How much wind and solar power would $1,000,000,000,000.00 buy?

[Old and In the Way]

Between Bush's taxcuts to the rich and the war on Iraq, I think we've burned through about Trillion dollars and 2270 American lives. What do we have to show for it? Higher oil prices.

So, I'm wondering, would a trillion dollars invested in alternative/renewable energy have made us energy independent? Would that trillion dollars have primed the pumps for new jobs and investment opportunities in our country?

Does anyone else think that Bush/Cheney were selected so that Big Oil could bankrupt our opportunity to give us true energy independence? I do.

[havocmom]

1. Would have made a BIG difference in global energy, created jobs

and kept the families of 2270+ Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis from being turned into hell.

But, a different bunch of folks would have scored, and they are not about to let that happen. Status Quo is all they know.

[sasha031]

2. absolutely, it was a coup

brought on the war profiteers and big oil

[NNadir]

3. This is easily calculated.

Here is the cost of solar energy as reported by www.solarbuzz.com: $5.32/"watt".

Dividing one billion dollars by $5.32 we see that the answer is 187 Megawatts, the size of a very small coal fired plants. (The average coal plant is about three times as large.)

I note that solar plants only produce their capacity for about 25% of the time on average.

[jpak]

6. Umm....Trillions....not Billions

:rofl:

[NNadir]

16. One trillion dollars would provide less than 2 exajoules

Exajoules. Boo, baby, boo!

Here's the math, for those incapable of doing it: $1,000,000,000,000/$5.32 watt^-1 = 191,000,000,000 watts.

191,000,000 watts * 86400 seconds day^-1 * 365.25 days/year * 0.25% = 1.50 X 10¹⁸J or 1.5 exajoules.

The 25% refers to the capacity loading of solar cells.

Since US energy demand is now 105 exajoules, we can easily see why the solar industry has failed to address the serious crisis of global climate change.

Boo! Exajoule!

:bounce:

[jpak]

17. LOL!!!!

As one poster pointed out, a trillion bucks could buy PV arrays for half the homes in the US.

Trivial indeed...

And how many Ex-O-Jewels will the US economy use after the oil and gas and uranium run out????

(clue: not many)

Renewables are the only REAL options we have....and if we had used the trillion bucks ChimpCo squandered on his Cronies and the War Against I-raq to buy PV, the nation would have been better served.

[NNadir]

19. The unit is exajoules. Deliberately mocking the word proves zero.

Tough shit. One can say "solar" and "could" one trillion times, and not a single exajoule will be produced. Solar power has yet to produce a single exajoule. The earth will need to produce 440 of them if humanity is to survive global climate change.

Boo! Exajoule. Boo, baby Boo!

Physics, in which the exajoule is a standard accepted unit, is real, just like global climate change.

Oh yeah, and numbers are still numbers.

:bounce:

:bounce:

:bounce:

:bounce:

:bounce:

:bounce:

[jpak]

22. You're right solar sucks - just ask any Republican

Democrats, however, have different ideas....

Howard Dean

http://www.alternet.org/story/16059/

John Kerry

http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2003/09/23/griscom-kerry/

and the rest of the 2004 Dem presidential candidates....

http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/features/feature_template.cfm?ID=1048

Last year renewables added >2500 MW of generating capacity to the US grid.

and US wind and PV installations are growing *exponentially* at >35% per year.

20 states have enacted Renewable Portfolio Standards and will generate 10 to >30% of their electricity from *new* renewable sources by 2020.

Those that oppose solar energy will be sorely disappointed...

[Old and In the Way]

25. Our energy choices are political, aren't they?

The Republican Party is financed by Big Oil. Big surprise our energy policy is dictated by Exxon-Mobil.

[DoYouEverWonder]

33. And the Saudis are having fits

that we would even dare to think about alternative energy.

Legalize industrial hemp and screw them.

[NNadir]

27. No one "opposes" solar energy. Everybody loves it and thinks it's great.

Me too.

That's why it's amazing that with all this good will, it still has yet to produce an exajoule, 50 years after the invention of the solar cell.

One wonders, what's the hold-up?

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/solar.renewables/page/trends/table1.html

35% of next to zero is a pretty easy thing to do.

[jpak]

29. What horse-shit - Republicans and LaRouchites hate solar

and demean it every chance they get....

[NNadir]

30. Looking at numbers is not "demeaning."

It's called being realistic.

Global climate change is a serious business and requires looking at the numbers, numbers being an ancient tool invented by humankind to evaluate reality.

No one is trying to stop solar power. Solar power is always considered sexy and cool, by nearly everyone.

However some people need to point out the facts. It is too weak a tool against global climate change to be relied upon. It cannot meet the challenge.

If this changes, and it does meet the challenge, everyone will be thrilled, but thus far it hasn't done so.

[jpak]

31. Do the names Ronald Reagan, Poppy Bush, Junior

Hassert, Delay, Gingrich, Lott and Frist mean anything to you?????

How have they advanced renewable energy in the last 30 years????

Renewable energy can't meet the challenge????

What a fucking lie.

Again - renewable sources added >2500 MW of new generating capacity to the US grid last year - and US wind and solar installations are growing by 35% per year...

...as opposed to 0 MW of new US nucular capacity last year...

ChimpCo is offering $12 billion in subsidies to build 6000 MW of new nucular capacity - that won't come on-line until after 2016.

If additions of solar and wind to the US grid remained *flat* at 2500 MW per year between now and 2016, they will have added 25,000 MW to the US grid.

as opposed to 6000 MW of GOP-subsidized nucular.

Oh yeah, the US currently imports >66% of its uranium, and when current stockpiles of yellowcake are used up, the US will have to import >95% of its uranium (in competition with France, the UK, China, Japan, Finland, Germany, Latvia and South Korea).

Numbers indeed.

[NNadir]

32. I always know I am winning when the "guilt by association" logical fallacy

comes out. http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/guilt-by-association.html

Some people like to pretend that the only place that matters is the US.

Renewable energy, with the exception of hydropower, is undependable and tiny worldwide.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/table17.xls

Read it and weep. Converting billion-kilowatt-hours to exajoules by multiplying by 3.6 X 10¹⁵ billion kilowatt-hours exajoule^-1, we get 1.12 exajoules. World demand for energy in 2003 was 440 exajoules.

Global climate change is a serious matter to be dealt with my mature thinking and serious solutions. It is not a game for children, not a subject for tantrums.

You can repeat the same "Chimpco 12 billion dollar" crap to the end of the earth, and you still cannot produce 440 exajoules of energy with renewable energy.

Here let me demonstrate: Chimpco. Chimpco. Cheney. Hassert. Chimpco. 12 billion!

Nope, no more exajoules.

Boo! Exajoule!

Regretfully, renewable energy cannot meet the challenge. This is shown by contemplating something called numbers.

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

[jpak]

36. and guilty as charged

:rofl:

[jpak]

60. Winning??? No one wins with GOP energy policy

Except GOP Cronies...and their natural allies the "pro-nucular environmentalists".

This is GD-Politics Forum and the energy politics of the Democratic Party and the GOP are fair game for discussion.

The legislative history is clear....

The GOP and the wacko LaRouchites are absolutely hostile to renewable energy and very much pro-nucular.

