posted
I hate to do this, and I know that generally any sort of discussion on his reviews and essays goes on the other side (or Ornery really), but I wanted to reach the widest audience, and worried that people might read his review and think, well, that he was right.
Let's run down the essay:
quote:That means that by 2012, it will be illegal to offer for sale in the United States any incandescent light bulbs -- except perhaps a new generation of "high-efficiency" incandescents. Can't wait to see those.
First off, that's not precisely true. The measure will START in January of 2012. Starting in January 100 watt lightbulbs must use 30% less energy than current bulbs get. By January 2014, it'll end with 40 watt lightbulbs. By 2020, 40-100 watt bulbs will have to be 70% more efficient. It might only be a matter of two years, but still, they're called facts. I'll cover HEIs, or high efficiency incandescents later.
quote:Naturally, the fanatical puritans of the Religion of Environmentalism are complaining that this new law doesn't go far enough in requiring the immediate adoption of efficient lighting methods
Okay, more opinion than reality check but, where has he heard that? The average American hasn't even heard about this measure, and none of the environmentalist community that I hang out in has negative things to say. They're all extremely impressed. This new national measure even blows away what California had on the books, and that's where the majority of my ecofreek radical friends live.
quote:Here's the fact: This is a traditional example of caring more about some ridiculous and unnecessary tenet of the environmental religion than about the actual health and safety of living human beings.
If you really believe that electricity-generating power plants are going to destroy the world because of their greenhouse-gas emissions, when replace them all with nuclear power plants and have done with it.
So let me get this straight. The complaint is that a CFL poses a huge health risk to people and shouldn't be used, because the better, safer option is NUCLEAR power? Nuclear power isn't completely safe, if there's an accident it certainly isn't healthy, and by the time we got the next generation of nuclear plants actually up and running, we could've gotten the same amount of power from renewables, which actually are totally clean and safe. By the way, each CFL has 5 miligrams of mercury in it. It would take 100 CFLs to equal the same amount of mercury in your average household thermometers. Where's his call to ban thermometers for their huge health risks to Americans? That 5 miligrams by the way is as of the middle of 2007, a number which is expected to drop even more in the next six months as more advances are made in the technology.
His problem is I guess with one of the infamous three R's. Reduce, reuse and recycle. His solution seems to be for Americans to maintain their wasteful lifestyles with no considerations for reducing their energy use. Like those who want to drill our way to oil independence (which will never happen), he wants to use vastly more energy. Lighting efficiency is just one of many prongs of a more integrated effort to reduce our total use of energy. And it's not just about using less power and therefore emitting less gas, it's also about saving consumers billions and billions of dollars. It's about lower cooling bills in the summer and lower energy bills year round. Just pumping out more energy doesn't solve the problem, it staves it off, messily.
quote:The problem is that the replacement bulbs are not good.
We all heard a few years ago about exploding halogen bulbs that can start fires. So we removed all halogens from our house.
Now they want us all to buy Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs). But these bulbs all contain mercury. Safety regulations forbid us to throw them away with our regular garbage because they're toxic.
They aren't good based on his fallacious descriptions of them, which I'll cover. God forbid by the way that we recycle more. The DOE is stepping up efforts to work with bulb makers to make recycling efforts easier. In November it was announced that a packaging maker was approved by the USPS for a package that could hold a CFL in it safely for postal transport. The DOE is working with CFL makers to make it so those packages will be included with every bulb sold, but plenty of businesses like Ikea will take any bulb you have and recycle it for you. HP and other companies include packaging so you can recycle printer ribbons and cartridges when they are empty, we can't do that for bulbs? Ever throw a computer away? There's toxic materials in there too, to say nothing of the precious metals you're tossing.
quote:If you drop one of these bulbs and break it, you're supposed to evacuate your house immediately and stay out for fifteen minutes, until the mercury vapors dissipate!
