 3,800 terawatt-hours per year, so we’ll need a huge, unimaginable 60% increase … and that just for electric cars and trucks and nothing more.
How much generating capacity will that take? Here you go:
> # gigawatts new generation needed > (generation_needed=twh2gw(tot_twh,capfactor = .95)) [1] 569.8329
We’ll need an additional ~ 570 gigawatts of generating capacity. And how long do we have to do that?
The only currently available technology capable of delivering that is nuclear. And it takes about ten years from conception to completion for a nuclear power plant.
Figure 1. Timeline from feasibility studies to actual startup for a new nuclear power plant.
So that means we have only until 2040 to begin the power plants we need by 2050. How many do we need?
> # months from now until 2040 > (time_available=round(monthstodate(2040))) [1] 215 > > # gigawatts of new power plants needed per month > (round(generation_needed/time_available,1)) [1] 2.7
So … to provide for an all-electric transportation fleet, starting tomorrow we’d have to build a new 2.7 GW nuclear power plant each and every month for the next 215 months … and those are huge plants, 20% larger than the giant Diablo Canyon power plant in Californa that the eco-fools are planning to shut down.
( … gotta love California. We can’t even keep the lights on now, and the idiots in charge want to shut down Diablo Canyon and require only electric cars to be sold in the state after 2035 … but I digress.)
Oh, and besides building 215 new giant nuclear power plants at the rate of one per month every month for the next 18 years starting this month, we’d need to upsize our entire power grid by 60% from end to end, all the way from the generators down to the transformers and the electric wires feeding your house.
I’m sorry, but doing all of that is politically, practically, logistically, and financially impossible.
And what will it accomplish? Sweet Fanny Adams, as our British cousins say. The entire US could go net-zero tomorrow, and even if we accept the alarmists’ hysterical figures, the temperature difference it would make in 2050 is too small to even be measured … we’d be throwing trillions down a rathole and we’d get nothing in return.
Well, except for greatly increased taxes and much higher energy prices …
The stoopid, it burns.
w.
My Usual Request: When you comment, QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS YOU ARE REFERRING TO, so we are not left in mystery as to who and what you are talking about.
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What is great about this post is that one can approach alarmists & say “Fine ! So how are you going to solve the problem ? (without ever getting into / arguing the scientific issues)… ” and show that even if you are a true believer, the only way forward is to adapt. I guess the flip side is that most the true believers won’t be able to grasp even simple calculations, such as present here.
Thanks for “doing the maths” , Willis !
Good job Willis. Question: I assume the auto companies have people who can also do the calculations which you just did. How come then are they all seemingly planning for an all-electric EV future?
Hi Tom,
While I can’t presume to speak on Willis’ behalf, I submit that the auto-industry knows the ‘all-electric EV future’ is a pipe dream, just as well as the rest of us and they are not planning for an all electric EV future at all. They are playing the ball as it lies to their advantage. With the current crop of government diktats related to NetZero, with the number of urban slcaktivists going with the flow so as to look good in front of their neighbours, the car companies are working on the principal that a fool and his money are soon parted and building today what the customers want today.
The current fad of selling EVs to ‘enlightened’ consumers and the basis of being ‘green’ is no different to the great shift toward diesel powered cars (on the basis of reduced thin air emissions and cheaper fuel costs) a decade ago. You surely recall how that planning did a complete 180 turn when Volkswagon were busted cheating on their US emission testing and champions of deisel were forced to admit that while CO2 emissions per mile may be lower than for petrol, emissions of particulates and oxides of nitrogen were not.
So a lot of ‘enlightened’ customers replaced servicable petrol powered cars in favour of ‘green’ new diesel powered cars, to then be pollution shamed into replacing their servicable diesel powered cars with less polluting petrol powered cars a few years later, and those same ‘enlightened’ customers are now being encouraged to replace their serviceable petrol powered cars with ‘clean’ overgrown golf buggies.
Auto companies didn’t plan for an all-diesel future, nor did they plan an all-petrol future, just as they are not now planning an all-electric future; they’re playing the game, selling what ever types of new cars they can most easily shift. The “customer is always right”! Even when he hasn’t the faintest idea what he is talking about.
As a bonus, with so much unneccessary turn over in cars based on what the indecisive, politically fashion conscious market thinks it wants from one half decade to the next, they’re keeping their revenues flowing by selling new cars instead of servicing older but still serviceable cars – and their advertising gobshites will tell the ‘enlightened’ consumers whatever they need to hear to be persuaded to part with more credit to buy the latest fashion accessory.
There is the Climate Group’s EV100 Initiative which consists of 100 companies (actually now 121companies) in 80 markets across the world committed to switch their fleets to EVs and /or install charging for staff and/or customers by 2030.
Most of the major car manufacturers are on board but the IEA has said that only 60% of them support government targets to phase out petrol and diesel cars.
https://www.theclimategroup.org/ev100.members
There’s a huge difference between issuing a press release and actually spending enough money to replace their entire fleet by 2030. That’s only 8 years away. If they aren’t already buying huge numbers of electric cars and trucks, this was nothing more than a PR stunt.
Noting that just the transportation side of things creates a practically impossible scenario, how much further beyond does converting all the energy consuming activities move these numbers? Plus all the products that require O&G as a base component?
All of which is beyond the understanding of the innumerates populating the MSM and the liberal gaggle.
Willis,
Its right of course, to do it is impossible. But maybe the real issue is to go a little further.
We know from what you’ve done (and it was intuitively obvious anyway) that the idea that we all carry on as now but with the engines changed from ICE to electric is not going to happen.
But that does not mean we are all going to carry on driving ICE cars as now. What is much more likely is that the government, particularly in the UK, where all four political parties agree on it, the other three of them being even more extreme on this stuff than the present Conservative government, will make a serious effort to do it. And they really will actually ban the sale of ICE vehicles after 2030.
What then?