Democrats - by all measures - favor renewables over nuclear.

There is no "logical fallacy" here.

ChimpCo is offering $12 billion in taxpayer subsidized incentives - including $6 billion in production credits - to build 6 new nucular power plants.

Those that support this program support ChimpCo energy policy....

period.

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

[MisterLiberal]

92. Let me ask you a question please

What is the solution? I am a strong proponent for alternative energy to get us away from oil.

[lostinacause]

76. Your numbers for solar energy are probably high (asuming you did the

calculation). A large scale solar operation would have additional costs such as transportation, instillation, and land preparation. Solar power is supplied in the middle of the day requiring some form of storage if it were to become a mainstream solution. These all add costs. I would expect you could cut your estimate in half and still be overestimating the true cost.

[jpak]

35. Here's some numbers to chew on

As of 2005, the US possessed 385 MW of installed PV capacity (all sectors) and 9145 MW of grid connected wind capacity.

Both are expanding at >35% per year.

California and Nevada are adding another 1064 MW of solar thermal-electric capacity between now and 2012.

If PV and wind grew at *only* 10% per year over the next 10 years, and there were no further additions by solar thermal-electric beyond that already planned, they will add ~24,400 MW of new generating capacity to the US grid.

...as opposed to 6000 MW of GOP-subsidized nucular capacity.

...and that doesn't include new biomass or biogas electric generating capacity that will add a *minimum* of 590 MW of new capacity to the US grid between now and 2016.

[NNadir]

51. And here's some reality to chew on. Units of power are not units of

energy. Watts are units of energy divided by time. A tiny bit of energy present for a tiny bit of time may have acceptable power ratings, but it is still tiny energy.

The capacity loading of most solar plants is crap, and won't get solar near an exajoule.

Boo exajoule.

A megawatt of power operating a 25% capacity loading (typical for solar plants) produces about 8 terajoules. Therefore for a solar plant to produce an exajoule, there needs to be close to 130,000 Megawatts peak. To provide for US energy total would require 13,000,000 Megawatts peak, and that's not counting the need for energy storgage.

Tough luck.

Exajoule! Boo!

[Old and In the Way]

53. With all due respect, efficiency models are not what my post is about.

The $1,000,000,000,000 we've wasted (we didn't have to do those tax cuts and we didn't have to invade Iraq) could have been sunk in renewable/alternative energy. Now, maybe that does not make us totally energy dependent....but it does address a significant portion. Maybe another trillion or so to finish. What would that trillion bought us? A better energy position for the 21st century, more jobs, a healthy future for our kids. Has the trillion we've invested in tax cuts or the war given us more or cheaper oil? No on both counts.

[jpak]

59. Apples, Oranges and Horseshit

Anyway you run the numbers, renewables will beat GOP-subsidized nucular in the next 10 years.

24,400 MW of renewables with a *very conservative* 0.25 capacity load factor would provide 53 billion kWh of electricity per year as compared to 47 billion kWh from Dick Cheney's vaunted new nuclear plants.

As wind and solar are currently growing at 35% per year - not 10% per year - the amount of electricity supplied by renewables will much greater....

Furthermore, wind and PV *and* Nucular produce electricity - not gasoline or diesel fuel or heating oil.

Biomass, however, can provide both home heating and automotive fuels - and, for home heating, biomass is far less expensive (by a factor of three) than nucular electricity.

The 105 Ex-O-Jewel argument is therefore a Red Herring.

Renewables Rule - Republicans Drool...

:bounce:

[NNadir]

72. If I was supporting energy that could not produce an exajoule, I'd feign

contempt for units of physics too.

It is amazing how poor the understanding of logic can be, but a "red herring" is something designed to distract. An example would be saying "Cheney" to distract attention from the fact that nuclear power is the safest cleanest continuously available form of energy there is.

Actually it a dubious contention to claim that the units of energy are irrelevant to a discussion of energy. What should we measure energy with? Farts? Number of unsupported words?

Sorry bub, the exajoule is the currency of reality, not percent. Percent of next to nothing is still next to nothing.

Boo! :scared: Exajoule!

We hear, "Biomass can blah blah blah," out the butt. What we don't see is biomass displacing fossil fuels. Anyone who pretends that it can do so, merely has their head in the sand at the obvious expense of everyone else on the planet.

The entire US wood biomass industry put out less than 2 exajoules :scared: last year:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/solar.renewables/page/wood/wood.html

Lord knows how much pollution they put out last year.

It is incapable of meeting the energy demand. I note that the biomass industry is many thousands of years old, and that burning biomass led to over 4 million deaths last year.

It's hardly a coincidence that a frequently discussed form of biomass is sewage. I advise anyone contemplating this load of shit to compare the size of their turds with the size of their gas tanks. In such circumstances one can easily assess what is shit and what is not.

It doesn't matter in any case what opponents of nuclear power think in any case. The day that such nonsense could be taken seriously are over, because of experience. World consensus, scientific, economic and environmental has rejected the idea that nuclear power is less safe than its alternatives, and is now planning over 30 exajoules of new nuclear capacity, representing many billions of tons of carbon dioxide emmissions avoided, clear cuts avoided, soil depletion avoided and so on. (Boo! :scared: Exajoule!)

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

Most people are indeed now aware that global climate change is a serious matter that cannot be addressed by wishful thinking and self-delusion.

[jpak]

77. LOL!!! The cascade of ca-ca continues

The numbers are clear and obvious to anyone.

Growth in renewables will outperform nucular in the US and the EU over the next 20 years - any way you look at it.

Half of Japanese homes will be equipped with PV arrays by 2030.

and, oh yeah, all biomass power plants have to meet US emission standards, biodiesel is cleaner than the regular product, and all wood and pellet stoves sold in the US exceed EPA standards for particulate and other emissions.

Ignorance of this is quite common among pro-nucular environmentalists.

...and anyone that supports ChimpCo's nucular energy policy is well a.....

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

[NNadir]

79. The numbers support it? Anyway I look at it?

The only numbers I've seen here are the ones I posted myself.

Here they are again, since they seem to have missed the first time:

The conversion factor between billion kilowatt-hours and exajoules is still the same, the IUPAC hasn't changed them since yesterday. 1 billion kilowatt-hour = 0.0036 exajoules.

I guess some folks have no clue what numbers look like, unless we are talking about the 50 year old refrain about what solar energy is going to do in the "next 20 years."

This is hardly a surprise. One thing that people who revel in wishful thinking while the oceans rise avoid is numbers.

:eyes: :eyes: :eyes: :eyes: :eyes:

All renewable energy has to do to be a success is to produce significant energy, the unit of significant energy still being the physical unit, the exajoule.

The world needs 440 of them. Less than two still won't cut it. It didn't cut it yesterday either, or for that matter 20 years ago.

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:


:popcorn:

[northzax]

95. don't forget, while you're talking about it

the ultimate numbers we are dealing with. Solar Power can only be part of a greater solution. Let's say, for a minute, we cover every inch of the terrestrial United States with solar panels. The US has a terrestrial area of 9,161,923 square kilometers. Which, of course turns into 9,161,923,000,000 square meters. Since the peak solar radiation at ground level is somewhere in the neighborhood of 3-9 kwh/m^2/day, and solar panels are roughly 15% efficient. Let's take the best case scenario, shall we? 9 kwh/m^2/day and 50% efficiency. That means the entire United States would produce...

tada...