Untrue. The DOE's energy star website says to open a window if you can and leave the room for about 15 minutes, not evacuate your house. That's melodramatic and an attempt to smear something you don't seem to understand. There are clear instructions for how to clean them up afterwards. Personally I can't ever even remember breaking a bulb, but if I did, and it was a CFL, I wouldn't worry. It's not going to change your life, and it isn't going to kill you.
quote:Also, like all fluorescents, CFLs flicker. (All light bulbs using AC power flicker at a very rapid rate, but CFLs make it far more noticeable.) It has been shown that fluorescents, including CFLs, can significantly increase migraine headaches in people who are prone to having them, and can negatively affect epileptics.
New CFLs do not flicker in the way you describe. Those are older CFLs that use magnetic ballasts for cycling, whereas new CFLs use electronic ballasts and cycle much faster, and by some reports even faster than incandescents.
The Migraine Action Association itself has said that they have no knowledge of a scientific connection between CFLs and migraine sufferers. There've been a couple hundred news stories in the past couple weeks as this measure gets more publicity, but the MAA says that all evidence thus far is purely anecdotal. Likewise, older CFLs used to emit a high pitched whine, but no longer emit any noise.
quote:Before I knew about these dangers, I tried CFLs. The first round failed miserably because the first CFLs were too big. Their stems fit in the sockets of lamps, all right, but the bulb itself wouldn't fit inside the light fixture! Not ceiling fixtures, not lamps with standard-size harps to hold up the shade.
Worse yet, CFLs don't play well with dimmer switches or three-step switches. Forget that bedside lamp that can switch between gentle light and bright reading light!
Newer CFLs come in all shapes, sizes, intensities and colors. They come in many different forms, and fit most all sockets and fixtures. Better yet, they play well with dimmer and three-step switches, as newer CFLs are dimmable. But hey! Even if they aren't the new legislation doesn't include dimmer and three step switches, they are exempt, as are bulbs of less than 30 watts, special appliance bulbs, 150watt+ bulbs, and a lot of other specialty bulbs.
quote:What's especially galling is that since global warming is almost certainly not caused by greenhouse gases emitted by human activities (global temperature fluctuations have no relation to CO2 emissions, as a demonstrable, historical fact), the supposed benefit of this mandated light bulb change is trivial or nonexistent, while the increase in hazards is not insignificant.
Someone is going to die or suffer serious, permanent health damage because of this change -- nobody's going to die because of human-induced global warming.
I'll touch on this lightly, because I don't want this to devolve into a global warming debate, but, you're missing the point Mr. Card. The idea is in part to reduce our total energy use for the sake of efficiency, to use less energy, not just for the sake of emissions or to have anything to do with global warming. In the 70's and 80's during the oil crunch, we first created Energy star products, first instituted CAFE standards, and a lot of other efficiency regulations. That's part of the reason why skyrocketing oil and energy prices today aren't having quite the same bite that they had back then. Imagine how bad it'd be today if we hadn't done what we did back then. The other issue is money. Reducing our total energy use saves consumers money. It's that simple.
As for deaths, no one is going to die because they broke a bulb. The major, biggest concern is pregnant women and extremely young children, as mercury emissions would have undue effects on their neurological development. However, coal emissions give off more mercury for the power they provide for incandescents than CFLs do per bulb. You're already breathing it in if you live anywhere near a coal fired plant. I guess that brings you back to nuclear power, but nuclear power for the whole country would take decades, this is a solution in the next six years or seven years that means a major reduction of energy use, and a reduction of mercury emissions.
I said I'd bring up those HEI bulbs again, and here's the skinny. GE (those bulbs that Mr. Card prefers) has invented a high efficiency incandescent light bulb. They plan on bringing it to the mass market by 2010, and it'll meet or beat the efficiency standards of a CFL. So, even if you don't like CFLs, and you think that all the problems with a CFL are too big to overcome and that they will ruin the world, well, there's an alternative that'll be on the market before the restrictions come into play in 2012. They were designed to focus on 40 to 100 watt bulbs for the EU's increased standards. 40 to 100 is exactly the area they need to cover here, and I guess they'll have a bigger home market than they were planning on. Besides, GE, sorry to say, has already cut workers at their incandescent factories to focus on CFLs and HEIs, so either way your incandescents of the past are going, well, to stay in the past.
