Essay by Eric Worrall
The Economist setting forth a nightmare vision of saving the world by paving over the wilderness.
The case for an environmentalism that builds
Economic growth should help, not hinder, the fight against climate change
The sheer majesty of a five-megawatt wind turbine, its central support the height of a skyscraper, its airliner-wingspan rotors tilling the sky, is hard to deny. The solid-state remorselessness with which a field of solar panels sucks up sunshine offers less obvious inspiration, but can still stir awe in the aficionado. With the addition of some sheep safely grazing such a sight might even pass for pastoral. The sagging wires held aloft by charmless, skeletal pylons along which the electricity from such installations gets to the people who use it, by contrast, are for the most part truly unlovely. But loved they must be.
If the world’s climate is to be stabilised, stopping electricity generation from producing fossil-fuel-derived emissions is crucial. So is greatly increasing the amount of electricity available. With more generating capacity, it will be possible to power motor vehicles and warm homes with electricity, rather than by burning dirty fuels. Expanding access to power for people in the poorest countries will reduce emissions from biomass burning and greatly improve living standards. More copious and reliable electricity will be needed for effective adaptation, too. If heatwaves are not to become ever more lethal, grids in developing countries will have to reliably power wider use of air conditioning in energy-hungry cities.
…
If those plans are to work, and to do so legitimately, there also needs to be less objection to building in the first place. That would make timid politicians more comfortable with legislation designed to streamline things; it would hasten the arrival of essential new capacity; and, by reducing uncertainty, it would lower the cost of capital.
…
Read more: https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/04/05/the-case-for-an-environmentalism-that-builds
Instead of carpeting the entire world with mechanical monstrosities, how about using small footprint nuclear power stations, which can supply endless zero carbon power without clear felling the entire wilderness and peppering it with concrete and steel monstrosities?
But the urban “greens” who articulate their visions of covering the wilderness with power pylons and turbines as far as the eye also tend to be the people who reject low footprint zero carbon energy solutions. We can only speculate why.
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Here is a Googlepic of the Collinsville power station. It used to be a coal station with a capacity of 175 MW. Near the power station, you’ll see the solar array with a capacity of 42 MW. Which do you think is better for the environment?
The coal plant is better. The coal mine would still be there to provide coking coal for silicon purification to make those solar panels but the coal generation provides power 24 hours a day while the solar array only works 4 hours per day…and as an added benefit CO2 fertilization is created that Plants just LOVE and vastly increases food production.
BTW that 42MW capacity equates to about 10MW Generation…17 times less than the coal plant
It’s never “17 times less than the coal plant”, that makes no sense. You could write “one seventeenth of the power” or better still the the coal plant produces 17 times as much power as the solar.
What would one times less be for a 175 MW station? 17 times less would be -2.6GW
You’re mixing up ‘+-‘ with ‘*/’. The word ‘times’ refers to multiplication and division, not addition and subtraction. “17 times less than the coal plant” makes sense to me. To me, it means 1/17.
Yes, this is English, not a mathematics journal.
Well…
That’s about what Solar is good for…
-2.6GW
Also, as I realised on my first argument on this site, a solar panel delivers at best 8% of nameplate capacity. That means we can get about (42*10^6)*0.08=3,36kWh per day.
For a thing so big, it is noticable on a photo of the largest coal mine in Australia?
Language may a whore, sir, but numbers only lie under torture…
Amendment: 3k36Wh x 24 = 80k64Wh per day.
Eighty kiloWatt does not power many hairdryers and selfie lights, It won’t even support a small factory, until Nick’s pet unicorn starts pooping batteries.
That seems to depend on where you are. We actually do average around 30% in much of Australia. The US south-west should give similar figures.
Made the same mistake until Someone here (Kip?) set me straight.
How many sunlight hours? Let’s average you at twelve. 50%.
Clouds, at least quarter of the time. 37% ish.
Now add losses, ageing and the overhead for the following:
Seasonal elevation of collectors. None? -3db. 18%. Ish.
Daily able to follow sun? Add here your 30% efficiency. 6%
Add automated cleaners, control gear and converters…
A coal station gives and gives, 24/7, as long as the business plan includes preventative maintenance.
Which is the real problem, innit?
Dunno, but the official numbers are around that – perhaps a bit less.
