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The idea that EVs are inherently good and ICEs inherently bad is too simplistic.
Key thing to remember is that ICEs aren’t limited to fossil fuels,
No - The key thing to remember is that no matter which way you look at it and no matter how you generate the fuel. ICEs will BURN fuel in the presence of air, they will continue to generate emissions throughout their life and they will always need a significant logistics train to keep them and almost only them fueled. EVs don't do or need any of that. Yes there are losses of between 2% and 8% in power transmission, but that's nothing compared to shipping, pumping, drilling power required to support ICEs.
Ethanol - The production of ethanol requires more energy than you get from burning it. It's dumb.
As for power>liquid - that's equally dumb. Why use electricity to make something else (methanol/ammonia/hydrogen/whatever), then use more energy to move that something else (tankers/pipelines), in order to move something else (car) with the result being to make more emissions? Just use the solar/wind/tidal/fusion/SBSP to charge/power the car directly. No emissions from start to finish is possible and at substantially less loss. Generously, it's 70% loss for the ICE and pessimistically, 20-25% loss for the EV.
Chemical generation should be used for local energy storage to support power generation or applications which requires significant power desnity which batteries cannot currently provide - aerospace.
EVs are no solution. alternative / renewables are limited in the amount we have. Its also intermittent and we have no viable large scale storage
Every KW used in an ev is an extra KW of fossil fuel burning because it increases the total amount of electricity used and that extra generation comes from fossil fuels. Renewables are limited and only acount for a part of the UKs generation mix
No emissions from start to finish is possible
No its not. Emissions to make and dispose of the vehicle include the batteries, transport costs of moving all the materials around. Installation and decomissioning cost of the generators and finally - as above - renewables are intermittent so fossil fuels will always be used as backup/
EVs are not the solution in that they are a sticking plaster to maintain the status quo, they are not a more efficient modal shift.
renewables are intermittent so fossil fuels will always be used as backup/
Only for last ditch critical systems. We can afford that. For the rest we have plenty of solutions you just don't want to entertain.
Anyway, this place is ****ing depressing.
Become a dark green Squirrelking 🙂 I'll lend you a hair shirt and teach you how to knit your own yogurt
EVs are no solution. alternative / renewables are limited in the amount we have. Its also intermittent and we have no viable large scale storage
This again. There's NO study which shows us running out of lithium. There's NO study which shows that EV production emissions costs outweigh their savings in use. There's NO study which shows there's an alternative other than a reversion to non-motorised transport. EVs ARE a solution whether you like it or not. They're available, impactful, and sustainable. Almost all studies on EV production look at continually ripping lithium from the grouund/ocean, not what happens when it's already in the system. I studied something similar for titanium usage in aerospace looking at LCA (Life Cycle Assessments) and again, the vast majority look at mining to use and disposal, but not at recycling, because it's very complex to follow. In reality, when you look DEEP into it. vast quantities of material can be recycled, but are only recycled when price for raw increases. What you need to do is FORCE recycling, make it prohibitively expensive to NOT recycle.
Let me ask you a question - What's your REALISTIC alternative? Right now. What would you do that's batter than EVs can do right now or in the next 10 years.
Every KW used in an ev is an extra KW of fossil fuel burning because it increases the total amount of electricity used and that extra generation comes from fossil fuels. Renewables are limited and only acount for a part of the UKs generation mix
Utter and complete bollox. Why do you think there are cheap off peak tarrifs? Why do you think we're encouraged to charge overnight. We routinely turn OFF wind turbines as we have too much generation and nowhere to put it. You can put it in EVs. You can't do that with ICEs, certainly not as efficiently.
EVs are not the solution in that they are a sticking plaster to maintain the status quo, they are not a more efficient modal shift.
Not in and of themselves, no. But as part of a system of systems, they will help.
Anyway, this place is **** depressing.
It certainly can be.
Oh and back on topic - asteroid lithium mining will be a thing. It may not be needed on the surface, but will most certainly be used for backup power systems and energy storage in space. Energy density doesn't matter as much when all you have to fight is inertia, not gravity*.
*I know.
