…as lots of people seem to think there is one!

I could tell you but ‘they’ would come for me.

it’s called the sun. it’ll last my life time.

The hot air generated on here?

It’s called “The Sun”, assuming you’re not being a pedant and claiming that a few billion years isn’t unlimited.
The issue is harnessing it.

er, wind and sun.

Both are ‘unlimited’ as long as the sun and the atmosphere exists.

The issue is harnessing it.

We must have 1000s of unemployed miners, can’t be use them to mine it?

The issue is harnessing it.

But people don’t want fields of those terribly unsightly solar panels.

I’m eating chilli , give it an hour or so and there’ll be plenty of gas round here !!

*breaks wind*

Energy is all around us. Unfortunately the concept of high energy density = affordable conversion is one missed by the vast majority of people. Oil, Coal & Gas are in effect the result of a natural stockpiling of a distributed energy source (the sun), and mother nature has conveniently spent the last couple of millions of years capturing that low grade heat and storing it underground for us to access. That process was in effect “free”, our capitalist economy has not had to spend any money on that original packaging, and has simply leveraged those vast high density stores of energy. So, going forwards, and moving away from that naturally conglomerated source, we will have to in effect work at least twice as hard as previously, and that means at least twice the cost.

It seems to me that alternate energy sources will not necessarily get any more economically viable, just that conventional ones like oil will get LESS economically viable……..

I am currently deep in my R&D lab, will let you all know when its ready for release, cant tell you much at the moment, all a bit hush, hush y’know !

It seems to me that alternate energy sources will not necessarily get any more economically viable, just that conventional ones like oil will get LESS economically viable……..

so best start planning to use as little less of it then if & when you can

The issue is harnessing it.

I thought the issue was storing and transporting it.

We have massive deserts that stretch across continents. Nobody would give a tinkers cuss if we filled them with solar panels but how would we get all that effectively unlimited energy back to population centres?

Coal, gas and oil are easy to transport and convert to usable energy closer to where it is needed.

The miracle source of green energy is to stop using the stuff so greeedily

My last deposit felt like it was hotter than the sun. Really had hopes for charging my iPad.

In reality I found that my toilet potato was not as nearly conductive as a real potato.

Energy is energy, you can’t make it, you can’t break it…. You can only convert it.

er, wind and sun.

Both are ‘unlimited’ as long as the sun and the atmosphere exists its daytime and its windy.

FTFY

Pussywillows awesomeness.

Oh hello Zulu.

It’s always windy somewhere. And it’s always daytime somewhere.

Fusion is almost certainly the answer.

The problem is that it’s 50+ years off and has been for a while… the real issue is what we do between now and then as carbon energy sources become increasingly expensive.

Sorry for the serious answer…

In the words of Dylan . The answer is blowing in the wind

Any idiot can protest and be idealistic and misunderstand the intricacies of energy production and geo-political power…

I’d like to do a poll about how they got themselves to Balcombe, and what their personal energy use levels are…

Any idiot can protest and be idealistic and misunderstand the intricacies of energy production and geo-political power…

And they let these people vote. Makes my blood boil. It really is about time that they restricted protesting to just clever people.

As long as rain keeps falling from the sky my mate will continue to have free energy for his farm (mini hydro scheme), a series of three tiered ponds on a hillside with a central drainage overflow pipe just below the surface on each of them, water flows over the overflow and down the pipe with the aid of gravity and the venturi effect increases the pressure and turns small turbines on the outlet and feeds the water into the lower pond (same thing happens), then into the lower pond (same thing happens) and out to the burn – home made system and quite ingenious, i admit there is one drawback – not everyone has a 1200acre farm on a Galloway hillside to collect rainwater.

The tide. Underwater turbines is where is should be at…. surely the energy of billions tonnes of water that moves every 6 hours could be harnessed. Also why not put smaller turbines on drains and sewers, large buildings down pipes etc.

Crap trolling by the OP. Try a bit harder won’t you?

I thought the issue was storing and transporting it.

There are issues with all of it. Current rooftop panels are about 17% efficient, meaning they only capture and convert 17% of the total solar energy hitting that panel. If they could get that a LOT higher, we’d need a lot less panels for the same effect.

