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Molgrips - energy density is the key.
Not only that - crude oil has tons more uses besides motor fuel... Think how many companies have a stake in each tanker load of fuel.
Juan, Elfin and TJ's "no cars ever" (though Elfin is taking the softer "no cars in teh city" approach)
No I am not... I am merely saying that don't make any excuses. You choose to have a lifestyle that is build around owning a car. It is very different.
I am not like TJ. I am actually much more cynical. I am certain that I am part of the last generation that will enjoy things like motorcycles, personal car for masses and middle class.
The way I see it in about 20 year times, you'll either have a car and be part of the 5% of the people in the first world to be able to afford one (and a house, a boat, a jet and education for your kids) or you will be living at the opposite end of the scale. Cars will be a symbol of social achievement. Sorry I mean they will be even more a symbol of social achievement. It's too late to change that. Car and petrol lobbies have the world hanging by the danglers (les couilles). They are going to raise prices of petrol as much as possible and they will skin most of people dry. Once done, with their friends the car makers they will release something new that will still make them richer. Most of people will not be able to afford it, hence the car going to be even more reflective of money (and maybe just maybe power).
While stuck at uni, I thought things much differently, but now that I am more in the real world (with non academic people) I think we are just ****ed up. Ninety percent of the people see the car as being representative of what you are. So I can't see things change. Far from it.
geothermal (relatively cheap as no inputs at all- just fire water down into the lovely warm radioactive rock you have up there and it'll come up hot and turning turbines).
There's nowhere near the temps/pressures required to generate electricity at the scale required.
wind. (cheap enough, and improving year on year. just need to deal with the nimbys)
HUGELY inefficient. Have you ever seen a real time report of what power these generate? 😯
AND they all require electrical [i]supplies[/i]. It relies on a huge variable which we cannot second guess and generates most power when it's least required (at night).
Hydroelectric (not cheap by current standards but will be in reach as oil reserves dwindle. again, needs some serious anti-nimby work)
Qiute like hydro, although envoronmental impacts nedd to be considered.
Tidal/wave (Edinburgh is home of the developer of the world's best wave system, the Pelamis snake. This one of the lowest impact and most impressive future systems and has the lowest cost per kwh of any energy system, r+d costs excluded).
This is where the UK needs to be looking IMO but MASSIVE investment is required for R&D, installation and maintenance costs are likely to be very high.
Solar (again, improving daily and excellently affordable personal energy with prices set to drop eventually).
PV can work but is not even in the slightest bit suited to the UK.
What are your thoughts on piezo-electric and say osmosis for example?
Efficiency of existing plant must be optimsed sooner rather than later. The EPC and DECs have been laughed off of the field by all but the dumbest, the CRC EE scheme has just turned into a tax and the govt needs to do more to ensure that companies aren't wasteful with energy.
Once done, with their friends the car makers they will release something new that will still make them richer. Most of people will not be able to afford it
How will they get rich selling something that virtually nobody can afford to buy? Wouldn't they get richer by selling stuff to the masses too?
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I understand that there is likely to be footfall harvesting at the 2012 Olympics using piezo electrics.
Anyone read Kim Stanley Robinson's Pacific Edge for a possibility of one future.
PV can work but is not even in the slightest bit suited to the UK.
No? I reckon there's in the order of 10^18 J of solar energy incident to the entire UK, and our total energy consumption would be of the order of 10^19 (according to various internetty type figures). So you're right 🙂
I may have lost count of those exponents and dropped a 10^3 multiplier somewhere tho 🙂
Wouldn't they get richer by selling stuff to the masses too?
That's what a certain Mr Ford discovered way back.
Edinburgh is home of the developer of the world's best wave system, the Pelamis snake. This one of the lowest impact and most impressive future systems and has the lowest cost per kwh of any energy system, r+d costs excluded
Hi Spokes, very interested in this. Is there any published data to show the cost of energy for Pelamis? Did you mean [u]any[/u] energy system or just any renewable energy system?
Its a good sytem pelarmis. There is a small set up off portugal that has run for a year or two - one is going in off shetland next year.
Its a good wave energy generator and has some good advantages. Its highly modular if some highly stresssed components so should be cheap and easy to build and maintain in large quantities and so far seems reliable. It looks very hopeful but its still early days - I want to see it survive a couple of winters off Scotland yet.
Long way from powering cars with it tho
bump for teh glitch
It's interesting that this debate has focused on the cost aspect of mass personal transport. If a new alternative, clean fuel is developed that is as useful as the current liquid hydrocarbons we'll still have the problems with congestion. Somethings got to give, no amount of technology, rephasing of traffic lights or similar will enable the road network to cope with every single occupant of UK having their own vehicle and having the "freedom" to use it as they want.
We're all going to have some interesting choices to make...