The other thing to discuss is LEDs. LEDs are already viable for office buildings, meeting centers, and other commercal applications. They aren't quite up to snuff yet for home use, though they make improvements on a daily basis. A lot of people in the energy efficiency community are talking about them as if they will be ready to sell by 2012 or 2015, but there are other bulbs that are being discussed too that are in the offing, including a recent British invention that is being boasted as a light source that will outlast any fixture you put it in, and a new cold cathode light that's basically an advanced CFL. Will LEDs be ready by 2012? It's debateable. I don't think so personally, but I do think you'll be able to buy some sort of acceptable LED by 2015 or so, but it'll be expensive, though the savings will make it totally worth it over the life of the bulb, both in monthly energy bill savings and in longevity.
In summary? Mr. Card is being extremely alarmist. Are there potential concerns? Yes, a few, but there are also alternatives to CFLs, and even if there weren't, CFLs aren't an eco-terrorist attack on your house, so take a deep breath, and please stop writing disinformation to your readers.
Sincerely,
An Environmental Wacko Fanatical Puritan of the Religion of Environmentalism
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
Although I am totally against banning incandescent bulbs. What are we supposed to do with all our easy bake ovens and lava lamps?
Posts: 1287 | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well, Card's is a better essay than this chucklehead's. Damning with faint praise, but still. Longman makes a strong argument that mandating CFLs will generate more CO2, except he forgot to account for summer. Details, details.
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
As a side note, I find it curious how many things that OSC disagrees with that he has compared to religion.
Doing a quick Google search confined to Orney, I've got slams against the religion of "money spent on science", the religion of "political correctness", the religion of "global warming", the religion that "Bush's presidency has been a disaster", the religion of the "extreme left establishment" (i.e. academia and the liberal tendencies), the religion that the US is losing the Iraq war (the religion of "smart people"), and a whole lot of slams including this one on the religion of "environmentalism."
If I had not read OSC's columns on Christianity, I would start to think that OSC has a real problem with religion. Since I have, I can only surmise that he cannot conceive (or does not like to) of people disagreeing with him unless they have been indoctrinated into a religion (i.e. indoctrinated rather than convinced by alternative reasoning or evidence). As if religion is so central to his life and way of reasoning that he believes that other people must reason in the same way.
Or in other words, "When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail"
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I agree with you, but for the record: I am for nuclear power. I think that there is a stigma against it, but it is a useful resource.
Posts: 2705 | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote: However, coal emissions give off more mercury for the power they provide for incandescents than CFLs do per bulb. You're already breathing it in if you live anywhere near a coal fired plant. I guess that brings you back to nuclear power, but nuclear power for the whole country would take decades, this is a solution in the next six years or seven years that means a major reduction of energy use, and a reduction of mercury emissions.
Yes, and coal-fired plants also emit more radioactivity (via isotopes) per kilowatt than nuclear plants do (barring accidents).
Posts: 6316 | Registered: Jun 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:So let me get this straight. The complaint is that a CFL poses a huge health risk to people and shouldn't be used, because the better, safer option is NUCLEAR power? Nuclear power isn't completely safe, if there's an accident it certainly isn't healthy, and by the time we got the next generation of nuclear plants actually up and running, we could've gotten the same amount of power from renewables, which actually are totally clean and safe.
.
Emphasis mine.
You're correct. Nuclear power isn't completely safe. But the data suggests that nuclear power is much safer than our current arrangement.
Do you remember how many people died from Three Mile Island? Exactly zero.
Posts: 3852 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
I don't have a problem with a small number of nuclear power plants, especially in the interim until renewables take over the bulk of our energy producting needs. But he's talking about nuclear power like it's a quick fix, and it isn't. But even if that were the case, it misses the point entirely. This is about efficiency and reducing our overall usage of energy, not about why we should explode our production of it. If I have to I'll push the argument to national defense and a variety of other sectors, because I can, and I'm right, but I won't because that's not the thrust of what I'm going for here.