4.13 x 10^13 kwh of electricity every day. times 365...

1.42 x 10^16 kwh of electricity every year. roughly.

now, in 1998 the US used 2.523 * 10^13 kwh of power. roughly.

covering the entire united states with 50% effiicient solar panels would meet the energy needs of the entire world. OF course, that would mean no crops, no cities, no nothing, converting the entirety of the energy that hits the surface of the planet from Florida to Alaska would fix it.

Solar is one part of a larger solution, it is not the only one.

[eppur_se_muova]

104. That's a more reasonable response than the post I was responding to.

(But why raise the issue of the US meeting the demands of the entire world? That's a red herring.) Don't forget that US energy demands per capita are much higher than the rest of the world -- I hear figures of 25-30% of the world's energy (people are doing a lot of guessing, I know) used by 5% of the population. So the US is basically a worst case to begin with.

By your numbers, the solar energy falling on ~3000 sq mi, or a 55 mile square (~8,100 km^2, or ~0.175% of US area), is equal to the total US need. We can't harvest that with 100% efficiency, but the real point of my post was that that is our ultimate upper bound on *renewable* energy. Some of that energy will go into making the wind blow, some into evaporating water, and some can be harvested more directly. But there's 60 times more energy there than what we're using, so it's not a pipe dream -- it is a serious, but realistic, technological challenge. If we had put as much money, conviction, time, effort, and lives, into developing renewable energy technologies as we have into fossil fuels, we would be SO much closer to that goal now. And if we had made some fairly modest efforts to curb energy comsumption, we would be even closer.

I agree with you that "Solar is one part of a larger solution, it is not the only one" as long as you are talking about direct solar. But my post was to point out that hydro and wind are ultimately solar power too. To see how much total *renewable* energy is available under best possible circumstances we only need to consider how much energy comes from the sun. Once nonrenewables are in short supply that is the budget we need to try to live within. (Actually, there is probably more available than suggested by your numbers, since much wind/convection is generated by heat absorbed in the atmosphere. The numbers you give, which are actually a little higher than the ones I found, are for sunlight at the surface. Also, energy absorbed by the ocean accounts for much of the rainfall which generates hydro power, as well as wind power, which may be harvested on land or sea.) So I'm giving a long-term, broad-view analysis here, not assuming some particular current technology is IT.

(edit to slide a decimal point over)

[northzax]

108. see, I think there is less energy

since if everything that hits the eearth is absorbed, there will be much less energy stored in wind and or/hydro. you can calculate, fairly easily, the sum total that hits the earth, and it is significantly less than the amount required to bring the entire world population up to US standards, even if 100% efficiency was attainted (at which point weather would almost cease) the fact remains that there is not enough energy entering the globe to sustain us, solar and wind power are adjuncts to tide us over until other sources are found.

and remember, hydro power kills fish, and changes local climates in some places, it's not a panacea.

[eppur_se_muova]

111. Energy which is absorbed is re-radiated as heat, not all "lost".

But I wasn't proposing to absorb ALL the sunlight on earth anyway! I think this is the big fallacy that people have to get over -- there is no *reasonable* plan to maintain our energy expenditure at current levels into the forseeable future, or to increase our energy-harvesting ability to the maximum (theoretically) possible. We have to stop acting like there is. Certainly there is not the remotest possibility of "bring{ing} the entire world population up to US standards" -- I've never heard anyone suggest that we should, and it would be insanity to even consider it, if by "standards" you mean that everyone will consume as much energy per capita as we do. The earth will not bear that. US energy usage is incredibly wasteful -- and by that I mean that not only do we use inefficient technologies, but that we wantonly squander energy through bad choices -- driving a huge SUV where a smaller car would do the job, investing vast resources in infrastructure to support our "everybody-drives-his-own-car" lifestyle rather than mass transit, huge consumption of "disposable" plastic and paper goods, poorly insulated buildings, etc. etc. I'm not sure the rest of the world wants to live that way -- I suspect a fair portion of the world frowns at it. Yes, they want to live "comfortable" lives, even lives of relative abundance, but not live like wastrels.

As long as oil products are supported by gov't subsidies, tax breaks and writeoffs, not to mention the power of the entire US military, they will look like the cheapest resource, of the options available. It's not that other options aren't available. It's that the price of oil is held artificially low vs the alternatives. And as long as oil is held "cheap" the impetus to conserve is supressed. Last I heard, we had allotted some $440 billion (known costs, YMMV) to the Iraq war, supposedly to keep our supplies of oil secure. What if we had spent that same amount to improve the efficiencies of technologies at home? We might very well be able to get by on a much smaller oil supply, which would mean we would not be so entangled in ME politics, and particularly not so beholden to the Saudis.

(I'm not a fan of hydro, just included it to complete the list, and because we are using dams already -- in some parts of the country theirs is a huge portion of the energy available. I grew up in TVA country myself. But I read Marc Reisner's "Cadillac Desert" and it pretty well turned me off to dams.)

[jpak]

113. LOL!!! Read posts 35 and 59

I posted numbers alright.

Lots of MW and kWh for renewables and 0 MW and 0 kWh for new nucular between now and 2016...

[glitch]

66. Your numbers never include the total cost of nuclear, which should include

cradle to grave: all the way from the billions in subsidies nuclear has already received through the cost of clean up of existing waste sights to safe storage and disposal of the future waste it will generate.

Why is that?

Perhaps because including all the costs make nuclear far less attractive.

[jpak]

69. Those costs are pretty substantial

Decommissioning a *single* uranium mine in Utah will cost taxpayers $0.45 billion.

The three Mile Island accident cost PA ratepayers $1 billion.

Disposing of depleted UF6 accumulated at US uranium enrichment plants will cost taxpayers $4 billion.

Decommissioning the defunct commercial reprocessing plant in West Valley NW will cost taxpayers $8 billion.

Decommissioning existing US nuclear plants will cost $23 billion.

Nuclear utility lawsuits pending against the DOE for not disposing of the spent fuel they created and made a profit on could cost tax payers $56 billion.

Yucca Mountain will cost >$65 billion with taxpayers picking up most of the tab.

And stranded costs for the 110 nucular reactors canceled in the US over the last 30 years will cost rate payers between $112-500 billion.

The total "hidden costs" of nucular power in the US are somewhere between ~$270-650 billion.

Such a deal.

[NNadir]

71. The cost of so called "nuclear waste" is trivial, cradle to the grave.

The cost of global climate change is beyond comprehension. The cost of fossil fuel subsidies has destroyed our country.

In fact, nuclear energy represent the only source of energy for which "cradle to the grave" numbers can be assessed in any way.

If spent nuclear fuel - which by the way has yet to injure a single person - is to be assessed, one must recognize that the accumulated nuclear material represent 50 years of nuclear power. I defy anyone to show me where someone might put 50 years of fossil fuel waste. There is no such place. The atmosphere of the planet is that place.

If so called "nuclear waste" cost $200 billion dollars - and in spite of what you hear such a figure is pure nonsense - the annualized cost comes to 4 billion dollars a year, or about 2 days worth of oil imports.