Yeah, 50% sunlight hours, but 10 hours min and 14 max.
Nothing like 25% cloud over most of the tropical and sub-tropical inland. That’s the biggie which most people outside the area can’t really understand.
The equipment might e reasonably new, so drop-off with age will be a problem.
Really, the point is that 8% is way low. 30% might be a bit high, but certainly 25% of nameplate.
It’s not a like for like comparison if you don’t adjust for the miserable capacity factor of renewables. And where is the lake of toxic sludge from processing all the exotic minerals required for the solar panels? And where is the battery backup?
… talking of batteries, where does Nick Stokes think all that Lithium comes from?
“ all that Lithium”
World production of lithium in 2020 was 82,000 tons. Production of coal was 7,921,000,000 tons.
Coal is good. So is oil and gas. Good for powering dispatchable energy generation, good for jobs, good for economic growth, good for business, good for tax receipts (that “dirty” income from the FF industry is used by the elite green hypocrites in governments to help subsidize their renewable nut-zero fairy tale), good for everything.
Nick, coal is, like, you know, rocks? Like, you dig this helluva hole, then you come across this layer of black rock, which you dig this up and that’s coal.
Lithium? Now, Nick, lithium is a metal. Extremely reactive, catches fire if you let it see air, very reactive, Nick, very reactive. Found as ore in the ground, rocks and sands and salt mines and all sorts of weird places. Weird places you then rip from the face of Mother Earth, and grind into fine, dead dust, which you then leach with poisonous chemicals, Nick, poisonous chemicals, millions and millions of liters of poisonous chemicals, Nick. From a ton of ore, you extract a few gram of lithium Nick, a few gram.
Litium is not like coal at all, Nick, not at all. And it is so much more dangerous, and poisonous, and cancerous, and expensive, and not renewable at all, Nick.
Item 1
CCC, a bunch of RE idiots trying to pull the wool over the eyes of innocent, gullible lay people, got caught lying and obfuscating big-time.
CCC, which advises UK PM Johnson, aka, the UNRULY MOP, used 7 days of low wind, whereas the low-wind days were 65 in 2021, and 78 in 2016.
CCC wanted to make wind look extra, extra good.
More low-wind days means vastly greater CAPACITY, MW, of instantly available, reliable, low-cost, traditional power plants, which must be staffed, fueled, ready to operate, in good working order, as demanded by the UK grid operator, to fill in any wind (and solar) shortfalls; the UK has LOTS OF DAYS without sun, throughout the year.
Initially, CCC was obstructing the public release of its report to THE UNRULY MOP.
CCC was ordered by the Court to release the report to the public.
Are you f….g kidding me?
We are talking hundreds of millions of small folks spending $TRILLIONS EACH YEAR, to “save the world”, and CCC is blatantly lying about the feasibility and cost!
These CCC people should be drawn and quartered.
ALL OF THIS IS AWFUL NEWS FOR THE SCOTLAND COP CLIMATE MEETING
BTW, every wind turbine draws significant electricity from the grid, whether it is producing or not.
Item 2
Great graph. It shows Wind Capacity Factor (0% to 100%), versus Temperature (-10C to 25C)
It clearly shows, the capacity’s factor of wind very often is less than 10%
The average CF is about 30%.
It is important to note wind power is the cube of wind speed
In addition, at very low CFs, say 3 to 4%, with winds at 5 mph and less, the wind turbine is producing about as much as it is consuming, i.e., no net feed to the grid. Yikes.
The graph shows a lot of red at low CFs, meaning onshore winds are frequently very weak.
The RE clowns at CCC are of-the-charts fabricators of lies.
They should be drawn and quartered
https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/9736254476?profile=RESIZE_710x
Neither is better for the environment, since both are dirty and involve massive trashing of the environment. A nuclear power station is the obvious solution. Where I live, the large power lines (400kV) are virtually invisible in the valley, whereas the wind turbines look awful on the hill tops.
The one which produces more net energy will have less impact on the environment : clearly, the coal plant wins hands down. Did I mention that the coal plant is also a reliable energy production ?
Nick,
You avoid some of the effects of time.
Coal mining started at Collinsville in 1919. Enormous numbers of people have subsequently felt the benefits, including USA warships in WWII. One hundred years later, of course you can see where soil has been moved. It gets smoothed over almost to golf course quality when its time comes.
