Posted on 08/13/2021 1:21:52 PM PDT by Hojczyk
Along with inherent intermittency and ridiculously high cost, one of the fundamental problems with wind turbines and solar panels is that they require an enormous quantity of minerals. This is because they are such low-density sources of energy.
So meeting current U.S. electricity needs with wind and solar would require a 50% increase in global copper production, a tripling of global nickel production, and a 2,150% increase in global cobalt production. This would be the largest mining and manufacturing project in world history, and even if one assumes that sufficient supplies of those minerals exist somewhere, the vast increase in demand would send prices through the roof.
If we adopt electric vehicles and otherwise try to electrify our economy, these numbers skyrocket, so that, for example, global copper production would have to triple and cobalt production would have to increase by 8,200%. I will hazard a wild guess that this isn’t going to happen.
Where would all these minerals be processed? You don’t get three guesses.
Great idea! Let’s turn complete control of our economy over to the Chinese Communist Party. Which the Biden administration, with its energy policies, is trying to do. (I haven’t even mentioned the fact that 80% of the world’s solar panels are manufactured in China using coal-fired power plants and, in large part, slave labor.) This prompts once again the thought, if Joe Biden were an enemy agent, what, exactly, would he be doing differently?
(Excerpt) Read more at powerlineblog.com ...
You can’t run a modern technological civilization of the sort the USA has come to expect on wind and solar, it is a pipe dream. There are a lot smoking that pipe . . .
Its all about CONTROL. Nothing else.
The above estimates of what it will take to replace fossil fuel energy for the US economy with wind and solar appear valid and realistic. But, since it is more than unlikely this will happen, forget the word “replace”. That would mean that the US economy will not get the 100 Gigawatts of energy on a continuous basis necessary just to keep up with demand.
And as any economy requires energy to continue to exist, the American Economy will be allowed to shut down, and ultimately collapse. With a return to pre-industrial age technology, perhaps we can all wear powdered wigs, carry flintlocks, and have another American Revolution? Seems nostalgic, a bit.
They’ve managed to convince many that we’re on the precipice of a climate change disaster. That’s the real problem we’re facing.
Buy the old ‘Oscar Meyer’ weinermobile and paint it green, then follow AOC everywhere she goes.
Put a big belching diesel engine in it and a tiny solar panel that wouldn’t wind a watch on the roof. Toot Toot.
With today's technologies, wind and solar are simply insufficient to meet our energy needs. The Greens simply don't understand this or are willfully ignorant.
Of course they come back with the argument that government subsidies are needed to develop these energies. But if these energies were really viable, private companies would be jumping all over them.
Good question!
Actually we would need the entire world copper output for many years, and I mean all of it.
Indeed.
I just saw the following and if the UK would need the entire world output of copper for one year what would the US need?
So the UK plans to ban the sale of internal combustion engines by 2030.
Whats seemingly left out of the debate (or more accurately the thinking process) is the sheer amount of commodities that would be required to make this target happen, which is what we are most excited by as investors.
The amount of forecasting by those responsible for coming up with this nice round number of 2030 appears to rhyme with hero. Its as if the Imperial college of London and that clown Neil Ferguson are providing the forecasts.
In order for the UK to meet this target, it needs the amount of copper equal to the entire global supply mined in 2018.
Apologies to the rest of the world the UK, which represents 0.87% of Earths population, is going to require the lions share of global copper just for its cars.
Im sure the rest of the world will be fine with that. Foregoing food production, transportation, construction, healthcare All of it will be worth it so that the UK can drive Teslas.
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How wrong could you be?
I’m not even gonna read this idiotic article I’m just gonna point out some simple facts
This is from a Berkeley engineer who has been in the solar business for 30 years now
Solar panels photovoltaics work. There’s no doubt about
I have systems now that are 40 years old it still work fine
I build systems for 50 years Minimum
You have two choices in life wanted a. 1 to keep paying the utility
2. the others to put in solar panels
In California we now have 40,000 MW of solar panels installed which is approximately 2/3 of the largest utility Pacific Gas & Electric speak load of 60 to 65,000 MW
We now put in very sophisticated battery systems with a Schneider electric 6.8 kW can text ex W pro inverter which AC couples to any solar system and you can have your own operating power system without the utility it will exist in perpetuity
and otherwise you don’t need the utility anymore
My customers have zero or near zero electric cost from the utility
Some of my customers used to have $20-$50,000 electric bills a month
Your typical 300 W solar panel right now cost $150 and the pay back on it is about 1.7 years At I electric cost $.15 a kilowatt hour
Please oh idiot Please please please please argue with any of this argue with any of this
A little math here. $50K month at .15 cents KWh is 50,000/.15 = 333,333 KW/month or = 10,000 KW / day = 10 MEGA WATTS per day. So just how do you generate that kind of power without a prime mover? I call BS.
Are we at ‘Peak Copper’? ‘Peak Nickel’? (just kidding)
What’s with the solar power ‘commercials’ on Freerepublic every time we get an article about renewable energy?
Almost as bad as the guys hawking 100 mpg carburetors back during the Arab Oil Embargo.
The wizards at the top have not explained how jet aircraft, tanks, and aircraft carriers are supposed to run on solar power. Not to mention taxis. I mean they run all day. A taxicab company would have to triple it’s fleet just to keep fully charged cars in the rotation.
There are a lot of applications for the internal combustion engine. Tractor trailers, farm tractors, air compressors (for jackhammers and such), locomotives, bulldozers and other construction equipment. The day may arrive where electricity is both abundant and powerful enough. But it is, at best, a pipe dream right now.
Here in Virginia that 300W solar panel will produce 480 kWh per year. At our typical 12 cents per kWh, that's $57.60 in electricity per year or 2.6 years payback. Only one problem though, the storage you are talking about costs much more than the panels.
6 munce ago I cunnnint even spel injunear. Now I are one.
Dear Berkeley,
Please rewrite in coherent English and check your physics.
Bless your heart!
“Where would all these minerals be processed? You don’t get three guesses.”
We’d only need one guess under Trump, who tried to get mining going to continue our goal of self-sufficiency - in oil and energy.
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