Posted on 11/12/2004 10:10:21 AM PST by TChris
haven't these guys been preaching global warming long anough? I remember that the completion of the aswan dam was going to cause an ice age by 1980. now i guess there's just no escaping global warming.
"Who Farted?"
Two words: NUCLEAR POWER.
Ok, perhaps not a "free" lunch. But far cheaper if the left quit trying to strangle it in a misguided attempt to damage capitalisim.
Wind Power is a hoax. Here in Germany taxpayers subsidise this green nightmare with billions of Euro so a couple tree-huggers can have their fancies.
Meantime techs such as nuclear power are switched off so in future China can build our plants which we need when the last green in power has woken up to a cold stove.
Maybe we're framing it wrong... we should tell 'em we want to be like those sophisticates - the French.
What? I thought turbines spun in revolutions per minute.
Maybe he means, "If that 30 story tall windmill falls, the turbine will hit the ground at 400 kilometres an hour."
First, I wonder whether they've gotten around to understanding that the atmosphere is not two-dimensional. Second, how does this compare to trees?
I've long been predicting this objection. Professional objectors will find something to object to, even something as desireable as wind power. Also, you just can't extract that much energy from the environment without affecting it.
I think he means that the tips of the turbine blades can reach 400KM/hr when the turbine is spinning.
Speaking of nuclear power, does anyone have news regarding fusion research? It seems to have reached a dead-end.
Try your own experiment. Set a large shop fan (fan off)in one doorway for incoming air with another doorway at the other end open for airflow. Allow the air current to turn the fan blades. Prop or hang a lit (lighted from yesterday) cigar or a smoke machine upwind of the fan. See if the air is spoiled when it exits the wind turned fan blades.
I can't believe how such unvetted "science" gets published.
On the other-hand, doesn't this defy some laws of physics?
You forgot the rest of it:
Hoof-hearted.
Ice melted.
(works better if you say it out loud...)
bump
If cooling in the Arctic happens, that is a good thing. Enviros currently worry about warming at the Arctic, melting the ice and causing a desalinization of the oceans, which will stop the ocean currents. Cooling at the poles could be just the cure the wackos want. I say build more wind farms to not only limit carbon dioxide emissions, but also stop polar warming!
It essentially has reached a dead end. There are only a few die-hards that are still working the problem.
Ultimately, there were too many technical problems and essentially no progress for the last 30 years. Specifically:
1. No one has figured out how to engineer a torus reactor vessel that could be reasonably reliable (principally because of neutron embrittlement).
2. The Lawson criterion (density times confinement time) at fusion temperatures has saturated. We are still just below the break even point and well below the ignition point. Because the curve has flattened out, heroic efforts are needed to achieve these limits.
3. The energy density is still atrocious. The ratio Beta, Beta = kinetic energy of the plasma / magnetic energy of the confinement field, is about 1/10 of 1%. The only way that this becomes acceptable is if superconducting magnets are used. It is still problematic though. Also, no one has been able to figure out how to get superconducting magnets at liquid nitrogen temperatures in a nuclear environment and at high fields. Indeed, superconductors become regular conductors at high B.
Short answer, doesn't look likely.
Now, a really, really good alternative would be the high temperature, gas-cooled reactors that are passively stable.
Couple this with a UREX+ process (being developed by the DOE), and you have full separation of the nuclear waste. All of the fissile nuclides (Pu, Np, U, etc) are recycled. The fission products are disposed of in borosilicate glass. There is essentially no waste, no safeguards concern, and you re-use the nuclear material.
We subsidize it here, also -- 1.9 cents per kwh.
"For example, Jerome Niessen, president of NedPower, which has received permission from the West Virginia Public Service Commission for a 200-turbine wind farm near here in Grant County, said he expected to generate 800 million kilowatt hours per year, for a tax savings of $16 million a year for 10 years, or $160 million — on a wind farm that will cost $300 million to build."
-- commondreams.org/headlines03/0605-10.htm
(Tax savings = Taxpayers cost)
This website seems to have some interesting answers to creating new sources of energy.
http://www.cheniere.org/
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.