Oil at $87 and rising - still no alternative energy

Many of these posts focus on what the government should be doing.

What about what individuals should be doing?

How many people here are in car pools or take mass transit? How many people have changed out their light bulbs to the new high efficiency compact fluorescent light bulbs?

But there is an alternative engergy. It's environmentally friendly, clean, safe, inexhaustible, and compared to other energy sources, it's almost free. It's called nuclear energy.

easyasabc wrote:

But there is an alternative engergy. It's environmentally friendly, clean, safe, inexhaustible, and compared to other energy sources, it's almost free. It's called nuclear energy.

Naturally, it's not as easy as you describe.

Cycloptichorn

Cycloptichorn wrote:

easyasabc wrote:

But there is an alternative engergy. It's environmentally friendly, clean, safe, inexhaustible, and compared to other energy sources, it's almost free. It's called nuclear energy.

Naturally, it's not as easy as you describe.

Cycloptichorn

Naturally.
:wink:

I would like see Solar powered rechargable batteries explored in addition to Nuclear for electric generators. I like those windmills too.

What would you prefer?

Face it, wind and solar provide very little energy and the hope that they will in the future is decades away.

Lots of concrete in a nuclear plant seems like a small price to pay for providing energy for decades.

Interesting footnote I offer here, I watched a construction site the other day with huge earthmovers, scrapers, and dozers, as they worked to cut and fill along a new road being built. I tried to visualize the machines running on batteries or solar or wind, and I concluded again that deisel made from oil is pretty efficient and reliable.

But there is an alternative engergy. It's environmentally friendly, clean, safe, inexhaustible, and compared to other energy sources, it's almost free. It's called nuclear energy.

Interesting footnote I offer here, I watched a construction site the other day with huge earthmovers, scrapers, and dozers, as they worked to cut and fill along a new road being built. I tried to visualize the machines running on batteries or solar or wind, and I concluded again that deisel made from oil is pretty efficient and reliable.

okie wrote:

Face it, wind and solar provide very little energy and the hope that they will in the future is decades away.

Lots of concrete in a nuclear plant seems like a small price to pay for providing energy for decades.

Interesting footnote I offer here, I watched a construction site the other day with huge earthmovers, scrapers, and dozers, as they worked to cut and fill along a new road being built. I tried to visualize the machines running on batteries or solar or wind, and I concluded again that deisel made from oil is pretty efficient and reliable.

The thing is, the total thermal efficiencies of those engines is actually quite low. That is to say, very little of the power of the gasoline is transformable into usable energy by the machines - 20% at best according to some information discussed earlier in the thread.

In many cases electric motors exist that are as powerful as many of the gasoline that you see - they just require more efficient storage technology. That's why you see me going on about it so often.

Still, you will see that I did mix nuclear in there. I believe that there are ways to make it safe and that science can overcome some of the problems. And the energy output is quite large.

One thing to ponder - with greater efficiency gains in our electronics, we have often noticed a drop in the power necessary to run them. It won't be long before our computers are in many ways so small that solar and wind power would be ideal for powering many things which today suck off of the grid. I think solar and wind are technologies that individual people can invest in and use - this allows those who seek a cleaner environment to take direct action, instead of getting the government to do it for them. One would think that you would be behind this position fully - self-sufficiency for the homeowner, at least in terms of energy.

Cycloptichorn

Cycloptichorn

cjhsa - I couldn't agree more.

We had our first energy wake-up call in the early 70s - and we did nothing.

I believe the United States is on a non-sustainable path, not only on energy, but on multiple issues. And on each and every one of them we are either doing nothing or actively digging the hole deeper.

Another SUV or big screen high definition TV anyone?

" I believe oil prices are going up because the demand for oil outstrips the supply for oil. Oil is going up because developing countries still use a lot of oil. Oil is going up because we use too much oil. And the capacity to replace reserves is dwindling. That's why the price of oil is going up."

Bush today at the press conference:

Quote:

" I believe oil prices are going up because the demand for oil outstrips the supply for oil. Oil is going up because developing countries still use a lot of oil. Oil is going up because we use too much oil. And the capacity to replace reserves is dwindling. That's why the price of oil is going up."

Thats a pretty startling statement Walter. Bush must have been reading my posts these last 4 years.

Bush really isnt as dumb as he appears. He's just doing what any president would do in the position of presiding over a nation of addicts.