5 ms·

The success of solar (and the end of coal) is really a story of the success of natural gas. Gas turbine capacity was so cheap to deploy that most of what's dep

by kokey 8y ago

The success of solar (and the end of coal) is really a story of the success of natural gas. Gas turbine capacity was so cheap to deploy that most of what's deployed in the past is enough to cover demand, in other words there are very little 'new' gas generators coming online because they're not needed. Solar capacity is much slower to deploy, hence why we will see 'new' capacity added over a long time to come. This is also a good thing, since with gas you still need to provide it was gas and expand the sources of gas and without carbon capture of gas generation it still has co2 emissions. However, gas allowed a massive short term reduction in co2 emissions and displaced coal and will for a long time fill in where solar can't, until we find a way to store energy from coal and that way might actually be synthesised gas.

api 8y ago
Gas can also be produced from biological and even synthetic processes. There's been a great deal of research in producing CH4 from CO2 and H2O using surplus electric power from wind, solar, and off-peak nuclear. That means someday all our gas turbines could double as battery discharge machines for a giant chemical battery and the existing gas transport and storage infrastructure could store and transport renewable energy. That's pretty nice from a recovery of sunk cost perspective. Coal and oil can pretty much only be economically obtained from fossil sources.
- ben_w 8y ago
  > Coal and oil can pretty much only be economically obtained from fossil sources. Given that vegetable oil can be used in a Diesel engine after being used for deep fat frying fish and chips, and given we currently over-produce food to the point that obesity is one of our largest health issues, I’m going to have to [citation needed]-you on that.
  - AshleyGrant 8y ago
    A gas turbine and a diesel engine are two completely different things. The only thing they share is that they are internal combustion engines. A gas turbine is basically a jet engine.
    - ben_w 8y ago
      I’m not suggesting otherwise. I’m saying that it looks a lot like oil can be produced economically from non-fossil sources.
      - rileyphone 8y ago
        There's still a lot of excess energy wasted in farming for something like this that you end up with less energy in the oil than was used to make it. See the case of ethanol, which completely failed as a sustainable product and was only propped up by subsidies.
  - beat 8y ago
    https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/2012/05/diesel-vs-biodiesel-vs-vegetable-oil/index.htm https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/2012/05/diesel-vs-biodie... 2012, but I don't think the economics have changed significantly. At this point, biodiesel is significantly more expensive than fossil diesel. This would be even more strongly true for synthetic diesel, which is probably economically unviable at any substantial scale.
  - thinkcontext 8y ago
    World yearly vegetable oil production is approximately 200 million metric tons [0], while crude oil is approximately 250 billion metric tons [1][2]. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/263978/global-vegetable-oil-production-since-2000-2001/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/263978/global-vegetable-... [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/265203/global-oil-production-since-in-barrels-per-day/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/265203/global-oil-produc... [2] http://www.opec.org/library/Annual%20Statistical%20Bulletin/interactive/current/FileZ/cfpage.htm http://www.opec.org/library/Annual%20Statistical%20Bulletin/...
    - ben_w 8y ago