I don't see the point in a massive new push for nuclear power when wind and solar, to say nothing of geothermal and wave/tidal power are cresting. Major breakthrough announcements are coming on a seemingly daily basis now, we added a few gigawatts of wind power last year, that's like adding a couple of nuclear power plants, and solar is headed for a multigigawatt breakthrough in the southwest. If we can push HVDC T&D lines across the country, we'll all be getting cheap solar power from Nevada and California in 30 years, not risky nuclear, and certainly not deadly coal.
But like I said, I've no problem with some nuclear (maybe 25-35% of our national total) in the short term until we totally phase out coal and phase in renewables, it's just not our long term solution. This just isn't about that, it's about reducing, not increasing, the amount of energy we need to begin with. He seems to totally be missing the point on what the treehugging wackos are even after to begin with if that's his point. And he's certainly missing the point of why Congress enacted the legislation, why Bush signed it, and why even the major power suppliers (or bulb makers) aren't complaining.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Good post, Lyrhawn. I was definitely curious about Card's complaints, because I hadn't heard about the legislation until his article.
quote:The idea is in part to reduce our total energy use for the sake of efficiency, to use less energy, not just for the sake of emissions or to have anything to do with global warming
I think he would agree that this is a good idea, and has supported increased energy efficiency in the past. Whether he believes it's true or not--I don't know.
quote: I can only surmise that he cannot conceive (or does not like to) of people disagreeing with him unless they have been indoctrinated into a religion (i.e. indoctrinated rather than convinced by alternative reasoning or evidence). As if religion is so central to his life and way of reasoning that he believes that other people must reason in the same way.
I think he does have a problem with strict/blind religious thinking. On the contrary, he seems to have a very scientific mind, beginning as a skeptic instead of a true-believer. I think the article isn't against people who want to increase energy efficiency, it's against non-thinking true-believers that want to push their agenda without consideration. I'm not saying that's what the legistlators were, but that's where his article seems aimed.
Posts: 1314 | Registered: Jan 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Whereas I suspect most renewables will be, in the long term, a fairly small amount of our energy supply, and small fission plants that cannot have a meltdown plus large fusion plants will be how we provide our increasingly growing power needs, going into the future.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:If you drop one of these bulbs and break it, you're supposed to evacuate your house immediately and stay out for fifteen minutes, until the mercury vapors dissipate!
In the four or five or more years my family has been using these bulbs, we have no broken a single one. They are spiral and thus pretty hard to break. How often does one go around randomly breaking bulbs? Not often.
In the same time period, we have broken two mercury themometres because long skinny glass things are much more prone to breaking. (Let me just say that I definitely have inhaled mercury in my time, not knowing that it behaves via inhalation.)
Anyway, the point is, unless you're planning on stomping on bulbs (which I guess considering this article is a real consideration) the risk is far more negligible than, say, your furnace that may emit carbon monoxide, or an old faulty microwave, a house lit by candles, or the mould in the ceiling of your garage.
Also: The thing that I object to with nuclear power is the waste. Sure, they have less waste than coal plants, but the waste goes on and on and on.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by fugu13: Whereas I suspect most renewables will be, in the long term, a fairly small amount of our energy supply, and small fission plants that cannot have a meltdown plus large fusion plants will be how we provide our increasingly growing power needs, going into the future.
quote:by the time we got the next generation of nuclear plants actually up and running, we could've gotten the same amount of power from renewables, which actually are totally clean and safe.
Where are you getting this information from?
quote:I don't have a problem with a small number of nuclear power plants, especially in the interim until renewables take over the bulk of our energy producting needs.
What are these renewables that you think will solve our energy problems? I don't know of any renewable source that can come close to taking over the bulk of our energy production needs.
Personally, I agree with OSC about the nuclear plants. America needs to get over its hang-up with nuclear power and largely switch over to fission plants.
quote:In the four or five or more years my family has been using these bulbs, we have no broken a single one. They are spiral and thus pretty hard to break. How often does one go around randomly breaking bulbs? Not often.
We have broken quite a few in our home.
quote:By the way, each CFL has 5 miligrams of mercury in it. It would take 100 CFLs to equal the same amount of mercury in your average household thermometers. Where's his call to ban thermometers for their huge health risks to Americans?