The solar panels, of course are also visible. They also can be removed prior to their rehab.
For a given area, like a square kilometre of land, the coal operation has produced, can produce, will produce far more useful energy in a given time, like a century. It is inherently superior.
Finally, why don’t you also show the silica mines and the other mineral mines that go into manufacture of solar panels and the mines for their steel or aluminium supports?
What do you hope to show with incomplete, unmatched comparisons? Have you, a thoughtful mathematician, resorted to propaganda images?
Happy Easter. Geoff S
Geoff,
“silica mines”?
According to Wiki, solar cells need 8-9 gm silicon per watt. 42 MW needs 400 tons, or about a kiloton sand for the whole site for its lifetime. That’s about how much coal the old power station burned in a day.
Better not shut the coal mines too quickly Nick, you’ll need lots of coal to refine and process the silicon.
Stokes seems unable to understand the concept of embedded energy.
It’s hard to get a man to understand something, when his paycheck depends on him not understanding it.
The only plus side to having the solar panel facility close to the coal is that when soon useless they can be chopped up, processed, and deeply buried as the cuts are filled, recontoured, and planted with lovely flowering plants for bees.
If you cut the panels up, the toxic stuff inside them will leach out more quickly. Better to just bury them intact. Might be cheaper as well.
Your 8-9 gm per Watt would make about 4 ounces per sq ft for a highest available efficiency solar panel. That means must be describing just the silicon in the semiconductor cell, not the protective cover. After a few days, you would have to go out every day to change all the unprotected panels that fail daily.
8 gm per watt. Now multiply that by 175 million in order to equal the power output of the coal plant.
Now multiply that by 4 or 5 since solar only produces 20 to 25% of face plate power.
Now multiply that by 4 again since those solar cells will have to be replaced 4 times over the expected life span of that coal plant.
It’s almost as if you are going out of your way to be deceptive.
OK, do all that. It comes to 28000 tons of silica. The coal station takes less than a month to get through 28000 tons of coal.
How’s the foot Nick, it must hurt after a self inflicted blast like that….
What you show is NOT: a Picture Of Collinsville Power Station
It just happened to PhotoBomb your picture
What you point to is the Collinsville Coal Mine – one of the largest mines in Australia.
(We do see how you selectively cropped your screenshot. Some would call that = Lying by Omission but we all know that that’s a Million Miles below your high-standing, morals and ethics. Had we seen the whole coal mine, the power station would disappear and the solar panels would appear exactly the same as a Pile of Spoil/Tailings. i.e. Dead and black)
The power station is incidental to the mine, except that it was put there to power the mine itself and the local town, where the miners live. And enjoy playing golf apparently. nice.
As regards ‘The Environment’ – it little more than what the whole rest of Australia is – except that:
the mine is a lifeless, dry/dusty/dead desert that is black/grey in colouraustralia is lifeless, dry/dusty/dead desert that is orange/yellow/red in colourMaybe not in the Strict Legal Definition of ‘Environment’ but I personally would assert that:
‘Environments should contain ‘Life’
ymmv
To all intents,
there is no ‘environment’ there – it a burnt-out desert.nobody goes there to witness/see/endure The Environment = 550 miles from Brisbane….so does it matterExcept to the miners and they patently don’t mindFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Collinsville Coal Mine is a coal mine located in Springlands and Collinsville in the Whitsunday Region, Queensland, Australia. The open-cut mine lies in the northern Bowen Basin. Collinsville produces coking and steaming coal for both domestic use and export. Exports leave the country via Abbot Point
The mine has coal reserves amounting to 196 million tonnes of coking coal, one of the largest coal reserves in Asia and the world. Collinsville has an annual production capacity of 6 million tonnes of coal.
From the figures given..
Check my figures but I get that the power station would use ~500,000 tonnes of coal per year to make the electricity it does
(Taking that 1kg of coal contains 10kWh thermal)
The attached should show what I guess to be the extent of the entire Collinsville mine.
I also ran a measure around the panels and got an area of 6.5km2
If we take those at 42MW nameplate and in that sunny place, to make as much electricity as the power station does would need a solar farm running to (about) twenty times that size/area
(Annual accumulated total MWh)
So, just to replace the power station with solar panels would need over 125 square kilometres of precious environment
(Compare to the area of the mine at 25 km2)
To replace the energy output of the mine itself would require a solar farm of twelve times that= 1,500km2
and Nick is concerned about ‘The Environment’
aren’t we all
edit to PS.
