7 ms·

And methane has the added benefit of being able to be used in unchanged home heating systems, at least in large parts of Germany and probably of Europe. And the

And methane has the added benefit of being able to be used in unchanged home heating systems, at least in large parts of Germany and probably of Europe. And there is an existing distribution network in the form of pipelines to most houses. And there are large storage facilities, like the strategic reserves for natural gas. If you factor in the saved CO2 due to the fact that you don't have to change most home heating systems. And that you can easily retrofit lots of gasoline engines in already existing cars. Then I don't get why Germany started to support EV at all.

manfredo 6y ago
The problem is that synthetic methane requires a source of carbon. Extracting the fraction of a percent concentration of carbon in the atmosphere is not feasible. Hydrogen is one of the inputs for the sabatier process, so if the lower energy density by unit of volume isn't a concern it makes more sense to just use the hydrogen directly. The reality, though, is that none of the proposed energy storage solutions are easier than just building nuclear power plants. France already generates most of it's electricity from nuclear power. Belgium recently surpassed 50% nuclear power generation. It's more feasible to just avoid the unsolved energy storage problem altogether.
- epistasis 6y ago
  Some startups are working in direct air capture of CO2. I've linked one in another comment here, Carbon Engineering: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_Engineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_Engineering They think that at scale, a ton of CO2 will cost $100 and take 5-6GJ if energy. Totally agreed that it is far cheaper to just never emit in the first place. But as far as building new nuclear, France has not been able to succeed at this economically, and similarly the UK's plans at building new nuclear are coming apart completely. And even if we are able to decarbonize, with whatever technology, be it nuclear or not, we will still need to get to negative CO2 emissions in the coming decade. While some of that will take the form of CO2 sequestration in the biosphere, such sequestration is only temporary, and we will eventually want geologic sequestration. So we must solve the capture problem by some means. Perhaps it will be with something like Carbon Engineering's process, or maybe something else.
  - Manfredo_1 6y ago
    Startups are also working on nuclear fusion. Carbon capture represents a potential solution, but a solution that doesn't currently exist. Sure if that potential is realized, it'd be great. But if we want to decarbonize the economy in the next several decades, we need solution that currently exist not solutions which may exist.
    - epistasis 6y ago
      Unlike SMR fission and fusion startups, direct air capture is being used in practice, and has captured CO2. They will be able to start iterating right now. The technology is far more real, understood, and far more developed than SME fission, much less fusion. I would say that direct air capture of CO2 is about 2x as likely to be economically efficient and a significant part of the economy than SMR fission. And fusion is only at pie-in-the-sky stage, the level of materials development that would need to happen is practically unimaginable. We have no idea that it would ever be cheaper than fission, for example.
      - manfredo 6y ago
        Right, and while this technology is set to start iterating, fission has been iterating for more than half a century. France generates the majority of it's power from fission since the 1980s, recently joined in this achievement by Belgium. If this start-up's promises come to fruition then that's a new option. But it's still a question of if.
- pfdietz 6y ago
  > The reality, though, is that none of the proposed energy storage solutions are easier than just building nuclear power plants. This doesn't appear to be the case, or at least doesn't appear to be the case for much longer, when renewables are multiple times cheaper than nuclear.
  - Manfredo_1 6y ago
    Renewables are cheap when they make up a small percentage of total power generation. Solar is cheap when it's only providing supplemental power during the day, same with wind. Using them as a primary source of energy requires staggering amounts of storage, and proposals to fulfill these demands exist either on paper or in the form of prototypes 4-5 orders of magnitude smaller than what is required. I've repeatedly [1] [2] addressed the shortcomings of your assumption that hydrogen will deliver low cost storage, in particular electrolysis and compression remains only ~30-40% efficient, underground storage is not widespread, and existing infrastructure to transport and storage methane cannot be used for hydrogen. At this point, claiming renewables + storage is a solution to decarbonizing the economy is analogous to saying fusion is a solution. Yes, it's possible and we are familiar with the physics of how to make it work. And if it works, then yes it's a good solution. But it doesn't currently work, and it's unknown whether or not it will work in the foreseeable future. Technology that's 10-20 years away tends to stay 10-20 years a way for much loner than 10-20 years. 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23735379 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23735379 2. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24619197 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24619197
    - pfdietz 6y ago
      Renewables have lower LCoE. Intermittency adds a cost, but the add is finite, and if the LCoE difference is large enough they beat nuclear. You will notice hardly anyone is building nuclear power plants. They can see the writing on the wall. As renewables and storage technologies continue to get cheaper, nuclear will be pushed aside. Yes, you've repeatedly claimed I'm wrong. You're the one who is wrong. Your objections are spurious, as I've repeatedly explained.

