Heavyweight physics professor weighs into climate/energy scrap

The Register ^ | June 20, 2008 | Lewis Page

[hreardon]

Professor David J C MacKay tells The Register that he was first drawn into this field by the constant suggestion — from the BBC, parts of the government etc — that we can seriously impact our personal energy consumption by doing such things as turning our TVs off standby or unplugging our mobile-phone chargers.

Anyone with even a slight grasp of energy units should know that this is madness. Skipping one bath saves a much energy as leaving your TV off standby for over six months. People who wash regularly, wear clean clothes, consume hot food or drink, use powered transport of any kind and live in warm houses have no need to worry about the energy they use to power their electronics; it’s insignificant compared to the other things.

[hreardon]

Sounds like we may have the Al Gore crowd telling us how often we can bathe before long....

[Schnucki]

Sounds like we may have the Al Gore crowd telling us how often we can bathe before long....

Well, many of those lefties skipped bathing years ago. :)

[Coffee200am]

Live in trees...that's the answer..

[ken21]

the ideal life of the american socialist professorate that take their directions from the europeans,

would be a small french village, a la degas’ or pissarro’s milk cows returning from the ideal fields and the sun setting through the trees.

no cars, no freeways, no scientists, no technology, no brains. all good little socialists.

[Red Boots]

MacKay sets out his calculations in a book, Sustainable Energy — Without the hot air. You can download it here. As he says: The one thing I am sure of is that the answers to our sustainable energy questions will involve numbers; any sane discussion of sustainable energy requires numbers. This book’s got ’em, and it shows how to handle them.

Snort -as if the sustainable energy debate actually involved sanity !

This is a great discussion, because his numbers show that all those politicans and others who say, let's just switch to renewables, basically do not have a clue.

He estimates just how much of Britian would have to be covered with windmills to actually produce enough power .

Hint: they won't like it. As a bonus: the book is a free download.

[Mrs.Z]

“Sounds like we may have the Al Gore crowd telling us how often we can bathe before long....”

Well, they already only use one square to wipe.

;^)

[Walkingfeather]

What they are creating is an equivalent of the bible of Carbonanity. ( I just coined it) The rule book that you measure your carbon output of your life by.

[Southerngl]

no cars, no freeways, no scientists, no technology, no brains. all good little socialists.

***************************

And immediately hold your arms up in the arms when the Nazi’s come marching through.

[Banjoguy]

Everything will be O.K when all the humans are dead.

[ravingnutter]

Aw geez...there's an error in the headline:

Heavyweight physics professor weighs into climate/energy crap

There, fixed it ; )

[Raycpa]

My Grandfather watched every microwatt of power he used.

I once purchased him a microwave. I noticed it was never plugged in. I realized it used power to run the clock.

I once saw his night light in his bedroom. It was at the end of a cord next to his bed and it had a switch on it.

He was way ahead of his time.

[Lou L]

Sounds like we may have the Al Gore crowd telling us how often we can bathe before long....

Just an extension of Obama's now famous, "...we can't sit around in our homes with the thermostat set to 72..." remark.

We Americans can't practice good hygiene by bathing in warm water...wasting soap and polluting our water supply...

[Dr. Bogus Pachysandra]

It seems that none of you have read the article. Only the snippet posted here.
Also, though, The Register is grossly anti-American.
“ MacKay tells us that the entire human race could power itself — transport, domestic, industry, the lot — at hugely profligate American levels using nothing but fission for around a century. Since it’s unlikely that everyone will suddenly ditch fossil and ramp up to that level of use overnight, realistically you’re talking about at least a couple of centuries; longer if people only fancied being Europeans rather than Americans. It wouldn’t even cost much, compared to renewables.”

[Zuben Elgenubi]

I’m not sure what the other posters ahead of me read, but it seems the professor is very, very skeptical whether alternate energy can really contribute much at all.

[Zuben Elgenubi]

You actually read the post before commenting? I’m shocked, shocked I tell you.

[A_perfect_lady]

Yes. If only we could all live like the Hobbits!! Oh, how clean and pretty it would be!

[thackney]

I once saw his night light in his bedroom. It was at the end of a cord next to his bed and it had a switch on it.

He was way ahead of his time.

Do you realize he spent more money on the cord and switch than he ever saved in a lifetime of turning off a 4 Watt bulb?

[ThisLittleLightofMine]

Waste not, want not generation.

[cake_crumb]

It took a LOOOOOOOOOG time for the author to get off the subject of wind and around to nuclear power. I am offended by the typical British arrogance about “hoggy Americans”, though. I guess the Brits already stopped using electricity...

[Dr. Sivana]

It seems that none of you have read the article. Only the snippet posted here. Also, though, The Register is grossly anti-American.

I read the entire article, and found that the author, despite being a left-leaning pacifist type, attempts to be scientifically thoughtful and honest. He did not have his conclusions drawn ahead of time, and he did not pretend that we would all live like Kenyans.

To me the article is very useful, because even a left-leaning tree-hugging type has to conclude that nukes and coal are the best long-term solutions to cutting down on oil and gas consumption.