No-one needs to hug anything, let alone a pylon.
Instead we should embrace a DC grid
(That was Edison’s first plan wasn’t it)
Peta,
I agree that comparing the areas isn’t fair, since the power station used only a fraction of the coal that was mined. Although, as your more wide-ranging pic shows, the mine area is even larger.
The point was, though, that coal mining mars the landscape far more than solar panels or wind farms ever will.
When you compare the amount of land required for the solar and wind to power the entire grid (never mind the batteries that haven’t yet been invented), coal wins that argument, too.
Those wind turbines, in particular, are eyesores, hurt wildlife, deforest the planet. When they’re placed near a population, usually poorer people, they interfere with sleep and the low-frequency whump-whump-whump causes other harm.
We can’t rely on coal forever, but we cannot rely on wind or solar at all. It’s time to stop constructing those harmful structures and focus on the future of energy. Reliable energy. Something your wind turbines cannot provide.
the solar in that photo is probably producing only a few MW, it’s far too small to produce even the name plate of 42, it that’s what it says- near my ‘hood is a 2.5 MW solar “farm” on 18 acres- which means the solar in that photo would have to be 300 acres- yet it looks like only 5-10 acres though no way to tell without a scale- if I had a scale, it would be easy to estimate
139.28 acres
Thats from Google Earth Pro
Let’s call it (about) 140 acres (56.65 hectares)
OK- yuh, Stokes’ photo – he tried to make it seem that that tiny solar you can see on it- produces 42 MW- instead, 140 acres of land need to be wasted – even then, it won’t produce that much
now give us evidence that the solar in that photo will produce 42 MW- and even if that’s the claimed amount, the actual production will be far less so the comparison is absurd
Mars the landscape? Every human activity “mars the landscape” to some extent. Construction of highways, liquor stores, vineyards, race tracks, churches and cemeteries all “mar the landscape”. In fact, even nature itself “mars the landscape” through rain, snow, flood, glaciation, storms, etc. There is no stasis of the environment, humans present or no.
I “mared” the landscape today, I went out of my home. I work outside and mar the landscape daily.
If you are going to include the mining for the coal, you need to include the mining for the solar. And then do a 1:1 comparison of actual power generation per km2.
Once again Nick attempts to deceive through omission. What he leaves out is the fact that the coal mine will be remediated when it is retired. Once remediation is done, you won’t be able to tell that there was ever a coal mine there.
The solar farm on the other hand, will be there forever.
“The point was, though, that coal mining mars the landscape far more than solar panels or wind farms ever will.”
Not known for your humour old mate greeny, however……that is the funniest thing I have read in a long time. You should keep the humour coming, give us a break from your endless green diatribes.
That image carefully avoids displaying the Hamilton
SolarSubsidy Farm to the north. Another real blight on the landscape.I was in Collinsville a few years back, for the purpose of making and submitting a town planning application. One issue was a requirement to provide a complying surface from the property boundary to the state-controlled road. This crossover point was used by very heavy vehicles with tyres more than 2m high. Bitumen would soon be dispersed, and concrete slab would probably move every time a vehicle was driven over it. My suggestion was, agree to what they want, but only do what you are doing already, which was to regrade the crossover area with a bobcat when it needed it.
That day was a very refreshing experience. Real people actually doing real work.
“you’ll see the solar array “
So, who got the cleaning contract, Nick?
Can you show evidence that the solar “farm” is 42 MW? I doubt it. A 2.5 MW solar “farm” next to my ‘hood is 18 acres. Based on that, a 42 MW solar “farm” should be 300 acres. Doesn’t like more than 5-10 acres- though without a scale I can’t tell.
Wiki says so:
“A solar power farm generating 42MW has been built on adjacent land.”
But it seems to have been upgraded
“Collinsville Solar PV Park is a 58.12MW solar PV power project.”
Nick,
Honest question.
When they give output for solar plants, do the provide the MW based on the theoretical maximum output per individual panel discounting any line losses, transformer losses, etc.?
Meaning: Panels have a maximum output as a specific (90 degree) angle of input solar radiation an optimum ambient temperature and probably a certain wind speed for cooling efficiency.
