That’s putting it mildly, when you consider that the oil shale formations are in the basin of the already used-up and over-appropriated Colorado River.

If producing oil from shale is going to require lots of water — at least that was a given a few years ago — just where is it going to come from? Are you going to tell Las Vegas or Phoenix to give up their share?

On the other hand, although y may understand the oil business, he has no idea what he is talking about regarding nuclear. There is more energy in the uranium that comes out of the smokestack of a coal plant(!) than there was in the coal that was burned. It is thermodynamically efficient to extract one atom of uranium from the crust of the earth, given the EREI for nuclear energy. In the 1980s, the Japanese figured out how to extract uranium from seawater at prices that are not much higher than they were on the U spot market about a year ago, and there is a tremendous amount of thorium in India that could take over if the cost-benefit ratio flipped.

And amount of waste is tiny, compared to the waste from wind and solar. It is also quite useful, and it drops in toxicity as it ages, unlike other waste. Has anyone figured out what they are going to do with all of these solar panels and fiberglass windmill blades when they have to be decommissioned? They are quite large, and composite plastics are notoriously difficult to recycle. Maybe they will just be dumped into landfills, to contaminate the water-table.

The issue of subsidies for nuclear lumps all of the weapons work into the commercial business. And then the same people who critique commercial nuclear take the same numbers and complain about how expensive nuclear weapons are. Well, you can’t have it both ways – ether you charge the work to the commercial business or the weapons, not to both at the same time. And if we are going to aportion costs, then the windmill people and the solar cell people need to take a charge for the entire space program and the military aeronautics industry, and maybe even the Navy in the days of sail, where we learned how to harness the power of the wind. Just to show that these arguments about “subsidies” are just a waste of time and effort.

The Price-Anderson act does not contain any subsidies to nuclear insurance. It does not work that way. Each commercial plant buys real liability insurance from a private pool, and if an accident were to occur, the pool members could be assessed to provide additional coverage up to a particular figure. What P-A does, is to say that if a really bad accident occurs, the Congress will get to figure out how to cover excess losses, just like they did with losses from 9-11. The industry is on the hook to cover a certain amount of losses, but above that, it becomes a national issue that requires Congressional action. There is no subsidy, in the sense that people understand that term. And you could say that this is true about just about any modern technology, from chemicals to airplanes, to biotech, to computers, to nanoparticles, that has the potential for widespread impact. Everyone buys insurance, and if the really unexpected happens, the political process figures out what to do. P-A is a nuclear red herring thrown out by its opponents.

Finally, regarding solar and wind systems, I actually have one of these providing power to me on my sailboat. I have several large battery banks, several large solar panels, a windmill, a standby generator with battery charger, a main engine that can also charge the batteries, shore-power connections, and an inverter to provide AC from the batteries. This system is not simple. My technically-minded wife cannot make it work, much less maintain it. What Mr. Gore wants is to install this same technology in every house in the US. Those of you who have parents beyond a certain age should ask yourself “Could my mother/father run/maintain such a system in their home?” I know that mine could not. It is likely that a LOT of people will be seriously injured/killed by these systems, as they get old, experience failures, cause fires, cause people to fall off of roofs while maintaining them, spill acid, cause lives to be lost in traffic accidents while maintenance people travel to service them, etc. Getting rid of the grid is really silly. But that is where the environmental community is pushing us. And when the grid finally starts to collapse, because it can’t handle the loads that are growing steadily, we will finally see what is is like to live in a simpler society.

I also notice that biggest big-deal about AGW and what huge cut-backs in consumption need to be made have started in a day and age when not only millions of brown and yellow people in the world stand to claw their way out of poverty for the first time in millenia but also when the middle and lower classes in This country began having access to luxuries once reserved for the elite. You can find imported wine and fillet mignon in a podunk town of less than a thousand people out here.

But hey, Hanlon’s razor and all that,I’m sure all those big decision-makers in the Democratic party… who also are among the social and financial elite and could still afford steak and red wine no matter how high gas-prices go.. all have the best intentions at heart.

Actually, I’m not the “true believer” type on either side; I simply thought you might like to see what actual engineers think about the issue. After all, they are the people who have to turn the theories into machinery. Mr. den Beste’s tone results, I think, from having to answer too many ferocious “true believers” incapable of dispassionate analysis.

