4 ms·

I think you need to reread the previous comments. The question is: do we have enough minerals to switch to a solar/wind plus batteries energy system as a speci

by evilos 4y ago

I think you need to reread the previous comments. The question is: do we have enough minerals to switch to a solar/wind plus batteries energy system as a species? There is a controversial report from a mining professor who says the answer is 'not even close'. https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/42_2021.pdf https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/42_2021.pdf

wizofaus 4y ago
Fortunately I don't believe we'll need to. From a previous glance of that report, scenario F is pretty close to what I'd imagined we'd likely aim for. It would've been a lot smoother and less costly if we'd started 40 years ago, but it's not shortage of minerals like lithium or cobalt that have been holding us up. If the "Big rare-earth-metals-mining" industry had anything like the clout of Big Oil/Gas/Coal, we'd probably be half way there by now.
- evilos 4y ago
  You might want to look at figure 26.10 of Scenario F. We still hit mineral constraints. The author says outright the report is not an attempt at simulating a realistic transition because it's asking first order questions: along the lines of "do we even have enough stuff to try this?". There's no attempt to ask if this is economical or logistically possible because it is not. The author is convinced that we're all about to be much poorer because the IV drip of cheap energy that the world has enjoyed for at least 50 years is about to be ripped out. Personally, I think what's most likely to happen is that we will fail to get the world's nations to stop using fossil fuels and we will suffer the environmental consequences of that. Plus all the consequences of the resource wars that will follow. It's a shame. I think our best chance to avoid this is to rush research on mass manufacturable gen 4 nuclear reactors. We need a factory that spits these things out so we can ship them to developing nations because otherwise, they build coal plants. I have high hopes for Thorcon. They plan to use shipyards to build annually up to 200 GW of modular shippable reactors.
Schroedingersat 4y ago
That report is a pathetic attempt at a hit piece from a coal shill. Cherry picking reports from 2014 that refer to technologies from 2008 and assuming an order of magnitude more batteries than anyone is seriously suggesting of an old version of a chemistry that is never going to be used for bulk storage isn't science. It's just pathetic. And dredging up this report in order to try to sell people on a solution that actually is resource constrained every time the subject comes up is even more pathetic.
- evilos 4y ago
  Ah good old ad hominem. Never fails to show up. It's true he worked in Australian mining (I assume coal). The guy has been working in industrial recycling and 'circular economy' since 2015 https://www.simonmichaux.com/current-work https://www.simonmichaux.com/current-work > And dredging up this report in order to try to sell people on a solution that actually is resource constrained every time the subject comes up is even more pathetic. We will literally never run out of fissile material.
  - Schroedingersat 4y ago
    An ad hominem is where you use someone's character as a faulty reason their argument is flawed. Pointing out someone's argument is flawed and is a standard part of the coal propaganda machine as a valid reason to question their motives is not ad hominem. The absolute most generous interpretation of the report you linked is that it was a mastubatory exercise by a completely naive person who thought he was the first person to think of problems that have been studied for decades and have detailed roadmaps for overcoming the real roadblocks (which are not even issues he considers). > We will literally never run out of fissile material. There are no commercially viable or even prototype closed loop breeding programs and there never have been. The current stock of economically accessible fissile material is around 40,000 tonnes and each GW of reactor needs 3-20 tonnes. There are no processes with a doubling time under 10 years because spent fuel needs time to cool, so rolling out your non-existent reactor in place of renewables rather than after one or two generations still requires mining all of it. Even in the scifi world where breeding is viable, we still need a 70-95% renewable transition to fill the 20-40 year gap.

by evilos 4y ago

wizofaus 4y ago

Fortunately I don't believe we'll need to. From a previous glance of that report, scenario F is pretty close to what I'd imagined we'd likely aim for. It would've been a lot smoother and less costly if we'd started 40 years ago, but it's not shortage of minerals like lithium or cobalt that have been holding us up. If the "Big rare-earth-metals-mining" industry had anything like the clout of Big Oil/Gas/Coal, we'd probably be half way there by now.

evilos 4y ago
You might want to look at figure 26.10 of Scenario F. We still hit mineral constraints. The author says outright the report is not an attempt at simulating a realistic transition because it's asking first order questions: along the lines of "do we even have enough stuff to try this?". There's no attempt to ask if this is economical or logistically possible because it is not. The author is convinced that we're all about to be much poorer because the IV drip of cheap energy that the world has enjoyed for at least 50 years is about to be ripped out. Personally, I think what's most likely to happen is that we will fail to get the world's nations to stop using fossil fuels and we will suffer the environmental consequences of that. Plus all the consequences of the resource wars that will follow. It's a shame. I think our best chance to avoid this is to rush research on mass manufacturable gen 4 nuclear reactors. We need a factory that spits these things out so we can ship them to developing nations because otherwise, they build coal plants. I have high hopes for Thorcon. They plan to use shipyards to build annually up to 200 GW of modular shippable reactors.

Schroedingersat 4y ago

That report is a pathetic attempt at a hit piece from a coal shill. Cherry picking reports from 2014 that refer to technologies from 2008 and assuming an order of magnitude more batteries than anyone is seriously suggesting of an old version of a chemistry that is never going to be used for bulk storage isn't science. It's just pathetic. And dredging up this report in order to try to sell people on a solution that actually is resource constrained every time the subject comes up is even more pathetic.

evilos 4y ago
Ah good old ad hominem. Never fails to show up. It's true he worked in Australian mining (I assume coal). The guy has been working in industrial recycling and 'circular economy' since 2015 https://www.simonmichaux.com/current-work https://www.simonmichaux.com/current-work > And dredging up this report in order to try to sell people on a solution that actually is resource constrained every time the subject comes up is even more pathetic. We will literally never run out of fissile material.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  An ad hominem is where you use someone's character as a faulty reason their argument is flawed. Pointing out someone's argument is flawed and is a standard part of the coal propaganda machine as a valid reason to question their motives is not ad hominem. The absolute most generous interpretation of the report you linked is that it was a mastubatory exercise by a completely naive person who thought he was the first person to think of problems that have been studied for decades and have detailed roadmaps for overcoming the real roadblocks (which are not even issues he considers). > We will literally never run out of fissile material. There are no commercially viable or even prototype closed loop breeding programs and there never have been. The current stock of economically accessible fissile material is around 40,000 tonnes and each GW of reactor needs 3-20 tonnes. There are no processes with a doubling time under 10 years because spent fuel needs time to cool, so rolling out your non-existent reactor in place of renewables rather than after one or two generations still requires mining all of it. Even in the scifi world where breeding is viable, we still need a 70-95% renewable transition to fill the 20-40 year gap.