@RexRed,
RexRed wrote:
georgeob1 wrote:
You haven't offered a solution either. Wind and solar power are so much more expensive than conventional sources that their mandated use (on a time scale consistent with those offered by AGW zealots) would cause mass starvation and political havoc.
There have been no facts yet established thast suggest that natural gas extraction will "ruin our water supply". Quite the contrary, the facts suggest the impacts are minimal and easily prevented. You are chasing prejudices and illusions here.
I have no idea what you mean by the following;
Quote:Every electron has enough energy to fuel this planet,
The fact is the energies associated with changes in electron & ionic reactions, whether through chemical or incident radiation (as in solar cells) are well known and hardly sufficient in any individual case to "fuel this planet". However a somewhat related physical phenomenon, the energy within unstable nuclides of abundant elements, is millions of times greater than any reactions involving mere electrons.
That is the real source of manageable safe mass energy production for the planet without any adverse effects on our atmosphere.
I am just paraphrasing Einstein when he said:
There is enough energy locked up in a grain of sand to boil 10 000 000 kettles and the energy equivalent of the average adult is about 7 x 1018 (7 000 000 000 000 000 000) joules of potential energy, enough to explode with the force of thirty hydrogen bombs!
You must likewise not understand that statement either.
On the contrary I apparently understand it far better than do you.
Your "paraphrase" of Einstein's words constituted a very fundsamental distortion of his essential point. That is that the mass energy in the nucleus of atoms is overwhelmingly greater than the potential chemical energy stored in its orbiting electrons. This means that the potential energy in nuclear fission and fusion reactions is vastly greater than that involved in combustion or other like chemical reactions or even the excitation of electrons by light photons in photovoltaic cells.
In view of that, I find your eagerness to criticize the use of emission-free nuclear power rather self-contradictory.
The observable fact here is that you merely use words and pohrases you don't understand, and you don't bother to match your prejudices with any apparent effort to understand the physics and engineering principles involved.
RexRed wrote:
Why? Because we have become complacent using primitive energy forms. Dark energy is only a theory now yet it is the only hypothesis that explains certain physical phenomenon. Were we to actually do some research and development into that field it could also yield new forms of usable free clean energy. It was worth it to spend billions to produce a bomb to blow up our neighbor but not worth it to solve our energy crisis. Seems like the wrong priorities. And you seem to be part of this very problem George. And what of when we run out of oil gas, coal, clean air and water? Oh then this path would be viable had we not already squandered away any chance of using it in a clean environment. You take for granted this earth and that these vital resources are finite while other forms of energy are nearly infinite.
The only complacency I see here is yours, in your rather amazing ignorance of the facts and lack of understanding of the physical principles you spout off so much here and the words of others that you recite and badly distort in your "paraphrasing". The fact is that the Manhattan Project staff recognized the energy generating potential of fission reactions well before they finished developing a bomb and indeed were operating power producing reactors at the Hanford site two years before the bomb was ready - that's how they produced the plutonium. Very soon after WWII we were avidly using this technology to "solve our energy crisis. Indeed for the past 40 years we have produced about 20% of our electrical power in nuclear reactors.
As for the rest, you merely amplify the reader's impression of the superficiality of your "knowledge" . Both Germany and Denmark have recently cut back on their government spending to subsidize wind power production. The reason ? It is beginning to dawn on them that government subsidies have the opposite of the intended effect on technological advancement : they tend to inhibit profit-motivated investment in risky technological improvements that might reduce the very high costs of these technologies. The result in Europe is that there have been none of the promised technical advances and no cost reductions, and they don't have enough money to go much beyond around 15% of their power consunption in it.
I believe you are the last person I have encountered who should be advocating technological development. You apparently don't understand high school physics, and, worse, you don't seem at all aware of your own limitations in this area. Not recognizing and acting on what you don't know is a good way to remain ignorant.
The Malthusian ideas you are spouting off were discredited many years ago.