I thought the commentary was fully as interesting as the original entry, e.g.:

“…Third was that he linked to a Scientific American article. Time was when I thought the world of SciAm but about fifteen years ago the editorial slant of the place changed and now it’s mostly a worthless rag. That said, the front of that article contained a claim that it was possible to produce 35% of our energy with solar by 2050.

As mentioned, average energy usage in the US today is about 3.6 terawatts. If our energy usage remains flat level for 40 years, then 35% of that is 1.26 terawatts.

24-hour-365-day average solar power density in Albequerque is 240 watts per square meter. If our hero’s proposed solar farms are 25% efficient at converting that to useful energy, then to produce 1.26 terawatts he’d have to pave 21,000 square kilometers with high tech. That’s larger than the dry area of New Jersey.

Of course, if the efficiency is more like 10%, which is far more likely, then he needs to high-tech pave more than 50,000 square kilometers. You believe that’ll happen?

And if our energy consumption continues to increase along historical norms, then by 2050 our power consumption will be 2.85 times what it is now, and our 10%-efficient solar farms would have to cover an area comparable to the dry area of Michigan.”

Just a simple line of thought about the numbers involved. Not a rant, denying the utility of taking advantage of local advantages for particular systems; just a cautionary about some folks’ tendency to get starry-eyed about comprehensive world solutions. If you can estimate the percentage reduction of energy usage likely to be obtained from conservation as you envision it, the land-area consumption result can be reduced, but I think it’s likely to still be considerable. The same sorts of considerations apply to other renewables; once again, not a rejection, just a cautionary.

The ultimate point being that seeking increased production of “non-renewables” is necessary at present and the obstructionism cited in the post above is wrong.

By the way, the price mechanism is apparently already producing conservation. The media seem loathe to recognize this overtly, expressing it as “a reduction in traffic fatalities due to less travel”.

One last note: AGW is BS. Measurements show that many of our neighboring planetary bodies are warming up lately and to my best knowledge the Mars rover has yet to encounter even a Toyota Prius, let alone a Ford Excursion or a Hummer.

Part of my operand definition of a modern “progressive” is someone who can keep two contradictory ideas in their mind at the same time, believe both of them, and argue for both of them – all without noticing the obvious conflict.

In other words, modern progressives are psychotic.

If any one wants to call me, feel free!

Cell number 361-230-9839

I did pay my cell bill last month.

Also , use your REAL name on blogs or HIDE!

your CHOICE!

NO COMMENTS!

GO TO HUGGINTOOOOOOOO RAG MAZZ–CAN’T SPELL

yosihidah: I have two more HALLIBURTION (VICE – PRIESIDENT OF UNITED STATES) Frac Jobs next week>

Moral of story! You tell me

Peace & Love in South Texas! My Older sister taught me this pharse!

You’re mistaken thinking I’m from New York. I really and truly know what it’s like to look out from a rig floor, over a six-foot-tall stack of Hughes tool bits to see a lagoon full of drilling mud. I know the difference between a “spudder” and a rotary drill. My grandpa built pipelines from Oklahoma and East Texas to the East, and my Dad was a land man. I know the difference between a working interest and an overriding royalty.

So don’t take your worries about me too seriously. I’m on your side — just a little longer term than you’re thinking.

And nobody — and I mean *no* body — respects oilfield work more than me. And if you think that deep well on land is fancy, imagine going down six miles below the ocean floor in the Gulf. Now that is some deep shit!

And have you seen the seismic stuff they’ve got now! Three-dimensional under-the-ocean subsurface maps. Man! That’s some serious technology!

Anyway, my brother, we disagree about some of this stuff, but don’t let the turkeys get you down!

BTW, I just read Jim Webb’s “Fields of Fire” — You’d like it. He knows what it is to be a man. (Lots of kids around nowadays, not too many men.)

MORAL OF THE STORY! NOT MUCH! IF YOU ARE TO THE MOON – MONEY IS NO NO NO NO CONCERN!

JUST LIKE THE IRAQ WAR!

THINK ABOUT IT PEOPLE !

OIL = FREEDOM!

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

HURRICANCE IN THE GULF , GOT TO BOARD UP WINDOWS!

THAT IS TRYING TO SURVIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!