You don't have to quit coal.
Posted on 03/12/2024 1:12:46 PM PDT by DallasBiff
Ending climate change requires everyone to be poor.
What is wrong with coal?
******************
Nothing.
It has gotten bad PR, but it’s everywhere and not pricey “to get.”
China is building coal plants to cover their electrical needs til their 22 new nuclear plants com on line. They are taking the short term hit with the use of coal to play the long game of energy independence with the new plants. I assume they will continue to use coal as they build more nuke power but we will be wallowing in false promises of wind and solar.
The article I read has the US building only one nuke plant at this time. How long before that construction is shut down with the environmental Amish.
My understanding that the Wyoming coal mines are selling to China.
Electric plants that use coal pulverize it to the consistency of talcum powder. The smaller,finer material burns cleaner. Most people think there’s people throwing coal chunks into furnaces like in the movie Titanic.
Look at the size of this bucket-wheel excavator in Germany.
It digs up the dirt that is on top of the coal then digs up the coal.
https://standfirst-brusselssignal-production.imgix.net/uploads/2023/08/GettyImages-1453601515.jpg?auto=compress,format&crop=faces,entropy,edges&fit=crop&q=75&w=846&h=564
Right now, coal is the largest and most affordable energy source on Earth. There is a lot more coal around than crude and natural gas. Moreover, coal is widely distributed so many countries, especially in America and Europe, but also in India and many other places can benefit.
And coal is cheap and easily mined.
The only “problem” is that coal is basically pure Carbon, so burning coal will release more Co2 per energy unit than crude or natural gas.
Instead of rejoicing to enjoy release of life giving CO2, this makes coal “dirty”. (CO2 is NOT dirty!)
If you look at the 19the century industrial revolution, it was all powered by coal. The countries with most coal ended up the richest.
Coal was feeding all the industrial advances until about 1900 and it is still the biggest source of energy on the Earth.
Yes,
We are selling coal to China, so they can burn it there, generate cheap electricity to make cheap solar cells they then send over here.
So we can feel warm and fuzzy about helping the Earth and climate change.
Solar cells are barely net energy producer, but the energy used to make them is a coal energy burned in China, while we make “clean” electrical energy from them over here.
Guess what, the CO2 released in China is the same as the one we could release here.
“Solar cells are barely net energy producer, but the energy used to make them is a coal energy burned in China, while we make “clean” electrical energy from them over here.”
The first part of your statement is false solar panels of typical polysilicone construction pay back their EROI in four years or less. Can you provide a reference for an negative or even slightly positive EROI on any modern panel made this century? If so please do.
You are right about China using coal electricity to refine silicon into cells for panels. Humans should do that while.we have the resources to make the inevitable transition to forever energy sources. As I tell my students and what was told to me by my mining industry mentors. Mine once use many. Silicon is recyclable as is aluminum ,boron and phosphorus the four primary ingredients to modern polysi cells.
Here is the official EROI of solar panels on residential rooftops.
https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35489.pdf
Forever energy source?
You have shown your stripes.
“Climate Change” is a RELIGION.......................
Oh yeah. But I will say, only to the weak-minded proles is it a “religion”. To the ideologues, it is a tool.
That is the government doc. As all global warming document it is highly skewer they way they want you to believe.
Independent evaluations show a lot longer EROI, even infinite in cases of northern latitudes, e.g. Germany.
I am a real scientist with 20 years in the oil industry as a geologist,geochemist,and engineering plus hydrogeo. I can tell you with confidence that this planet has limited resources and at our current rate of consumption humans as a species run out of oil in 47 years, gas not long after as demand shifts from liquid to gas. Coal at present consumption rates will be used by 2060. This is with 6 billion people in energy poverty and 900 million living at middle class levels of consumption. When the other 4 to 5 billion and climbing population numbers demand access to resources at anything close to European middle class levels of consumption those years drop drastically. You might not like to hear the cold hard math numbers but that doesn’t make them less true. Simply put this planet cannot support 8 billion at anything close to European middle class levels of consumption even if we burned everything accessible. That is using 400+ million years of fossil sunshine in just under teams half centuries. The only sources of energy that can power 10 billion which is where the earth population will be at by 2060s is nuclear,solar, and wind. Only those three have the raw exajoules to supply ten billion people. Solar has enough in any of the deserts at a few percentages of land area to power all 8 billion people today. Millions of times the energy humans could ever use falls on our planet every year.
