4 ms·

The author is missing the point that technology R&D responds to oil prices. Strictly speaking, if oil becomes scarce and expensive, alternative energy develops

The author is missing the point that technology R&D responds to oil prices. Strictly speaking, if oil becomes scarce and expensive, alternative energy develops more rapidly. It's the cheap oil that creates developmental risks.

dredmorbius 12y ago
Yes, but there's only so much power in research -- humans can find and exploit existing entropic gradients. We cannot create them. And people have been looking at the exhaustion of fossil fuels since the late 18th century. Yes, 18th, not 19th, with the first questions arising over how long Britain's coal would last. In that time, the three big developments have been accessing petroleum (1859), commercial electricity generation (1870s), and nuclear fission (1935). Petroleum replaced one fossil fuel with another (albeit a vastly more useful one). Electricity allowed for energy generation and use to be decoupled by thousands of miles, if necessary (transmission losses for long-distance electricity are quite low). And nuclear fission offered one possible out, though it's been a highly problematic option. Wind and water power have been utilized by humans for centuries, if not longer. Solar power has progressed hugely in recent decades, but it's far more fundamentally limited than many people realize. Raw availability at Earth's surface is ~8,000x present human energy consumption. Factor in land area (30% of total), population and per-capita energy growth (roughly doubling energy demand even at a small fraction of present US energy use levels), total conversion efficiencies (you're left with about 1% of the available incident energy after PV conversion, capacity factor, spacing factors, and inverters), and we're down to a 20x surplus of solar energy as available capacity if you pave over the entire Earth's landmass. You start rapidly arriving at the conclusion that either we're 1) not going to see levels of resource consumption comparable to those of the advanced world, or 2) not for projected populations, or both. You can hypothesize alternatives, but most are assuming tremendous advances which have been exceptionally non-forthcoming.
- kazagistar 12y ago
  Nuclear being "problematic" is vastly overblown. That's why I think the answer to the title is a resounding no: we still have a lenthy nuclear buffer before a proper energetic collapse, so at the very least it is not imminent.
  - onnoonno 12y ago
    ^ This. There might be a very harsh wake-up to energy realities for the ignorant subset of the treehuggers, but nuclear can and hopefully will keep us going energy-wise. I am MUCH more scared of a nuclear war breaking out over diminishing oil resources than I am about peaceful nuclear energy. That would be mankind's biggest and worst irony. IMHO, it is bordering on insane to not consider peaceful nuclear energy as someone who is keen on saving the planet. Sure, conserving, saving, making everything more efficient is fine and laudable. But one still has to support the energy needs of some 7e9 people.
  - dredmorbius 12y ago
    I've discussed the specifics of why nuclear's problematic at more length here: https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/2awjj2/thoughts_on_nuclear_energy/ https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/2awjj2/thought... The issues are multiple, many are not technical in nature (which means that the solutions are also not technical in nature). Among them: risk, particularly systemic risk (not strictly limited to fallout or acute plant operational scenarios -- think Japan stressing its grid and industrial capacity following Fukushima), scale (Derek Abbott, "Is Nuclear Power Globally Scalable", IEEE), Proliferation, the 10,000 year perspective (language, cultures, institutions...), credibility. The near-term prospects are also not great. For once-through conventional plants, there's about an 80 year fuel reserve, 6 if we go all-out nuclear. Advanced thorium designs aren't proven and are likely 20-25+ years from deployment (those are ambitious Chinese estimates). Controlled energy-positive fusion strikes me as a "never going to happen" option, and quite likely with even greater systemic risks than fission (fission reactions aren't that hard to make happen, fusion is very hard). I'm aware of claims that uranium can be extracted from seawater -- that strikes me as possibly but not hugely credible. And nuclear fails (of and by itself) to address numerous other concerns, notably a liquid fuels replacement, or scarce minerals availability -- humans are running short of numerous resources, not just energy. It's also worth noting that one of nuclear's harshest critics was one of its most effective engineers: US Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, father of the nuclear navy.
    - maxerickson 12y ago
      What do documents like this one do to your estimates of credibility? http://www-pub.iaea.org/iaeameetings/cn216pn/Thursday/Session13/181-Kung.pdf http://www-pub.iaea.org/iaeameetings/cn216pn/Thursday/Sessio...
- berntb 12y ago
  I'd like to see references to your claims re usable area for solar energy? A pity I'm Hellbanned. :-) If there is a high energy price when solar energy becomes cheaper and more efficient, then houses will be plastered with them and there will be solar roofs above roads and so on. That should be all that is needed. (In most populated countries, not e.g. Scandinavia.) With emerging solar cells, the per capita energy need should be covered by ten-thirty square meters per person, including transports. It is not a real problem. A hand waving example: Assume the present worst case, a built up city with a population density of 25K/km^2. If houses/roads cover 50% of that city with solar cells, then there would be 20 m^2 of solar cells per capita. (Personal transports would be less energy intensive in such a city, but e.g. food transports to the city would use more energy.) [Edit: This ignores e.g. server farms and industrial needs. Use wind or nuclear for that.] About nuclear energy: We don't know what will happen in nuclear power developments (General Fusion, Tri Alpha or others?), but we do know that it will work better and probably have safe ways of burning present nuclear waste. I wouldn't use "highly problematic". It seems the largest problems are regulatory, at least in the Western world.
- berntb 12y ago
  As an addendum: I checked Wikipedia and saw that the sunnier parts of the US will have grid parity in 2015. If the prices keep falling a few years after that, then energy is a solved problem for consumers (in sunny areas not too far north). Without assuming technological breakthroughs. The next phase will be when transport get electrified.