Right - so where is all this extra electricity generation that is needed for EVs coming from? Where are you getting that electricty from in a winter high pressure event where there is minimal solar and no wind?
Its a fact that increasing electricity useage in the UK means more fossil fuel burning. Its maybe not 100% but its there. pretending it isn't is no help at all
My solution - there is not one but pretending moving folk around in two tonne vehicles is a solution is no help at all.
Right – so where is all this extra electricity generation that is needed for EVs coming from? Where are you getting that electricty from in a winter high pressure event where there is minimal solar and no wind?
Scotlands vast renewable energy boom that'll be happening in the coming years 😁
Was that an attack? Or just some stranger on the internet offering their differing opinions?
Referring to my strongly held view that there will be a scientific solution as 'the kind of things tec-****s believe in' - I didn't read that as just bantz. I read it as an accusation. I don't know what's behind the asterisks though.
Doe-eyed “futurism”
There it is again.....
and a belief that somehow concentrating on space exploration when more terrestrial issues present far more of an existential threat seems to be following a foolish pattern (IMO).
Anyway it’ll be a fun conversation with the Grandkids:
“why did the sea levels rise Grandpa?”
“Well we were distracted, we used all of our resources making sure a handful of disgustingly rich people could get 200 million miles away from the rest of humanity and live on a cold, barren rock”
Go back and show me where I said that space exploration is a priority? I think my words were...
Of course climate change is more important and pressing at present, but it’s not either / or, in my opinion, and that like it or not some good will come from it.
So yes, I do feel attacked for what I think is actually quite a balanced position
Not in and of themselves, no. But as part of a system of systems, they will help.
Agreed, was just getting that distinction out there.
Where are you getting that electricty from in a winter high pressure event where there is minimal solar and no wind?
That naughty n word you dark greens don't like.
ICEs will BURN fuel in the presence of air, they will continue to generate emissions throughout their life and they will always need a significant logistics train to keep them and almost only them fueled. EVs don’t do or need any of that. Yes there are losses of between 2% and 8% in power transmission, but that’s nothing compared to shipping, pumping, drilling power required to support ICEs.
ICEs do not have to burn fossil fuels. It is fairly simple to turn CO2 extracted from the atmosphere into methanol. When you burn methanol, it turns back into exactly the same amount of CO2 that you started with. It's CO2 neutral. You seem to completely misunderstand the difference between emissions from fossil fuels (bad) and emissions from fuel generated from atmospheric CO2 (carbon neutral).
Ethanol – The production of ethanol requires more energy than you get from burning it. It’s dumb.
Powering an EV by charging a battery requires more energy to charge the battery than you get from discharging it. Every time you transform energy from one form to another, you lose some. One of the big questions is what is the most efficient way to deliver the energy from the generation source to the end user. If you live in a city, a battery EV is probably most efficient way to power a personal vehicle.
Why use electricity to make something else (methanol/ammonia/hydrogen/whatever), then use more energy to move that something else (tankers/pipelines), in order to move something else (car) with the result being to make more emissions?
For many purposes, liquid fuel has advantages. It has much higher energy density than a battery, for a start, plus it's very easy to transport or store in barrels. For aircraft, heavy equipment that runs day and night, military vehicles, or people living in remote rural areas, liquid fuels are much better than batteries. You can fuel a rocket with liquid fuel. You cannot run one off a battery.
I think that for people living in cities, EVs will replace ICEs for personal cars. However, that doesn't mean there won't be niches where ICEs are better. I'm including fuel cells as a form of ICE. Methanol can be used to power fuel cells, so fuel cell powered EVs may replace traditional engines.
If no one has children for 50 years the human race dies as there would be no women capable of having children. They’d all be 50y old and too old to have children. So, in your efforts to save us, you’ve killed us. <slow clap>
Do you (ever) have a positive suggestion? IME, people like you are the problem. With your glib “wit” and “simple” solutions which offer no practical suggestions or solutions at all. Why, because the issue is too complex for you to understand and thus you reach for the simplest answer that fits your narrative best
Wow ! 😃
Apologies for not taking your extremely serious and important forum discussion seriously enough. I hadn't realised that you were actually deciding the definitive solutions to Earth's problems.