Well, it would be a very long post to spell it out, but I think the bottom line is fewer cars, maybe 10% of what we have now. Much less driving. Much less freight. Much less shopping. Tracking vehicles and charging per mile and by where is driven. Using the car as a grid storage device, and draining its battery when the grid needs it.
Buy a bicycle. Not a fancy lightweight one, a Dutch style bike with big panniers and metal fenders. You are going to need it, if they really keep on with this. And they show no sign of stopping.
I’m a fan of the TV series, All Creatures Great and Small, set in the UK in the years between 1936 and 1939. A hundred years later in 2039, the transportation scene in the UK will resemble what it was in 1939; i.e., walking, bicycling, taking a bus, and taking a train will resume their previous relative importance as primary modes of transportation for the average UK citizen.
Yes – and all this time the Chinese, Indians, Brazilians & Russians etc will be driving around in more and more cars – laughing at us.
And this is the plan for the so-called ‘environmentalists’ of course. For the most part they don’t care about the environment as much as they just hate the success of western culture – and people in general.
And when we finally see the error of our ways we’ll be too poor to afford the Chinese and Indian cars that will be the only ones on the market. It’s OK though, our children and grandchildren will be able to go and work as maids in those countries and send some of their wages back to us. Probably no more than a few million of us will starve.
Result!
“Then I went and got the figures for the number of miles driven and gallons of fuel used in the US in 2017 from the US Department of Transportation. “
Did I miss the calculation for regenerative braking that electric vehicles enjoy? I’m sure it wouldn’t make all that much difference, but it would allow the critics an opportunity to throw water on the argument and dismiss it out of hand.
Wouldn’t that feature be logically reflected in the manufacturers’ range estimates, Steve?
Steve, I actually know the numbers since I drive a hybrid. Depending on the vehicle (mine is a Ford AWD Escape small SUV) even in city traffic it is well under 10%. The reason is very basic. To extent battery life, you baby it. Regen braking is big pulses, so all the kinetic energy cannot be used to charge. Same reason Tesla’s rapid charging done frequently kills battery life and voids warranty.
Rud, we just got one of those a few months ago. There are things to complain about, but gas mileage at nearly double what our old 2010 Escape got, wasn’t on that list.
Yeah. We had to decide between the standard V6 and the hybrid. I crunched the numbers. V6 about 20 blended hi test, Hybrid I4 AWD with class 1 tow hitch a blended 30 on regular. The hybrid premium incentive that year (2007) was 3k. We made that back on day one. No brainer. And the battery is still ok. A bit of low voltage leakage current if sits too many days, but Ford designed in an easy button fix.
EV figures always include regenerative braking, Steve.
w.
Thanks
A few years ago I did a similar calculation based on the energy equivalent of all the oil we were using in Canada. That produced a number like 2x the current generating capacity equivalent . Reworking to to use average miles driven etc to try to factor in EV effeciency gains it still came at over 1x the current capacity… so doubling at a minimum the electricity generating capacity in Canada is required. I got into arguments with people but nobody ever corrected the math. At this point my conclusion is the best way forward is to go gung ho green in certain provinces and states and let them fail quickly so we can move on. They wont learn unless they fail so lets get it over with fast.
Well I can’t speak for the USA, but looking at the average commute in the UK – 11 miles – the average journey length – 8.4 miles – the average annual mileage – 6,800 miles and the average mileage in first 3 years for new cars – 10,377 miles – it is plain that taking a 200 mile range (most UK smaller EVs will do more than that) you’ll be charging your car about once a week in the UK.
And you’ll do that off peak, at the commuter rail station or supermarket or gym as often as at home…
So there’s not going to be some huge increase in power use every evening.
Average mileage means nothing. Average trip length, neither. What’s the standard deviation, is what you should be asking. That is what determines usability.
Read today’s Telegraph. They got three people living in the country, using their cars for the usual things, to try going electric for a week. With cars varying in price from 35,000 to about 80,000, and that is pounds not dollars.
Every one of them had serious range issues. This was winter. They don’t get anything like their nominal mileage in winter. Or on a freeway. And when they came to recharge? That is a story in itself. No, you can’t find charging points, and when you do, you can’t afford the time.
What you have to take on board is not that it cannot be done. It can and will be done, or at least attempted. What you have to accept is the consequential changes that will happen when it is attempted.
The first thing is, cars will become impossible to afford for a large proportion of the population. The second thing is, there will be evening surges, and the proof of that is in the two plans now surfacing: the right to turn off chargers, and the right to draw on car batteries to fund the grid. The third thing is, there will not be enough range, enough charging points or fast enough charging to accomodate the present pattern of car use. Its not five minutes at a pump, its hours at the plug. And finally, when the grid is taken to 15 minute spot rate pricing you can be sure this will cost a bomb when you most need a charge.
They are fine as second cars for a run to the school or supermarket. Expensive luxuries, but OK. Make them into the sole means of transport, the primary vehicle, and it can be done, but at the price of huge changes in how people live, work and play. Its going to be a more confined and limited and more expensive world.
Because not only will they cost more to buy than most can afford, they will also be charged per mile for road use. The cost of ownership and running costs will be much greater than current cars.
A big part of this will come from the requirement to run the cars and the heat pumps and all the current demand off intermittent power generation. The costs of that will all be built into the charging or the heat pump charges. And they will include not only backup, but also restructuring of the transmission network to take the power from the wind farms somewhere north of Thurso.
Griff will tell us that this is the best of all possible energy plans and that it will work out wonderfully, because there will be all this cheap electricity between midnight and 4am, and that is when all the cars will be charged.
Right, that is the only time you’ll be allowed to charge them. But don’t expect a cheap rate then. On the contrary, you will be paying through the nose every time there is a calm hour or two. And you’ll never know how much until you have incurred the charges.