All the wiring from panels to combiner boxes to DC to AC inverters to transmission lines have losses. Do they subtract those losses to provide a maximum output to the actual transmission line point of connection?
Is that what the developers (and their political crony capitalist supporters) use to claim output? The theoretical maximum with no losses?
Your quote from Wiki of a “farm generating 42MW” shows Wiki is written by loons because the “farm” would NEVER actually generate 42MW even in the best of HATURAL conditions would it? And 0 MW at night, correct?
Drake
It’s been expanded. 58.12 MW is apparently now the maximum output from the array.
Under perfect conditions. Which never happens in the real world.
Nearby is the Daydream Solar Farm. 1,070 acres, supposedly producing about 315GWh/year according to its owners from a peak nominal output of 168MW – an average of about 36MW, or 29.8 acres/MW produced on average, which is actually less productive per acre than many. It has single axis solar tracking panels (which accounts for the low land use productivity), but its output can vary enormously in minutes as clouds pass over. It must be a nightmare for grid integration.
http://nemlog.com.au/nem/stn/DAYDSF/
Yesterday it averaged about 34MW. Today its output is worth around minus A$50.
you said “Near the power station, you’ll see the solar array with a capacity of 42 MW.” What I see in THAT photo is not a 42 MW solar “farm”- so be more careful and show us a photo of that 42 MW “farm”
Does your pathetic solar power plant work at night? The coal-powered one certainly did.
How much fossil fuel was required to refine the amorphous silicon for the solar panels?
42MW means its about 6mw in reality meaning you have to build ~30 of those to get the same power.
Solar is crap.
You forgot to mention that the 42 MW capacity is only available when the Sun is shining on a clear day.
175 MW is available 24/7.
“175 MW is available 24/7.”
Not any longer. Since they now have the option of exporting the coal at high prices, that is what they do.
Because coal mines have the option of exporting some of their coal, therefore coal fueled power plants can no longer produce power 24/7?
Is that really the argument you want to go with?
Nick’s reply is a “Swing and a miss!”
Good,
Which is better for the environment. The coal, by far.
Sill not capable of actually reading the articles, Nick?
Nick’s goal is not understanding, it’s distraction.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tvtJPs8IDgU
Just put those trees in a tree museum
and charge all the people a dollar and a half just to see ’em
You don’t stabilise something you cannot control
The Economist is economical with the truth
I find it amazing that a magazine/journal with such a name would NOT be conservative.
Even the left have economists. Of course, they’ll never get it right.
Joseph, Economist is the property of the Rothschilds. It has been completely controlled by them for at least seven years.
They used to be, but then it was taken over by journalists and the real economists were shown the door.
“”ChatGPT is making up fake Guardian articles. Here’s how we’re responding…””
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/apr/06/ai-chatgpt-guardian-technology-risks-fake-article
Apparently you can make it up
Do not click on links to the Guardian, it just encourages them because it increases their click count. As far as making it up goes, that has been the prime Guardian/BBC practice for as long as the political left has had control of them.
I give the online version (Environment, climate crisis, energy etc. a cursory glance.
Most of the time it’s a laugh and they’re being deadly serious.
Haha pot calling the kettle black or what, they make it up every day! I’m not clicking as get the gist, not even to see if they’ve still got the hat out for donations!
I stopped subscribing to the Economist several years ago when it turned out to another of the destructive instruments of Führer Schwab and WEF!
If you hug a five-megawatt wind turbine, you only get about 1.5-megawatt worth of kisses in return.
ROFL. And only at unpredictable intervals.
I’ve been in the base of a large wind tower. I encourage anyone that can to do so. The technology is interesting and the scale impressive.
The tour guides were young people with no engineering or technical training, but very nice and tried to answer the questions. If you go, treat them courteously as they are (mostly) just doing a summer job to pay for pizza and beer. Also, often some information is proprietary.
Meanwhile the rural versus urban temperature at any moment in time comparison continues to suggest energy policy involving more major despoiling of our environment means the lunatics are in charge of an upside down and out of control asylum.
Let’s settle for nuclear and gas and – for the sakes of whales and all marine life – abandon major wind and solar farms wherever we imagine we should build them since they are not going to help us to do anything other than further despoil the planet and cause an incomprehensible increase in so called ‘harmful emissions’ way beyond what they need to be for useful benefit.
