The Green Leap Forward

[Speaker to Animals]

It would be nowhere better than now. "Renewable power" does not replace an industrial nation's power grid. I don't know how many people have to explain this to you, some have done so in detail, but for fuck sake it's not the same thing.

Powering your greenhouse is not the same thing as powering a fucking aluminum foundry.

[Montegriffo]

It would be nowhere better than now. "Renewable power" does not replace an industrial nation's power grid. I don't know how many people have to explain this to you, some have done so in detail, but for fuck sake it's not the same thing.

Powering your greenhouse is not the same thing as powering a fucking aluminum foundry.

The UK is running at around 60% renewable or nuclear-powered electricity generation. Only 40% is now fossil fuels and there's plenty more space for offshore wind power. Solar farms are still growing and rooftop panels are everywhere. The technology keeps improving and appliances use less power year on year.
Perfectly possible to generate 100% low carbon electricity.
All it takes is the will to do it and the strength to resist the fossil fuel lobbies.
Might even see it in my lifetime. Coal generation will definitely be gone before I die if I can get another 20 years. We already have coal-free days when the sun shines in the summer and when the wind blows.

[C-Mag]

I'm not opposed to 'Green Energy' , I fucking hate the Green Energy Stasi, and the Gosplan.

The real way to do this is de-centralize and encourage, even subsidize independent local energy. Make it economically advantageous for every home to have micro solar or wind. But the Stasi and Gosplan demand that the central planners and their International Mercantilists are in control and making money from you. I would love to be personally 100% energy independent.

Note: Battery tech, cost and environmental impact is still the biggest constraint in green energy.

[brewster]

I'm not opposed to 'Green Energy' , I fucking hate the Green Energy Stasi, and the Gosplan.

The real way to do this is de-centralize and encourage, even subsidize independent local energy. Make it economically advantageous for every home to have micro solar or wind. But the Stasi and Gosplan demand that the central planners and their International Mercantilists are in control and making money from you. I would love to be personally 100% energy independent.

Note: Battery tech, cost and environmental impact is still the biggest constraint in green energy.

Easy answer is a carbon tax to pay down the national debt. No winners picked, freedom to solve it any way you like, and money going to where everybody benefits. Fact is, had oil just stayed above $120/barrel we'd have a much bigger base of renewables than we have now. There's technologies like cellulosic ethanol that just aren't cost effective (yet) at current oil prices.

[nmoore63]

Big Hydro works.

Until the Greens are willing to put more large hyrdo on the table, then they can't possible be as concerned about climate change as they claim.

https://www.historylink.org/File/7440

The Corps of Engineers identified Pasco as a potential dam site in a master plan adopted in 1932, but the project was given low priority. Not until the 1960s, with the completion of the John Day Dam in southwestern Washington, did the Corps begin preliminary studies for construction of what was to be called the Ben Franklin Dam.

The dam would have generated 3.8 billion kilowatt hours of electricity annually -- equal to eight million barrels of oil -- and it would have opened the upper Columbia to navigation, turning Wenatchee into a port city. But it also would have flooded the Hanford Reach, by then the last undammed segment of the river, flowing 51 miles from the Priest Rapids Dam to the Tri-Cities. The dam's reservoir would have destroyed the few remaining places on the river where chinook salmon, steelhead trout, and other fish can spawn naturally.

[C-Mag]

Big Hydro works.

Until the Greens are willing to put more large hyrdo on the table, then they can't possible be as concerned about climate change as they claim.

https://www.historylink.org/File/7440

I couldn't agree more. But gut Greenies have worked themselves up into a lather on Hydroelectric and don't consider moving water to be Green Energy.

Big Hydro is good, but small hydro needs to be embraced as well. We need to De-Centralize Energy to the greatest extent possible. The amount of energy we are missing out of in our mountainous regions form the Appalachians to the Cascades is ridiculous. All these smaller towns >100,000 people and especially towns >10,000 should have their own Hydroelectric production. The resource is there and was tapped into early in the 20th C. Then Washington rolled in and centralized energy power grids.

Do that, and you could turn Millions of people from users to effective producers of energy. Change the supply and demand. More local jobs, more local independence, more local innovation.

[Montegriffo]

Dams are great for making clean energy (after all the CO2 from the concrete has been balanced) but they can cause serious ecological damage to the local wildlife.
Even tidal power has its drawbacks. The plans for a huge generator in the Severn estuary were shelved, after a public enquiry, over concerns about the loss of wetland habitat.

[Speaker to Animals]

It would be nowhere better than now. "Renewable power" does not replace an industrial nation's power grid. I don't know how many people have to explain this to you, some have done so in detail, but for fuck sake it's not the same thing.

Powering your greenhouse is not the same thing as powering a fucking aluminum foundry.

The UK is running at around 60% renewable or nuclear-powered electricity generation. Only 40% is now fossil fuels and there's plenty more space for offshore wind power. Solar farms are still growing and rooftop panels are everywhere. The technology keeps improving and appliances use less power year on year.
Perfectly possible to generate 100% low carbon electricity.
All it takes is the will to do it and the strength to resist the fossil fuel lobbies.
Might even see it in my lifetime. Coal generation will definitely be gone before I die if I can get another 20 years. We already have coal-free days when the sun shines in the summer and when the wind blows.

Key term there is "or nuclear energy". You are not going to run an industrial nation on solar and wind. Sorry. It's just not going to happen, dude. Get real.

[C-Mag]

Dams are great for making clean energy (after all the CO2 from the concrete has been balanced) but they can cause serious ecological damage to the local wildlife.
Even tidal power has its drawbacks. The plans for a huge generator in the Severn estuary were shelved, after a public enquiry, over concerns about the loss of wetland habitat.

Coastal energy development concerns are hypocrisy. Nations love coastal development with high real estate prices and high taxes to the gov.

I ranted a lot about rebuilding N'Oleans after Katrina. We should not have. Greenies didn't say a fucking word when they rebuild on land that should be delta flood plains and riparian areas.

Fuck the Greenies. They just want more Central control.

[Speaker to Animals]

Dams are great for making clean energy (after all the CO2 from the concrete has been balanced) but they can cause serious ecological damage to the local wildlife.
Even tidal power has its drawbacks. The plans for a huge generator in the Severn estuary were shelved, after a public enquiry, over concerns about the loss of wetland habitat.

Coastal energy development concerns are hypocrisy. Nations love coastal development with high real estate prices and high taxes to the gov.

I ranted a lot about rebuilding N'Oleans after Katrina. We should not have. Greenies didn't say a fucking word when they rebuild on land that should be delta flood plains and riparian areas.

Fuck the Greenies. They just want more Central control.

Look what happened when somebody tried to build a wind farm off the shore from the Kennedy compound. They shut that shit right the fuck down. Every last environmentalist is the most NIMBY mofo out there.