A coal plant puts more waste in a single day that a nuclear plant puts out in a lifetime, and that waste is not solid and cannot be contained. From a mass balance standpoint, from a fluidity standpoint, the case should be obvious but some people think it is ethical to ignore fossil fuel wastes (and for that matter, renewable energy wastes) because they heard on TV that so called "nuclear waste" is "dangerous." Here's something to contemplate: Something is dangerous when it hurts some one. No one has been injured by the storage of spent fuel.

Let me repeat that: No one.

When you have a figure for the cost, cradel to the grave, of fossil fuels, come back and let me know what it is. I'd love to hear it.

I note that the fossil fuel subsidy this year alone is well more than 200 billion dollars - and it is being taken out of the pockets of our children, and our grandchildren, and our great-grandchildren.

There is no such thing as risk free energy. There is only risk minimized energy. That energy is nuclear energy.

[glitch]

74. If costs are so trivial why does the nuclear industry insist we taxpayers

pick them up? And won't any insurance company insure nuclear power plants? Why do we the taxpayers have to carry that risk as well?

[NNadir]

75. Um, who picks up your fossil fuel subsidy bill?

Who insures your lungs against death by air pollution?

Do you have any idea of how much the oil war is costing you, both morally and financially?

Who pays the health costs of the risks of coal? Black lung? People incapacitated by air pollution? Deaths from lung cancer?

Do you have any idea how much it costs you when children ingest and breathe mercury from coal plants? Education costs? Loss of productivity? Eroded intellect?

The anti-nuclear case that suddenly thinks that waste should be a matter of importance when the so called "waste" is radioactive is what I call "nuclear exceptionalism." It pretends that since people ignore the risks of the fossil fuels, and focus on the tiny risks of nuclear energy, the risks of fossil fuels are acceptable.

That is self delusion and pure nonsense.

Here's some news: Global climate change is real. It's not a game. And it's going to cost you and every other taxpayer, indeed every citizen of the planet, more than you will ever be in a position to pay.

The situation is crystal clear, as clear as a lake outside a nuclear power plant, nuclear power is the safest form of energy there is. I get so tired of repeating this obvious fact.

The matter has been well documented over at the Environmental & Energy forum. Why not come over and contemplate the nine billion times I have to link to the www.externe.info website.

Oh, and by the way, anyone who had insured nuclear power plants in the United States would have gathered billions of dollars in premiums over the last thirty years and paid zero in claims. It doesn't always happen that insurance executive know shit about science. In fact, they know next to zero. After all these are the same people who did insure Florida, a part of the world that is paying hell for global climate change. Oh, yeah, you are paying for that too.

The same people who rant against capitalism all the time suddenly become big admirers of the insurance industry when the subject of nuclear energy comes up, as if suddenly the insurance industry is all knowing. No, they are not all knowing. They are retards, not quite as retarded as the American populace in general, but way up there.

[jpak]

78. Nuclear power is a GOP Scam perpetrated on the American Tax and Rate-payer

ChimpCo's Nucular Giveaway Program will fuck taxpayers out of $12 billion.

...and the owners of these plants will charge consumers between 113-170 billion dollars for the electricity produced over their 40 year lifespan.

...and taxpayers would have to spend more of their tax dollars to dispose of the spent fuel generated.

...and someone would have to have this waste buried against their will in their backyard...

...and no existing or planned coal-fired plants will be shut or canceled as the result of this program.

Not one.

So how does this benefit the American people????

It doesn't - the only ones benefiting from this scam are the Friends of Deadeye Dick.

If that amount of money was given to homeowners for $20K PV arrays, it would provide *clean* PV power for more than 6 million American homes.

Who would this benefit from this??? (not any deep-pocket GOP Cronies)

Power To The People - Right On....

[NNadir]

84. Sorry but I don't agree.

Saying "Cheney" over and over and over and "$12 billion" over and over and over does not eliminate the cost of global climate change and fossil fuels.

I wish that it could, but such wind power is basically useless.

Japan put over 4600 MWe of new nuclear capacity on line in 2005 and believe it or not Dick Cheney had nothing to do with it.

All people on earth benefit by realistic solutions to global climate change. It is a serious business and not a game for ridiculous chanting.

I submit again, that the waste from fossil fuels, which is dumped without any regard to future generations, which cannot be controlled by any physical means because of its huge mass and because it is represented as a gas (and therefore high volume as well as high mass).

Spent nuclear fuel on the other hand, is a dense solid with relatively low mass. Since most of its elements are insoluble, it is not much of a problem at all, which accounts for the fact that no one has ever died from the storage of so called "nuclear waste."

The recitation of Dick Cheney's name has nothing to do with the laws of physics. The laws of physics, which include units of energy - for the purposes of significant industrial energy, exajoules - will be unchanged by Dick Cheney's death.

All of humanity, myself included, benefit by the nuclear power plants built 20 years ago. The amount of carbon dioxide prevented each year through the agency of nuclear energy. It is relatively easy to show that the 9.1 exajoules of electricity produced by nuclear power (27 exajoules of primary energy) represents about three quarters of a billion metric ton of carbon dioxide not dumped into the atmosphere, land and water. (Land and water refer to coal ash and volatilized heavy metals released by coal.) The cost of this largely unrestricted uncontrolled dumping by the fossil fuel industry is impossible to calculate. Major habitats are being destroyed worldwide by global climate change, and the number of ultimate deaths are likely to number in the hundreds of millions, if not billions.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/table27.xls

Over the last 20 years nuclear energy has prevented the addition of 12.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. (1TJ of coal heat = 25.4 metric tons of carbon, carbon dioxide to carbon ratio = 44/12.) This accounts for the concentration of carbon dioxide being reduced about 4 ppm than it other wise have been.

http://www.northwoods.org.uk/c/home/guidance_&_information/biomass_conversion_tables

The matter of global climate change is somewhat bigger than pedestrian paranoid attempts to apply the logical fallacy "guilt by association" to try to generate a silly equation Nuclear Power = Dick Cheney. Today's link - and I seem to need to repeat a description of logic and thinking every day - to this particular logical fallacy has a gem:

For example the following is obviously a case of poor "reasoning": "You think that 1+1=2. But, Adolf Hitler, Charles Manson, Joseph Stalin, and Ted Bundy all believed that 1+1=2. So, you shouldn't believe it."

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/guilt-by-association.html

I liiiiiiiiiiiiike it! :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

Dick Cheney sucks and all that but in the broad scale of things Dick Cheney will not be remembered at all in any positive way for his position with respect to nuclear power, which might have offset some portion of his criminal reign. Basically this is because all the bad he did in hyping "uranium" to get his oil war, which further strung out the minds of credulous Americans about all things nuclear. None of this will outweigh his failure to overturn the COL process that dates to to 1990's that allows nuclear power to give us the best chance we have to save ourselves.

In any case, irrespective of US domestic policies and the poor thinking skills of some Americans, the need for nuclear energy is widely understood worldwide. Worldwide, by consensus, the anti-nuclear argument has been rejected as absurd as the effects of global climate change become more graphic. The world is now planning to built tens of exajoules of new nuclear capacity, a number that is sure to grow rapidly in the near future.

[jpak]

85. Sorry, support Cheney's nucular power give-away program

and you support Cheney's nucular power give-away program.