manfredo 6y ago

The problem is that synthetic methane requires a source of carbon. Extracting the fraction of a percent concentration of carbon in the atmosphere is not feasible. Hydrogen is one of the inputs for the sabatier process, so if the lower energy density by unit of volume isn't a concern it makes more sense to just use the hydrogen directly. The reality, though, is that none of the proposed energy storage solutions are easier than just building nuclear power plants. France already generates most of it's electricity from nuclear power. Belgium recently surpassed 50% nuclear power generation. It's more feasible to just avoid the unsolved energy storage problem altogether.

epistasis 6y ago
Some startups are working in direct air capture of CO2. I've linked one in another comment here, Carbon Engineering: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_Engineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_Engineering They think that at scale, a ton of CO2 will cost $100 and take 5-6GJ if energy. Totally agreed that it is far cheaper to just never emit in the first place. But as far as building new nuclear, France has not been able to succeed at this economically, and similarly the UK's plans at building new nuclear are coming apart completely. And even if we are able to decarbonize, with whatever technology, be it nuclear or not, we will still need to get to negative CO2 emissions in the coming decade. While some of that will take the form of CO2 sequestration in the biosphere, such sequestration is only temporary, and we will eventually want geologic sequestration. So we must solve the capture problem by some means. Perhaps it will be with something like Carbon Engineering's process, or maybe something else.
- Manfredo_1 6y ago
  Startups are also working on nuclear fusion. Carbon capture represents a potential solution, but a solution that doesn't currently exist. Sure if that potential is realized, it'd be great. But if we want to decarbonize the economy in the next several decades, we need solution that currently exist not solutions which may exist.
  - epistasis 6y ago
    Unlike SMR fission and fusion startups, direct air capture is being used in practice, and has captured CO2. They will be able to start iterating right now. The technology is far more real, understood, and far more developed than SME fission, much less fusion. I would say that direct air capture of CO2 is about 2x as likely to be economically efficient and a significant part of the economy than SMR fission. And fusion is only at pie-in-the-sky stage, the level of materials development that would need to happen is practically unimaginable. We have no idea that it would ever be cheaper than fission, for example.
    - manfredo 6y ago
      Right, and while this technology is set to start iterating, fission has been iterating for more than half a century. France generates the majority of it's power from fission since the 1980s, recently joined in this achievement by Belgium. If this start-up's promises come to fruition then that's a new option. But it's still a question of if.
pfdietz 6y ago
> The reality, though, is that none of the proposed energy storage solutions are easier than just building nuclear power plants. This doesn't appear to be the case, or at least doesn't appear to be the case for much longer, when renewables are multiple times cheaper than nuclear.
- Manfredo_1 6y ago
  Renewables are cheap when they make up a small percentage of total power generation. Solar is cheap when it's only providing supplemental power during the day, same with wind. Using them as a primary source of energy requires staggering amounts of storage, and proposals to fulfill these demands exist either on paper or in the form of prototypes 4-5 orders of magnitude smaller than what is required. I've repeatedly [1] [2] addressed the shortcomings of your assumption that hydrogen will deliver low cost storage, in particular electrolysis and compression remains only ~30-40% efficient, underground storage is not widespread, and existing infrastructure to transport and storage methane cannot be used for hydrogen. At this point, claiming renewables + storage is a solution to decarbonizing the economy is analogous to saying fusion is a solution. Yes, it's possible and we are familiar with the physics of how to make it work. And if it works, then yes it's a good solution. But it doesn't currently work, and it's unknown whether or not it will work in the foreseeable future. Technology that's 10-20 years away tends to stay 10-20 years a way for much loner than 10-20 years. 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23735379 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23735379 2. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24619197 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24619197
  - pfdietz 6y ago
    Renewables have lower LCoE. Intermittency adds a cost, but the add is finite, and if the LCoE difference is large enough they beat nuclear. You will notice hardly anyone is building nuclear power plants. They can see the writing on the wall. As renewables and storage technologies continue to get cheaper, nuclear will be pushed aside. Yes, you've repeatedly claimed I'm wrong. You're the one who is wrong. Your objections are spurious, as I've repeatedly explained.