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A Brilliant Analysis of Solar Energy into the Future

drradon says...

Hardly a brilliant analysis - more like a brilliant piece of advocacy that, like most of its kind, is long on optimistic projections and very short on real numbers and a real analysis of those numbers. For instance: what is the megawatt hour cost of a solar power generation station that can replicate the power responsiveness and availability factor of a fossil power generation station (over a similar life cycle). He quotes the kwh cost for solar and wind power systems but each and every one of them is "backed up" by a much larger conventional power generation system that, ultimately, is burdened with the costs of maintaining grid stability, grid voltage, and grid frequency. There are huge engineering problems and substantial costs associated with maintaining a power supply that we now require to operate a modern economy. Just ONCE, I would like to see the green power advocates address those challenges and costs in a realistic way instead of glossing over them with their fantasy projections.
And I will say, as an aside, that I have spent my entire working career working in the renewable energy sector and fully agree that we need to transition to a renewable energy economy - but unrealistic projections are going to doom our economy if they are taken as being possible in the near term.

WKB (Member Profile)

Adam FAILED to Ruin Tesla

drradon says...

These guys make a start at assessing the energy/carbon cost, but stop well short of completing the job. What is the life-cycle carbon cost of PV cells used to produce the electrons; what is the life-cycle cost of the storage of electrons prior to going into the EV, etc. Only then can you make an honest carbon balance sheet.

The Perfectionist Trap

oblio70 says...

Here's an example of a project we'd have 2-weeks to finish:

A Space for 2 people to live out their life-cycle together.
Site: Desert (Southwest US)
Requirements:
- mass-based passive heating/cooling w/ profound southern views
- brise-soleil with morning privacy
- compost privy as hearth of house


about 3 years of projects like this, fast-fast-fast, with our Senior Thesis being a year-long self-initiated/directed exercise. Fluidity and broad gestures were rewarded...but not as we were discover in the "real world".

Deformed Frog Parasite Life Cycle (Ribeiroia) - BBC Nature

Ribeiroia - Parasite with 3 Host Life Cycle

Deformed Frog Parasite Life Cycle (Ribeiroia) - BBC Nature

The Tech That Could Fix One of Wind Power's Biggest Problems

ChaosEngine says...

Would be interested to see the total life cycle efficiency of these.

One of the problems with wind turbines is the energy cost of the foundations. Most large wind turbines require a lot of concrete to be mounted on. Concrete is a horrible material in terms of CO2 production, so a wind turbine actually has to operate for several years before it becomes carbon neutral.

This looks like it might solve that problem, but on the other hand, I'm unsure if it would scale well.

I dunno, I'm not an engineer, so happy to listen to someone more knowledgeable on this.

The Most Costly Joke in History

transmorpher says...

LOL I can't be a pig and Sarah Palin at the same time. Make up your mind

Those are all valid criticisms, but nobody apart from the flight engineers and test pilots truly know whether this plane is a lemon or not. If it does everything it's supposed to do, then it's exactly what the military asked for, just 10 years too late....

Any suitability and fit for purpose criticism that anyone has ever come up with for the F-35 also applies to just about any piece of military equipment that has been created in the last 70 years. Engineering is a balancing act, and an iterative process. Almost every aircraft, and vehicle in the military today was built to fight a soviet army. Luckily that never happened. But that means that most aircraft and vehicles in the military today have been grossly modified to make them fit for a different purpose. The F-35 will probably go through this as well over the next 30 years, because it's a normal part of the life-cycle of military equipment. Almost every plane dropping bombs now was previously designed as a fighter. But nobody ever calls them out for being mutants like they do with the F-35, they call it additional capability. The F-35 was born with these capabilities instead of being added over time.


Expensive: I'll agree. Could the money have been spent better else where? Definitely. You could argue that the cost is tiny compared to that of a full scale war, maybe F-35 is a good deterrent. Air superiority is the key to winning a war. If you're going to spend money then that's where it should be spent. When the oceans rise enough, is a country like Indonesia going to lash out and try to take land and resources for their civilians? Maybe. I doubt all 200 million of them will just stand there and starve. (Ok I'll concede, this does make me sound a bit like Palin. But hopefully not as dumb )
They could have probably made 3 different stealth planes for 1/2 the cost, but that has it's own strategic downsides. You have to have the right assets in the right places or you have to spread them quite thinly. With a multi-role plane you have all of the capabilities everywhere. Just a matter of a loading it with different weapons.