No logical fallacy required.

[bvar22]

101. Lets play "Spot the Logical Fallacy "

You were running on about Logical Fallacies above.
See if you can spot the Logical fallacy:

1)"Something is dangerous when it hurts some one."
2)"No one has been injured by the storage of spent fuel."

3)Therefore.....what?


Trivia Quiz:
Q) No one was EVER injured by the production of electricity from a nuclear reaction until what event?

[MH1]

73. For what it's worth...

Your excessive repetition of "Boo!" is not making your posts any more compelling. Something about "tantrums" and "grownups" upthread seems to fit somewhere here....

[eppur_se_muova]

87. One should look at FACTS as well as NUMBERS.

Virtually all life on earth is totally dependent on a continuous flux of solar energy. (Exceptions: a handful of "black smoker" biomes near the mid-oceanic ridges.) LIfe on earth has survived for billions of years based on nothing BUT solar energy. Turn off the sun, and life dies.

All the power produced by wind power is there because heat from the sun causes air to move from warm areas, where air is expanding and rising, to cold areas, where air is contracting and falling. The returning cold air is heated again, so the atmosphere moves in great recirculating cells. Turn off the sun, and the wind stops.

All the power produced by hydropower is there because water, evaporated by solar heat, is carried by wind (caused by the sun) to higher elevations and returned as rain. Turn off the sun, and the rivers stop.

All of the coal, oil, and natural gas we burn for fuel is there because plants, using the energy of the sun, converted CO2 to biomass which eventually became trapped in sedimentary deposits and, under heat and pressure, converted to the fuels we use today. Only a TINY FRACTION of the biomass on the planet at any one time is likely to be converted to fossil fuel. Most is (eventually) broken down by microorganisms. The total coal, oil and gas reserves of this planet, accumulated even over hundreds of millions of years, represent a TINY FRACTION of the solar energy which has fallen on this planet. No sun --> no fossil fuels.

Energy sources NOT derived from sunlight: nuclear, tidal, and geothermal power. Should we restrict ourselves to those options?

So the evidence in favor of solar energy is that it HAS and DOES meet the energy demands of all the living organisms on earth, with the exception of humans, who have taught themselves to demand too much. Fortunately, learning is a reversible process.

An exajoule is not really that impressive a deal. Add up x per person for a population of a quarter billion and you'll get a large value of x. Only the simple-minded are put off by that trick. Calculate the amount of solar energy which falls on this country every year. That's a big number. The bottleneck is finding ways to trap it efficiently, and that's where spending a $billion or so could make a real difference. Photovoltaics may or may not be the "best" answer; IMHO the "best" answer will depend on time, place, and purpose, so the "best" approach is the most flexible one. And that means not throwing out options just because someone childishly said "boo".

[northzax]

97. I did add it up, in post 95

as you can read. the numbers simply don't add up. switch-grass is a more efficient absorber of sunlight than anything else we have come up with.

We would have to cover .1% of the entire suface area of the country with 50% efficient solar panels to get to our 1998 consumption levels. for the record, that would be half of the entire area of the US currently devoted to agriculture. think about that.

[eppur_se_muova]

105. I responded to post 95.

And I get an even larger number than 0.1%. But I think your number on ag must be way off. That would be a square only ~135 km (82 mi) on a side. That's not even one big county.

[northzax]

107. my number on Agriculture came from the CIA world factbook

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/fields/2097.html which states that .22% of the US land area is used for permanent crops. Remember, the US inculdes Alaska, which is roughly 33% of the land (half the size of the lower 48) skews the numbers a bit.

[eppur_se_muova]

114. PERMANENT crops...I might have been picturing grazing land as well.

That STILL sounds small. I'm wondering what their definition of a "permanent" crop is. Probably excludes a lot.

Besides, we all know how unreliable the CIA is ... that's why Unca Dick needed two guys in a Pentagon office to do the "real" intelligence work for him.:evilfrown:

The USDA gives total US "harvested cropland" as about 10 M acres, or 40,000 km^2, or about 0.44% of total land area. Again, do they consider range/ranch land or not? Not clear. Still, I think the number given for solar harvesting (not necessarily assuming PV!) is much smaller than this. Probably less than the total area of rooftops in US.
http://www.nass.usda.gov/Charts_and_Maps/Farms_and_Land_in_Farms/fncht6.asp

[northzax]

117. maybe permanent crops include

things like orchards? Probably not occaisional grazing land, that's gotta be a couple of percent. Maybe, as a thought, it is simply land under permanent cultivation, private farms? Remember, there is a hell of a lot of the country that is not used for anything 'economic'

And the Factbook is put together by actual CIA professionals, not political hacks, which is why I tend to trust the numbers, once you tease out what, exactly, they mean by them.

[eppur_se_muova]

118. the Factbook is put together by actual CIA professionals...

Sorry, should have chosen the sarcasm smiley for that para.

[northzax]

120. well, since one of them is my college roommate

I don't think a smiley is neccesary.

no, his position is not classified, or I wouldn't make this level of hint about it.

[eppur_se_muova]

112. So...you never watched "Who shot Mr. Burns"?

"Since the dawn of time, Man has yearned to destroy the Sun!":evilgrin:

[northzax]

96. uranium is running out?

why didn't someone tell me that one of the most common elements in the crust of the earth is being expended? what's next, we're running out of Nickel? or Silicon?

Uranium is incredibly common.

[SnoopDog]

18. I think the point of the original post is...

The USA is spending 1 trillion dollars for bombs and bullets, caring for the injuries from this illegal war, and tax cuts for millionaires.

And we, as Americans, get nothing for that 1 trillion.

So if we had this money to spend as we want, we could make half the households in America energy independent.

This is hugely significant.

And the Solar Industry has not failed, it is the failure of our government and proponents of 'recurring' energy costs that has failed not only America but the world.

[Old and In the Way]

23. How much of that $400BB a year defense budget subsidizes oil energy?

seems to me, rediverting a significantportion of that money into renewable/alternative energy is a much better ROI on our national security/defense.

[LaPera]

24. Fuck, did you miss the point!!!

The cutting of all alternative energy research programs, start up programs, investments in... the trillions that were given and went to oil, gas, coal, nuclear, corporations for their explorations instead...The media(MSM) pounding away for years into people's minds that alternative energy can't meet future energy needs, over & over again, until the gullible, keep repeating the oil, coal & nuclear industries mantra...

The gutting of all alternative energy programs (taking away) trillions in incentive programs, that undoubtedly would of produced huge strides if the trillions of dollars were put forth...

Reagan, Bush, Clinton & Bush have done little or nothing but gut, trash and or abolished clean energy and alternative energy programs over the years for obvious reasons...

And then there are those who still want to make the comparisons to the polluting huge profiting energy to the purposely underfunded & gutted clean alternative energy for the past 28 years (2008 and beyond).

[NNadir]

34. No, I got the point.

I just used the opportunity to inject a dollop of reality.

Nobody likes the oil war. All reasonable people oppose the war. It is murder and it is theft. All reasonable people are concerned about the global climate change crisis.

