Catch up on stories from the past week (and beyond) at the Slashdot story archive

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
User Journal

Journal eglamkowski's Journal: energy policy 48

Journal by eglamkowski

Think Iraq was a war for oil?
Worried about our dependence on foreign oil sources?

Obviously we need to start producing energy from alternate sources RIGHT NOW.

Wind power isn't possible everywhere - the turbines take up too much space for the amount of power they generate, so only places that have too much space, like in deserts or in the ocean, can they even be considered. Then obviously you have to have wind. Where it works it's great, but only a few places in the USA, like Boston, have serious potential for this.

Geothermal energy also can't be done everywhere, isn't always economically feasible even where it can be done, and anyways the hot spots cool off over time and have to be abandoned. Is it even being used anywhere in the US at all?

Solar energy may work in some places, but again it isn't suitable everywhere, particularly in extreme northern or southern latitudes where they get little to no sunlight for large portions of the year. And of course, even in other areas, you still have to worry yourself about the number of sunny days you can expect, and even then it isn't always price competitive with existing utilities.

While I'd like to see improvement and investment in solar technology, that's more of a long term thing. It will take a long time to get to the point of having really good solar power.

Which leaves us with... nuclear power! Yeah, you gotta deal with the waste, and there is always the potential for a meltdown scenario, but in terms of ability to produce unlimited power and eliminating our dependence on foreign sources, it's something we can do RIGHT NOW. It's economically viable and we have the technology today.

If you hate wars for oil, hate Halliburton, hate Bush, and hate dependence on foreign sources for our energy needs, you NEED to support nuclear power! It's our only option for getting off the oil addiction RIGHT NOW.

Work on other sources in the mean time, but we can't wait another 10 or 20 years to get something going, we need to take action TODAY. And that means nuclear.

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

energy policy More

energy policy

Comments Filter:
  • Any idea of what the breakdown is of oil consumption currently between power plants, vehicles, and other uses? I mean a valid question from my end, what powers most of our power plants now? Oil? Coal? I really have never thought about it, but what would things look like if we were able to back off oil consumption to vehicular (or similar size generators only?
  • It's pronounced nu-cu-lar.

    I'm all about nuclear power. Good idea. Wish we could make it more efficient though. There's still too much wasted heat with the current process.

  • While I'd like to see improvement and investment in solar technology, that's more of a long term thing. It will take a long time to get to the point of having really good solar power.

    And wouldncha know it, it was Carter (the worst president EVAR, I gather from your JE) who tried thirty years ago to help get solar off the ground with tax credits...and Reagan (best president EVAR from the same horse's mouth) who nixed that tax credit. Carter's also the one who got the very Strategic Petroleum Reserve going

    • My comment on the presidents was that ALL the presidents in my lifetime have been BAD. That was someone else (RailGunner) praising Reagan.

      Well, he was a better choice than Mondale, but that's not saying much, eh? :-p

      But actually, the problem of bad presidents isn't just a modern thing - once we got out of the Age of the Founders, just about all the presidents have been bad.

      Fillmore? Arthur? Cleveland? Who's ever heard of these guys? They certainly couldn't have been great. I bet most americans wouldn'
      • One of my conservative IRL friends likes to point out someone's quote (sadly I can't remember whose) about the presidency not often demanding great men, and not often getting them. You're completely right about the quality of presidents historically. One could even argue that some of the founders were less than wonderful. The same friend likes to regale me with tales of Jefferson's political assholery.
        • Why is it that people expect their Presidents to be marble gods? Good Lord, they're human.

          The preaching about how it all went downhill since the Founders also strikes me as a bit odd. We went from a bunch of womanizing white property-holding slaveowners to dyslexic teetotalling pompous gits. While I'm not find of teetotalling pompous gits, I much prefer them and their mediocre ilk to the womanizing white property-owning slaveholder, even if the slaveholders happened to have had some brilliant flashes of i

          • For my part, I said "just about all" were bad, not literally all. I allowed for one or two decent presidents in there...

            I'm not asking them to be gods, but come on, Grant was a disaster! I'm rather disgusted with Jackson's policies on ideological grounds so I can't grant him a reprieve. I'm not talking about guys who just didn't do great things, I'm talking about guys who actively did bad things.

            One doesn't have to save the world to be great, but certainly launching an imperialistic war of aggression aga
            • One doesn't have to save the world to be great, but certainly launching an imperialistic war of aggression against a sovereign country using flimsy lies to justify the war (e.g. the Spanish-American War) definitely puts you into the category of bad presidents.

              Oooooh, I'm so tempted to make a trollish remark about Iraq... ;-)

              Cheers,

              Ethelred

            • One doesn't have to save the world to be great, but certainly launching an imperialistic war of aggression against a sovereign country using flimsy lies to justify the war (e.g. the Spanish-American War) definitely puts you into the category of bad presidents.

              Kind of funny how many modern Republicans claim to admire the McKinley administration isn't it?
          • The preaching about how it all went downhill since the Founders also strikes me as a bit odd. We went from a bunch of womanizing white property-holding slaveowners to dyslexic teetotalling pompous gits.

