4 ms·

The Green Energy Fantasy

4 points by gibsonf1 18y ago

noonespecial 18y ago
This kind of thing is really starting to irk me; and I'm a libertarian (although, not a 'Randian' libertarian). Summary: Greentech sucks compared to the low low cost of wonderful coal. Brilliant deduction. I've got a calculator too. The implicit (and never stated) "solution" offered by articles like this is, "just keep on burning the coal and don't think to much about it." Its just complaining without offering up any ideas to fix things. The whole point of renewable energy is that its... (do I really have to say it?). So Keith thinks green energy will wreck the economy? Wait till there's no more coal. If the government is going to make-work, we might as well work on saving our asses.
- thaumaturgy 18y ago
  I'm actually a pretty big fan of Ayn Rand's works, so all that aside ... How does it take "tens of thousands of acres" to house 1,000 wind turbines? All the wind farms I've seen so far have a much higher turbine density than that -- on the order of 1 / acre at least. I also used to loathe wind farms as an example of a stupid resource sink, since I so often saw them sitting idle, and since I considered all of the energy required to manufacture and maintain the things versus their output. Turns out, I was wrong. I finally found some data -- at http://www.eoearth.org/article/Energy_return_on_investment_(EROI)_for_wind_energy http://www.eoearth.org/article/Energy_return_on_investment_(... -- and it turns out that wind kicks the pants off all the other energy generating systems we have, even nuclear, in terms of energy-return-on-investment. I think this article is factually wrong.
- dasil003 18y ago
  Yeah, the assumption is "coal is cheap and unlimited", and "all green energy sources are expensive and will never get cheaper". It's also pretty lax on the whole risk analysis of global warming. Even if there's only a 20% chance that we are causing global warming and can affect it, you still have to weigh that against the potential inability to grow enough food for the planet and suddenly spending significant money right now to try to fix the problem doesn't seem like such a stupid idea. It also completely ignores the question of energy independence.

4 points by gibsonf1 18y ago

This kind of thing is really starting to irk me; and I'm a libertarian (although, not a 'Randian' libertarian). Summary: Greentech sucks compared to the low low cost of wonderful coal. Brilliant deduction. I've got a calculator too. The implicit (and never stated) "solution" offered by articles like this is, "just keep on burning the coal and don't think to much about it." Its just complaining without offering up any ideas to fix things. The whole point of renewable energy is that its... (do I really have to say it?). So Keith thinks green energy will wreck the economy? Wait till there's no more coal. If the government is going to make-work, we might as well work on saving our asses.

thaumaturgy 18y ago
I'm actually a pretty big fan of Ayn Rand's works, so all that aside ... How does it take "tens of thousands of acres" to house 1,000 wind turbines? All the wind farms I've seen so far have a much higher turbine density than that -- on the order of 1 / acre at least. I also used to loathe wind farms as an example of a stupid resource sink, since I so often saw them sitting idle, and since I considered all of the energy required to manufacture and maintain the things versus their output. Turns out, I was wrong. I finally found some data -- at http://www.eoearth.org/article/Energy_return_on_investment_(EROI)_for_wind_energy http://www.eoearth.org/article/Energy_return_on_investment_(... -- and it turns out that wind kicks the pants off all the other energy generating systems we have, even nuclear, in terms of energy-return-on-investment. I think this article is factually wrong.
dasil003 18y ago
Yeah, the assumption is "coal is cheap and unlimited", and "all green energy sources are expensive and will never get cheaper". It's also pretty lax on the whole risk analysis of global warming. Even if there's only a 20% chance that we are causing global warming and can affect it, you still have to weigh that against the potential inability to grow enough food for the planet and suddenly spending significant money right now to try to fix the problem doesn't seem like such a stupid idea. It also completely ignores the question of energy independence.