Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What can a technologist do about climate change?

worrydream.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 293 posts

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#221

Post by DennisP »

danieltillett wrote: post #205
DennisP wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear plants cost a lot up front but they produce a lot of power for a long time. Per MWh they're not that expensive compared to renewables. Taking the government's estimates for capital cost, we have onshore wind at $58/MWh, nuclear at $70/MWh, hydro $71, advanced coal $77, solar PV $109, offshore wind $168, solar thermal $192. But I don't think anyone would claim that the construction of a modern coal plant has s…

How many recent Nuclear plants have been built that will be able to generate power at $70/MWh? All the recent ones have had massive cost and time overruns. This report from the UK is interesting reading [1]. 1. http://www.parliament.uk/documents/post/postpn_383-carbon-fo...

Yes, that report is interesting. It says, "Nuclear and renewable generation generally have a low carbon footprint." In the charts, nuclear has a significantly lower carbon footprint than solar PV, geothermal, and small/medium wind, and only a slightly higher footprint than large wind.

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#222

Post by guscost »

pjc50 wrote: post #119
guscost wrote: post #13

While I don't really agree with the premise, my initial impression is that this should get ten upvotes for being so well reasoned and executed. Amazing work, I'm confident a lot of good will come of it. One recommendation, at your earliest convenience do something about this: > I didn’t mention nuclear because I don’t know much about it.

Nuclear generates a lot of controversy. On paper it looks great; in practice there it turns out to be very expensive or have nasty problems buried in the details. For example, molten salt reactors have corrosion and reprocessing problems. I don't blame the author for refusing to take a position on nuclear.

If that was confusing, all I'm recommending is to learn more about it for now, since he says he does not know much.

My reasoning is that any technology that can produce an enormous amount of energy without burning hydrocarbons is worth more than a little consideration, even if it presents serious engineering and regulatory challenges, and especially to anyone who is concerned about carbon emissions.

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#223

Post by grenzbegriff »

hanniabu wrote: post #218
grenzbegriff wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks :) 43 still gives you about 20 more years than most people to do something other than earning money to spend! Imagine what you'll get to do with that kind of time. I love hearing from other people who have a similar plan. And of course I'll suggest you could be independent sooner if you reduce some spending. ;) But that's your tradeoff to consider.

You guys speak of dividends. I'm not good with stocks so pardon my novice. May I ask what you invest in that earns you the best dividends and keeps you diversified? I'm also assuming you reinvest the dividends? Are there any tips you can give for someone wanting to start doing this? Are there any tricks you have that help you pay less taxes? And tricks to how one should diversify?

I put almost all of my savings into total stock market index funds. I use Vanguard so the expense ratio is 0.05%. Dividends are automatically reinvested so I don't have to worry about that -- from my perspective dividends look no different than the fund's value going up.

Here are some resources that explain why to do this and how:

https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/investing

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/05/18/how-to-make-money-...

There are endless ways to diversify. For example, my portfolio is "diversified" across all stocks. But the entire stock market goes up and down, so some people diversify by putting a percentage of their savings in something else, like bonds or money market funds. These tend to have lower historical average returns than the stock market, but they won't necessarily go up and down at the same time so your savings will not fluctuate as much.

I haven't looked into paying less taxes, aside from maxing my 401k.

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#224

Post by Brakenshire »

DanBC wrote: post #176
gd1 wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's genuinely embarrassing is that you think there is enough ice on the planet to raise sea levels 150m.

Clearly a typo for 150 cm.

It's not a typo, historic changes in sea level are in the hundreds of meters, from over 100m below current levels (in the relatively recent history) up to a maximum of perhaps 200m. A lot of that is to do with shifts in geology - configurations in the continents, levels of continental shelfs etc, but there's about 75m of potential increases which are locked into ice-sheets, glaciers, etc, and/or dependent on thermal expansion. Of course, even under the most catastrophic scenarios seeing increases on that scale would take thousands, probably tens of thousands of years.

I'm just trying to illustrate how absurd it is to say "oh yeah let's return to the climate in the Cretaceous, everything would be lovely".

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#225

Post by personomas »

Jemaclus wrote: post #57

I've asked this question a few times but haven't really gotten a satisfactory answer. There are a lot of what I might call "epic problems" out there. Malaria, homelessness, HIV, refugees, war, climate change, income inequality, gender inequality, hate crimes. I don't know anything about creating vaccines or cures for malaria or HIV. I don't have a degree in social work or behavior science. I don't have any experience…

Listen to God, and he'll tell you what to do!

