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practically free energy We've heard that before, as far back as 1954: "too cheap to meter". The problem is, even if the incremental generation of electricity i
by PhantomGremlin 11y ago
practically free energy
We've heard that before, as far back as 1954: "too cheap to meter". The problem is, even if the incremental generation of electricity is practically free, there are still large costs in building the windmills and solar panels. And there are large distribution costs as well.
In addition, the more cheap energy there is, the more inefficiently people will use it. Why bother with things like Energy Star and LEED? Just build inefficient power supplies and poorly insulated buildings. After all, it is "practically free" to heat them and cool them.
Post scarcity energy is a non-starter. Consumption will always increase as necessary. Here's an even more crazy example: just how much bitcoin (or similar) mining would there be if energy were cheap? It's already a disgusting misuse of resources, it would be a lot worse!
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Too_cheap_to_meter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Too_cheap_to_meter
- toomuchtodo 11y agoYou're free to your pessimism :) I've got another 50 years of life to be hopeful. Enough sunlight falls on the Earth in 5 minutes to power the world for a year. That's effectively limitless.
- SideburnsOfDoom 11y ago> Enough sunlight falls on the Earth in 5 minutes to power the world for a year. At current levels, and that's the point of the parent comment. > That's effectively limitless. It's 0.0000095 or so. Impressive but not limitless. An earth in which all the infalling sunlight was used for power would be a dark place, which would be bad for people and for agriculture. And oxygen production. So actually lot less than that.