Soldato
Screw on Earth energy solutions, let's get our selves into space and gather the energies from out there! \o/
The clean green energy thread - Lets talk about alternatives to nuclear power and how we can save th
- Thread starter SkScotchegg
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Man of Honour
Solar is very much feasible...in other parts of the world. CSP can be done with plentiful materials, making it feasible. If you have a lot of unused ground and a lot of strong sunshine, solar power is feasible. Since we have neither in the UK, it isn't at all feasible here. It is feasible to generate it in north Africa and transmit it here, though.
Wind would be feasible higher up, at least on paper. If you didn't mind creating huge no-fly zones and you had some way of dealing with extremely long and heavy cables falling down if something went badly wrong and they snapped.
Wave and tidal are promising in the UK as we have a lot of coastline and a lot of waves.
I think we need to be using a mixed bag approach, with various different forms of generating electricity. Including nuclear fission right away and nuclear fusion if it becomes viable as a power source at some point in the future.
Man of Honour
That might happen under optimum conditions, i.e. constant noon sunlight in a perfectly clear sky sat right on the equator.
Photovoltaic panels simply suck in the UK. The only reason anyone can even pretend they're viable here is that the government is wasting huge amounts of public money buying them for purely political reasons.
I've read all your replies and I've seen the holes in my power cut idea even though I liked the idea at first! lol but I still think electric cars are a good idea.
And...If you haven't seen it already, maybe you should watch that electric car documentary...I cant remember the exact details and specifics so dont quote me on any of this but here goes....The documentary showed people in the 80's in California USA driving electric cars, and testing them, loads of people had them, and there was electric re-charge stations setup all over the state and people were really apprehensive before they got their electric car, and they thought perhaps they would be slow, and they would look rubbish, and they wouldn't enjoy to drive them, and they would run out of battery...but when they got their brand new electric car, all their fears were put to rest, and the car was actually allot faster then they thought it was going to be, they liked the look of the car, it seemed nice and sporty like other normal cars and it felt great to drive, and people really fell in love with this car....but then apparently the oil companies complained or something and there was some big conspiracy and all the cars got taken away from people, got drove to a scrap yard and completely demolished, the documentary made it seem like a big scandel...so basically we already had electric cars in the 80's in california, the whole system worked! and the world could have been changed for the better right there and then, but no....it's now 2011 and everyone is still driving cars with petrol engines...
So after seeing that documentary, plus all the other factors...someone above said batteries are crap....dont know where your getting your info from because batteries have come along way since the 80's and they were driving their electric cars like 6 hours a day.
And I've seen some new documentaries recently and they've actually invented some new electric cars now in last couple of years which are great.
So all we need is to put stations all over the city across the country to charge them, and start selling the cars! and offer incentives to people that go green and give them tax benefits etc so they opt for an electric car over a petrol car.
I think we need to do this to stop using oil once and for all...for the sake of the planet and all the species that live on it.
Plus oil prices are ridiculous now, and oil spills are dreadful when they happen, and the pollution from oil could end up killing us all eventually, I dont think there's a debate as to weather or not global pollution is real or fake any more, I believe the evidence speaks for it's self so there should be no argument there.
And...If you haven't seen it already, maybe you should watch that electric car documentary...I cant remember the exact details and specifics so dont quote me on any of this but here goes....The documentary showed people in the 80's in California USA driving electric cars, and testing them, loads of people had them, and there was electric re-charge stations setup all over the state and people were really apprehensive before they got their electric car, and they thought perhaps they would be slow, and they would look rubbish, and they wouldn't enjoy to drive them, and they would run out of battery...but when they got their brand new electric car, all their fears were put to rest, and the car was actually allot faster then they thought it was going to be, they liked the look of the car, it seemed nice and sporty like other normal cars and it felt great to drive, and people really fell in love with this car....but then apparently the oil companies complained or something and there was some big conspiracy and all the cars got taken away from people, got drove to a scrap yard and completely demolished, the documentary made it seem like a big scandel...so basically we already had electric cars in the 80's in california, the whole system worked! and the world could have been changed for the better right there and then, but no....it's now 2011 and everyone is still driving cars with petrol engines...
So after seeing that documentary, plus all the other factors...someone above said batteries are crap....dont know where your getting your info from because batteries have come along way since the 80's and they were driving their electric cars like 6 hours a day.
And I've seen some new documentaries recently and they've actually invented some new electric cars now in last couple of years which are great.