The fundamental intellectual dishonesty here is pretending that we can just swap out the engines of our vehicles and carry on as before with neither inconvenience nor increased costs. We cannot, and we will not. The attempt to do it will revolutionize personal transport in the UK.
And it will have no effect whatever on global emissions.
I live in country NSW Australia and regularly drive to Sydney, point to point for my purposes is just over 300 kilometres.
Driving my diesel engine 4WD I could drive to Sydney, drive around the suburbs I visit for a few days and drive home without refuelling. To buy an EV that has the range just to reach Sydney and maybe drive around part of my routes would cost me about A$25K more retail price plus home charging equipment and without the passenger and luggage capacity of my SUV.
And I on average before the pandemic drive 50,000 kilometres a year and tow a large boat or caravan and the EV could not.
and that may be an issue… but all I can tell you is that it is NOT an issue for most of the UK population in their daily lives.
Read the Telegraph piece and you will see that it is. The point is, your average miles may be a dozen or so per trip. But you will have some important trips, a big part of the reason you need a car, which are significantly over that, and that’s when you find when the Telegraph testers found, they had range problems. And charging problems.
The only way electric cars are going to work as plug in replacements for ICE is if they:
It ain’t happening now, and it won’t by 2030, and this is why the attempt to ban ICE cars in the UK after 2030 will only happen at the price of huge changes in how people live work shop and travel.
To pretend otherwise is intellectually dishonest.
Its not that it cannot be done. Its that if done it will require huge changes in living styles which the advocates are not being honest about.
What do you do for a living? It’s *very* common for a working man (e.g. an appliance repairman) that is dispatched from a central hub to travel 100 miles or more per day as they work appointments. And there are a *lot* of those people, even in urban London! How is recharging their vehicle on a cold winter day going to work into their efficiency?
Probably the only way to make them work is to remove the battery and power them with OH lines like the old Electric Trolley system of the 40’s
Or you could power them like Slot Cars
which ironically is already being tested in Germany for heavy trucks…
three people living in the country..
The urban and suburban dwelling British are not going to have a problem though, are they?
there won’t be evening surges, will there? The whole point of the smart technology is to incentivise people to move, not force them… carrot, not stick. Saying we will all be ‘forced’ is frankly just conspiracy theory.
and again, it is clear not everybody charges every night (not everybody needs to top up whole battery capacity every time they charge).
Think how much time the average Brit spends parked at the supermarket, leisure centre, place of work, commuter rail station…
I am skeptical of the ‘everyone must get a heat pump’ narrative.
Or why is so much research and so many trials going into putting hydrogen into the gas grid? either as sole fuel or in the 20% mix which all UK boilers post 1996 will run on?
“it is clear not everybody charges every night”
Ask those in California who have to evacuate at a moments notice because of fire. Or those in Florida who have to evacuate at a moments notice because of hurricane weather. Ask those in North Dakota that must drive 20 miles to work in -20F weather.
Ask why they recharge every night.
(a 20mile commute is nothing, it’s from the south side of Kansas City residential areas to downtown Kansas City. Or from the south side of Topeka to the north side – and Topeka is a *small* city!)
Looking at the future from the other side of the coin, another important reason why there won’t some huge increase in power use every evening is because there won’t be enough power available to allow it.
All you have done is show that it’s possible for some people to commute using electric cars.
However you have not demonstrated that electric cars can completely replace ICE cars.
How nice of you to declare that everyone now needs to own two cars. One for commuting and one for everything else.
You also have done nothing to deal with the problem of how to charge that electric car for most people, and where the electricity is going to come from.
I believe that mainly for the zero exhaust emissions and public health reasons EV for city and other built up areas driving makes good sense, but is not practical or affordable yet.
A city family could buy two small ICEV for the price of one EV of the same size.
That is pretty much how they are used now. One status car to park outside so everyone can see it, and the workhorse in the garage.
Being outside also keeps it from burning down the house when it catches on fire!
I’ve shown that there is one heck of a lot less of an issue than the ‘everyone will charge, not enough power’ narrative.
I live on a large housing estate where half the cars are used for local journeys… and most of the commutes are within 20 miles (to judge by my neighbours)
How nice of you to prove MarkW’s comment true!
mark: “One for commuting and one for everything else.”
griff: ” half the cars are used for local journeys”
What are the other half of the cars used for?
You have shown nothing of the sort. You’ve made various claims, all of which have been multiply refuted.
No. You’ve asserted it, not shown it. I will show the opposite.
In CA last year, during power emergencies, the state had to “ask” EV users not to charge their cars in the evening after work because it was worsening the emergency. There were proposals to make it statutory.
Imagine if all autos were EVs rather than a small fraction of them.
That is obvious! Most of our states are larger than the UK.
In most of my younger years I would commute about 50 miles each way to work. So, I’d want to recharge every day, to be sure I didn’t exhaust my battery on the way home the second day. What does recharging a half-discharged battery every day do to its longevity?
When I take a vacation, it is not unusual to drive 600 miles per day to get to where I’m going. That turns a two day drive into a 6 day drive plus the cost of lodging for 5 nights instead of one. The motel owners will love that.
I also travel regularly to Australian remote country areas where there are no electricity grids, fuel service stations or road houses have diesel generators and with demand for energy from air conditioning, food freezers, operating fuel pumps, often also for nearby motel and/or caravan park customers and more few if any would welcome too many EV drivers wanting to plug in.
Your definition of most is 20%?
No, 30%
Another way of looking at it is that the 15 US states that are larger than Great Britain have 27 times the area of Great Britain, not 15 times.
Lets put it this way. Great Britian is about 80,000 sqmi. The average of 48 states is about 62,000 sqmi. GB’s density is about 850people/sqmi and the continental US is about 100/sqmi.
During the late 1980s I was visiting the UK and while dining out with colleagues the conversation turned to travelling distances, we all at first assumed that Australian business vehicles would travel further per week or year than UK business vehicles.