I am a pro-nuclear environmental activist. People often "confront" me when I do my speil with the wishful thinking that goes like this "solar energy will save the day." People have been trained like Pavlov's dogs to think that the purpose of renewable energy should be to eliminate nuclear energy even though nuclear energy is the safest continuously available scalable form of energy known.

The "solar energy will save the day" fantasy is part of the reason we are still dependent of very dangerous fossil fuels and is a part of the reason we are in Iraq. That is the point I am making.

[jpak]

37. Nuclear is the fantasy (of the GOP and Lyndon LaRouche)

and renewables are the only *sustainable* energy technologies available to power the US economy in the 21st Century and beyond.

period

:bounce:

[NNadir]

43. Boo!

Exajoule! Boo!

We are all dying for 10 exajoules of renewable energy and given the magnitude of global climate change, dying would be the right word.

People make all kinds of predictions about the arrival of Jesus too, but he never comes either. If prayer and dogma could solve our problems, we wouldn't have problems, but it seems we do, glaciers disappearing and all of that.

Do you know anything about glaciers?

Boo! Exajoule!

All the renewable industry has to do to be taken seriously is to produce. No one is trying to stop it. Everybody is cheering it on. Why then is it so difficult? Let me guess. Laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaroooooooooooche. :eyes:

Why all the confusion between energy itself and words about energy? Wouldn't it be more convincing to produce energy (the unit of significant energy being the exajoule - boo!) than to talk endlessly, trying to shout down reality by shouting "period!."

Like renewables, it isn't working.

Sorry bub, but the period in which the renewable energy scam had to prove itself is fifty years long now, and we're six years into the 21st century. So if you're talking about the 21st century you're a little late.

Here it is, again:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/table17.xls The conversion between billion kilowatt-hours and exajoules (boo!) is still 3.6 X 10¹⁵. It's a constant. You can look it up.

It still ain't happening the solar nirvana, and I ain't betting my kid's lives on anybody's tired boring religion.

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

[Jose Diablo]

39. Maybe I am reading your math wrong

But shouldn't it be 191,000,000,000 watts in your formula? Or was that a typo?

Or maybe put another way it like this: Roughly $5/watt = 200 Gigawatts times roughly 5 sunlight hours in a day should be about a terawatt hour of electricity work provided by a 200Gw solar array.

What is our daily consumption of electrical energy?

[eppur_se_muova]

106. He wrote it right the first time, and the final answer is correct.

He just copied it down wrong in the next line.

[eppur_se_muova]

100. I suspect the point is not that we could have spent $1T on CURRENT tech..

but that we could have invested some of that money in research to improve current technologies and get more efficient recovery of solar and wind power. The field right now is back where microprocessors were 10-15 years ago -- lots of room to move up.

BTW, I notice you are assuming in your calc'n that ONLY photovoltaics be considered -- that's where that $5.32 comes from (also average, 40% above cheapest value quoted).

[yourout]

115. self delete.

eom

[greenman3610]

9. sorry, that's BS

http://www.oilendgame.com/

has a credible strategy for transforming this
economy to non carbon energy for about
20 billion a year over a decade or two.

[jpak]

13. To put it another way

a trillion dollars would buy a 500 million Sun Frost refrigerator/freezers that use only ~250 kWh of electricity per year (as opposed to 800-1500 kWh per year for older models).

or 166 billion 14 watt compact fluorescent light bulbs...

or 43 million Priuses (Priusii???)...

etc...

[Old and In the Way]

38. Thanks, interesting site information.

This page is interesting. Looks like the Dept of Energy stopped reporting the cost of energy (kh) in June, 2001. Hmmm, I wonder why? That'd be about the time Dick was having his secret energy meetings....

http://www.solarbuzz.com/SolarPrices.htm

[Gregorian]

68. Well I'll be damned.

First, thanks for the nice website.

I totally assumed that a trillion would have made us independant of oil. Wrong I was.

You opened my eyes. However, solar is still in it's infancy. It's just beginning to grow up and find an efficiency worthy of investing in.

But even so, I can see that with double the efficiency, we are still a long ways off. And we can't even begin to address energy issues that are not addressable by solar. Like trucking.

Thanks. I've gotten too full of truthiness.

[joshcryer]

80. The Earth recieves over 5 million exajoules.

Certainly if manufacturing solar power was cheaper it would be quite easy to tap. Take that trillion dollars and research CHEAPER and MORE EFFECTIVE solar, and maybe you'll be on to something. :)

Little known fact. Solar power has recieved the least research and development of all other energy sources in the last 30 years. Nuclear itself has recieved more than all other approaches combined.

[SnoopDog]

4. Approximately 50,000,000 roof top solar energy systems...

$20,000 a piece.... (did I do my math right?)

And an end to many coal and nuke plants....

[jpak]

7. That's about half the homes in the US....

n/t

[SnoopDog]

8. Correct....

And think how many new jobs being created thus allowing more people to put up solar... what a concept.

Oh, then add in that our air and soil would be cleaner (no coal/nuke plants) - thus hopefully reducing health care costs.

Why is evil prevailing in this day and age?

[ladjf]

11. All indications are that the price of solar energy production

is falling dramatically. It's likely that within 10 years, the cost may be down to 10% of present costs.

[jpak]

5. At the current *retail* price - $5 per W(p): Solar (PV) = 200,000 MW

Wind @ the current price: $1000 per kW = 1,000,000 MW

[Jose Diablo]

40. No shit, somebody missed a set of zero's

Think a little more about that $5/watt. How much of that retail price represents profit to the oil companies that have bought into solar? Would you say the actual cost to produce the solar array is about $2.5/watt. I would.

With the new eminent domain laws, passed by the Republicans no less, in their efforts to rip-off and privatize the 'commons', it should be a simple thing to take the ownership of all manufacturing of solar arrays for the 'greater good'.

Let the oil companies put that in their pipes and smoke it.

[paparush]

10. Yeah, but WTF are we gonna do with all the lead acid batteries?

Gotta store that energy somplace, mon. Or, are we just gonna feed it all back into the existing grid?

[ladjf]

12. Lead acid batteries are on the way out.

[jpak]

14. You mean like the batteries in the 130 million cars

69 million light trucks, and 1.2 million heavy trucks on the road in the US today????

[Jose Diablo]

41. Yes, good observation

I would suggest a gravity system, take the excess solar electrical energy and pump water from the oceans uphill to lined storage lakes, then release the water through the same pumps to harness it's potential energy created by the nature of its elevation above sea level. Just like at the Niagara Falls power station, but on a much much larger scale.

We are talking scale here, not your everyday residential/commercial photovoltiac generating system. Think BIG. Remember when we do things on a government scale, humans become like gods.

Edit: As an added benefit, imagine someplace close to the west coast, say Nevada in the middle of a desert. With ocean water pumped in and impounded at altitude, there will be evaporation, and rain downwind. Maybe new forests that would cool what once was a hot desolate expanse of wilderness. A form of weather modification as the earth adjusts to our presence. Maybe more land can become productive in producing food to feed us.

If we can imagine it, we can make it real. This is the power of humans to see what doesn't exist and then make what we see into reality. It's really just a matter of doing it.

[Old and In the Way]

46. Republicans hate people like you.

you think. I had an argument about this with a Republican friend. The 'market' is more efficient and can do this better than government. Yeah, right. Big Oil, a monopoly if there ever was one, will climb the supply curve to maximize profits to the last drop. Since when do they give a shit about our commonwealth?