” If the world’s climate is to be stabilised ….. ”
Well I suppose there is a first time for everything but don’t hold your breath on that one.
Yeah, the author thinks windmills are majestic and the climate can be stabilized by human effort. The author doesn’t have a clue.
So, yet again leftards say they will save the world by destroying the world.
From the article: “The sheer majesty of a five-megawatt wind turbine, its central support the height of a skyscraper, its airliner-wingspan rotors tilling the sky, is hard to deny.”
These windmills have to be one of the biggest monstrosities ever created by human beings. They should all be torn down, and no more should be built. They are an unnecessary boondoggle; mean death and illness to many innocent species, including humans; and are a blight on the landscape.
Calling windmills “majestic” is just downright delusional. Windmills are a horror show. An unnecessary horror show.
here’s one of these beauties on the land of Mt. Wachusetts Community College in central Woke-achusetts
Pontifications such as this article convey the undeniable climate cult religion.
“The sheer majesty of a five-megawatt wind turbine, its central support the height of a skyscraper, its airliner-wingspan rotors tilling the sky, is hard to deny.”
Idolatry.
What to do? “… let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up.” (From Daniel 3:18.)
‘If the world’s climate is to be stabilised’
Impressive statement of ignorance in suggesting that our changing climate can be made static.
‘Land Use in US By Electricity Source in Acres/MW produced’
Coal 12.21, Nat. Gas 12.41, Nuclear 12.71, Solar 43.5, Wind 70.64, Hydro 315.22
Includes all land required to mine and drill for coal and gas.
Strata Group, Utah State University ‘The Footprint of Energy: Land Use of US Electricity Production’
OK do they have anything that actually measures POWER, as in MWH.
We know the first three listed can produce continuous output so add the H to MW, hydro can produce output based on water supply, so the MW, if maximum, would not be MWH for continuous production but some lesser amount.
Solar and wind would not produce the equivalent of adding the H to the MW. Not by a long shot.
In this study, does the unit of measure of ‘Acres/MW’ refer to nameplate capacity without consideration of wind and solar’s capacity factors? Or is the study based on MW-hours of energy produced over some period of time, such as one average year of production?
I think it takes account of capacity factors. Surprised the nuclear one is so high though. Gas and coal will clearly depend on the thickness of the strata being exploited.
Thank you Dave.
I was looking for this comparison that shows what a lame effort Nick’s comment was.
‘Land Use in US By Electricity Source in Acres/MW produced’
https://docs.wind-watch.org/US-footprints-Strata-2017.pdf
The Strata report includes the foundational assumptions being made in its analysis. The methods of calculation being used in arriving at these figures are fairly easy to discern.
In looking quickly at the report, one important factor which hasn’t been considered in the analysis for wind and solar are the acres of land needed for grid-scale backup storage batteries, or for backup hydro.
Including the land needed for grid-scale energy backup in dealing with wind and solar’s intermittency issue would raise their figures even higher than what the report now indicates.
The study was published in 2015. I guess backup storage was not a ‘hot topic’ back then.
They did, however, say “One of the severely understudied land use requirements for wind is the resource production process” and in particular talked about neodymium for the magnets
It turns out that the majority of the land use for conventional power generation is actually their allocation of land taken by transmission grids, which they allocate on the basis of share of annual output. That is not really an appropriate basis. Transmission is sized on the basis of the peak output it must carry. The length of transmission involved will depend on the distance between the facility and major centres of demand it supplies.
So nuclear, which has a very high capacity factor and constant output will typically be a very efficient user of transmission capacity. Offsettting that slightly is that you do not find nuclear plants in major city downtowns, but they are often only a few tens of miles away. Solar farms will make much less efficient use of transmission capacity, and larger ones will be located further away from cities in areas with low land values. Hydro locations are typically a considerable distance from the demand they serve, and that can also apply to coal power, because it is cheaper to transport electricity than coal: minemouth locations are common. Natural gas is typically piped to power stations that are fairly close to demand. Wind farms must be in the windier locations, implying longer transmission lines, and of course rather lower utilisation factors.
“The sheer majesty of a five-megawatt wind turbine”
Majesty?
I would rather have the “sheer majesty” of an unblighted natural landscape.