Yes I was fully aware that what I suggested to solve the planet's problems would result in the eventual extinction of humans, er, that was the point, but thanks for pointing it out anyway 👍
My comment regarding dilithium crystals might not have been entirely serious either btw. Still, I'll let you carry on with your desperately serious discussion concerning how interplanetary space travel will save the human race.
no they aren’t. CO2 is a huge issue and pissing about with space rockets causes a lot of it.
The problem isn't rockets and the CO2 they generate, it's the economic system which requires the unsustainable exploitation of natural resources so that billionaires can have the money to pursue vanity projects like going to Mars. I don't have any real problem with space exploration, but it can't be achieved sustainably within in our current economic system. If we have to destroy the earth in order to escape it, then that seems like a ridiculously self-destructive thing to do.
If we have to destroy the earth in order to escape it, then that seems like a ridiculously self-destructive thing to do.
Space exploration isn't about sending huge numbers of people to live on other planets, that's just a fantasy with the level of technology we have. It's about learning about the solar system and the universe and developing technology. If it's done properly, the knowledge we gain from it will help make things on Earth better.
WTF is a "dark green"?
FWIW, billionaires aren’t really looking at Mars or the Moon as escape capsules.
Correct. It's a pissing contest.
Which is exactly what it was back when the US put men on the moon in the 1960s. The primary driver of the Space Race was to make a point, to give those cold war Ruskie commie bastards a bloody nose. The massive investment and development in many areas of science was a happy side-effect.
“Well we were distracted, we used all of our resources making sure a handful of disgustingly rich people could get 200 million miles away from the rest of humanity and live on a cold, barren rock”
"All of our resources" is hyperbole. Like many things that involve seemingly large numbers, it's a drop in the ocean globally.
I don’t know what’s behind the asterisks though.
I suspect a euphemism for onanism.
I don’t know what’s behind the asterisks though.
I suspect a euphemism for onanism
ooh, I might retract my annoyance. Tech-w&&king is definitely science I can get behind, I assume it means VR headsets and tactile materials......
I know compared to climate change it's still a frippery, but if we're going up in flames in 50 years time anyway, might as well do it with Elvis leg.
WTF is a “dark green”?
Greener than those sellout light greens.
Space exploration isn’t about sending huge numbers of people to live on other planets
I never said it was. It's self-evident that the resources required to enable just one billionaire to do that makes it a terrible and self-destructive idea.
It’s about learning about the solar system and the universe
We can do that without sending people to Mars.
and developing technology.
To benefit whom? For decades we've been told the advancement of technology would benefit all our lives. Has it? Are we working less? Are we happier? Are we more free? Are we more secure? Space travel may have produced some fancy gadgets and clever technology, but has it made any real difference to the things that matter or has it contributed to our societal decline? I just don't see any real positive outcomes from it beyond satisfying childish curiosity and reinforcing misplaced pride.
To benefit whom? For decades we’ve been told the advancement of technology would benefit all our lives. Has it?
Billions of people are much better off today than they were in previous generations due to scientific advances.
Billions of people are much better off
Define 'better off'. I look at my kids and honestly think I had a better, less stressful and happier childhood. I'm pretty sure they'll be worse off in adulthood too. Yes they have the internet and mobile phones etc but these things haven't benefited them. Technology can absolutely be a force for good, but in an economic system which encourages private hoarding of wealth, it's the opposite.
This isn't specifically about space travel but it's relevant to the whole debate around technology and how it benefits us. (and I can't resist an excuse to post something with David Graeber in it)
WTF is a “dark green”?
fundamentalists if you like
the light green believes there are technological solutions to climate change, The dark green knows that only energy usage reduction on a massive scale will do any good.
A simple analogy: The light green uses ecover fabric conditioner. The dark green does not use fabric softener as unneeded.
or
the light green uses an EV, the dark green walks cycles and uses public transport
Define ‘better off’.