[skids]

15. Wind.

...is currently running about $2 per peak watt (a little less) in large installations with current technology. Capacity loading is typically around 30%. So 1 trillion would get you an averaged 150,000 megawatts,
(for 1,314,000,000 Megawatt hours per year) That would be such a signifigant chunk of energy proportional to our overall electrical demand that base/peak loading issues would come into play, however. Probably for base load you'd be best off diverting some of that to tidal/wave. Storage systems would also be an option.

For reference 150,000 MW would replace about 150 coal power plants.

[Old and In the Way]

20. So why aren't Democrats jumping on this mesage?

Republicans are tied to Big Oil. Big Oil means war withut end and no real long term solution. Every Democrat should be contrasting a different vision for America, one that invests in a decentralized energy economy that will create jobs and buffer our national security from the politics and culture of the ME.

We are where we are today because the House of Bush put their financial interests ahead of America.....Bush/Reagan dismantled the Department of Energy after they took power in 1980. Their "Morning in America" has transitioned into "evening in America". That's the real treason.

[happydreams]

21. Just a thought but Carter was destroyed

when he broke the faith with Big Oil. It's almost like trying to reduce defense spending.

[jpak]

26. They should and it would be a powerful message

If Democrats proposed a $5000 federal solar/wind rebate (paid for by the $7 billion in oil and gas royalties that ChimpCo recently gave away) AND increased homeowner solar tax credits from $1000 to $5000 - the voters would eat it up.

It could fund 1.4 million solar installations a year - and empower American families (not Big Energy).

Call it the Family Energy Ownership Society Initiative

...as opposed to ChimpCo's $12 billion in taxpayer subsidies to build 6 new nuclear power plants (that would charge taxpayers the highest rate possible for the power generated and billions more to dispose of the spent fuel), billions in tax breaks to Big Oil (at a time of record oil profits at consumers expense) and Big Coal...

[Old and In the Way]

28. Centralizing our energy choices is the Republican way.

Not only is it bad for the consumer, it is a national security risk.

[SnoopDog]

42. The only way America and the world will survive is to use ..

..renewable energy.

These sources are solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal energy sources.

The absolute fundamental reason why wind and PV Solar are not on every roof top is because of our government and the energy corporations. This includes the nuke and coal energy.

With wind and solar energy, these energy companies cannot get their recurring monthly energy income. It is that plain and simple. They force us to use their energy sources so that they can get a monthly check.

The nuke folks think it is soooo cool to receive billions in federal aid and build these reactors to split the atom for heat. And, who cares about the nuclear waste - that is something they don't care about. Or if there is some radiation leaks - we all have to die somehow - right? It is so sexy to divide an atom in half, to have all those dials and switches and reaction rods and containment centers and control rooms.

And all that rocket science to burn coal, coat the earth with mercury, to waste millions of gallons of water for 'cooling', to pollute the air for some 'electric'.

No, once a solar array is installed and either grid tied or with batteries, no more dependence on an energy company. Of course this will not fly. How will these pricks make their millions if not by recurring coal and nuke energy monthly payments.

They, government and energy businesses and advocates, are trading our health, our clean environment, our independence on energy, our children's and our earth's survival for a dollar they can put in their pocket.

One thing that totally astonishes me is that all these evil criminals in office and the brain dead proponents of energy that kills is that it also ruins and destroys their own place they call home.

It is totally an archaic thought to use dirty energy when there are alternatives that would literally save the earth and us.

Side note: 100,000,000 homes x $100 per month x 12 months is how much money could be saved each year if solar arrays were on every roof top. (Fill in your own monthly electric payment)

[Old and In the Way]

45. If a trillion dollars were invested by the government to make us

energy dependent in a decade, the cost of manufacturing would go waaay down as technology and competition entered the market. Thrown in 1/2 the annual defense budget that we spend protecting the shipping lanes for oil companies and war-without-end and thats another trillion dollars over 10 years. We'd be 1/2 way there now. In a booming economy, too.

[SnoopDog]

48. I totally concure...

We are so bogged down with archaic thoughts of the basic requirements of energy. We are held hostage by those you force the world to utilize energy sources that eventually will kill the world.

We need to transform our basic way of thinking in this respect, to once and for all remove the capitalistic requirement for energy. Our life depends on a clean environment and the current energy sources are and will be the primary cause for our extinction.

And we have the means to accomplish this task - yes a technology 50 years old but held hostage to the all mighty dollar.

[Old and In the Way]

50. I consider it treason.

When the end of US History is written, the chapter will begin in the early 60's.....and history will show our downfall began with the rise of the House of Bush who were cutting oil deals with the Sauds. If we had followed Carter's lead, we'd be energy dependent today and we wouldn't be draining young American blood in the ME as the payment for this treason.

[SnoopDog]

52. We must be near the same age...

Yes the real downfall of America started in the year 1963. From 1963 to 2000, America had basic honor and ethics but stood stagnate in real progress for humanity. Some presidents did better than most - cause America to at least advance in economic and environmental steps, some presidents were very average, and some presidents harmed America.

But no real progress in humanity occurred. Sure we got the PC and fancier electronics and the like. But no real human progress events. We still have smog. Our water is not pure and our lands and bodies are filled with chemicals. No hugh advancements in transportation or energy. The Hoover dam seems to be the last United States wide accomplishment.

Now, since 2000 and Bush, our America is being destroyed before our very eyes by sinister men and women you just want death. Their own insecurity, their own inferiority are taking the entire country down, if not the world.

I see it happening. I know it is happening. I see these people drill the holes in our wooden boat - yet we stand and watch as the water begins to accumulate on the bottom of the boat.

[Old and In the Way]

54. The Selling Out of America.

Republicans have been short selling this country for years. It's like a hostile takeover and the country is being broken up and the the assets sold off to the highest bidder.

[glitch]

65. 1980 was the true turning point. I felt it in my gut then, and nothing

has changed that since. RFKjr calls this lot "businessmen treating our country like a company in liquidation" and he is absolutely correct.
The bright side is more and more people see this reality, and awareness can turn it around.

[jpak]

67. Yes Reagan and the '80's GOP Congress screwed us good

They eliminated federal solar tax credits and cut R&D for renewables and conservation to the bone.

Clinton and the last Dem Congress reinstated some PV R&D funding - that the Gingrich Impeachment Congress then cut.

And mo-rans wonder why solar "hasn't advanced" in the last 30 years....

[glitch]

83. And then sneer because the industries that have been heavily subsidized,

like nuclear and oil, whose costs have been externalized, appear more cost effective. :eyes:

[joshcryer]

81. Basically, that is exactly what would happen.

Solar hasn't been touched from an R&D perspective (go to the IEA website and check out R&D stats), it has recieved less than 5% over the last 30 years (nuclear has recieved well over 50%). The technology isn't being researched because if it existed there would be no monopoly for the energy companies, energy would be free.

[Free the Press]

44. Did you miss CNN's recent report on the high cost of energy alternatives?

It was a great excuse for America to stick to its addiction to oil!