They have already been largely banned. The average household thermometer has no mercury. They use alcohol instead. I haven't seen a household mercury thermometer in over a decade. I've never had a mercury thermometer in my home, even when I was a child.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
But m_p_h, you're already using them. Clearly you view the risk to be negligible. I'm only saying that the dangers of breaking bulbs (and I'm surprised you've broken so many between taking them out of the box and screwing them into the lamp, but I don't doubt you) are in reality very small. People aren't stomping on them, crushing them with their fists, throwing them against the wall. It's out of the box > screwed in.
You're more likely to have to evacuate the kitchen and open the windows for burning something in the oven than from breaking a lightbulb.
I think our esteemed host and author must get a kick out of stirring the pot and seeing what froth results . . .
****************
I've broken plenty of the old lightbulbs but never one of the new twisty kind . . . although I like that they last longer . . . I grew up with the old fashioned thermometers, which I trust more than the new ones -- they don't have a warning beep or light to let you know if the battery is failing . . . oh well, back to wrist on forehead days. Posts: 5609 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by fugu13: Whereas I suspect most renewables will be, in the long term, a fairly small amount of our energy supply, and small fission plants that cannot have a meltdown plus large fusion plants will be how we provide our increasingly growing power needs, going into the future.
Debateable. Fusion is still a dream technology at the moment.
We have enough renewable potential for all of our power needs, even with our growing demand, which I imagine will be tempered by increases in efficiency.
I won't go into a lengthy reply, but I think renewables COULD make up the bulk of our energy production needs cost effectively. It might take 20-30 years to really secure a good foothold, a lot depends on the amount spent on research and what we really put into making it a reality. Microgeneration is really starting to kick off in a lot of places, which will take a lot of people off the grid. That plus green building and retrofitting, and electric cars powered at night, will drastically reduce the amount of power that we need, allowing renewables to pick up a lot of the slack.
It all depends on what we choose to do, but the opportunity is there. It will take a multi-pronged, coordinated effort, but it's possible. And in the meantime, we can work on what to do with nuclear waste.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Renewables have much greater barriers to expansion, location, and efficiency than nuclear power does. Additionally, many of them, especially those that are less bound to particular locations, are unreliable to varying degrees, making them significantly less reasonable for the constant bulk of power required.
Fusion power is mostly viewed as an engineering, rather than theoretical, challenge by those working on it. The limitations in achieving it have mostly been in how much investors have been willing to put into it rather than an inability of fusion power to be feasible.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Glenn: nobody has really expected to produce a self-sustaining fusion reaction, yet. We've long known the plants had to be bigger, but smaller ones have been built in order to test our assumptions so that the really large one(s) don't get messed up.
This isn't to say that creating self-sustaining fusion reactions is going to be easy, but that not having achieved one yet is not significant evidence against it being feasible.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Launchywiggin: ... against non-thinking true-believers that want to push their agenda without consideration. I'm not saying that's what the legistlators were, but that's where his article seems aimed.
See, if this were the first time that he has used the word "religion" as an insult or a label, I would tend to agree with you*
* (although I would still find it a bit off-putting in the "I'm not calling these guys n***ers. I calling those guys in the ghettos n***ers" sense)
What I find curious is the *frequency* with which he uses the label as I demonstrated before. At what point does it start to stretch plausibility that so many people can disagree with you on so many different topics purely due to "religious-thinking" rather than rational reasons of their own?
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: ... I've never had a mercury thermometer in my home, even when I was a child.
quote:But m_p_h, you're already using them. Clearly you view the risk to be negligible
I also don't wear a helmet when I ride my bicycle.
quote:You're more likely to have to evacuate the kitchen and open the windows for burning something in the oven than from breaking a lightbulb.
We burn stuff all the time, but the only time I've ever had to evacuate the kitchen for my safety was when I mixed ammonia and bleach together.
quote:We have enough renewable potential for all of our power needs, even with our growing demand, which I imagine will be tempered by increases in efficiency.
I repeat, where are you getting this information from? What renewable sources do you think could provide all of our power needs?
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:I repeat, where are you getting this information from? What renewable sources do you think could provide all of our power needs?
