That all sounds quite wise. I wonder how similar the computer and electronics industries are. I wonder if anything has been done over the past 4 years since the article appeared. Mind you, slag heaps weren't exactly great either. And would you want to live next to an oil refinery or Sellafield?
If 'clearly' is the answer to the question then you have missed the point of the question. What is the energy content of the panel (in terms of manufacture and ultimately disposal) ? It also depends upon where and how the electricity from panel is to be used. If it is on a satellite in orbit then great it is cheap energy if it is to blow up a child's balloon then it is very expensive and to produce power to drive a truck LEJOG it would take an awful lot of them. I come back to the point of what would a world look like without cheap and plentiful oil and gas. I don't know what you think but it scares the shit out of me.
There are other neutron sources and neutron generators are becoming commonplace. Agree it is no magic solution but it is an option. The meltdown scenario can be avoided by allowing the Thorium element to drain away from the neutron source and which point it dies. Unlike a Uranium meltdown.
Slag heaps are an interesting example. From Victorian times until 60 years ago they were thought to be a valueless liability and a blot on the landscape, sterilising the land on which they sat. Then in the 1960's it happened that hard core was in demand, to form the foundations of the motorway network among other things, and slag was ideal for the purpose. Millions of tons of slag were needed, so the worthless slag heaps turned out to be worth many millions of pounds. Most of the slag heaps of England were cleared, and great profits were made (by Harold Wilson, among others). And the land under them also gained value, and became worth millions too. Concealed in every problem is an opportunity.
I have huge confidence in human ingenuity. When you look back over the past 100 years, the technological advances have been staggering. There is no evidence that this is tailing off. I have no doubt that humans will solve the energy crisis. The only question that remains is will they solve it a few decades too late, after the environment we know and love has been irreparably degraded? Not to take the bull by the horns now means increasing this likelihood. Fossil fuels will be replaced. Exactly how, I don't know, but smarter energy sources will be found. Solar is still in its infancy. What might it look like in 50 years time? I wonder what people would have made of a Bugatti Veyron in 1910, or one of the most recent jetliners. As for microchips made of silicon... We take so much for granted now and yet seem incapable of looking into the future.
The Centre for Alternative Technology in Wales, of which I have been a supporter for many years, produces some good stuff What is the energy and carbon payback time for PV panels in the UK? | CAT Information Service A modern panel has an energy payback period of 2.5 years with a life expectancy of 25-30 years which gives an EROEI of 10-12:1 Conventional oil/gas has an EROEI of about 100:1 Burn it in a power station at 35% efficiency and you get 35:1 So yes PV can supply useful electricity but it is no longer cheap and the effect of tripling electricity costs on industry would be frightening. There is no green utopia just around the corner, it would be like stepping back into a Victorian world.
I wonder what people would have made of a Concorde or a Saturn V rocket in 1910 ... and I wonder what people would make of a Concorde or Saturn V in 2013.
Really interesting. It would be even better if you could get similar data for different forms of fossil-fuel electricity consumption. Also note that the data used was from 2004 to 2006. Recent PV panels are considerably more efficient now (7 to 9 years on). Costs are also falling dramatically. Also in your model, you need to take into account the amount of electricity lost in the grid from power station to home. This is much tinier in a home-mounted solar system, seeing as it is travelling feet rather than miles or hundreds of miles. Also surely the point is that fossil fuels come with a hidden cost linked to global warming : increasing natural disasters, droughts, wars, emigration, displaced persons etc, quite apart from vanishing species. Not easy to put a cost on that, but is that not what the whole debate is about? After all, if we didn't care about droughts and mudslides and vanishing species, we wouldn't care about being green, would we?
We place too much value in the past, that's what's holding us up. People fear change. Look at the bunfight caused by a new Ducati turning up...
Local combined heat and power (CHP) can increase efficiencies by utilising waste heat on a local basis. I have a sister who lives off the grid and uses a combination of diesel generation with lead acid batteries, solar PV and wind with varying degrees of success, but cheap and convenient it ain't !
Indeed, we are back to the beginning. All of these things are not new, were happening long before industrialisation and will continue to happen long into the future whether we are green or not. So use it once, use it wisely and pray for a miracle (only we don't believe in God do we). Good night :smile:
but John, you are only looking at one side of the equation - electricity production, there is also demand to consider. 10 years ago we were all buying 100W lamps, and today we can buy LED lamps which use 90% less energy. In a few years time lamps will be 20 times more efficient. so with a bit of foresight, ingenuity and investment we can afford to triple the cost of electricity production if we reduce our demand by 66%. the sooner we invest in new technology the better we will all be for it. also, we are not far away from large scale wave power generators.
Without a step change in technology efficiency gains get smaller with time, the low hanging fruit has been picked. The use of LED lights will make a very small difference to our overall energy usage. If energy prices triple we become poorer so even if we did reduce our demand, which we would have to do, we would still struggle to pay the cost and risk a downward spiral. Wave power has been promising much and delivering little for several decades now. Abandoning tried and tested technology for a new green dream will end in a nightmare as they consistently fail to deliver their promises. The stop start nature of renewables means they cannot meet baseline demand. Storage solutions exist but the scale of the problem would require a massive investment that we cannot afford or even deliver right now.
