I’m all in favor of going apeshit with renewables, but I was under the impression that with current global energy usage, it would take renewables on a scale that is basically impossible to accomplish, if we wanted to drop carbon and nuclear as the backbone of global power production. Or at least that’s what Sabine Hossenfelder told me on YouTube.
I watch her videos, but I’m pretty sure she didn’t say that. I remember the conclusion was that is expensive, not renewable, new nuclear tech is even more expensive and nobody wants it next door.
We need to reduce carbon immediately, but there is no way to build enough nuclear plants to even make a dent into the carbon emissions we produce. Not to mention many reactors are even scheduled to close.
So sure let’s have the conversation and let’s plan to build but not at the expense of what is urgent now.
Yes. PIMBY - please in my backyard - solar, methane capture off my septic tank, a windmill. I’m not saying “it’s impossible, so fuck it,” to be sure. Though solar infrastructure needs more incentive/requirements to be installed over urban parking lots. They’re converting arable farmland with prime soil into massive solar fields that aren’t designed to be compatible with shade-based agriculture either because of the density or the heavy metals leeching into the soil, and meanwhile there are entire countries worth of parking lots in the USA where I’m sweating my balls off in the baking August sun.
If going 100% renewable is impossible to accomplish, then nuclear is even more impossible. The front-loaded cost for nuclear plants means you’d be able to power the world for 20-30 years or more of solar/wind/batteries (at an amortized rate because costs aren’t front-loaded) for the cost it would take to just turn on the facilities that got us to 100% nuclear.
I’m all in favor of going apeshit with renewables, but I was under the impression that with current global energy usage, it would take renewables on a scale that is basically impossible to accomplish, if we wanted to drop carbon and nuclear as the backbone of global power production. Or at least that’s what Sabine Hossenfelder told me on YouTube.
I watch her videos, but I’m pretty sure she didn’t say that. I remember the conclusion was that is expensive, not renewable, new nuclear tech is even more expensive and nobody wants it next door. We need to reduce carbon immediately, but there is no way to build enough nuclear plants to even make a dent into the carbon emissions we produce. Not to mention many reactors are even scheduled to close. So sure let’s have the conversation and let’s plan to build but not at the expense of what is urgent now.
Yes. PIMBY - please in my backyard - solar, methane capture off my septic tank, a windmill. I’m not saying “it’s impossible, so fuck it,” to be sure. Though solar infrastructure needs more incentive/requirements to be installed over urban parking lots. They’re converting arable farmland with prime soil into massive solar fields that aren’t designed to be compatible with shade-based agriculture either because of the density or the heavy metals leeching into the soil, and meanwhile there are entire countries worth of parking lots in the USA where I’m sweating my balls off in the baking August sun.
If going 100% renewable is impossible to accomplish, then nuclear is even more impossible. The front-loaded cost for nuclear plants means you’d be able to power the world for 20-30 years or more of solar/wind/batteries (at an amortized rate because costs aren’t front-loaded) for the cost it would take to just turn on the facilities that got us to 100% nuclear.