Billions of people have been lifted out of poverty in the last 50 years. Life expectancies are much higher now than 100 years ago, mostly due to lower infant mortality. For middle-class people living in wealthy countries, the quality of life hasn't changed much. If you look at other parts of the world, there have been huge improvements for billions of people.
theotherjonv
Full MemberYep, good post. The cross-fertlization of research ideas; work that starts in one area and then someone has a ‘hang on, does this mean….?’ moment
That's the hope. But it doesn't always happen, and less and less so as technologies get mature and the research projects get either massive, or really really specific. Really big projects tend to get spread out so you lose the single-team oversight, meaning that the importance of a side-discovery can be missed, or discounted as an error, or just not resourced. And really specific projects tend to be very target focused. (as do outsourced projects, since you're generally getting paid to deliver a specific piece of work not to just **** around and find out). So a ton of interesting discoveries will just never get picked up on as they're footnotes in the sub-team of the sub-team of the project that's being funded by one company for one purpose, and because the one person or team that knows about it, doesn't have the big picture that would tell them it's important, or is already doing 14 hour days for teh main project.
Not always though. And the plus side is that there's an incredible amount of research happening so while the rate of interesting spinouts falls per hour of research, the total hours goes up. And it does apply less to less mature technologies which is where stuff like "how to not die on mars" comes in handy
Like, smart fabrics are a field that lots of new and interesting stuff is happening, because it's very novel. There's projects with literally only a few thousand pounds of funds and a couple of postgrads involved, that are still producing exciting stuff, whereas that's more or less unthinkable with something like the internal combusion engine.
Equally, battery tech is really old, but the way we're fighting to improve and optimise it in very specific ways is creating new opportunities- the demand for smaller, more portable, less resource intensive, lighter (and also much larger), longer lived batteries and different chemistries is causing lots of things to be looked at in new ways.
So there's always a bunch of tweaks being done with lithium ion batteries and one of them literally started in a lab at my old uni when a postgrad got bored with the project and went offpiste and his supervisor was kinda incompetent and didn't notice, and as a result they completely failed to deliver the research goal and it caused all sorts of political shenanigans and they lost their funding and the entire institution took a hit, but they got some totally unexpected benefits out of it. But the unintuitive thing is that there's actually a bunch of factors that should specifically have stopped that from happening, they just didn't work!
TLDR the more industrialised and commercialised research is, the less eureka moments you get, for a bunch of reasons.
tjagain
Full MemberEVs are no solution. alternative / renewables are limited in the amount we have. Its also intermittent and we have no viable large scale storage
Every KW used in an ev is an extra KW of fossil fuel burning because it increases the total amount of electricity used and that extra generation comes from fossil fuels. Renewables are limited and only acount for a part of the UKs generation mix
"Every KW used in an ev is an extra KW of fossil fuel burning" is only the case if you weren't already making that journey. It'd only apply if we were literally inventing the car today having never had ICEs, or if we were literally abolishing ICE cars and then after that EVs came along. Instead, what it's actually doing is consuming a pretty comparable amount of power, but producing it differently. So without being rude, pretty much everything you said is wrong. It does require a shift in generation- where we used to have millions of little inefficient power plants in cars we'll need much fewer big ones. And it needs good infrastructure. But that's not the same as burning extra, at all.
People get a wee bit hung up on the scale of generation transfer from fossil to renewable on a grid scale- and it's true that moving to EVs makes that bigger. But that's mostly a logical trap of seeing fossil fuel burning in cars as somehow separate from grid scale. Really it all belongs in the same heap and reducing any of it is positive. In fact removing the most polluting part is going to be most productive and that's basically coal, really old plants, and cars.
Oh yeah also cars ARE viable large scale storage. We haven't got that figured out properly yet but it's a fairly simple engineering problem and faster charging makes it much simpler (since it's less and less important to keep an EV permanently charged). Any plugged-in car can be a power bank. EVs are going to be a really important part of electricity load spreading and storage in the near future. As are dead EVs- old batteries are getting turned into power walls already, they're not good enough for car use any more but they're ideal for nonmoving storage.