This is an interesting site which puts energy use/whats left etc… into perspective.

As mentioned, mini sun / fusion, they are building a powerstation or a prototye anyway in France: http://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/sep/16/nuclear-fusion-iter-jet-forshaw

Or mirrors in space, that would work but would probably get skyjacked by the Koreans and used to blow up the White-house.

What ever happened to Irish perpetual motion with magnets machine? I wonder what the maths add up like for self sufficiency growing biofuel? I reckon the only thing holding that back is the oil companies, under the guise it would be bad politically to import all your food as a consequence, and environmentally poor from a diversity perspective.

i read today that gemany is closing down its nuclear and fossil fuel power plants because they are financially unable to compete with its renewable energy production.

meanwhile sweden is being paid to take waste from other eu countries since many of their powerstations run on waste and they are running out of fuel for them.

it would be crap if we took this kind of approach in the uk though, what with us having the highest tides and wind in europe, and a serious problem with landfill…….best just do some experimental fossil fuel extraction, its worked really well in texas after all

here is an article quoting goldman sachs take of the unprofitably of fossil fuel powerstations before i get called a hippy and told to get a job http://cleantechnica.com/2013/08/19/graph-how-wind-power-displaced-coal-power-in-spain/

i read today that gemany is closing down its nuclear and fossil fuel power plants because they are financially unable to compete with its renewable energy production.

Germany can only do that because it has French nuclear power to rely on for baseload. I’m sure it’s not actually shutting down all it’s fossil fuel plants either, as otherwise how does it cope with variations in demand and supply. Of course the renewable sources which can’t be competed with aren’t subsidised at all, are they?

well ok ill accept that it has imported energy as peak demand times, but it is on a path, not at the end of it. as a country germany is a net exporter though and it doesnt have the option of tidal/wave energy that the uk does, which could easily provide a totally predictable base load.

for me however, your subsidy argument holds no weight though since all energy production is subsidised. coal, gas, nuclear and all ‘green’ forms of power production all draw government subsidies.

this experimental fossil fuel fuel which is apparently going to be so cheap has to have huge tax breaks to be viable, which lets be honest amounts to a subsidy does it not?

i read today that gemany is closing down its nuclear and fossil fuel power plants because they are financially unable to compete with its renewable energy production.

They have an ageing fleet of power stations and a green party that is actually in government. They were very worried after Japan about Tsunami & Earthquake damage because they failed to spot those events are at the most extremely unlikely in Germany. People dislikes nuclear power and complained. Now as posted above they get it from France, of course if it ever went wrong in France the chances of problems in Germany are slim to LOTS.

Back to the OP, what do you call green?
Bio Fuels – deforestation, the world’s poorest growing fuel not food, exporting/transporting the fuel/food round the world.
Hydro – Dams, Flooding, Changed to rivers etc. space it takes up
Wind, massive amount of turbines required with associated cost of moving power from windy rural locations to places it’s needed
Solar – covering land with panels massive grid distribution, construction, manufacture/disposal
Nuclear – Construction/Waste
Fusion – No idea, not invented yet

Using any fluctuating source requires something as a back up that can ramp up quick, if that fossil then it’s bad news.

click

Article about a village in Germany

I wonder what the maths add up like for self sufficiency growing biofuel? I reckon the only thing holding that back is the oil companies, under the guise it would be bad politically to import all your food as a consequence, and environmentally poor from a diversity perspective.

In a world where we’re struggling to grow enough food for a growing population, do you think it’s just an oil company cover-up that suggests stopping growing food to grow food for our cars is a wise idea?

And good on Germany if what they’re doing is kosher. But, the bit they’re not doing (baseload thanks to neighbouring fossil / nuclear), is the hard bit. And pretty much out of their control as clearly they can’t tell the French to build another power station so they don’t have to.

to my mind its about investment

space race as an example, sending men to the moon was fantasy , then along came the cold war, $ billions were pumped into it and in a few years it happened

the uk’s (let alone the world’s) contribution to
ITER is a tiny fraction of GDP

Tidal aways seemed like a good idea to me, easy to capture could be stored in closed sections to release on demand and are predictable for the next hundefed odd years.

Would make interesting tv sheduling aligning with phases of the moon for high/ tides.