Not so according to the comparisons discussed because in Australia we tend to fly between cities for business purposes but in the UK business people drive.
Yes, but the distances in the UK aren’t vast. London to Edinburgh 400 miles… and that would be one of the longest journeys.
You would have difficulty towing a largish caravan that distance by EV
What about winter or summer? What about when the battery is no longer brand new?
LOL, so when everybody charges the EV “off peak” … a new peak will be created. Never mind, you will have to sharpen up at the gym because the only people there charging their EV’s will be the beefcakes 🙂
Yes
And this destroys the various energy storage schemes like pumped hydro which arbitrage between cheap and expensive demand periods
But if they smooth all that out with smart charging that all becomes stranded investment
I think you underestimate the gym mania in the UK…
Perhaps look at a map and compare the size of UK to most other countries … you are a tiny nation down at 78 on the list of countries by area.
This is just the mindset of a central planner. This is like calculating how many tons of pots and pans are produced by a factory and calling that a meaningful measure of the plant’s output.
A central planner can’t imagine a hive member will want to drive his/her car on the weekend for something other than going to work.
Ignore.
Central planning is required for any grid or economy.
Really? The grid in the US didn’t evolve from central planning by the government. Neither did the economy.
Your ignorance of the world is huge.
Grid yes, economy most certainly not. Every attempt at planning an economy has ended in total failure, usually at the cost of millions of lives.
Nobody is smart enough to plan an economy. That goes double for socialists and communists.
Griff, your stoopid is exceptional today. R U getting worse?
I live in Northern Virginia, and took delivery of a new Toyota 4Runner on August 31 of last year – that’s 5 months and 16 days ago. Today, I noted that I have put just a little over 7,000 miles on it so far. I’m “retired”, so none of that is work commute. I do plan to start a new job soon, and that will add another 250 miles per week to my usage. I estimate I’ll be putting a little over 21,000 miles a year on the vehicle, and I don’t drive it anywhere near as much as I did any of my cars when I lived in Southern California (average there was 40,000 miles a year). The US is a lot bigger than the UK…
Willis Eschenbach
“I’ve written before about the insanity of the “Net-Zero By 2050” ”
Willis, it’s not insanity, it’s criminal ! As with the “Wufu Flu”, the left is trying to get rid of the non productive, non Demoncrap voting segment of society..
Another great post, how do you find the time to write them all with so few typing errors ?
I use a Chrome extension called “Grammarly”, which flags not only misspelled words, but also things like doubled words, doubled spaces, singular vs plural, and other errors. Couldn’t do without it.
w.
Willis,
Thanks for your detailed efforts in this regard, but wouldn’t it have been much simpler to have uses the R code function “credibility test” to establish the non-feasibility of “net-zero by 2050”?
My use of this function in R code returns a value of 0.0000013 (basically, “one-in-a million” chance), but then again I am not as facile as you in using R programming language.
🙂
Thank you for the analysis, Willis. You make it obvious that no one government is actually thinking.
The need for electricity is even greater if rail transport were added to this set of equations. While the US has some electrified lines that are primarily passenger transport, think of all the freight that moves by rail.
On this site alone we have had years of discussion concerning the improbability of going carbon free. We have had years of discussion on the need to go carbon free. I don’t see where we are getting anywhere.
Isn’t it time to back up and get out of the weeds – who and why is leading this? Six years ago AOC’s chief of staff openly stated that this isn’t about the climate – it is about destroying our capitalistic society and replacing it with a global socialist type of society lead by a few and making the rest of us serfs.
My suggestion is to take all of the green money allocated and MAKE the USPS go green. Make them order the vehicles they need. Make them request budgeting based on design drawings and actual quotes. Stop repairing the existing fleet. Put in the charging stations, etc. This will shut down the Post office in a few years and will put actual numbers on the actual costs.
Currently we are spending a little money here and a little money there. Nobody notices what is accomplished and the cost – a form of divide and conquer.
.
WE’s last post inspired me to write a possible post on exactly that theme. Draft is finished. Will polish tomorrow and send to CR. Tonight is Super Bowl.
but it IS about the climate.
It IS about the science.
and bear in mind that this is global and not just about the US or US domestic politics.
Nope. The UN has been quite transparent – it’s all about wealth transfer.
There has never been any science behind the claims of the alarmists. Computer models are not science, and never will be.
Willis, you missed one big fuel user for transporting goods. 30-40% of the truck/trailers are refrigerated with diesel motors running the compressors. I have seen the trailers set for several days with the Diesel running to keep the cargo cold. How is that going to work with batteries?
It won’t!
Fascinating thought, Paul, and you’re right, I missed that entirely. A bit of research says the following:
Reefer trailers use ~ 1 gallon of diesel per hour … and generally they run 24/7 …
Half a million reefer trailers in the US.
365.25 days per year * half million trailers * 24 hours = 4.4 trillion gallons diesel.
Electric is probably 3X as efficient, so that gives us ~ 1.5 gallons diesel equivalent
That gives an additional 15 GW of power plants needed … a mere six 2.5 GW nuclear plants …
w.
Parked reefers could be plugged into a yards grid. The refrigerated containers on Container ships are plugged into the ships power system I believe. On the road they could draw power from the tractor. I believe they do that now?
So no batteries, but still need the power and extra grid capacity.
How can the reefers run off the electric system of the tractor if the tractor itself is running solely on battery power?
Have you ever been to a large truck stop on an interstate highway before? It can get so loaded its a traffic jam just getting in and out. I’m not sure how you would get all of them access to a charging port. Most of the truck stops here in Kansas would require a huge expansion of parking space and most of it would probably be wasted so as to allow in/out flow.
However, adding the extra battery capacity for refrigeration will increase the hauling weight with possible penalties in hill climbing, range, and cost.