Mph: This question seems strange in light of the Lyrhawn's green energy new center thread. Lyrhawn has provided hundreds of links documenting progress in renewable energy. That's progress, not just potential.
quote:This isn't to say that creating self-sustaining fusion reactions is going to be easy, but that not having achieved one yet is not significant evidence against it being feasible.
posted
Not having created a self-sustaining fusion reaction in reactors that were never supposed to create a self-sustaining fusion reaction, but merely be research reactors, is not a count against the feasibility of a self-sustaining fusion reaction.
Also, by long term I meant sometime in the next one hundred years or so. Prior to that, I expect fission power will gradually increase in importance, particularly small, small city- to neighborhood-scale meltdown-proof reactors.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Yeah, that article bugged me when I read it. I think you almost hit it point for point. I do think we could use more nuclear power, though.
Generally speaking, I think we need to hit this energy problem both ways: reducing consumption AND finding better production alternatives.
Posts: 2392 | Registered: Sep 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
It's not a count against it, perhaps, but it's not a count for it either. I've worked on too many processes where the theorists keep saying it will work, or it will be economical when we scale it up, only to find that in actual practice, it isn't, and it doesn't.
The burden of proof lies with those claiming it will work, and until it does, it's still just theory.
Posts: 3735 | Registered: Mar 2002
| IP: Logged |
Solar alone, or geothermal alone, could supply enough power for the entire United States, if we built the stations and arrays to harness it. What's more likely I think is combination of many different forms of renewables, combined with a more advanced transmission and distribution array, and an increase in efficiency (reducing our total need) along with an increase in microgeneration. It's already started. Major corporations are installing green roofs and solar and wind arrays to power their factories or office buildings individually, taking them partially or entirely off the grid.
Like Glenn said, swing by the Green Energy News Thread sometime and read up.
Unless fugu gets more specific, it's hard to refute him, but, with those generalities, I'd have to politely disagree with him.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Solar alone, or geothermal alone, could supply enough power for the entire United States, if we built the stations and arrays to harness it.
Do you have any sources for that claim? From what I've read, solar and geothermal combined could only supply a fraction of our energy needs.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:PV technology can meet electricity demand on any scale. The solar energy resource in a 100-mile-square area of Nevada could supply the United States with all its electricity (about 800 gigawatts) using modestly efficient (10%) commercial PV modules.
posted
I encourage you to look at some of the myths listed on that page, especially number 2.
Re: ability to use, there are reasons renewables are treated as purely extra in many power companies' plans. Most renewables are unreliable. The few that aren't (notably geothermal and hydroelectric) are highly location-specific. Also, while many renewable power sources are theoretically capable of providing the nation's energy, even at vastly improved efficiencies, they would still be less cost effective than nuclear power.
Also, renewables will tend to hit a substantial cost barrier after being substantially employed. Even if at some time they provide a significant percentage of energy, expansion will prove difficult, and more readily expanded sources (like fission) will come to the fore.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
We'll see. Myth two is because solar is a starter industry. They're just starting to ramp up the building of the factories that make the parts that make solar a reality in the big time.
I assume by reliability you're talking about consistancy in power generation. That's being worked out as we speak. Test facilities are being built in Kansas and Texas to try out new compressed air approaches, by using the energy from renewables to compress air and then release it as needed to drive turbines. They think the efficiency rate can be high enough to make it work and make two inconsistent renewables into constant suppliers of energy. It's in the works.
A lot of solar is ready to go now, though advances are being made on literally a daily basis which drops the cost and increases efficiency. Wind too is headed for efficiency upgrades as GE and other turbine makers integrate mag-lev technology into the designs.
How much does nuclear cost per kilowatt? Coal is the cheapest form of energy as far as I know in the US right now, and I've seen a lot of talk about solar beating coal in the next 10 years, mostly with nanofilm solar sheets.
We'll see though. Solar is just getting started.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Glenn Arnold: It's not a count against it, perhaps, but it's not a count for it either. I've worked on too many processes where the theorists keep saying it will work, or it will be economical when we scale it up, only to find that in actual practice, it isn't, and it doesn't.