“Every KW used in an ev is an extra KW of fossil fuel burning” is only the case if you weren’t already making that journey. It’d only apply if we were literally inventing the car today having never had ICEs, or if we were literally abolishing ICE cars and then after that EVs came along. Instead, what it’s actually doing is consuming a pretty comparable amount of power, but producing it differently
Yes - from fossil fuels - because an increase in electricity consumption means an increase in fossil fuel burning in the UK right now. ( not 100% perhaps )
this is why EVs are not a solution. they reduce pollution a small amount and transfer it out of cities - but they do not reduce over all energy consumption - in fact there is evidence that the low per mile cost actually encourages more driving
and of course I am comparing it to not making that journey. Thats the point. we need to reduce energy consumption massively in the west not just use it a slightly less pollutting way
These things need global solutions that allows the developing world to develop and at the same taime needs a massive reduction in energy usage worldwide
Reduce, reuse, recycle. The first and key thing is reduce
Define ‘better off’.
Walk round a graveyard. Look at the dates.
Walk round a graveyard. Look at the dates.
Two things:
1. What does space exploration contribute to improved life expectancy? (Almost none I think)
2. Life expectancy in the west, in particular the US and among the working class elsewhere is declining.
The trickle down 'a rising tide lifts all boats' concept doesn't work. The past 40 years have resulted in unparalleled inequality not just within western countries but internationally between countries too. This idea that people at the bottom should be happy with the scraps they're offered and tolerate excesses of people at the top is a very cynical, negative and self-destructive outlook.
There's no better indicator of where we are as a society than billionaires with childish space travel fantasies spending all their money trying to go to Mars rather than those resources being applied to more socially useful activities.
So we should pack in science and research unless it's got an obvious use for a socially useful activity?
I don't think that's going to end well .... some people want to discover stuff because it's interesting, and commercially , and as a nation it tends to lead you to a dead end and some someone goes into the disctance.
You know this money stuff is an abstract concept right? You know that you can do all these things at the same time if you decide to as a society? Where does this leave football? It takes money from poor people, gives it to rich people, is it useful. What about riding expensive bikes?
tjagain
Full MemberYes – from fossil fuels – because an increase in electricity consumption means an increase in fossil fuel burning in the UK right now. ( not 100% perhaps )
But the cars that they're replacing ran on fossil fuels too. That's the point. The increase in electricity consumption from EVs categorically does NOT mean an increase in fossil fuel burning now, it means a redistribution of where it happens but not an increase. It's like one of those budgeting errors people make where they think that moving things into a different column on a spreadsheet saves money. The possible but unproven increase in mileage which you mention- which I do think is pretty likely- is going to be absolutely eclipsed by the efficiency savings in big power plants over stupidly inefficient little engines, and probably also eclipsed by the efficiency savings of not transporting petrol and diesel to filling stations
Not making the journey is great and the thing is, you can not drive an EV just as well as you can not drive a car.
But the idea that this is a choice, switch to EVs or stop driving, is false. It's a choice of switch to EVs or keep driving ICE cars.
So we should pack in science and research unless it’s got an obvious use for a socially useful activity?
I didn't say that. There's a huge difference between doing science and research and engineering a way to travel to Mars for no particular good reason. What will sending humans to Mars achieve beyond satisfying curiosity about whether it can be done? What benefit will the vast majority of the human race derive from it? Almost nothing in both cases.
You know this money stuff is an abstract concept right?
Of course it's abstract, but it's also materially real as long as the majority are denied access to sufficient amounts of it. I'm actually arguing that going to Mars would be more achievable and more justifiable if we changed our economic system to make it more equal and more decentralised.
What will sending humans to Mars achieve beyond satisfying curiosity about whether it can be done? What benefit will the vast majority of the human race derive from it? Almost nothing in both cases.
You do understand that this is complete bunk don't you?
The standard complaint about the Apollo missions is that all it gave us was non-stick frying pans while casually avoiding all the minor things like decent computers (it supercharged research into electronics and micro-computers which is part of the reason why we all started to get home computers in the late 70's and early 80's....YOURE LITERALLY USING SOMETHING THAT IS A DIRECT RESULT OFTHE SPACE RACE RIGHT NOW!!!!!), global telecommunications (how do you send live sound and video across very long distances? hint:microwaves), medicine (so much in this one), fuel cells, ergonomics (technically from aircraft research in the 50's but again, the process was supercharged by the space programme) , fly by wire aircraft (indeed, we've also got planes that don't crash, thats very nice isn't it...) etc and then the very small matter of the overview effect (jeez, where do I begin on that one) oh, and ecology...and thats just a few things.
what about things like GPS? Weather satellites?