“Sheer” can mean thin and transparent so any “majesty” wind turbines have is thin and transparent.
This is why i cancelled my economist subscription a couple years ago, after 30 years.
They totally lost the plot like so many other organizations.
Hopefully they fold.
The main obstacle to serious consideration of nuclear power as a zero-carbon alternative to wind and solar is keeping nuclear’s capital costs and its operating costs under control while also meeting strict regulatory requirements for basic nuclear safety, for plant construction quality assurance, and for post-construction operational safety.
NuScale, TerraPower, Rolls Royce, etc. etc. are focusing their efforts on utility-scale small modular reactors of various capacities. Other start-up vendors are working on smaller SMR’s and on microreactors for use in micro-grids and for supplying industrial power and process heat.
Here are two recent interviews with the leaders of two micro-reactor development projects, one privately funded, the other government funded:
————–
Atomic Insights, Atomic Show #303:
Interview with Bret Kugelmass, CEO Last Energy and producer of the Titans of Nuclear podcast.
From the interview notes: “Last Energy is an innovative new company governed by a philosophy of avoiding the invention of anything that has not been done before. They have created a business that is laser focused on building, owning and operating small (20 MWe), modular pressurized water reactors and selling the electricity they produce under long term power purchase agreements. …. Last Energy has chosen a small number of initial deployment locations, specifically in the UK, Romania and Poland. They are aiming to supply power to major industrial consumers that need somewhere between 20 and 100 MWe. They will connect to their customers “behind the meter”. From the customer point of view, Last Energy power will look and act like the electricity they currently purchase from their local utility company.”
Titans of Nuclear,
Interview with Yasir Arafat, Chief Designer and Project Lead, MARVEL Project, Idaho National Laboratory
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Microreactor Program supports research and development (R&D) of technologies related to the development, demonstration, and deployment of very small, factory-fabricated, transportable reactors to provide power and heat for decentralized generation in civilian, industrial, and defense energy sectors. A description of this DOE program is at:
Microreactor Applications Research Validation and Evaluation Project (MARVEL),
Integrating Microreactors with End-User Applications
————–
Bret Kugelmass of Last Energy and Yasir Arafat of DOE/INNL share a common trait of successful nuclear technology entrepreneurs.
They both have an in-depth understanding of the future market for nuclear energy; they both have an in-depth understanding of the reactor technology they are proposing; they both have the leadership qualities needed to manage their respective organizations; and they both have a rational plan for how to move forward in getting their respective nuclear technologies out of the development stage and in to production operation.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/16/us-green-impossibilities/
John, an e-mail from Northwest Public Broadcasting showed up in my inbox several weeks ago concerning a presentation event in Moscow, Idaho, on the evening of April 6th:
NWPB and NOVA Present: Climate Across America
Join us for a special screening of climate change videos followed by a live panel discussion Thursday, April 6 at 7 p.m. at the Kenworthy Performing Arts Centre 508 South Main Street, Moscow, Idaho
About the Event:
Northwest Public Broadcasting (NWPB) has partnered with the award-winning PBS science series NOVA, a production of GBH, to produce and distribute multiplatform, climate-focused content as part of NOVA’s Climate Across America initiative.
As part of the initiative, NWPB produced two videos focused on solutions-based approaches to different aspects of climate change at the community level. This event will give our local audience the chance to preview one of those videos as well as a segment from NOVA’s Weathering the Future documentary.
The event will also feature a live panel discussion of the challenges and solutions portrayed in each video and provide inspiration that each of us can take away to continue making positive changes in our communities.
“The mounting impacts of climate change are among the greatest challenges our society will face in the next century,” said NOVA Co-Executive Producer Julia Cort. “As crucial as it is, communicating effectively about climate has also become extremely challenging. NOVA’s first climate documentary aired in 1983, and we have produced 30 more climate films since then, continually leveraging the latest research on how best to engage people in this difficult topic. We’re excited that this national-local collaboration allows us to share our expertise with the wider PBS system and the next generation of media makers.”