If the point of the exercise were as stated, the goal will not be reached. But if the true goal were the bankrupting of industrialization, it may well be reached. And if a byproduct of the exercise would include a major decrease in population, whether by starvation, violence or disease, the Malthusians would be ecstatic.
Well, if we needed Net Zero to be EVEN MORE IMPOSSIBLE than it was yesterday, w. has supplied the data.
Of course, I was perfectly willing to settle for just normal everyday impossible, but I’m a mere pragmatist.
It is extremely frustrating that the globalists are behind net zero emissions and the combined influence and pressures applied to nations that dare to resist, trade for example, are significant.
Accordingly the Australian Federal Government rejected demands for a ban on coal mining and to increase Paris Agreement emissions targets, also refused to commit to signing an agreement to achieve net zero emissions by 2050 but instead stated that Australia has “an aspirational goal” based on new technology being developed and without undermining the economy.
Unfortunately our leaders are being manoeuvred into supporting the climate hoax agendas regardless of what we the people want done and believe, as in being sceptics and not being prepared to have our taxes squandered on exercises in futility to solve problems that are natural climate and weather based.
Kip, you and WE got me thinking about how to reframe the basic debate, given this level of palbable idiocy. Working on it now. Regards.
Rud ==> Look forward to it. Anyone can see that it is impossible on time scales being proposed….just look out your window at your power poles!
Longer. Here are the dates for Plant Vogtle units 3 & 4:
August 2006: Application submitted for ESL (Early Site License)
March 2008: Application submitted for COL (Construction and Operating License)
August 2009: Early Site License and Limited Work Authorization issued by NRC.
February 2012: COL approved by NRC.
July 2012: litigation initiated by environmental and anti-nuclear groups was rejected by the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.
March 2013: Construction officially begun on unit 3.
June 2013: original schedule extended by 14 months
November 2013: Construction officially begun for unit 4.
October 2021: revised schedule announced: unit 3 operational 3rd quarter 2021 and unit 4 to follow 2nd quarter 2022.
Total time from conception to completion: 16+ years.
Total time for major construction: 9+ years.
The Plant Vogtle campus has been approved as a nuclear power site since before construction started on units 1 & 2 in 1976. For a totally new site it is quite likely the ESL and COL review process will take longer.
Even the French are taking much longer to build nuclear reactors these days: the average start construction to operational status for the four reactors put in service this century is 14.3 years. For the 52 put in service before 2000 it is 6.7 years. The one still under construction is the 1660 MW Flammanville unit 3; started in December 2007 and projected operational May 2023 — 16.5 years.
Aside from cost and time the other reason we can’t rely on all nuclear to meet the additional demand is that pressurized water reactors (the entire US commercial fleet) can’t be ramped up and down to follow demand due to Xenon poisoning. The explanation is here. With current designs nuclear is limited to base load; variable demand will need to be met with other generation types.
Plus Voglte 3-4 cost is something like 2x original estimates. Bankrupted Westinghouse Nuclear, a bit of a problem for Toshiba.
French Flammanville reactor has also had large cost over-runs. Don’t know exactly how much.
I believe Barakah UAE is a better site for what can be achieved. Units 1 and 2 took around 8 years each to complete and are now up and running and supplying power at the same price as previous. The final cost for the four units, delivering 5.6 GW, is expected to be around US$24bn.
Sitting in the UK in a fog of uncertainty, I asked my MP whether I would be allowed to import another French Citroen diesel automobile in 2030 as I’d seen nothing about it. She didn’t know. What wd be the WTO’s reaction to an import barrier?
I think we are misunderstanding what this means. It is not the intention of the elites – the John Kerry’s, Klaus Schwab’s, Leonardo DiCaprio’s etc, that non elites – the 98% of the population, continue to live like we have been living. For example, ownership of personal transportation devices must come to an end except for the wealthy. As Schwab, the originator of the elite wateringhole – Davos, said of the future: “You will own nothing, but you will be happy.”
Willis,
Just one little nitpick. You won’t have just transformer losses to worry about. If all the public, residential, and business chargers use transformers they will put a huge inductive load on the transmission lines. That’s especially true for residential load at peak usage time. Those inductive loads increase the current requirements at the source generator even though the inductive current produces no real work at the load. That inductive current increases total loss in the transmission lines used to serve the load.
I’m not sure what the power factor of the typical low-output, residential charging system is but I’m pretty sure it is not 1. How much widespread residential chargers will increase the inductive current for a typical residence is something I can’t judge. Maybe someone on here will know. It is a factor that should be considered in sizing the generator plants.
Thanks, Tim. Hadn’t considered that … anyone have any hard numbers on that question?
w.
Sure, the numbers are 1 when 2πfL = 1/2πfc. So they will just slap capacitors on the load to eliminate the inductive power factor just as they do now.
Except high voltage Farad size capacitors are not cheap. And neither are the switches. So add that to the cost.
“They will just slap capacitors on the load” that’s true and they will just slap a charge on your bill to pay for them all, its the property owners responsibility.
Modern converters have an input power factor that is generally >0.99. This is not an issue.
Yeah if the utility lines are up to the load, if not oh well.
I found a CA spec that says large battery chargers require built in PFC circuitry (C=correction) to bring PF to 0.9 or higher. So additional grid (utility) level PFC should be unnecessary or at least minimal.
What does PFC circuitry do to the efficiency and power capacity of the converter? Ain’t nuthin free in this world.
Those power factor capacitors also suck huge amounts of inrush current when the load first hits. So doonman is right about needing switches being needed for the capacitors which means multiple capacitors so you can switch them in sequentially. The inrush current also adds to the needed capacity of the generator and transmission line, think 100,000 people getting home at 5pm and plugging in their electric car – big current spike needed from the generator. It might be short-lived but it still needs to be available. (if you have a 2hp to 5hp air compressor in your garage and your lights dim even a little bit for a second or two when it kicks in then you have experienced what the grid generator will also see)
All of this adds to the cost of each residential power converter.