So yes, nuffin useful there whatsoever...
Human spaceflight give us some truly incredible technology, long duration spaceflight teaches us a great deal about things that happen to the human body as it ages like osteoporosis, muscle loss, cancer etc
What about really efficient Solar panels? Yup, completely useless, who on earth would want that?
Etc, etc, etc.
Mars: go. Find out something new. I can guarantee we'll get some very surprising and incredibly useful results from this that will benefit almost everyone and change the world for the better, most probably things we would otherwise have never thought of.
Ok, rant over 🙂
Yes – from fossil fuels – because an increase in electricity consumption means an increase in fossil fuel burning in the UK right now. ( not 100% perhaps )
This is not even wrong!
yesterday fossil fuels supplied about 18% of the UK energy needs National Grid live.
1. What does space exploration contribute to improved life expectancy? (Almost none I think)
Well, there's one example amongst many on that Wikipedia page linked earlier.
2. Life expectancy in the west, in particular the US and among the working class elsewhere is declining.
No it isn't.
(It might be, I have no idea, but you're going to have to evidence that claim. Otherwise, "no it isn't.")
What will sending humans to Mars achieve beyond satisfying curiosity about whether it can be done? What benefit will the vast majority of the human race derive from it? Almost nothing in both cases.
Aside from this being abject bollocks (just for a change), even if it were true then so what?
Why did we stick pilgrims in boats and point them West other than curiosity? Yeah, OK, that didn't work out too well for the Native Americans, but I'm fairly confident that we're unlikely to wipe out the indigenous population of Mars or the Moon bar a few Clangers.
How do you suppose we discovered vaccines or antibiotics, by shrugging our shoulders going "what's the point"? Why do people swim the Channel or climb mountains when we have boats and helicopters? Why do you ride a bike when there are cars? Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria.
If we don't know something, then why not try and find out?
Ok - an asteroid passed us inside the orbit of the moon a few weeks ago, it had only been spotted a couple of days prior. We are long overdue for a planet killer type event.
Being a multi planet species will help mitigate against a planet killer type event. It’s not difficult to grasp 🤷♂️
The trickle down ‘a rising tide lifts all boats’ concept doesn’t work. The past 40 years have resulted in unparalleled inequality not just within western countries but internationally between countries too.
Hmm. I'm not sure about this. Inequality is far greater, but is life at the bottom end of society better or worse than it was 50 or 100 years ago? What about the bottom 20%?
Clearly the bottom 20% now SHOULD be better of than they currently are, so their lifestyle may be relatively worse than 100 years ago, but that's not the same as worse in absolute terms.
The big issue is that it is worse now than only 15 or 20 years ago.
YOURE LITERALLY USING SOMETHING THAT IS A DIRECT RESULT OFTHE SPACE RACE RIGHT NOW!!!!!
Computers (and all the other things you list) would have been invented whether we went to the moon or not. All this space travel fantasy is basically just techno-geekery. I've got no problem with it as long as it's sustainable, but with our current economic system, it's not. We're literally destroying the planet so that people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos can act out their egotistical fantasies.
Computers (and all the other things you list) would have been invented whether we went to the moon or not.
Almost certainly true.
But because of Apollo et al, progress happened a lot sooner.
All this space travel fantasy is basically just techno-geekery. I’ve got no problem with it as long as it’s sustainable, but with our current economic system, it’s not. We’re literally destroying the planet so that people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos can act out their egotistical fantasies.
No it isn't.
I’ve got no problem with it as long as it’s sustainable, but with our current economic system, it’s not.
Really? As said above, the resources needed to do this are miniscule. The problems of Earth are essentially caused by the likes of you and me buying loads of crap thinking it's important.
Computers (and all the other things you list) would have been invented whether we went to the moon or not. All this space travel fantasy is basically just techno-geekery. I’ve got no problem with it as long as it’s sustainable, but with our current economic system, it’s not. We’re literally destroying the planet so that people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos can act out their egotistical fantasies.
