The Trouble With "Renewables"

UW_Doog_Bot

Good video, if you don't watch it then you aren't serious about climate change.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5cm7HOAqZY

allpurpleallgold

The climate has always changed.

PurpleThrobber

Edibles > Renewables

Kaepsknee

I actually wanted to watch it.








But I'm not serious about climate change, so I can't.

UW_Doog_Bot

allpurpleallgold said:

The climate has always changed.

So you didn't watch and you don't care. Got it.

BearsWiin

I've kayaked on Elkhorn Slough right next to that Moss Landing power plant

Sledog

Holy shit you mean it gets dark and the wind don't blow?

WestlinnDuck

That late breaking story is unavailable for the true green gaia religionists.

YellowSnow

Maff and physics are hard for greens.

GreenRiverGatorz

Good post @UW_Doog_Bot. California is a good microcosm of the larger renewable energy issue - the investment costs and land intensiveness of solar and wind power mean they are still not feasible to replace natural gas and nuclear energy. Their variability due to seasonality and weather only adds to the cost when battery storage becomes another necessity. As always, incremental progress as we continue to find more cost effective ways to replace natural gas and nuclear energy is the only realistic scenario.

Note that none of this touches upon the other very pressing energy issue of the world - transportation. Electric cars are nice, but no renewables are even close to properly substituting the fossil fuel consumption that comes from shipping and air travel. We have a long ways to go.

Sledog

It's all conservatives fault for wanting electricity when it gets dark.