Modern converters do not require any large power factor correcting capacitors at their input, There is no large inrush current – in fact they can be programmed to ramp up slowly if required. The input current to the converter will be basically a sine wave with a PF >0.99 and a total harmonic distortion (THD) of <5%. These converters are a very clean load for the source. The efficiency of the converter will generally be above 95%.
You should look here: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1165&context=ece_fac
“http://pubs.sciepub.com/ajeee/8/4/6/index.html
At least one of these studies contradict what you are saying. That study recommends the use of synchronous capacitors instead of shunt capacitors to correct for the reactive current caused by heavy charging loads. That reactive current is being generated somehow.
ROFL. That’s first one is about 10 years old and was looking at EVs that were definitely at least 10 years old. That’s ancient history in the power electronics world.
In that first one they had to try really hard to identify a problem and realistically the problem wasn’t there. It doesn’t matter if your harmonics are high when as a proportion of the prospective load they are small. If your supply is capable of providing 100 amps and a load is drawing 1 amp with very high distortion that is not a problem. If you had 100 such loads then you have a big issue, but that is not the case here. When the cars were first connected and drawing maximum load there total harmonic distortion was less than 4%. The total demand distortion never exceeded around 3.2%.
You really should find another hill to die on as this one really is not an issue.
I’ve only worked as an engineer in the industry for a bit over 30 years so may know a little bit about the field,
I’ve been an electrical engineer for 50 years. I’ve learned a few things over that time.
Harmonics may be small in an individual unit. But when you multiply those by 1000, or 10000 they can become quite large and have a negative impact on both generation and transmission., Even you seem to understand that: “If you had 100 such loads then you have a big issue,” How many loads does your nearest substation serve?
If doing this were as cheap and easy as you present then this kind of equipment would be put into all kinds of things like washers, dryers, air compressors, well pumps, heat pumps, air conditioners, furnace fans, etc. Anything with an electric motor or transformer.
If genetics is any clue, I’ll be dead way before 2050 and probably incompetent to drive by 2035.
So I will be missing out on all that electrical stuff anyway.
But I’m sure my grandchildren are more than capable of voting for their own best interests regardless of what currently aging boomers have planned for them.
OK Boomer?
So we instead need to look towards the real issue which is that fossil fuels will run out, especially oil which is the focus of your transport calculation
Even if you ludicrously say that oil can be made to last at current production rates with whatever growth is needed for 12 x 18 = 216 years then that still means we need to be building one new plant every year.
That’s why its imperative that we do something about this now. But we need to do it for the right reasons. The wrong reason includes CCS which is a waste of time, money and energy.
First, I think you mean 12 * 18 = 216 months, not years.
Next, here’s cumulative US oil production and US proven reserves … not seeing the problem here.
Yes, we’ll need more electricity production. But electric cars and trucks make the need skyrocket far beyond possibilities …
w.
Nope. You had months (ie one plant per month) I stretched the whole thing out by a factor of 12 to make it years.
You’re talking about 216 years in the future??
Seriously???
Pass …
w.
You’re right 216 years is absolutely crazy. There is no way oil will last that long.
But the key point here is that its one plant per year on the assumption the fossil fuels (ie oil) can be made to last that long for the transition to nuclear energy. It cant.
Maybe you think 216 years is long enough for some new saviour energy technology to come along? I hear they sustained a fusion reaction for 5 seconds recently.
I’m not at all sure why you think it is so unlikely that substantial new oil and gas reserves won’t continue to be found, even if we burn them up as a significant part of the energy mix for the next couple of hundred years. The thing is, if new reserves take a more and more expensive effort to reach as time goes on, that’s just an incentive to go more and more nuclear, with the feedstock elements for nuclear fission being in plentiful enough supply to last for many thousands of years.
Just to emphasize the vast amount of time that the natural “biotech’ of the world has had, to concentrate and store large amounts of solar energy in the oil reserves, I provide you here with a handy educational link, along with a quick extended quotation from the article there:
https://energyeducation.ca/encyclopedia/Oil_formation
” 70% of oil deposits existing today were formed in the Mesozoic age (252 to 66 million years ago) … This is likely because the Mesozoic age was marked by a tropical climate, with large amounts of plankton in the ocean … The energy in oil initially comes from the Sun, and is energy from sunlight that is trapped in chemical form by dead plankton ”
The point is that none of this gives any indication that the finding of new oil should be expected to come to a sudden end on this middling large planet of ours — the prospectors just keep digging deeper and finding more ‘good stuff’ that was created during all those millions of years, whether any worrywarts like it or not..
Also on the educational end of things, someone else out there might happen to have some sort of handy link on just how much *nuclear fission* energy supply is accessible to us. I just know from previous reading that it is an incredibly large amount, to be sure..
I see you want to add “gas” to that mix but cars dont run on gas. Sure we could have made our future cars run on gas and upgrade the distribution infrastructure to fit. But that’s not happening. We are making cars that run on any form of energy that is turned into electricity. So Nuclear, Coal, Gas, Solar, Hydro…the list goes on. And when we work out new technologies like fusion they can simply be added.
The rate of finding oil reserves has been dropping and the reserves that are found are increasingly difficult to retrieve and are becoming more costly. And importantly the production rates are lower for difficult reserves too.
But all that aside, I feel you’ve completely missed the point of my post which uses the same argument Willis is making to show how ridiculous the policy driven decision is to aim for “2050” by showing that aiming for “end of oil” is also a timeframe that is going to be difficult to achieve.
Postponing that move by believing “oil is cheap and plentiful” and expecting the market to eventually take care of it completely misses the importance of oil to our economies and the impact oil has on the price of everything downstream. Everything including the alternative energy sources that some say will become cost effective.
And equally importantly underestimates the size of the problem and length of time needed to address it.
