What is the REAL solution for energy?

[Wild Cobra]

With what we know works, I say we need more nuclear power plants built. We now have proven safe designs that could never be a "three mile island" or "Chernobal" disaster.

Yes, waste is a concern. However, there are safe ways to store it.

I really though by now we would see some breakthroughs in cold fusion. Looks like that may not be any more viable than burning sal er is.

It looks like solar panels will come down in price soon enough to make them viable for homeowner use. This will still be a high initial cost, but once there is a 10 year or less payoff, I think we can see such markets thrive for selling them. They will probably not make a home energy self sufficient without devoting more than a simple change in roof looks, but they can dramatically reduce the power a family uses off the grid.

[sabar]

Nuclear fusion is the end-all solution to power. No argument. There is no waste, the fuel is everywhere, and it produces obscene amounts of energy.

The only problem is that we have no way to reproduce the extreme pressures and temperatures that power stars except in hydrogen bombs, in which the reaction is started by a fission bomb. Obviously this isn't an ideal way to get fusion power.

Until we make those advances, civilization will most likely use up all their oil and natural gas and be forced into nuclear fission. Solar/wind/geothermal will supplement it.

I dislike wind. The generators are huge, expensive, ugly, noisy, kill birds, and inefficient. It takes huge tracts of land of wind generators to do what one nuclear reactor can do.

It'll be very interesting to see if the Australians build their massive solar updraft tower.

Anyways, if people would stop wimping out and go all-out on nuclear power we wouldn't need anything from the middle east. A massive percentage of France's energy is nuclear. How many disasters have they had? Zero. I'll take a one in a million chance of a meltdown near where I live over a 100% chance of breathing in soot and carcinogens from coal plants every time I step outside.

I bet more people die from lung cancer in a year from air pollution than from nuclear meltdowns.

[fyatuk]

With what we know works, I say we need more nuclear power plants built. We now have proven safe designs that could never be a "three mile island" or "Chernobal" disaster.

Yes, waste is a concern. However, there are safe ways to store it.

I really though by now we would see some breakthroughs in cold fusion. Looks like that may not be any more viable than burning sal er is.

It looks like solar panels will come down in price soon enough to make them viable for homeowner use. This will still be a high initial cost, but once there is a 10 year or less payoff, I think we can see such markets thrive for selling them. They will probably not make a home energy self sufficient without devoting more than a simple change in roof looks, but they can dramatically reduce the power a family uses off the grid.

Last year or the year before there was a "breakthrough" in fusion. They managed to create a fusion reaction that sustained itself for like 4 times longer than any previous experiment, or something like that.

Solar panels are a good helper. They aren't usuable in many places, but can drastically reduce grid consumption where they can be used. Some testing has shown that in some places it's even possible for a house to occassionally have excess production that can be stored in batteries or sent onto the grid.

[Wild Cobra]

Some testing has shown that in some places it's even possible for a house to occassionally have excess production that can be stored in batteries or sent onto the grid.

I know this is true. However, with how people normally consume energy, that is the exception. Such houses are more likely to be in desert climates that see little clouds. Other differences could be panels that stand out, and would be considered ugly rather than a pleasing aesthetic change to a home design. Then there is insulation quality and temperature averages.

Where I live, it gets hot in the summer and cold in the winter. I live just above the 45th parallel, so the winter sun is rather weak. Places like mine, it's not practical. Places like New Mexico, Arizona, and places it Texas, the payoff would be better as there are less clouds, and they are lower in la ude. A strong sun in the summer provides good energy for cooling, and it doesn't get as cold in the winter, and the sun is still stronger and lasts more hours than the sun we get in Oregon.

Yes. It's the same sun, but the angle makes a big difference.

[sabar]

Actually in Texas we get massive cloud cover for most of winter. I'd say 3/4ths of the past 60 days have been total or partly cloudy in San Antonio. Now its warming up and back to clear skies.

Anyways, government mandates need to learn their bounds. There are good regulations and bad ones. Good ones are mandates on dumping trash into our drinking water. Bad ones are massive obstacles in nuclear energy. I don't think that the government can solve this, this is a human obstacle. As either oil prices rise or we run out of fuel to burn, energy corporations should get incentive to invest in nuclear/solar power as they become more cost effective than oil.

Here's a good question. Is it possible for government regulations to make nuclear cheaper than coal/oil? I don't think so without resorting to flat out bans, massive subsidies, or price-fixing. I just think it's something that has to solve itself. The invisible hand of the free market should draw energy corporations into alternatives to oil as prices rise and supply falls.

Fusion is really the holy grail.
We just have to be patient to be able to sustain reactions. Experiments have generated 15mW for less than a second,obviously, totally useless so far. A new research plant was opened a few years ago in the states, hopefully that sees some advances.

[Holt's Cat]

Actually in Texas we get massive cloud cover for most of winter. I'd say 3/4ths of the past 60 days have been total or partly cloudy in San Antonio. Now its warming up and back to clear skies.

Anyways, government mandates need to learn their bounds. There are good regulations and bad ones. Good ones are mandates on dumping trash into our drinking water.

Right, protecting property rights, especially public property.