I'm not aware of any serious physical scientific barriers hampering the progress of fusion research. There is definitely a lack of knowledge but that will be overcome eventually. The reason it's been taking a lot longer than initially predicted is because of funding (and the years spent dicking around with ITER instead of just funding it ourselves).
Posts: 1327 | Registered: Aug 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
I agree with most of what you have said, but in the interest of strictest accuracy I must take a small issue with
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Nuclear power isn't completely safe, if there's an accident it certainly isn't healthy, and by the time we got the next generation of nuclear plants actually up and running, we could've gotten the same amount of power from renewables, which actually are totally clean and safe.
largely because "renewables" is a very broad term. Biodiesel, for example, tends to be rated as significantly lower in emissions of CO2 and toxins, but that's not the same as saying it's emission free.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Doing a quick Google search confined to Orney, I've got slams against the religion of "money spent on science", the religion of "political correctness", the religion of "global warming", the religion that "Bush's presidency has been a disaster", the religion of the "extreme left establishment" (i.e. academia and the liberal tendencies), the religion that the US is losing the Iraq war (the religion of "smart people"), and a whole lot of slams including this one on the religion of "environmentalism."
It's a crude rhetorical smear because of the implications of the definition of 'religion' -- it's being used as a pejorative nasty. It's always a hilarious mistake when a person who is faithful towards any actual religion uses it, because by using the word that way they're implying that religions are blatantly false things which are preached by those who are full of crap and wish to overwhelm sensible thought. They need to think about what happens when they switch gears over to the true definition of religion without any hint of irony.
It's the overused tool of a dullard pundit which makes it weird that it's been featured in OSC's articles regularly.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I found this essay surprisingly to the right until I realized it's a Rhino Times essay and not a World Watch article.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
In the US, nuclear energy's cost per kilowatt hour, using vastly outdated technology, is slightly under the cost for coal: http://www.uic.com.au/nip08.htm
This is, of course, before putting pollution into the accounting, which makes nuclear even more preferable to coal.
As for storing energy (in the form of compressed air) to later output it in order to generate energy during a lull in the wind, there is and will always be a huge amount of efficiency loss in doing that. Energy storage is extremely costly. Perhaps at some point that cost will be acceptable, but until I see figures, I remain skeptical. Contrasting, I can see modern fission technology examples in numerous places that generate more electricity more cheaply and more reliably using less space.
There has been talk of solar or wind beating coal in the next ten years for the last twenty or thirty years.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
There is no need to change anything if you purchase carbon credits, right? [/end snarky remarks]
We have started to switch because CFL's last longer. I don't know why but incandescent bulbs constantly go out around our house. I maybe go through 12-15 bulbs a month. We have been slowly replacing the bulbs in our house. It's just too expensive to replace all of them at once.
Posts: 1766 | Registered: Feb 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:There has been talk of solar or wind beating coal in the next ten years for the last twenty or thirty years
Yeah, and in the last twenty or thirty years, the largest solar arrays built were in the 10MW range. Plants have been licensed in California for megawattage 50 times that, to say nothing of the fact that solar is being invested in right now in the billions, and research dollars are blowing away anything in the past.
But I think fugu, we'll have to agree to disagree for the next, oh, decade or so. I think you're wrong, and I also think that, short of writing a novel on the subject, I won't be able to convince you.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
brojack, that's what we do too-- as lights burn out we replace them with CFLs. I just scored CFLs for $0.25/each-- Ralph's had four-packs of GE CFLs, all kinds of wattages and a couple of sizes, on sale for $1/4-pack!
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
This just another example of why OSC should stop writing columns on science issues. As with climate change, he's taken a strong position opposing the experts in field in which he has no expertise.
Because of his stature as a writer, he has access to forums to voice his opinions that others don't have. There are people who listen to him because they read his books. Using these forums to voice opinions in areas where he has no expertise, is unethical.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote:What's especially galling is that since global warming is almost certainly not caused by greenhouse gases emitted by human activities (global temperature fluctuations have no relation to CO2 emissions, as a demonstrable, historical fact), the supposed benefit of this mandated light bulb change is trivial or nonexistent, while the increase in hazards is not insignificant.