      Thanks, that’s a good answer :)
    - philipkglass 8y ago
      [1] says 92.2 million barrels of oil produced per day. [2] says 7.33 barrels / metric ton. That would put annual crude oil production at roughly ((92.2 * 10 ^ 6) / 7.33) * 365 = 4,591,132,332 (4.59 billion) metric tons. The implied answer "crude oil production dwarfs vegetable oil production" is still valid even after correcting the crude oil numbers, of course.
      - thinkcontext 8y ago
        Ack, I multiplied instead of divided. Thanks for the catch.
- nickik 8y ago
  While I like the idea of synthetic fuels. I think combining advanced nuclear power (producing both electricity energy and incredibly good thermal energy) with synthetic fuel (methanol) plants would be far better. The fact is that the amount of solar and wind you would have to install to cover all intermittent AND large parts of the fuel sector is mostly unrealistic. There is absolutely no scenario the cost of synthetic fuel in large quantities could beat extracted carbon based fuels.
  - nl 8y ago
    Nuclear power can't compete at these prices, even with the new advanced plants. One day hopefully we'll get fusion, but until then nuclear is dead.
    - nickik 8y ago
      The difference in terms of fusion and fission is not that large. In fact I would argue that any likely fussion plant would have the exact same capx problem that fission now has. If we can't get fission to work, fusion will not help us. Compared to carbon based fuel fission is 10^-12 more dense, while fusion is 10^-15. While that is a large change I don't think it matters when competing with wind. > even with the new advanced plants I disagree. Once we mass produce nuclear plants the price would be radically reduced, just like in any other mass produced object. The problem at the moment is nuclear is almost to dense and long running. Its hard getting the scale you need to do that. Specially if every single place you want to put a reactor you get sued 200x by Greenpeace and everybody else. Compare a nuclear reactor to a rocket engine. SpaceX produces rocket engines for incredibly cheap amounts and he produces 100s a year. A nuclear reactor does not need all that different materials or attention to detail. The problem with nuclear is the development cost and the regulatory hurdle. If you clear that then you have to find costumers enough to have mass production. That is why it has not happened and unlikely to on a large scale. However if nuclear reactors were produced like solar panels and you had global markets, nuclear would trounce solar in terms of price.
      - yazr 8y ago
- intrasight 8y ago
  See https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05357-w https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05357-w and https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2018/06/09/extracting-carbon-dioxide-from-the-air-is-possible.-but-at-what-cost https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2018/06/09/... "Though that sounds thermodynamically bonkers, such fuel would, from a legal point of view, count as “zero carbon” because making and then using it involves no net release of CO2 into the atmosphere."
  - api 8y ago
    It's a way of storing energy, not generating it.
rbanffy 8y ago
As for capturing CO2, has anyone tried to use it in greenhouses or vertical farms? Some waste heat and abundant CO2 would do wonders for plant growth in colder regions and abundant CO2 would still make plants happy in warmer climates. Would be complicated with coal (nobody wants radioactive lettuce unless you can enrich it to commercial grade) but I assume gas is much cleaner.
- Brakenshire 8y ago
  Yes, they do this with greenhouses in the UK. The greenhouse complex has a small gas powerplant, electricity is sold to the grid, waste heat and waste CO2 are used to increase yields.