That’s 100% incorrect. Without massive, long duration government funding, so many things simply wouldn’t exist. The private sector don’t continue to fund research without ROI I 3-5years.
I can give you a concrete example. OpenMDAO from NASA took 13 years, 3 complete resets and a very patient customer to achieve success. This simply wouldn’t happen in a listed company. There’s a reason why SpaceX and Blue origin are still private and why Musk wanted to take Tesla private again. There’s significant freedom in it. Musk and Bezos can individually act like NASA, they can find real technological moonshots, not worrying about failure as they have the funds to keep going and no board/shareholders to piss off.
It honestly sounds (like many climate arguments) more that you’ve found something you don’t agree with and despite all the evidence to the contrary, would happily see it killed in the name of CO2 reduction as it suits your narrative. Privatised space access reduces costs, increases investment and dramatically speeds development. In return you get faster deployment of technology, superior access to services and reduced costs.
As for the environment - Rockets are less than 1% of the 2% of total emissions in global aerospace. That’s 0.0002%. A cruise liner heading to the Azores consumes more. Ban one cruise and you’re climate neutral. If I were Musk - I’d do just that, but out one cruise and ask it to never leave port. The fuel saved pays for all of his launches.
The biggest technological advance that mankind made was during WW2 i believe, the space race fell out of that due to tensions between East and West, sadly conflict has advanced us more than anything else in the last century.
Anyway, i think the whole Mars thing is just a hell of an advance beyond where we are today, can we get a manned flight there, probably, can we colonise, not a chance under our current constraints, emissions from rockets isn't the concern, it's just the fact that chemical rockets are limited in regards to what we would require to sustain missions, it's a long journey, add in the return and that's over a year to sustain life systems and support for any crew, add in cargo and it's even more unviable.
Effectively if we wanted to do anything over the years, we'd have to create a 'spacebridge', a logistical port, maybe even on the moon, to allow sustained operations and it would be huge, beyond anything we've ever set out to do, would be great to see, but can't see many countries signing up for it!
The trickle down ‘a rising tide lifts all boats’ concept doesn’t work. The past 40 years have resulted in unparalleled inequality not just within western countries but internationally between countries too. This idea that people at the bottom should be happy with the scraps they’re offered and tolerate excesses of people at the top is a very cynical, negative and self-destructive outlook.
There’s no better indicator of where we are as a society than billionaires with childish space travel fantasies spending all their money trying to go to Mars rather than those resources being applied to more socially useful activities.
Very much ^^this^^
Over the last decade the financial holdings of the world's Billionaires has more than doubled, there is now a bit over 12 trillion USD tied up under the control of about 2600 billionaires (0.000033% of the global population). Towards the top of that list of gits you'll find Elon and Jeff.
They have the financial muscle to effect real changes on a global level, they could, if they chose to, pour resources into addressing climate change either through the wonders of technological woo or by funding social changes, they could squash huge chunks of poverty.
Instead they 'minimise' their tax bills and keep pushing the narrative that some rich boys getting into orbit will somehow lead to the betterment of all mankind. So long as you pay your Amazon & starlink subs, keep up the finance on your Model X and sign up for a special blue badge on twitter they'll almost definitely save us all with billionaire space magic... Probably.
Humanity are a bunch of suckers, those at the top know that, climate change and growing inequality will drive a century of increasing desperation, we're already well along that trajectory, resources become scarce, hoovered up by the wealthy, and who do you ultimately think will be there to capitalise on that situation?
Where does putting people on Mars even figure in all of this as a priority?
The past 40 years have resulted in unparalleled inequality
I disagree. Back in the good old days, kings lived like kings and the poor had utterly miserable lives. Slavery was considered quite normal, so the level of inequality was essentially infinite.
Rather than just looking at the level of inequality (i.e. the ratio of the poorest people to the richest), you need to look at the level of absolute poverty. Can poor people get food, shelter, clothing, etc.? Being poor in a wealthy country today is still much, much better than being poor in most places two centuries ago. Think about it like this, if your consciousness was going to be transposed onto some random individual at any point in history, would you prefer to take the risk of being poor in 1823 or 2023? I would definitely take 2023.