            And that's just in the past 10 years!

            Ba-dum-dum

            Thank you, I'll be here all... oh wait, it's friday, see ya!

    • Hey! That 'twas me who sang the praises of Reagan, and slammed Jimmuh Cartuh. I'll forgive you, cause I'm sure all us righties look alike. ;)

      And remember, as high as gas prices are, when adjusted for inflation they're still lower than gas prices in 1981 when Reagan took over from Mr. Malaise and the Misery index Presidency.

      Carter's also the one who got the very Strategic Petroleum Reserve

      bzzzzzt. That was Gerald Ford. Though I half expect some enviro-nut to start complaining about the irreversible da

      • Well, they are called "whacked-out lefties" or "enviro-nut jobs" for a reason - no need for their agenda to have to make sense, by God!
      • And remember, as high as gas prices are, when adjusted for inflation they're still lower than gas prices in 1981 when Reagan took over from Mr. Malaise and the Misery index Presidency.

        Hey, I'm not saying Carter or Bush have much of anything to do with oil prices. Though their respective actions do have/did have a lot to do with our dependence on oil, which long-term is a losing game economically and politically.

        Carter at least tried to get us off of oil a little; Reagan turned all that back and went rig

  • Where do we chuck the waste when we are done with the rods? Isn't the huge waste facility in/around LV, NV on hold?
    • Two things, one you reprocess the rods thus greatly reducing the amount of nuclear waste you have to store.

      Also get new reactors online that are much more efficient about their fuel use. (basicly fewer lbs. of spent rods per year per kilowatt of output)

      Take the remaining amount let it cool for a few years (most of the really nasty stuff is mostly gone in 50 years or so). Then put it in a ceramic matrix and bury it. Old uranium mines are a good choice for location (the waste at this point has about the same
  • Just needs to be expanded and better tranmission to the occupied areas:

    Wind power isn't possible everywhere - the turbines take up too much space for the amount of power they generate, so only places that have too much space, like in deserts or in the ocean, can they even be considered. Then obviously you have to have wind. Where it works it's great, but only a few places in the USA, like Boston, have serious potential for this.

    Eastern Oregon does great- and I'd imagine any other high desert environment
    • Ah yes - kicking the indians off the reservation in the name of energy production, eh? Recall Catch-22's Chief White Halfoat, how oil companies would follow his tribe around and as soon as they settled, they promptly kicked them off the land and started drilling for oil...

      Anyways, current geothermal energy production amounts to 0.34% of our total consumption. Solar energy accounts for 0.06% and wind energy for 0.14%.

      I guess that means we have proof of concept, but does make me wonder how viable it is on a
      • Ah yes - kicking the indians off the reservation in the name of energy production, eh? Recall Catch-22's Chief White Halfoat, how oil companies would follow his tribe around and as soon as they settled, they promptly kicked them off the land and started drilling for oil...

        :-) Yes, to some extent, though I think the Warm Springs Confederated Tribes got a better deal out of Enron than that.

        Anyways, current geothermal energy production amounts to 0.34% of our total consumption. Solar energy accounts for 0
        • Remove energy from the sun, and you gain shade to be under.

          People don't want 100% shade. make the photovotaics a 'cheap' semi translucelucent/semi-reflective polymer film that can be aplied to glass/etc and call me when you've got it working right. and sell me the rights for a dollar ;) guarentee you if you can mass produce the stuff by the dime/sqft that you've got a half a trillion dollar overnight boom business -- As long as you can vary the opacity of it to meet certain specifcations it doesn't matte
          • People don't want 100% shade.

            Really? Must be my asperger's acting up again- I'd kill to be able to be in 100% shade all the time. (years of migraines have left me a bit photophobic).
            • yes, in fact most people want to be in the sun. :) you apparently are one of the unfortunate few who sucks and cannot tolerate direct sunlight. sorry to hear that, but many people dream of relaxing on a white sand beach when they wanna relax ;) and of course drinks with umbreallas in them, and the hot people waiting on your every need... erm *cough* ahem.. the dream may vary, but absorbing sunlight is a common practice for people and cats alike.
              • yes, in fact most people want to be in the sun. :) you apparently are one of the unfortunate few who sucks and cannot tolerate direct sunlight. sorry to hear that, but many people dream of relaxing on a white sand beach when they wanna relax ;) and of course drinks with umbreallas in them, and the hot people waiting on your every need... erm *cough* ahem.. the dream may vary, but absorbing sunlight is a common practice for people and cats alike.

                Between the migraines, sunburn, and heatstroke, I can certai
        • Remove energy from the ground, and if you're carefull, you might just PREVENT a supervolcano by removing pressure from the fault lines.

          Whoa! Be careful there. Let all that pressure out, and the earth will collapse on itself like a time lapse movie of a rotting orange.

Slashdot Top Deals

Usage: fortune -P [-f] -a [xsz] Q: file [rKe9] -v6[+] file1 ...

Close