Anyways, many "epic" problems are caused by our own sin: hate crimes, war, homelessness, gender inequality, etc, etc. Our sin is the cause of these problems. Not only sin found else where in the world, but our sin.

So here's a starting point: love thy neighbor as thy self, read the bible with your heart, and rejoice for Jesus died for our sins! Finally, love God! And all of this will go along with in helping epic problems. Amen and God bless!!!

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#226

Post by XorNot »

ommunist wrote: post #136
XorNot wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you'll note, again, that the data I referred to isn't about what cars do or do not emit specifically. It is about whether volcanic eruptions track with significant increases in CO2 in the atmosphere. Which they do not. Where as your sources are still absent.

Look, data for individual eruptions: Year Volcano Mean Sulphurous Output Source Est. Carbon output during year(s) of eruption 1883AD Krakatoa 38 MtSO2pa Shinohara (2008) 26.14 MtCpa 1815AD Tambora 70 MtSO2pa Shinohara (2008) 48.16 MtCpa 1783AD Laki 130 MtSO2pa Shinohara (2008) 89.44 MtCpa 1600AD Huaynaputina 48 MtSO2pa Shinohara (2008) 33.02 MtCpa 1452AD Kuwae 150 MtH2SO4pa Witter & Self (2007) 67.40 MtCpa 934AD Eldj…

You really need to qualify what those units are.

But also, again, if what what you were saying were true, why does it not show up in the atmospheric CO2 record?

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#227

Post by protomyth »

rwallace wrote: post #217
protomyth wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does China use coal? If you truly want India and China to switch sources then you need to check all the boxes. No one is going to sacrifice when they are bootstrapping.

Why has China started investing heavily in renewable energy? For one, they want the status of a modern country that's leading the world in important matters; they don't want to be a shitty third world country stuck in the nineteenth century. For another, they're tired of constantly choking on coal smoke.

> they want the status of a modern country that's leading the world in important matters

Yes, their military spending and quest for a blue water navy is number one on that list.

They continue to use coal as the main source of energy because it is what the west did and its a know quantity, reliable, and cheap. They are increasing their attempts at other energy but a lot of that comes from their desire to stay dominant in all forms of manufacturing. If they can subsidize and crush the manufacturing in other countries (such as the US), they will do it.

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#228

Post by likeapub »

grenzbegriff wrote: post #216
likeapub wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how much savings will u have by 27? do you have a house too?

I expect to have $500k by 27. No, I don't have a house, I split an apartment with a roommate close to work so I have a very short commute.

500k is enough for retirement? are you going to live in a cheap city?

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#229

Post by danieltillett »

DennisP wrote: post #221
danieltillett wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many recent Nuclear plants have been built that will be able to generate power at $70/MWh? All the recent ones have had massive cost and time overruns. This report from the UK is interesting reading [1]. 1. http://www.parliament.uk/documents/post/postpn_383-carbon-fo...

Yes, that report is interesting. It says, "Nuclear and renewable generation generally have a low carbon footprint." In the charts, nuclear has a significantly lower carbon footprint than solar PV, geothermal, and small/medium wind, and only a slightly higher footprint than large wind.

Getting accurate information on the carbon footprint of nuclear energy is hard. The best paper I have seen on this is Life Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Nuclear Electricity Generation [1]. Their range is from 9 to 110 g CO2-eq/kWh by 2050.

1. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1530-9290.2012....

Re: What can a technologist do about climate change?

#230

Post by prbuckley »

chaosphere2112 wrote: post #186
adenylyl wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Anticipated Clearance Level: Q (Position will be cleared to this level)." ... why would someone working on climate modeling software need a clearance for nuclear weapon design information?

The lab clears basically all salaried employees at L or Q; if there's any chance that you might look at classified data some day (IE: if you want to interview at another group internally, or have some useful expertise that can be leveraged somewhere else), it saves everyone time and energy if you're already a Q. There's some financial reasons not to do it, but I think the math works out in favor of not running multip…

I worked at LLNL 2001-2005 as a mechanical engineering. It was a very nice place to work. I had to go through the clearance process and that was the weirdest part. They sent people to interview a camp councelor I had when I was 10 years old! I also had to list every address I had lived at and every country I had ever visited with cooresponding dates.

Given the huge amount of personal data the government now has on me it was quite concerning when the OPM had 21.5 million government employees information hacked, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/federal-eye/wp/2015/07/0...

Post reply on HN