By saying that oil shouldn’t be thought of as “plentiful”, it sounds like you are making a “leave it in the ground for future generations” argument then? If this is what you mean, then think how problematic that is for advancing the technology of retrieving these energy resources! If we had taken that approach in the past, we might never have developed the amazing tech advances of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracking! Those are techologies that are able to access previously inaccessible energy, in quite an efficient and economical way. Developments like that are motivated by the market and by the competitive advantage of being able to *produce* such a highly effective and storable form of energy.
In the sense of cautiously guessing at resource limits, even my own comment earlier, that oil and gas might just be more expensive to get at in the future, is basically just advanced speculation on my part. I don’t claim to know what might be discovered in the future to keep fossil fuels cheap, even 200 years from now! Plus, assuming the desirability of having no fuel powered cars say, or assuming that all energy has to be “turned into electricity”, that also turns a blind eye to fuel powered or hybrid alternatives, doesn’t it?
No its more a case of making hay while the sun shines. While we have relatively cheap and relatively plentiful fossil fuel, we should use it while we transition to renewable energy sources at a reasonable rate.
The longer we leave that transition, the higher the impact transitioning is going to eventually have on society and the more disadvantaged people are going to suffer and die.
I wrote a client report on the economics the of the frack sand industry 7yrs ago and was amazed myself at the large magnitude of hydrocarbon shale resources. One small example is the country Romania is completely underlain by oil shales.
Here is N American
Impressive.
I myself happen to live more or less right on the northern edge of the ‘Bakken’ shale play region of your map.
You are not an exploration expert.
You are of course assuming that charging takes place at an even rate across each minute and hour of the year, with no change in demand patterns for the rest of electricity usage. Maybe there is some spare dispatchable capacity that arises from the diurnal demand pattern, as illustrated by this chart that shows a dull windless day in January. Lower demand in summer or when it’s windy or sunny would create different patterns of charging opportunity. In practice, charging demand would tend to run overnight, and can be managed somewhat to give a more even flow. But if you get to a large fraction of charging being done overnight, it becomes the peak period. Perhaps trucks will have to be driven overnight,and charged up during the day at times to suit the grid. I suspect that in addition to nuclear, there will be a need for a substantial share of new flexible generation, and the total capacity required will be even higher in consequence.
The EIA report some 483GW of gas for 1617TWh (38%), 218GW of coal for 774TWh (41%), 103GW of hydro for about 250TWh (28%, allowing for a bad year), 97GW of nuclear for 790TWh (93%) and 36GW of oil for 36TWh (11% peaker operation) of generation that can be regarded as dispatchable – a total of 937GW for 3,467TWh. Average use amounts to about 395GW, so the current average capacity factor is just 42% reflecting the need to provide for high demand days (whether hot or cold weather), and to provide backup and spacefor renewables on the grid. I think this tell us that the real costs and requirements are going to be substantially higher, particularly if you have to factor in a larger intermittent renewables share.
There was a time when we bent technology to suit our needs. You seem to be suggesting that we bend to suit the needs of technology. That seems stupid.
I am suggesting that we will not be given the choice.
Here in the US, public policy decisions have already been made which guarantee that electricity will cost more in the future and that less of it will be available.
The only questions remaining to be answered at this point are (1) how much more will it cost in the future, and (2) how much less of it will be available.
Except you will be forced to go on a smart grid, which means higher prices and less power for you.
Don’t forget when you’re buying your new EV to get the really big long range battery so your neighbours can have the benefit of reliable power and wearing it out as the energy providers suck the life out of it regularly-
National Grid trials draining batteries of parked electric vehicles (msn.com)
Meanwhile more of the fallacy of composition as Western Australia joins South Australia with the inevitable-
Household solar to be switched off as another state gains emergency grid management powers (msn.com)
Always pays to hop in for your chop early with all the Greening going down as you don’t want to be tail end charlie. As the world’s greatest Treasurer reminded us once the easiest cut is the handout you don’t give in the first place and bad luck suckers and poor folks who were late to the trough or couldn’t afford the fare. You’ll get your warmening rotting in Hell watermelons.
Thanks! Great explanation.
What surprises me about many of the posts on this topic is the lack of optimism about the potential benefits resulting from scientific and technological research and development.
I think it’s true that the political agenda of many countries to reach net-zero CO2 emissions by 2050 is unrealistic in relation to the current state of ‘renewable’ technology. However, ‘science and technology’ is always progressing.
The negative aspect of net-zero goals is that many mistakes will be made along the way, energy prices will occasionally soar and power outages might become more frequent. If technology has not advanced sufficiently to address these problems during the following 2 or 3 decades, then the target of net-zero CO2 emissions by 2050 will not be met.
The positive aspect of such a target is that it will put pressure on the ‘science and technology’ community to solve these obvious problems by developing new, advanced devices.
For example, we all know that the current Lithium-Ion batteries used in EVs are heavy, expensive, and have limited range. Does that mean we should scrap the idea of EVs replacing ICE’s, or should we invest more money in research for better batteries that could eventually result in EVs becoming far more efficient that ICE vehicles?
Here’s a site that mentions a number of new battery types that are currently under development. Even allowing for an exaggeration of the benefits, they are still impressive.
“NAWA Technologies has designed and patented an Ultra Fast Carbon Electrode, which it says is a game-changer in the battery market. It uses a vertically-aligned carbon nanotube (VACNT) design and NAWA says it can boost battery power ten fold, increase energy storage by a factor of three and increase the lifecycle of a battery five times. The company sees electric vehicles as being the primary beneficiary, reducing the carbon footprint and cost of battery production, while boosting performance. NAWA says that 1000km range could become the norm, with charging times cut to 5 minutes to get to 80 per cent. The technology could be in production as soon as 2023.”
https://www.pocket-lint.com/gadgets/news/130380-future-batteries-coming-soon-charge-in-seconds-last-months-and-power-over-the-air
http://www.nawatechnologies.com/
I wonder how many negative ticks I’ll get. (wink)
Doesn’t matter how good the batteries get, Vincent. It will still take a 60% expansion of the electrical generation and grid to power them, and that will be … well … extremely unlikely by 2050.
w.