So all we need is to put stations all over the city across the country to charge them, and start selling the cars! and offer incentives to people that go green and give them tax benefits etc so they opt for an electric car over a petrol car.
I think we need to do this to stop using oil once and for all...for the sake of the planet and all the species that live on it.
Plus oil prices are ridiculous now, and oil spills are dreadful when they happen, and the pollution from oil could end up killing us all eventually, I dont think there's a debate as to weather or not global pollution is real or fake any more, I believe the evidence speaks for it's self so there should be no argument there.
Soldato
Theres nothing green about electirc cars if the power stations are not green themselves. You are just passing the carbon emissions to someone else
Again from what I can find this is simply no longer the case if ever.
you're thinking of the General Electric EV1, which was, by all accounts, a fairly reasonable EV.
The only two problems with it, are the same two problems that every battery-powered-electric-vehicle faces: it cost FAR too much, and it's range was pitiful.
Case in point? GM were only able to lease around 800 of them. they couldn't sell them due to government regulations.
Furthermore, the car was available in two generations, the first used Lead-Acid batteries, the second used NiMH batteries instead.
Lead Acid Batteries have a Specific-Energy of only 30-40 Watt-hours per Kilogram (Wh/Kg), and NiMH batteries have a specific energy of up to 75Wh/Kg.
as a result of the poor energy-storage capabilities of those battery technologies, i quote this from Wikipedia:
"Cars with the lead-acid pack had a range of 80 to 100 miles, while the NiMH cars could travel between 100 and 140 miles between charges."
best case-scenario, 140 miles between charges? considering a charge takes hours, can you see why that's simply impossibly impractical? a conventional petrol or diesel powered vehicle have ranges upto and exceeding seven hundred miles, and then refueling only takes ten minutes if there's a queue to pay.
Battery technology hasn't advanced as far as you might think it has.
Even with highly-environmentally-destructive lithium batteries (the production-process for them is abhorrent), you might see 200Wh/Kg.
Assuming that an EV with the same efficiency as the EV1, with a Li-Poly battery-pack of the same mass was used, the range would only increase to about 370 miles, which will still require the many-hour-charge-cycle to refuel.
going to mention the "fast-charge-technology" that allows these newfangled lithium batteries to be recharged in 20 minutes? don't bother: they're technologically impressive but have three major drawbacks;
First: They require current-delivery-capabilities that most STREETS cannot accomodate, we're talking currents in the thousands of Amps range.
Second: They reduce the charge-efficiency of the charging process markedly - with regular charging, more than 80% of the energy you put into a lithium battery will be stored, with these "fast-charges", that drops to around 60% or less, depending on the speed. that's energy that's simply turned into heat.
Third: the fast-charge-cycles are incredibly damaging to the already fragile Lithium batteries, which generally have a cycle-lifetime of only 1000 charge-cycles before their usable capacity becomes too low to be useful.
with fast-charges, this can be as low as two hundred and fifty cycles.
Assuming a daily travel total of about 80 miles, that could easily see the battery needing to be replaced after just eighteen months. Isn't the whole point to save the environment?
I don't know much about generating the power, but I do know how to switch off a light that isn't in use. A lot of people don't. I have a friend who has about a million lights set into his dining room floor and ceiling that are on all day, no matter how bright the sun is and everything is left on stand-by. Same in the bathroom. It annoys me no-end.
I don't agree with a one day per week power cut at all. I do think something needs to be done about low MPG vehicles though. It's just not necessary for the **** in the Cayenne Turbo (car chosen at random
) to do 4 times less travelling to his gallon than people who are trying to be sensible just because he thinks he looks cool/superior or whatever. I don't care if he does pay more tax at the pump for it - it's about using up everyone's resources faster for reason other than vanity. This might be a whole new thread
I don't agree with a one day per week power cut at all. I do think something needs to be done about low MPG vehicles though. It's just not necessary for the **** in the Cayenne Turbo (car chosen at random
) to do 4 times less travelling to his gallon than people who are trying to be sensible just because he thinks he looks cool/superior or whatever. I don't care if he does pay more tax at the pump for it - it's about using up everyone's resources faster for reason other than vanity. This might be a whole new thread
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by that do you mean televisions and computers and the like? because electrical devices of that nature tend to consume just a couple of watts when in standby mode.
i once actually measured the standby power-draw of my big, thirsty CRT TV for this very forum (it was quite a few years ago now though) and it only drew about 1.3W while in standby, compared to over 100W while on.
my desktop draws about three watts (estimate) whilst in standby, and most laptops are less than one watt while in standby.
