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I recently read, and recommend a book titled "Here Comes the Sun" by Bill McKibben. There's a passage where a calculation is made of the amount of minerals th
by yeureka 9mo ago
I recently read, and recommend a book titled "Here Comes the Sun" by Bill McKibben.
There's a passage where a calculation is made of the amount of minerals that have to be mined in order to build renewable energy to cover all current energy needs.
This quantity is huge. However it is equivalent in mass to the amount of fossil fuels that are extracted every year.
The major difference is that the equipment for renewable energy will last decades whereas the fossil fuels are burned and need to be dug up constantly, for ever.
- thatsit 9mo agoSolar panels etc. will last decades and can and will be recycled afterwards. Further, most materials needed for renewable energy infrastructure (iron, lithium) are highly abundant on earth. Most of the suppliers work to use cheaper (=more abundant) materials in their products, replacing lithium with sodium in batteries and silver with copper in solar panels. Wind turbine blades are produced now using re-solvable resins.
- pfdietz 9mo agoAnd iron (steel) is the most recyclable material we have.
- aaronmoodie 9mo agoNot only are older solar panels recyclable, but efficiency gains in panel construction mean that multiple newer panels can be created with the resources from older panels.
- Saline9515 9mo agoWind turbines are not recyclable[1]. Besides, the foundations use a massive amount of concrete (nowadays often extracted from the seabed, with all the problematic ecological consequences involved), that stays forever in the ground. [1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2352710225027263 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S23527...
- chrisb 9mo agoThe linked article is misrepresented. Two points regarding blade recycling techniques taken straight from the top of the article: - Cement co-processing and chemical dissolution are primary viable methods, yielding $27.57/ton and $199.71/ton returns respectively. - Chemical recycling achieves top circularity (PCI=0.7) and notable carbon reduction (−0.475 t CO₂/ton). Chemical recycling is not yet ready for industrial use; cement co-processing is.
- pseudohadamard 9mo agoConcrete recycling is actually a pretty big deal. For most of building history here the standard material to put behind basement walls, retaining walls, and so on, for drainage was crushed scoria. Now it's crushed concrete. Some amount of effort but you're recycling existing stuff, and they recover the reinforcing steel as well.
- Saline9515 9mo agoCement co-processing is not exactly recycling as the original material (fiberglass) can't be reused for its initial purpose.
- gregbot 9mo agoWho cares? Those blades and that concrete are totally inert and just sit in the ground after their useful life. The ground already has lots of rocks in it.
- Saline9515 9mo agoIt defeats the "renewable" designation, since it is quickly consumed and thrown away. Compare this with hydropower, where a dam can last centuries.
- nasmorn 9mo agoBut if you repower the wind mill, the foundation can serve for the next turbine
- addhochohoc 9mo agoBut it creates enough cash to redirect all ire away to weakly lobbying industries, like aggrarian-sector or other weakly lobbied sectors like nuclear.
- jbl0ndie 9mo agoOnly there is no forever when you're talking about a finite resource, like fossil fuels.
- specialist 9mo agoThey're talking about our nascent circular economy. Recycling now recovers >95% of raw minerals (and will continue to improve). The learning curves for battery and solar tech will more than make up the for the shortfall. Meaning at some point in the near future (2050 IIRC), humanity will have mined all the lithium it'll ever need. Also, in the same time frame, it'll be economical to mine our garbage dumps. Further reducing the need to extract raw materials.
- x0b4dc0d3 9mo agoSource? These are big claims and the collective shouldn’t rely on your recall as fact.
- ta20240528 9mo ago"Recycling now recovers >95% of raw minerals" Not of plastic - recycling rates are decreasing. This is largely due to the excess ethane begin produced as a by-product of US fracking. The ethane is converted to ethylene, then to polyethylene as a cost below that of collecting, cleaning, and processing used plastic.
- specialist 9mo agoTrue. The situation for both off-gassing and plastic recycling is rather bleak. Sorry for being vague; I was only referring to economically valuable minerals used in electric batteries. Aqua Metals has previously said they'll be able to reuse battery quality graphite (from batteries) as well (vs releasing it as CO2). But my recent scan of their progress wasn't very encouraging. Learning more about Redwood Recycling stack is on my to do list.
- yndoendo 9mo agoOne point that gets very little coverage is that fossil fuels are a limited resource. Once they used they are gone. The materials for renewable energy are still in a usable form.
- kevin_thibedeau 9mo agoCO2 can be converted to methane. It just isn't profitable to do so yet. After the fossil fuels are depleted, it will be a viable niche for storable energy where renewables aren't practical.
- Qwertious 9mo agoOnce fossil fuels run out, most exclusively-fossil-fuel-based activities will simply cease to be economically feasible. That doesn't contradict your statement, of course. But in the long term the fossil fuel niches will start looking more like today's rocket-fuel niches.
- esafak 9mo agoWhy is this conversion desirable?
- kevin_thibedeau 9mo agoYou swap a plentiful greenhouse gas for another greenhouse gas that is burnable at no net environmental cost.
- mrguyorama 9mo agoMethane synthesized from excess renewable power can store that renewable power for years, handily fixing the whole "Sun don't shine every day" problem. It's durable energy storage and can be easily moved around like liquid fuels. It also would remove CO2 emissions from things like airplanes, which won't be able to be battery powered in the near future, and could renewably replace chemical feedstocks in lots of industrial processes. But this requires immense industrial capability, probably some serious innovation in absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere because that's basically an unsolved problem right now, and a massive oversupply of solar power which cannot happen under market systems because nobody builds infrastructure to sell power at below market rates. It might be a 50 year plan.