Not needed: Time will tell whether this is the right plane, but new planes are needed. And they absolutely must have stealth. Within 10 years, weapon systems will be so advanced that if you are spotted, you're as good as dead. We are currently dropping bombs on fairly unsophisticated enemies, but wars tend to escalate quickly. You just never know either way, and it's better to be prepared for the worst. There are plenty of countries with very good planes and pilots that could get sucked into a conflict. If you're really unlucky you could be fighting US made planes with pilots trained in the same way, and you don't want to be fighting a fair fight.
Further still, Russia, China and Japan are developing their own stealth planes, which pretty much forces everyone else to do the same thing.
Especially if Donald Trump gets elected. You never know who that crazy asshole is going to provoke into a war

Doesn't work: It's still in development and testing.

Overtasked: It does the same stuff the aging multi-role planes (that were originally built as fighters) do. With the addition of stealth, and better weapons/sensors/comms. Small performance variables don't win wars, superior tactics and situational awareness does.

Underpowered: Almost every plane ever built has had it's engines upgraded to give it more thrust through it's life. And engines on planes are almost a disposable item, they're constantly being replaced throughout the life-cycle of the plane. Like a formula one car.
The current engine, is already the most powerful engine ever in a jet fighter. It is good enough to fly super sonic without an afterburner, which none of the planes it's replacing are capable of.

Piloted: Agreed. But who knows, maybe a Boston Dynamics robot will be flying it soon

Test Failing: That's only a good thing. You want things to fail during tests, and not in the real world. Testing and finding flaws is a normal part of developing anything.

Fragile: That can be said for all US aircraft. They all need to have the runway checked for FOD, because one little rock can destroy even the best plane. Russian aircraft on the other hand are designed to be rugged though, because they're runways are in terrible condition. But in reality, all sophisticated equipment needs constant maintenance, especially when even a simple failure at 40,000 feet becomes an emergency.

Quickly Obsolete: Time will tell. Perhaps it would have been better to keep upgrading current planes with more technology like plasma stealth gas that make then partially stealthy, better sensors and more computing power. But by the time you've done that you've got a plane that's as heavy as F-35 anyway, and not as capable. Although it might have been cheaper in the long run.

Like I said in my previous comment. All of this doesn't make an interesting story so you'll only ever hear the two extremes which are "the plane sux" vs "it's invicible!!11" depending on your media source.

newtboy said:

Wait....Sarah? Sarah Palin? Is that you? ;-)

You mean what's wrong besides the dozen or so meaningful complaints made above, any one of which was a good reason to kill the project years ago, like; too expensive, not needed, doesn't work, over tasked, under powered, piloted, did I say too expensive, test failing, fragile, quickly obsolete, WAY too expensive, ....need I go on?

Pig vs Cookie

transmorpher says...

I'll disagree that's it's perfectly fine food. Bacon is a type 1 carcinogen. Which means there is no doubt that it causes cancer. Non processed pork, is a type 2 carcinogen, which means it causes cancer, but they need more data to confirm it.
The risks aren't quite as high as with cigarettes but it's an extra set of dice I'm not going to roll. That's information from the W.H.O.

I'm not sure if this method would work in Hawaii, but they've had a lot of success in Europe with stray animals by using a catch a release program http://carocat.eu/the-catch-neuter-and-release-approach/. It's a little slower, but not that much since cats and dogs have a pretty short life-cycle when they are stray. I think you could make a few alterations and, the invasive boars instead of running away from hunters, would begin to approach them instead, and you could register, and neuter them.

Damn you blew my cover. I'm am indeed a pig, hence my bias in this thread. Here's a picture of me and my boat driver in the bahamas http://www.tecnologia-ambiente.it/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/maiale-isola.jpeg

newtboy said:

Well, if you think wasting perfectly fine meat/food is OK because you don't want to get in the habit of killing your food, yes, our definitions vary. To me, once it's dead anyway, wasting it is definitely bad for no reason, and using it is good.
Also...bacon! If that's not good to you, you're not a real human being, and I accuse you of being a pig that has learned to type.

Chicks Jump Off Cliff - Life Story - BBC

Phonebloks

Porksandwich says...

The thing is though, the way it's described in this video. Unless I am totally off in LaLa land concerning electronics and how they hook together. There's just no way his power grid section is going to work with 4 connectors. Let's assume 4 connectors is all anything needs, then how do you swap out pieces and re-arrange them to your desire and still have the connections end up to where they hook up properly to others without replacing the grid backing?

So if you need a grid backing for each arrangement, you're not helping your cause.

He's basically saying the grid back is your motherboard, which needs a bare minimum of things to function and it designed for them to hook up in certain ways with a myriad of different pin configurations. And you think of how many things in the PC market aren't QUITE compatible, like they do hokey things even though standards wise they should be compatible....so you have to look at the MFG sites to see if they have tested it with XYZ....