The locally produced CLIMATE ACROSS AMERICA content will be timed with two new NOVA documentaries premiering this spring:
WEATHERING THE FUTURE, premiering Wednesday, April 12 at 9pm ET/8C on PBS, will examine the dramatic ways in which our weather is changing. From longer, hotter heat waves, to more intense rainstorms, to megafires and multi-year droughts, the U.S. is experiencing the full range of impacts from a changing global climate. At the same time, many on the front lines are fighting back—innovating solutions, marshaling ancient wisdom, and developing visionary ideas. The lessons they’re learning today can help all of us adapt in the years ahead, as the planet gets warmer and our weather gets more extreme.
CHASING CARBON ZERO, premiering Wednesday, April 26 at 9pm ET/8C on PBS will look at the ambitious climate goal recently set by the U.S. to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 and slash emissions in half by 2030. But is that even feasible? What exactly would it take? The film examines the problem and identifies the most likely real-world technologies that could be up to the task. From expanding the availability of renewable energy options, to designing more energy-efficient buildings, to revolutionizing the transportation sector, and more, the film casts a hopeful but skeptical eye. Can these solutions be scaled and made available and affordable across the country? Find out why there is still hope that we can achieve carbon zero and avoid the worsening impacts of climate change.
Moderator: Sueann Ramella, NWPB; Director of Audience
Special Guests: Julia Cort, NOVA | Co-Executive Producer
Panelists:
— Karl Dye, TRIDEC; President and CEO
— Vivek Utgikar, Ph.D., P.E., University of Idaho; Professor, Chemical & Materials Engineering
— Jay A. Hesse, Nez Perce Tribe; Director, Biological Services for Fisheries Resources Management
— Shannon Wheeler, Nez Perce Tribe; Vice Chairman
While driving last week I inadvertently tuned the radio to Public Radio and my 2019 Ford150 coughed and nearly stalled. But I managed to change to a classic rock station, and all was fine.
We lived 11 miles east of Moscow in Troy; we were at the University and note folks from UI are participating. Moust have gone downhill from the 1970s. We left in 1988.
“If the world’s climate is to be stabilised, stopping electricity generation from producing fossil-fuel-derived emissions is crucial.”
This is the only sentence in this whole sorry article that is meaningful. The answer is no the climate does not need to be stabilized. It is mighyt presumptuous of this crackpot to think we have that kind of power. There is no need to eliminate fossil fuel use but if we were to replace some fossil fuel it sure shouldn’t be with wind and solar. They are not dependable, efficient, recyclable, they have a monstrous footprint, they kill wildlife, they are expensive and they are short lived. There is nothing to like about them.
May the entire staff of The Economist hug an offshore pylon.
“The sheer majesty of a five-megawatt wind turbine, its central support the height of a skyscraper, its airliner-wingspan rotors tilling the sky, is hard to deny.”
Yep. The Bird Choppers do a great job of killing off the birds. Each development requiring a permit for their kill count.
It takes about 8 years for solar and wind to pay for themselves with about a 25 year lifespan.
Think of it like population. A new generation every 8 years, the parent dies every 25 years.
It will take hundreds of 8 year generations before solar panels and windmills are not a net drain on power production. All renewable energy will be consumed producing solar panels and windmills.
This simple fact is inescapable. We must rapidly increase fossil fuel use to be able to produce the volume of solar panels and windmills required for Net zero.
The drive to reduce emissions will actually increase them substantially.
The Collinsville power station is more powerful and better looking than the jaggedsolar array with a theoretical maximum capacity of 42 MW and a real minimum of zero MW. The solar plant would be lucky to work 4 hours a day there.
It would be better and safer to hug a python than to hug a Pylon to Prevent ‘Climate Catastrophe’
And pythons hug back!
Keep the mat4h simple. Treat solar and wind the same and assume they are reliable. Assume today that renewables power 10% of global energy while fossil fuel is 90%. Assume renewables have a 10 year payback with 30 year life.
Plan net zero in 30 years. Renewables will have produced 6 generations of new renewables while one generation is retired. This would take renewables from 10% to 60% of global energy if global demand was static and we didn’t use fossil fuels to make renewable.
However global energy demand is increasing so renewable cannot be increased to more than about 50% of the energy mix without increasing fossil fuel usage to manufacture the renewables.
Thus net zero must increase fossil fuel usage and emissions or the deadline for Net zero must be extended.
This twattlebutt’s brain obviously grew in the same solar panel shade as his sheep’s grazing. In other words, twattlebut, not much at all, nothing grows in the shade. It is said Dolly Parton has a size 3 shoe…