Mr Card, Might I ask how you have concluded that global warming is "almost certainly not caused by greenhouse gases emitted by human activity"? This statement is in direct contradiction to the consensus of the scientific community. As a trained scientist who has done atmospheric research and who has been following the scientific progress in this area for over 20 years, I find your statements in this area statements in this area demonstrate woeful ignorance on the subject.
May I ask what expertise you have that anyone should trust your opinion over that of the IPCC? Because you are a noted author, there are people listen to you. If you lead these people astray with this kind of misinformation, you are miss using your voice. Before you spout off any more tripe on this subject, I suggest that you at least read the scientific literature on the subject and discuss the questions you have with people who have the proper scientific background to understand the issues.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Whats sad to me, Rabbit, is that OSC seems to think that he's actually a credible voice on matters scientific.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by ketchupqueen: brojack, that's what we do too-- as lights burn out we replace them with CFLs. I just scored CFLs for $0.25/each-- Ralph's had four-packs of GE CFLs, all kinds of wattages and a couple of sizes, on sale for $1/4-pack!
Wow! That's a great price. I can get a four pack here for $10. That's been my problem with energy efficient anything is it is almost cost prohibitive. I would love to put solar panels on my house but it's just too expensive. We did decide to bite the bullet and buy a pack of CFL's every time we go grocery shopping. $20/month we can do. I think I only have two or three more packs to get.
Posts: 1766 | Registered: Feb 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:Using these forums to voice opinions in areas where he has no expertise, is unethical.
I disagree that it's unethical. I think it's perfectly ethical to voice uninformed opinions, and even to rely on your experience in another field to focus attention on those uninformed opinions. It would be unethical if he said, "based on my lifetime of scientific study, I think these new-fangled bulbs are worthless."
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: This just another example of why OSC should stop writing columns on science issues. As with climate change, he's taken a strong position opposing the experts in field in which he has no expertise.
Because of his stature as a writer, he has access to forums to voice his opinions that others don't have. There are people who listen to him because they read his books. Using these forums to voice opinions in areas where he has no expertise, is unethical.
I'm not sold on the global warming issue either, and if I am mistaken, Al Gore is not a scientist in the field of global warming either? He seems to have taken a strong position.
Posts: 1766 | Registered: Feb 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
We'll talk again in a decade. If solar is more efficient than coal (we'll leave size of 'plant' considerations aside), feel free to crow. Heck, I'll be happy. I just don't think it will happen (and efficiency includes the cost to put the 'plants' in place).
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:I'm not sold on the global warming issue either, and if I am mistaken, Al Gore is not a scientist in the field of global warming either? He seems to have taken a strong position.
Although Al Gore is not a scientist, the strong position he has taken is the position backed by the leading scientists in the area. It is one thing to act as voice for the position held by the experts even though you yourself are not an expert. Using your voice to oppose the experts when you lack even adequate knowledge to clearly understand the expert position is quite another.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
| IP: Logged |
I agree that it's not necessarily unethical, but I do think it's dishonest (which may or may not be unethical in itself). In the incandescent column he wrote blatent falsehoods that could easily have been checked, and used hyperbole and alarmism to try and drive his point home. It's the same scare tactics that Republicans have become so famous for recently, and I think it's wrong, regardless of ethics.
brojack -
Hard to compare the two. Al Gore has spent 30 years on the subject, reading the material, and talking with world leaders and scientists on a daily basis. I'm aware of no such experience from OSC.
fugu -
I've got the date set on my calendar Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Using these forums to voice opinions in areas where he has no expertise, is unethical.
I disagree that it's unethical. I think it's perfectly ethical to voice uninformed opinions, and even to rely on your experience in another field to focus attention on those uninformed opinions. It would be unethical if he said, "based on my lifetime of scientific study, I think these new-fangled bulbs are worthless."
He does the same thing with homosexuality. It's harmful because he's preaching to the choir. They already don't have accurate information on gay people enough as it is, or at least something from a broader perspective. That only leads to more prejudiced.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