Nuclear power at present levels with once through PWR reactors uses the 8 million tonnes of uranium resources in 80 years less if you scale up nuclear power like China intends to do with 150 new reactors. Humans will have to reprocess and go fast reactors. At that point you go from 0.7% usage of uranium to near 100% a factor of 100 expansion of resources now you have a thousand years of energy at the scale needed for 8 billion or 10. People don’t want to openly say they want 6+ billion to live in energy poverty so they don’t have to change their sources of energy but That’s exactly what they mean in a practical sense.
Either way genX and certainly genZ will see in their lifetimes the end of cheap liquid hydrocarbons and that is from a petroleum geologist who has been on 6 of 7 continent’s exploring and producing total hydrocarbon systems.
So yes there are forever energy sources they are nuclear,solar,wind, and biomass that’s what our species has in the long term. Anyone who says there is no limit to fossil fuels aka fossil sunshine has an agenda or is willfully ignorant of the true numbers involved. Humans have burnt in 200 years what the sun and planet took 400+ million years to store, cook,migrate and, trap. Clearly if it takes millions of years for a total hydrocarbon system to accumulate the organic matter in a basin, then go through the hydrocarbon window at depth over more millions of years of emplacement. Burning that in a few centuries and expecting there to be unlimited reserves to be found at a future date is flawed thinking. The industry and 3D seismic has blanketed the planet with surveys every basin has been looked at save the ones covered in ice sheets the industry knows where and how much oil ,gas and coals are left that are recoverable at any price.
The fact is a small group of people 900mil or so consume more than the rest of the species combined that also clearly is not sustainable in longevity. Liquid hydrocarbons are more valuable as lubricants,medications,fertilizers,plastics and industrial chemicals like adhesives vs being burnt to the sky. Coal can be burnt once for power or used to make silicon cells to put in a sunny desert one has an EORI under one by definition since it took energy to transport the coal to the plant before you burnt it. Or that same tonne of coal can make SI cells that over their lifespan will return 25 to 50 times the energy it took to make them. Same.for wind turbines they have an EROI of 40+. burn fossil sunshine once or make a device that returns energy over a lifespan of use.
Nuclear power is even better ,burn coal to make concrete and steel which over the next 80 years as a reactor will make thousands of times the energy of just burning that tonne of coal up a smoke stack. This is how humans should use our blessings of millions of years of fossil sunshine anything else is foolish once you have the technology to do so, which in the 21st century we already do.
There is plenty of independent confirmation of solars EROI, international if one looks at the IEA. Putting panels up in Seattle or northern Germany makes for a long time for break even based on climate alone. Put those same panels in the desert southwest or Southern Spain and they break even in under 4 years and then make power for 21 years more. Thin film cells have a year break even in sunny climates.
My cells paid for themselves in under 4 years cost wise. You can’t have a oil well, refinery and fuel production plant in your backyard. I can most certainly fuel a Tesla off my panels my weekly mileage needs would be a few hours of the output off my panels. That is independence at it’s finest the gov cannot shut off the great thermonuclear fireball in the sky they can at will shut down gas pumps. Kartina and Harvey come to mind. If the gov decided overnight that they wanted to end gasoline sales they only need to tell the dozen or so refineries to lock their gates or else in two or three days there is not a single gallon for sale. Same for the gas grid. Tell atmos or Chesapeake turn off the gas main pumps or else and guess what in a few hours there won’t be anymore natgas on tap. It’s foolish to think that the gov doesn’t have the power to stop the sale of fuels they certainly do have the power and the force needed to do so. Can they go to every rooftop and smash the panels sure but not as easy as locking a few gates under armed stormtrooper guard or clicking a few computer keys to shut off pipeline valves and pumps.
They are not forever resources if you run out of ways to collect them.
Seems the only solution is population control.
Don’t worry plenty of that on the way.
Thanks for the long winded reply.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.