Man of Honour
Here here. Nothing wrong with it. Just need to take into consideration tsunamis now when it comes to their design. Much better than fossil fuels IMO.
Man of Honour
by that do you mean televisions and computers and the like? because electrical devices of that nature tend to consume just a couple of watts when in standby mode.
i once actually measured the standby power-draw of my big, thirsty CRT TV for this very forum (it was quite a few years ago now though) and it only drew about 1.3W while in standby, compared to over 100W while on.
my desktop draws about three watts (estimate) whilst in standby, and most laptops are less than one watt while in standby.
I think I remember that thread - I also was 100% in agreement with you about it IIRC.
Heck, I have a remote control, why bother switching the thing off, it means I have to stand up to turn it on!
Soldato
I'm probably being an idiot but if nuclear power creates steam to power turbines why does it need to be nuclear material to do that?
Surely you could have the same system with some industrial size elements to heat water to steam (like a huge mega kettle lol) and then have the power it generates from the turbines power itself so that it's a self sustaining system, meaning you only need a source of of power to start it up.
Obviously it must not be possible or just not possible to create the required amount of heat else someone would have done it or similar already
Surely you could have the same system with some industrial size elements to heat water to steam (like a huge mega kettle lol) and then have the power it generates from the turbines power itself so that it's a self sustaining system, meaning you only need a source of of power to start it up.
Obviously it must not be possible or just not possible to create the required amount of heat else someone would have done it or similar already
Yup.
Associate
I'm probably being an idiot but if nuclear power creates steam to power turbines why does it need to be nuclear material to do that?
Surely you could have the same system with some industrial size elements to heat water to steam (like a huge mega kettle lol) and then have the power it generates from the turbines power itself so that it's a self sustaining system, meaning you only need a source of of power to start it up.
Obviously it must not be possible or just not possible to create the required amount of heat else someone would have done it or similar already
And what are they going to use to heat the elements ???
by that do you mean televisions and computers and the like? because electrical devices of that nature tend to consume just a couple of watts when in standby mode.
i once actually measured the standby power-draw of my big, thirsty CRT TV for this very forum (it was quite a few years ago now though) and it only drew about 1.3W while in standby, compared to over 100W while on.
my desktop draws about three watts (estimate) whilst in standby, and most laptops are less than one watt while in standby.
Think I vaguely recall that thread now you mention it, so fair enough
I still turn my stuff off though.A while back wasn't there a govt campaign about getting us to save electricity by turning things off stand-by? Was that just the usual government incompetance then?
Sometimes it's not about the actual wattage used on a personal level, but more about the principle and the wattage used if EVERYONE didn't turn things off I suppose. I'm more interested in what people think about the MPG fuel issue - should people really be allowed to buy large engines just for luxury? Is the issue more complicated than that?
Man of Honour
This isn't intended as an argument against nuclear power stations particularly but it's worth remembering that some symptoms tend to occur after long cumulative exposure. You could say "I've walked through the city of Pripyat and I was fine" and I'm sure that's true but would you like to spend a year there?
At this point all you've proved is that you don't have radiation poisoning/cancer yet - in fact less than that, you've proved that nothing has been diagnosed (or indeed probably tested for). While I seriously doubt you'll come to harm eating your sea bass from around Torness I thought it might be worth pointing out that it's not infallible logic that proves its safety.
Associate
I'm afraid you are
The steam needed to power the turbines (which are bigger than houses in some cases) isn't steam in the sense you are talking, i.e wafting from a kettle
It has to be super heated and pressurised. The energy needed is enormous.Thermodynamics and basics physics 101 might be worth a read
Soldato
I'm afraid you are
The steam needed to power the turbines (which are bigger than houses in some cases) isn't steam in the sense you are talking, i.e wafting from a kettle
Thermodynamics and basics physics 101 might be worth a read
Cheers, far more useful than mr whites troll post
(i don't and never claim to be educated on such things, but have a good interest in knowing the inner workings of nuclear reactors, they facinate me) What sort of temperature are we talking about when you say super heated?
Optic Technium in St Asaph north Wales has (circa 2008) the largest photovoltaic wall in Europe, its in probably the best area in the UK to build one and yet its not expected the energy savings it provides will repay its cost in its lifetime.