Thursday, April 1, 2010

"Gaia hypothesis" originator makes total sense.

Yes, this is April Fools day... but no, this is not a joke.

Check out James Lovelock on the BBC where he shares some opinions I for one agree with: that predicting climate is hard and likely beyond our current skills, that the climate "scientists" have lost the plot, and that "renewable energy" is a scam.

Personally, I'm willing to cut the man some slack. He has a theory, he has a view on climate and nature, and as someone who has about .00001% of his experience, I cannot for sure say he's wrong. If there is something that the recent climate science scandal has driven home in my mind, it's how little we really know with any certainty. There is a chance we've heated the planet, and that the climate will change. Or not.

Where he and I share some common ground is observations on technology, "big science", politics, and economics... and I find I'm pretty much in agreement on those areas.

12 comments:

  1. What it boils down to is that the climate chages. It always has, it always will.

    I do not mind the quest for "renewable" energy: if we can find a way of using inexpensive (free) energy, why not? It may take time to develope, but we should go for it. It should be noted that it is environmentalists in the United States that don't hydroelectric dams becasue they kill fish, want wind generators because the kill birds; solar plants because they take habitat away from dessert turtles, etc. No matter what is developped, they will work to block it.

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  2. Prof. Lovelock: "Scientists, he says, have moved from investigating nature as a vocation, to being caught in a career path where it makes sense to "fudge the data"."

    And at that point, it is no longer science. I, too, find my self in agreement with his thinking here. I'm a bit skeptical about the "renewable" energy sources discovered to date, especially when they impact food sources. Wind farms for large population centers? Unicorn farts.

    IMO he is correct about most renewable energy ideas being better as lucrative business than sound engineering. Carbon credits are pure Enron redux.

    I'm not fully versed on it, but it appears the French have found a means to utilzie nuclear energy to generate electrical power without the massive waste spent cores we have...they re-enrich the materials as I understand it, with ultimate waste a mere fraction of what we generate and seek to store and hide away.

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  3. Renewable ousrces of power can be used a part of a greater system -- not neccesarily replace it all together.

    Also keep in mond that a great deal of energy is lost in transmission -- local generators do not need to replace everything that a distant plant generates.

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  4. About here we'd need to define what is a "renewable" energy source.

    No argument about large grids losing potential, they do. Local is better.

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  5. I will say that I am not advocating some "eco-friendly" boondoggle just because it is "eco-friendly." A useless “eco-friendly” anything is not “eco-friendly.”

    Some things won't work out, but some things may very well be developed into a viable system or sub-system -- or be an intermediary step to something that is.

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  6. RadioMattM....

    When viable alternatives are presented, we should look at them. At this point, my understanding is that both wind and solar energy generation requires large subsidy to be even partially viable. For Example

    Other Info on Wind and Water potential implies that there may be a way to do this, but we're not quite there yet.

    A potential way forward on wind turbine energy?

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  7. Now, as for environmental concerns about various wind and solar energy solutions....they have a point, and I am one of them who has those concerns. I agree with Prof Lovelock's basic hypothesis that the earth is a fully symbiotic ecosystem....as I understand him to say, anyway.

    That said, humans have created their problems, in many instances, by over riding natural realtionships in most cases...wiping out forests; decimating, or conversely, over propagating,ungulate herds; mindlessly wiping out predators; paving damn near everything; and so forth....all are important, even the more distasteful aspects like insects.

    The example oft cited about windmills versus birds is germane. As a student of avian raptors and their migration patterns, I know the migration routes coincide with the most wind available locations...e.g., they do kill birds, without a payback in kind....it's purely a human oriented technology as it is today.

    That makes me uncomfortable. For now I am of the opinion that our best avenue is to use less energy..e.g., use it more efficiently, and that technology is where we should concentrate at this time. Huge fields of fiscally inefficient wind turbine or solar arrays are an abomnation from my point of view.

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  8. I have an on-again, off-again project to research off-grid living.

    I have no conceit that I'm going to "help save the planet"; my planning is motivated by a desire to avoid the cold and the dark should "the grid" achieve metrics of reliability and affordability previously associated with the third world.

    Still, I think large solar installations have a place. Where the sun shines, for instance. You'd think this was obvious, but e.g. Germany has big solar subsidies.