Bad ones are massive obstacles in nuclear energy. I don't think that the government can solve this, this is a human obstacle. As either oil prices rise or we run out of fuel to burn, energy corporations should get incentive to invest in nuclear/solar power as they become more cost effective than oil.

Here's a good question. Is it possible for government regulations to make nuclear cheaper than coal/oil? I don't think so without resorting to flat out bans, massive subsidies, or price-fixing. I just think it's something that has to solve itself. The invisible hand of the free market should draw energy corporations into alternatives to oil as prices rise and supply falls.

Fusion is really the holy grail.
We just have to be patient to be able to sustain reactions. Experiments have generated 15mW for less than a second,obviously, totally useless so far. A new research plant was opened a few years ago in the states, hopefully that sees some advances.

The way government can assist is to not provide benefits to one particular industry. If you grandfather in a coal-fired power plant from certain clean air regulations so a utility doesn't have to cover the true cost of its production then that's a noncompe ive benefit and one that encourages greater investment in 'old' unclean technologies.

I agree with you, if the government would create an open playing field and get out of the way of the market we could see cleaner power generation coming online earlier.

[fyatuk]

Here's a good question. Is it possible for government regulations to make nuclear cheaper than coal/oil? I don't think so without resorting to flat out bans, massive subsidies, or price-fixing. I just think it's something that has to solve itself. The invisible hand of the free market should draw energy corporations into alternatives to oil as prices rise and supply falls.

Nuclear is cheaper than oil/coal in the long run. It's the plant construction cost that kills it. Unless you want to go from highly regulating and restricting construction of nuclear plants to subsidizing them, it won't really happen until coal prices rise significantly, which is highly unlikely any time soon, or the plants get cheaper to build, which won't happen until people start building some.

[boutons_]

Coal needs to be killed, and the lie of "clean coal" killed along with it.

(If the price and efficient of building a "clean coal" generation plant were totally factored in, it wouldn't be so different from the cost of building a nuclear station, but would still have the disastrous impact, see Alberta and W. Virginia surface mining and water destroyed.)

Electrical power must come from nuclear, with assists from wind and solar. The energy market needs total federal re-regulation to avoid Enrons, etc. The private equity people are ing up the energy market, eg, the electricity prices in Houston. Electricty is a "human right" like health care so for-profit elecricity and management must stop.

Transport fuel will continue to be from oil but big reduction in demand with electric hybrids, compressed air, whatever.

corn-ethanol is a $50B subsidy bad joke, but what do you expect from dubya other than reverse-Midas disasters.

[smeagol]

Coal needs to be killed, and the lie of "clean coal" killed along with it.

(If the price and efficient of building a "clean coal" generation plant were totally factored in, it wouldn't be so different from the cost of building a nuclear station, but would still have the disastrous impact, see Alberta and W. Virginia surface mining and water destroyed.)

Electrical power must come from nuclear, with assists from wind and solar. The energy market needs total federal re-regulation to avoid Enrons, etc. The private equity people are ing up the energy market, eg, the electricity prices in Houston. Electricty is a "human right" like health care so for-profit elecricity and management must stop.

Transport fuel will continue to be from oil but big reduction in demand with electric hybrids, compressed air, whatever.

corn-ethanol is a $50B subsidy bad joke, but what do you expect from dubya other than reverse-Midas disasters.

Not sure who's political views scare me more: your's, or whottt's

[Wild Cobra]

Actually in Texas we get massive cloud cover for most of winter. I'd say 3/4ths of the past 60 days have been total or partly cloudy in San Antonio. Now its warming up and back to clear skies.

I know. Notice I said "parts of Texas?"

Ooops... I didn't, but that's what I meant. I said "places it Texas" which should have been "some places in Texas."

Anyways, government mandates need to learn their bounds. There are good regulations and bad ones. Good ones are mandates on dumping trash into our drinking water. Bad ones are massive obstacles in nuclear energy. I don't think that the government can solve this, this is a human obstacle. As either oil prices rise or we run out of fuel to burn, energy corporations should get incentive to invest in nuclear/solar power as they become more cost effective than oil.

The only incentive they need is for the regulations being lifted or lessened that hamper their abilities to build them.

Here's a good question. Is it possible for government regulations to make nuclear cheaper than coal/oil? I don't think so without resorting to flat out bans, massive subsidies, or price-fixing. I just think it's something that has to solve itself. The invisible hand of the free market should draw energy corporations into alternatives to oil as prices rise and supply falls.

Clean burning coal is not cheap. Clean nuclear power is in the long haul. As for solar... I don't see it viable for any large scale. I could be wrong, but where ever you place a solar panel, you shade the landscape. I see them best used only on existing building, or maybe in the desert. Large blocks of shade in these regions would change the ecosystem of a desert. Probably for the best, but some whacko environmentalist I'm sure would say otherwise.

Fusion is really the holy grail.
We just have to be patient to be able to sustain reactions. Experiments have generated 15mW for less than a second,obviously, totally useless so far. A new research plant was opened a few years ago in the states, hopefully that sees some advances.

I've heard of better results from that from a power perspective, but it was in generated heat rather than electricity. I didn't hear of any attempt to generate power from this experiment. It would be great for efficient heating. You put power in for the fusion reaction, and it in turn generates more heat than the power put in.