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There is the other angle to global warming beyond CO2, that heat engines produce heat itself which directly heats the Earth. I hadn’t thought of that angle unt

There is the other angle to global warming beyond CO2, that heat engines produce heat itself which directly heats the Earth. I hadn’t thought of that angle until I read Gerald K. O’Neil’s book 2081 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2081:_A_Hopeful_View_of_the_Human_Future https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2081:_A_Hopeful_View_of_the_Hu... The upshot being at a certain point it would be wise move heavy industry into space. Of course rocket fuel production, rocket launches, and material orbital de-acceleration down to Earth would be issues. My point being that Nuclear power will at some point have its own issues. Edit: GOK’s book in question being 2081, not 2086 (confused with Japanese Anime ‘Thunderbirds 2086’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbirds_2086 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbirds_2086)

Retric 5y ago
Solar power doesn’t need a heat engine and can therefore avoid heating the atmosphere. We would need to be using something like 20,000 times as much energy before moving off the earth becomes useful.
cookingrobot 5y ago
In general adding heat to the earth doesn’t really matter, because it’s constantly radiating to space. The sun shines adding a ton of heat all the time, and the same amount radiates out. Running some more power plants isn’t going to compete with the amount of energy we’re getting from the sun. The problem comes if you add an insulator (greenhouse gas) that raises the equilibrium temperature.