dredmorbius 12y ago

Yes, but there's only so much power in research -- humans can find and exploit existing entropic gradients. We cannot create them. And people have been looking at the exhaustion of fossil fuels since the late 18th century. Yes, 18th, not 19th, with the first questions arising over how long Britain's coal would last. In that time, the three big developments have been accessing petroleum (1859), commercial electricity generation (1870s), and nuclear fission (1935). Petroleum replaced one fossil fuel with another (albeit a vastly more useful one). Electricity allowed for energy generation and use to be decoupled by thousands of miles, if necessary (transmission losses for long-distance electricity are quite low). And nuclear fission offered one possible out, though it's been a highly problematic option. Wind and water power have been utilized by humans for centuries, if not longer. Solar power has progressed hugely in recent decades, but it's far more fundamentally limited than many people realize. Raw availability at Earth's surface is ~8,000x present human energy consumption. Factor in land area (30% of total), population and per-capita energy growth (roughly doubling energy demand even at a small fraction of present US energy use levels), total conversion efficiencies (you're left with about 1% of the available incident energy after PV conversion, capacity factor, spacing factors, and inverters), and we're down to a 20x surplus of solar energy as available capacity if you pave over the entire Earth's landmass. You start rapidly arriving at the conclusion that either we're 1) not going to see levels of resource consumption comparable to those of the advanced world, or 2) not for projected populations, or both. You can hypothesize alternatives, but most are assuming tremendous advances which have been exceptionally non-forthcoming.

kazagistar 12y ago
Nuclear being "problematic" is vastly overblown. That's why I think the answer to the title is a resounding no: we still have a lenthy nuclear buffer before a proper energetic collapse, so at the very least it is not imminent.
- onnoonno 12y ago
  ^ This. There might be a very harsh wake-up to energy realities for the ignorant subset of the treehuggers, but nuclear can and hopefully will keep us going energy-wise. I am MUCH more scared of a nuclear war breaking out over diminishing oil resources than I am about peaceful nuclear energy. That would be mankind's biggest and worst irony. IMHO, it is bordering on insane to not consider peaceful nuclear energy as someone who is keen on saving the planet. Sure, conserving, saving, making everything more efficient is fine and laudable. But one still has to support the energy needs of some 7e9 people.
- dredmorbius 12y ago
  I've discussed the specifics of why nuclear's problematic at more length here: https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/2awjj2/thoughts_on_nuclear_energy/ https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/2awjj2/thought... The issues are multiple, many are not technical in nature (which means that the solutions are also not technical in nature). Among them: risk, particularly systemic risk (not strictly limited to fallout or acute plant operational scenarios -- think Japan stressing its grid and industrial capacity following Fukushima), scale (Derek Abbott, "Is Nuclear Power Globally Scalable", IEEE), Proliferation, the 10,000 year perspective (language, cultures, institutions...), credibility. The near-term prospects are also not great. For once-through conventional plants, there's about an 80 year fuel reserve, 6 if we go all-out nuclear. Advanced thorium designs aren't proven and are likely 20-25+ years from deployment (those are ambitious Chinese estimates). Controlled energy-positive fusion strikes me as a "never going to happen" option, and quite likely with even greater systemic risks than fission (fission reactions aren't that hard to make happen, fusion is very hard). I'm aware of claims that uranium can be extracted from seawater -- that strikes me as possibly but not hugely credible. And nuclear fails (of and by itself) to address numerous other concerns, notably a liquid fuels replacement, or scarce minerals availability -- humans are running short of numerous resources, not just energy. It's also worth noting that one of nuclear's harshest critics was one of its most effective engineers: US Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, father of the nuclear navy.
  - maxerickson 12y ago
    What do documents like this one do to your estimates of credibility? http://www-pub.iaea.org/iaeameetings/cn216pn/Thursday/Session13/181-Kung.pdf http://www-pub.iaea.org/iaeameetings/cn216pn/Thursday/Sessio...
berntb 12y ago
I'd like to see references to your claims re usable area for solar energy? A pity I'm Hellbanned. :-) If there is a high energy price when solar energy becomes cheaper and more efficient, then houses will be plastered with them and there will be solar roofs above roads and so on. That should be all that is needed. (In most populated countries, not e.g. Scandinavia.) With emerging solar cells, the per capita energy need should be covered by ten-thirty square meters per person, including transports. It is not a real problem. A hand waving example: Assume the present worst case, a built up city with a population density of 25K/km^2. If houses/roads cover 50% of that city with solar cells, then there would be 20 m^2 of solar cells per capita. (Personal transports would be less energy intensive in such a city, but e.g. food transports to the city would use more energy.) [Edit: This ignores e.g. server farms and industrial needs. Use wind or nuclear for that.] About nuclear energy: We don't know what will happen in nuclear power developments (General Fusion, Tri Alpha or others?), but we do know that it will work better and probably have safe ways of burning present nuclear waste. I wouldn't use "highly problematic". It seems the largest problems are regulatory, at least in the Western world.
berntb 12y ago
As an addendum: I checked Wikipedia and saw that the sunnier parts of the US will have grid parity in 2015. If the prices keep falling a few years after that, then energy is a solved problem for consumers (in sunny areas not too far north). Without assuming technological breakthroughs. The next phase will be when transport get electrified.