    Now: if electric vehicles ever make sense (and with nanotech, they may yet), then the curve for electricity demand will become more aggressive, and more marginal sources of electricity will be developed.

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  9. Just a random thought: the answer to our energy problems may be increasing our ability to actually STORE the energy we produce. If we can engineer a storage device that's small, inexpensive, and has a long life, it would be possible to generate power (by various means) on site. Each home/business/factory could essentially become a self-contained powerhouse.

    Banks of deep cell batteries are heavy, bulky, costly, have very limited capacity, and must be replaced every few years. That alone keeps many people from going off the grid.

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  10. I think Lady Red is looking in the right direction, storage capabiltiy as a mechansim of efficiency.

    Lewy14 is right about electric cars, they're super efficient and will be practical once the battery issue is resolved...even the "racing" folk will be pleased because it's already proven that electric race cars can blow the doors off petrol fueled vehicles hands down. The problem is "range"...e.g. distance they can go on a charge. Then the problem will be demand for electricity versus supply in our motorhead nation.

    As for solar, it's still nascent at best, and the idea of acres and acres of solar panels spread out over deserts appalls me, just as huge clusters of wind turbine windmills. They replace one abomnation for another, a worse one IMO.

    Man must learn to live with and within his environment, not in spite of it. Man is not the only life worth preserving...in fact without other life in generous amounts, man dies off....he/she is the weakest of species pound for pound.

    I look at what Israel has done in and within a desert for hope, by enhancing what was there they create lush abundance, so to speak. It's that mindset I hope we can achieve someday on a macro scale.

    I've worked in and around potentially self-sustaining electric hydropower facilites in my past employment. Sufficient power is produced, but storage of overage is an issue that keeps them connected to the grid, "selling" energy to the grind and using less than they sell. Another aspect I am sure Lewy is better versed in than I am is "regulation" of electical energy...we rely on our grids for this now and small facility potential in this area is qquestionalbe from what limited knowledge i have of it. It's a problem working directly off generators as well as in countries where the regulation is, in a word, irregular...such as where I lived in Asia at one time. Literally every appliance we had required its own regulating transformer.

    Even in a well regulated environment where I live now, UPS devices are necessary for vulnerable devices (high end stereos and computers for example, as well as refrigeration and heating equipment motors) the periods of brown out that come along on older grids....the devices switch over to battery power when A/C potential drops below 103 volts in my case....which acts, with a surge suppression capability, to prevent damage form the follow on hundreds of volts surge that occurs at the end of a brown out or black out as deivces everywhere come back on line in start up consumption mode. Reliably "managing" all this in a small facility sounds daunting.

    So get to work, Lewy...I want that design concept STAT!! :-))

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  11. I agree that we must find ways of doing what we need/want in a way that does not destroy other things we need/want. What troubles me is the "environmentalists" who insist we dismantle our infrastructure, but somehow still expect that we -- or they -- sill still maintain the lifestyle to which they have become accustomed. Look at Al Gore's and John Edwards' homes. They expect us to live in caves while they live in the lap of luxury.

    I do not want to see acres and acres of solar panels, either. However, roof-top solar panels may help take the load off of the grid while making use of space that is otherwise not being used. It is not as though roofs are known for being scenic.

    If a systems needs to be perpetually subsidized then that is not a practical system. But many systems need a boost in the beginning.

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  12. I don't even consider Al Gore or Edwards "environmentalists." They're hi-jackers at best, for personal gain. Neither could track a buffalo through a mud flat. For that matter, I doubt Caribou Barbie really could either. Both sides are serving personal interests rather than popular benefits.

    As for subsidies...most of the best innovations have come about through initial subsidy. What I object to is continuing subsidy for popular implementaiton. That just screams inefficiency. Solar panals on roof tops make sense...but only once they become affordable for Joe Sixpack. Unless I am misinformed, the ROI on solar to date is zero in most lifetimes....however, if you can afford it, they do offer a modicum of independence, for basic electrical needs. Mag Lev wind turbines might also, once affordable, if ever.

    I try to keep an open mind on the subject, but recoil in horror at the thought of multilpe square miles of windmill propeller generators arrayed off Cape Cod or in high mountain passes.

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