by kokey 8y ago

api 8y ago

Gas can also be produced from biological and even synthetic processes. There's been a great deal of research in producing CH4 from CO2 and H2O using surplus electric power from wind, solar, and off-peak nuclear. That means someday all our gas turbines could double as battery discharge machines for a giant chemical battery and the existing gas transport and storage infrastructure could store and transport renewable energy. That's pretty nice from a recovery of sunk cost perspective. Coal and oil can pretty much only be economically obtained from fossil sources.

ben_w 8y ago
> Coal and oil can pretty much only be economically obtained from fossil sources. Given that vegetable oil can be used in a Diesel engine after being used for deep fat frying fish and chips, and given we currently over-produce food to the point that obesity is one of our largest health issues, I’m going to have to [citation needed]-you on that.
- AshleyGrant 8y ago
  A gas turbine and a diesel engine are two completely different things. The only thing they share is that they are internal combustion engines. A gas turbine is basically a jet engine.
  - ben_w 8y ago
    I’m not suggesting otherwise. I’m saying that it looks a lot like oil can be produced economically from non-fossil sources.
    - rileyphone 8y ago
      There's still a lot of excess energy wasted in farming for something like this that you end up with less energy in the oil than was used to make it. See the case of ethanol, which completely failed as a sustainable product and was only propped up by subsidies.
- beat 8y ago
  https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/2012/05/diesel-vs-biodiesel-vs-vegetable-oil/index.htm https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/2012/05/diesel-vs-biodie... 2012, but I don't think the economics have changed significantly. At this point, biodiesel is significantly more expensive than fossil diesel. This would be even more strongly true for synthetic diesel, which is probably economically unviable at any substantial scale.
- thinkcontext 8y ago
  World yearly vegetable oil production is approximately 200 million metric tons [0], while crude oil is approximately 250 billion metric tons [1][2]. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/263978/global-vegetable-oil-production-since-2000-2001/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/263978/global-vegetable-... [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/265203/global-oil-production-since-in-barrels-per-day/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/265203/global-oil-produc... [2] http://www.opec.org/library/Annual%20Statistical%20Bulletin/interactive/current/FileZ/cfpage.htm http://www.opec.org/library/Annual%20Statistical%20Bulletin/...
  - ben_w 8y ago
    Thanks, that’s a good answer :)
  - philipkglass 8y ago
    [1] says 92.2 million barrels of oil produced per day. [2] says 7.33 barrels / metric ton. That would put annual crude oil production at roughly ((92.2 * 10 ^ 6) / 7.33) * 365 = 4,591,132,332 (4.59 billion) metric tons. The implied answer "crude oil production dwarfs vegetable oil production" is still valid even after correcting the crude oil numbers, of course.
    - thinkcontext 8y ago
      Ack, I multiplied instead of divided. Thanks for the catch.
nickik 8y ago
While I like the idea of synthetic fuels. I think combining advanced nuclear power (producing both electricity energy and incredibly good thermal energy) with synthetic fuel (methanol) plants would be far better. The fact is that the amount of solar and wind you would have to install to cover all intermittent AND large parts of the fuel sector is mostly unrealistic. There is absolutely no scenario the cost of synthetic fuel in large quantities could beat extracted carbon based fuels.
- nl 8y ago
  Nuclear power can't compete at these prices, even with the new advanced plants. One day hopefully we'll get fusion, but until then nuclear is dead.
  - nickik 8y ago
    The difference in terms of fusion and fission is not that large. In fact I would argue that any likely fussion plant would have the exact same capx problem that fission now has. If we can't get fission to work, fusion will not help us. Compared to carbon based fuel fission is 10^-12 more dense, while fusion is 10^-15. While that is a large change I don't think it matters when competing with wind. > even with the new advanced plants I disagree. Once we mass produce nuclear plants the price would be radically reduced, just like in any other mass produced object. The problem at the moment is nuclear is almost to dense and long running. Its hard getting the scale you need to do that. Specially if every single place you want to put a reactor you get sued 200x by Greenpeace and everybody else. Compare a nuclear reactor to a rocket engine. SpaceX produces rocket engines for incredibly cheap amounts and he produces 100s a year. A nuclear reactor does not need all that different materials or attention to detail. The problem with nuclear is the development cost and the regulatory hurdle. If you clear that then you have to find costumers enough to have mass production. That is why it has not happened and unlikely to on a large scale. However if nuclear reactors were produced like solar panels and you had global markets, nuclear would trounce solar in terms of price.
    - yazr 8y ago
intrasight 8y ago
See https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05357-w https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05357-w and https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2018/06/09/extracting-carbon-dioxide-from-the-air-is-possible.-but-at-what-cost https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2018/06/09/... "Though that sounds thermodynamically bonkers, such fuel would, from a legal point of view, count as “zero carbon” because making and then using it involves no net release of CO2 into the atmosphere."
- api 8y ago
  It's a way of storing energy, not generating it.

rbanffy 8y ago

As for capturing CO2, has anyone tried to use it in greenhouses or vertical farms? Some waste heat and abundant CO2 would do wonders for plant growth in colder regions and abundant CO2 would still make plants happy in warmer climates. Would be complicated with coal (nobody wants radioactive lettuce unless you can enrich it to commercial grade) but I assume gas is much cleaner.

Brakenshire 8y ago
Yes, they do this with greenhouses in the UK. The greenhouse complex has a small gas powerplant, electricity is sold to the grid, waste heat and waste CO2 are used to increase yields.