I mean hell anything PC is kind of throwaway as it is now, they cycle in new standards so fast. The only main difference is you can build it like you want it, so you're less likely to replace it soon....and if most things break you can replace them to keep from throwing everything else out...within some period of time usually 5-6 years would be a good "hope" for things like motherboards, cpu if you're right on the cutting edge. 1-3 if you buy them later in their life cycle.

So, maybe instead of a blok style phone, they need a design where shops could essentially build you a phone around a core module for each phone carrier. Then you wouldn't have 8 bazillion phones being manufactured each year and being tossed. You'd have 20 bazillion parts that could be used as needed within a few years to fit someone's needs/wants.

But, it won't happen. And they'll say it's because they are keeping costs down by doing it how they do it now....you know...not because it helps maintain bigger profit margins or anything.........never.

NerdAlert: SimCity Launch Disaster - EA Earns Your Rage

packo says...

this is why i don't preorder

and this is why i wait until most games goes on sale before I get them, I don't buy beta tests, want me to support a game at full retail, I want the full, functional game at retail, that's the video game developer's fault not mine

i'm more than happy to wait to the end of a game's life cycle if I actually get a fully functioning game (and with Simcity, with online DRM, maybe even then I wouldn't be getting the game if the servers going down meant my ability to play was going to dissappear)

for an INDUSTRY soooo concerned about piracy... they sure do EVERYTHING in their power to ensure that piracy is the most appealing option

EA lost me as a fan of some of the brands they own when they forced Origin on me as well... that was the first blatant, you can't ignore it any longer, slap in the face EA did in my opinion in regards to their profitability being ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE more important than my enjoyment of their games, my bang for my dollar, and my value to them as a customer

Walmart on strike

dannym3141 says...

People, people, people. Walmart is not the REASON the entire civilised world is finding itself in this situation - walmart is a symptom of the problem.

Walmart is an organisation motivated by profit just like any other.

I heard energy companies posting record profits year in and year out before the recession. There's people at the upper ends of those kinds of companies taking wages, bonuses, pensions and god-knows-what that some people couldn't make in 10 years. They don't deserve it, they don't work 10 times harder then the next person down, but there is a culture of taking what you can.

People don't need that kind of wealth, they just want it. Now, in times of hardship, energy companies are demanding more money for their services because they are no longer making the profit they used to. Instead of relying on the wealth that they have amassed during times of good, they rely on us to give them more.

So they cut a load of jobs to maximise their profits, but now the people they fired can't afford their energy bills. And this is going on all over the place - it isn't just the energy companies, it's also walmart with whatever schemes they've got. It's the oil companies and the politicians with whatever schemes they've got.

And all these schemes intermix, people losing jobs, people unable to afford this here and there because we've stagnated our money, there was no trickle down wealth, it's stagnated so much that there's not enough available anymore to share between the people that need it.

So now the government starts giving out handouts to the elderly or unemployed - £300 for your winter heating bill. But that's a huge amount of money so we need to raise taxes - which is a solution to nothing but puts the problem further ahead and maybe you can work harder later to make up for it.

Meanwhile, half the jobs that are getting taxed are now moved abroad because production is cheaper there. So entire markets of jobs no longer exist, we lost all of our car manufacturers, coal mines (it's cheaper from china), etc. which amounts to millions of jobs, and there's not a lot left to tax. What's the solution now? Which country do we bail out with borrowed money that is earning interest? If the untold billions in profit was returned to the customers back when times were good, we wouldn't be in this situation. But instead it went towards making let's say 30 individual people a lot richer.

Do you see where i'm going with this? It's a culture of greed, and each point down the line there is just enough intentional maneuverability for people to take more than you deserve and/or need; you either are in the clique, in the power scheme, taking cash - or you're not and you're holding up the facade. This isn't what a society is meant to be - it's meant to be a group of people working for their own common benefit because when we don't we all suffer and no one is happy.

This model has a short life-cycle; the eventual result is a few people having a lot of little bits of green paper that don't mean anything because they've forced everyone into abject poverty.

"A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in."
It doesn't get any simpler than that. Until these old men start planting some trees and giving a LOT back, we will stagnate and you don't want to learn this implied lesson the hard way.

Should *dead be more open (Sift Talk Post)

bareboards2 says...

With rights come responsibilities....

I like that you have to be completely involved in the Sift by posting vids before you "earn" the right to affect other Sifters videos.

First and foremost is the need to slow down trolls.

Secondly ...posting videos gives you empathy towards other Sifters. And vulnerable to other Sifters if you act like a dick.

And I agree that dead is dead, no matter where a video is in the Video Life Cycle. (Although there may be some programming restraints that require the unpublished to not be deadable, I don't know.)



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Beggar's Canyon