[Lorien]

58. And yet wind and solar are the energy options of choice in many

remote African villages. I know this because there was a report done on a large solar company based here in Florida (the perfect place for solar energy). The company CEO said that less than 10% of their sales are domestic-most come from third world countries. :eyes:

[Old and In the Way]

47. How about some nominations?

Isn't this the kind of core platform vision that Democrats need to coalesce around?

Republicans = Big Oil = War without end = dead end
Democrats = Decentralized (Renewable/Alternative energy) = jobs = future for our kids.

[SnoopDog]

49. Just did even before your post!

Thanks for your inspiring thread....

[rman]

55. We're on the verge of a technical breakthrough re solar electrical power

involving nano technology, which would greatly increase efficiency.

What we need is investment in research.
And time.

http://www.nanotech-now.com/news.cgi?story_id=10497

[markam]

56. Wind and Solar

will not do diddly (I believe that is the technical term) for our current problem, which is peak oil. We will need a replacement liquid fuel which provides the energy equivalent of 10 million barrels/day of gasoline, or our economy, our standard of living, our way of life, and our population crashes and burns.

This replacement doesn't exist and will never exist.

That trillion dollars (along with all highway money) should have been spent on railroads, light rail systems and high density housing near cities. Those, along with a big wrecking ball to every exburb in the country could save us.

[Old and In the Way]

57. I agree, we ought to have more light rail options.

I live up in the boonies, on the edge of the Great North Woods here in Maine. A looong time ago, they had rail service that went through town. They ripped out the tracks about 10 years ago. A real shame. If that option was available, I could take the train to Dover, NH where my business office is located. It's a 2 minute walk from the Amtrack station there. Instead of going 1-2x a month, I'd probably go a lot more frequently...and could get work done instead of driving for 3+ hours.

[Old and In the Way]

61. kick....do I have to beg for 1 more recommendation?

[jpak]

62. R'd and K'd

n/t

[Old and In the Way]

70. Thanks jpak!

I'm not interested in tooting my own horn, but I think this is a subject that Democrats need to grok and understand how Republican special interests have contributed to our declining options in developing an energy policy, indepependent of Big Oil. It is a position that can reverb positively with the entire country, regardless of political affiliation.

[SnoopDog]

63. Just to reiterate how important it is to point out that...

your original thread is saying "One trillion dollars for death and destruction and tax cuts for millionaires and nothing to gain from it" or "what else could we have bought for one trillion dollars".

To purchase 50,000,000 rooftop solar systems buys not only power for these households, but cleans the environment, promotes a healthy citizenship, and places an average of $100/month into the pockets of the homeowner to spend as they desire.

[TygrBright]

64. I don't know about wind and solar...

...as the "only" alternatives to fossil fuels. Where I live now (NM,) a very modest investment in wind and solar would reap huge benefits, as we have a reliable abundance of both. But where I used to live, in MD, there were long periods when neither could be relied upon.

However, if you took that trillion and invested it in researching a *variety* of alternative sources, appropriate for different geographical/geophysical/climatological circumstances, and making the alternatives commercially viable, we'd probably be able to ditch fossil fuels inside of a couple decades.

And if you just took that trillion and invested it in ways to reduce energy usage altogether (more efficient buildings, equipment, mass transit, etc.,) I bet we could HALVE our fossil fuel usage or better, within the same period.

Either way, it's a better investment than spending it on death and destruction to preserve access to a dwindling supply of oil.

sadly,
Bright

[CarlSheeler4U]

82. Sheeler A No Shit Comment

The real question ought to be - despite being in the minority, why was there so little opposition when this occuring and are we still re-eletcing and selecting these types of Democrats into office? If so, why?

More importantly, we can Bitch about it or start the common sense approach and start really exploring what alternatives are available in more salient ways.

Carl
Sheeler for US Senate
www.carlsheeler.com

[Old and In the Way]

86. I hope you'll lead on this issue, Carl.

I remember seeing Clinton on Letterman talking about this. Decentralizing energy is good for the economy and our national security. It's a winning issue and it would present a viable alternative to the oil addicts who are doing nothing to prepare us for a post-peak oil world.

[CarlSheeler4U]

89. It's far reaching and cutting edge and a must for the USA.....

.... I need your help. Pass it on, please!

[banana republican]

88. $1,000 per Kilowatt Hour For a One Time Investment... See the link.

or $1 BN Kilowatt hours...

www.windpower.org/en/tour/econ/

[ihelpu2see]

90. sort of off topic, but while driving in CT today not five miles

from my home, a home owner had a very large solar array put up in his back yard. It looks like it was done by a professional. It was two large panels each one 8ft by 10ft I would say. the house was a standard looking raised ranch maybe 2200 sq ft. Could that size solar array power the needs of that house? I have been wondering since my large 12 pitch roof faces south and gets sun a good majority of the day. I would be willing if they could make solar arrays look like standard roofing...

[Old and In the Way]

91. I wonder why they cant design solar cells into shingles.

Seems to be that one could hook them in parallel and in series by mechanical electric connections, maybe via conductive tape. You'd even create a new trade, roofer-electrician or roofician. :-)

[jpak]

94. They have and the Japanese are producing them

as well as other architectural PV devices...

[eppur_se_muova]

99. see my post in another thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=43289&mesg_id=43289

[MadHound]

93. You could fully power aprox 10 million households with 1 trillion dollars

That is aprox one tenth of what is required, but don't be discouraged, it would be a great start.

[SnoopDog]

98. I think your calculations are off...

That is $100,000 per household - way to much. I used $20,000 as the base cost and that turns out to be 50,000,000 homes.

Some areas would cost more, some less and I factored in cost reduction due to volume.

[bvar22]

102. I installed a PV system on my houseboat.

LOVED IT!
The initial cost was in line with that quoted above, about $5.00/Watt.
My system used a series of panels that totaled 750 watts.

One of the unexpected bonuses was that my total use of power dropped by about 1/2.
Having the PV system made me very conscious of my power consumption.
Electricity was no longer an unlimited resource that magically appeared out of an outlet, but a resource that needed to be husbanded and managed.

I sold the boat last year (made some money on the solar installation).
I am now planning a new (even more) energy efficient boat using wind and solar.

Solar isn't the whole answer, but combined with conservation it IS a big piece of the puzzle.

FUCK nuclear.
I would rather do without.

[LaPera]

103. 25 years & they still have no answer what to do with nuclear rods & waste

Except dump it into the Yucca mountains outside of Las Vegas...by rail!

Sounds extremely competent and safe doesn't it?

[BoneDaddy]

109. I was just thinking of...

what would have happened if we spent billions from the 70's on alternative energy and continued to fund it 30 years what we could have come up with to avoid the predicament we are in now. We are still in the infancy of alternative energy re: R and D, I was just thinking that although alt. energy can not sustain the world's energy use, what it will be able to do 50 years from now.

[CarlSheeler4U]

110. How many jobs would a legitimate AE Policy create!

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/2/19/1730/42036

Carl
Sheeler for US Senate
www.carlsheeler.com

Be a patriot and pass the bulletin board link to every person you know and every blog you can and ask the same from them, too.

[yourout]

116. Algae based Biodiesel growing on wastewater....

is showing great promise as a way to reduce demand for DINO diesel.

[eppur_se_muova]

119. Could you post or PM links? I should know this, I don't. nt