Of course it matters how good the batteries get. The cost, weight, storage capacity and longevity of batteries are crucial, as well as the continuous availability and supply of the materials needed to construct the batteries.
Imagine a future scenario when the real cost of solar panels is half what it currently is, and the durability of the panels and converters are double what they currently are. Combine that development with batteries that are half the weight, half the cost, double the capacity, double the durability, and are not dependent on scarce resources for their construction, and are able to be recharged much quicker than current batteries.
Are you still going to complain?
Those who live in houses in the suburbs, with lots of spare roof capacity, will be overjoyed. They’ll be able to recharge, at a low cost, their new EV which has, say, a 700-1,000 km range on a full charge, and has a purchase price similar to current ICE vehicles, and they’ll be able to export their surplus electricity, at a modest wholesale price, to those living in apartment blocks in the cities.
Wow! I look forward to such a future, probably because I live in the suburbs.
Your optimism reminds me very much of fusion power – always 10 years down the road every new year. Transitioning from lab demonstration to retail availability is a huge hurdle.
What a strange comparison. Battery storage and solar panels have existed for over a century, whereas the first Fusion power plant does not yet exist as a source of energy. The first solar cell panel had an efficiency of only 1 to 2%. The latest solar panels have an efficiency of around 22%.
The first EV was produced in 1894 but had just a 25 mile range and a maximum speed of just 20 mph. Compare that with the latest EVs. We’ve made significant progress in battery technology, solar panel technology, and EV technology, and we will presumably continue to make progress.
The alarm about catastrophic climate change due to CO2 emissions, is a major driving force behind this technological progress.
As we should all know, energy supplies are essential for modern civilizations to flourish, just as CO2 is essential for all plants to flourish, which in turn are essential to support all life. The more energy sources, the better.
The intermittency of solar power (and wind power, which I don’t like at all) is a huge problem which has to be addressed. If a practical and efficient solution can’t be found, then we will have to continue to use fossil fuels, and/or Nuclear Fission Power Plants.
“The first true battery was invented by the Italian physicist Alessandro Volta in 1800. Volta stacked discs of copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn) separated by cloth soaked in salty water. Wires connected to either end of the stack produced a continuous stable current.”
“In 1883, the first solar cell panel was made by the New Yorker inventor Charles Fritts. He coated selenium with an extremely thin layer of gold, so it was transparent to light, and obtained an energy conversion efficiency between 1 and 2%.”
“1894 – Morris and Salom Electrobat
Mechanical engineer Henry G. Morris and chemist Pedro G. Salom founded the first electric car company in America, the Morris & Salom Electric Carriage and Wagon Company. Their first vehicle is the Electrobat with two 1.5-horsepower electric motors, 25 miles of range, and a top speed of 20 mph.”
The 22% efficient solar cells are 1) At the theoretical limit of what is possible and 2) very expensive, very fragile and can only achieve that level under very specialized laboratory conditions.
While you note that EV’s have improved from early models, you fail to note that ICE’s have improved by a much, much larger amount.
The intermittency of wind and solar is a problem that can’t be solved, not without multiple miracles. Your belief that we should go ahead and make the switch and then pray for these miracles is at best foolhardy.
Even if it were possible, battery improvements aren’t going to reduce the amount of electricity it takes to move your car down the road.
You keep evading the core issue with your whines that batteries just might get better someday.
You truly don’t get it. No matter how good the batteries get, they’ll require the same power to move the same vehicles. The problem is at the other end—generating the required power.
w.
Yes, I do get it. I’ve been aware for many years that the extra demand on the electricity supply, if EV production were to rapidly escalate, has been a major issue which has slowed down the development of EVs, because such an increase in demand could only be met by a continuation of the use of fossil fuels, or nuclear power, at previous levels, or even increased levels as economies expand, which CAGW alarmists obviously don’t want.
Another obstacle to the development of EVs is the retraining required for the current ICE service personnel. Servicing an EV requires different skills.
To solve any problem one has to first understand precisely what the problem is. In my opinion, an EV is an improved technology, compared with ICE vehicles. They have fewer moving parts and are less expensive to maintain. As battery technology improves and becomes more affordable, the EV range will increase and the charging time will likely decrease.
Buying an EV in preference to an ICE vehicle will eventually become a no-brainer, especially for those who are able to cover their roof with affordable solar panels.
Starting a revolution based on the hope for improved technology is not a good idea. If the technology is available, then it is time to start making plans to implement it, based on what is known, not what is hoped.
Don’t all scientists hope that their research will have a successful and useful outcome? I don’t believe there is a major problem caused by AGW. I see the alarmism more like a religion. However, religions can have a positive side.
Likewise, promoting alarmism about AGW can focus peoples’ attention on taking care of the environment, and the harm done by deforestation and the pollution of the land and the atmosphere.
Yes, but most innovations fail. Even technical superiority wasn’t enough to keep Betamax from losing out to VHS.
Using false panic to force others to do the stuff that you want them to do. There’s a word for that.
Are you referring to the word ‘Religion’? If you behave well in this life, you go to Heaven. If you behave badly, you go to Hell. Would you agree that this concept of ‘Eternal Hell’ represents a ‘false panic’?
However, there is a benefit to society resulting from this ‘false panic’. Many who believe in it will tend to refrain from bad behavior. Likewise, those who believe in CAGW will, hopefully, show more respect for their environment.
Depending on future miracles is what got us into this mess in the first place.
The periodic table is pretty well known, nobody is inventing new molecules to add to it.
The best possible batteries are already being made. Future improvements will only add a few percent to storage capacity.
“The best possible batteries are already being made.”
Wow! What a knowledgeable scientist you must be!! (wink, wink)
Math is hard.