The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people • Hacker News Board

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#181

Post by kd0amg » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:19 PM UTC

popey456963 wrote: post #179

labster wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd normally agree with you, but the top Uranium producers are Canada, Kazakhstan, and Australia. Uranium mining is a first (and second) world problem.

To be fair, you need _significantly_ less[0] uranium compared with the amount of coal you mine. For every million mountains destroyed by coal mining, you'd only have to destroy a couple of mountains. Not to mention I don't think uranium is usually mined from mountains but rather pit-mined, makes it far better than the alternatives. Personally however, still support solar. Especially solar house tiles, they look good,…

Reminds me of this chart: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PI99A08Y83E&t=13m45s (if you want to skip to the punch line, it's just after 15:00), but this one is still in log scale.

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#182

Post by sedachv » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:22 PM UTC

_ph_ wrote: post #180

sedachv wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people, including me, think the exact opposite: we should be tearing down as many existing dams as possible. Dams are extremely damaging to river ecosystems and are a huge contributor to coastline erosion and exacerbate droughts. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/11/dam-removal-nelso...

One has of course to learn from the mistakes of the past when deciding where and how to plan and manage dams. But California seems to suffer alternating from floods after the snow melt and droughts in between. The current dam infrastructure is to buffer the floods and release the water at a more constant rate through the season. I cannot see how this could create droughts. Here in Germany we traditionally have more w…

Dams contribute to droughts by limiting the recharge of downstream ground water levels and aquifiers.

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#183

Post by CydeWeys » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:35 PM UTC

maxerickson wrote: post #148

CydeWeys wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The towers are just lots and lots of steel. And a lot of engineering is involved to optimize that design, to build the towers as strong as is necessary to survive high wind loads while using as little material as possible so as to minimize cost. You're trivializing something that has a lot of thought put into it just because you don't really understand it well. I can guarantee you that more thought, simulation, and…

And from a material standpoint they are still just lots and lots of steel. If it helps, I'm not a software engineer and have an unused degree in mechanical engineering.

From a reductive material standpoint, everything is just a collection of ingredients. Processors are "just" silicon. That doesn't make them trivial to engineer. What is your point?

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#184

Post by ams6110 » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:36 PM UTC

MrTonyD wrote: post #130

MagnumOpus wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meh about [2] - house cats and glass&steel skyscrapers kill an awful lot more birds than that. There is absolutely no outcry against either; that's how we know the outrage against windmills killing birds is planted and artificially kept alive.

And I was reading that most "capped" underwater oil wells are actually leaking oil - and there are many thousands. So oil is silently killing incredible amounts of sea life. So, while I regret the loss of animal life to wind turbines it is much better than the loss of life to oil. (And new wind turbines in the ocean are being placed at heights which almost eliminate bird impacts and also being designed with structure…

Oil leaks naturally out of the sea floor also.

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#185

Post by erikpukinskis » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:40 PM UTC

15charlimitdumb wrote: post #132

notadoc wrote: post #94

I recall some years ago T Boone Pickens had a plan for a large scale wind project throughout the midwest, but it fell through for various reasons. At what point will solar efficient enough to lay out massive solar grids in Texas, Arizona, and SE California?

in terms of efficiency not for the foreseeable future. hydrocarbons are essentially condensed solar power. when will it become more economically efficient to move and assemble all the materials for a solar panel vs extracting hydrocarbon stored energy (sapiens living in poverty can't care about the environment of tomorrow if they are struggling to thrive today, admittedly this is my global view)

Now ish

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#186

Post by Normal_gaussian » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:45 PM UTC

marze wrote: post #68

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I couldn't disagree more. They popped up as I was growing up - littering the coastline and countryside. They can be seen from great distances and serve to make the place seem an awful lot smaller. I for one can't wait until we develop a way to live without them - the only condolence is that they move us away from the coal and gas industries. I do hope that solar leaves them in its wake and we can be done with the mon…

Compared to ripping the tops of mountains in West Virginia and states nearby and filling in the beautiful valleys to strip mine coal, a huge win.

My point exactly

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#187

Post by _ph_ » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:46 PM UTC

sedachv wrote: post #182

_ph_ wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One has of course to learn from the mistakes of the past when deciding where and how to plan and manage dams. But California seems to suffer alternating from floods after the snow melt and droughts in between. The current dam infrastructure is to buffer the floods and release the water at a more constant rate through the season. I cannot see how this could create droughts. Here in Germany we traditionally have more w…

Dams contribute to droughts by limiting the recharge of downstream ground water levels and aquifiers.

Can you explain why? Over the year they would release the same water as the river without the dam would do - just not in a peak flood but reduced to a constant flood rate.

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#188

Post by Normal_gaussian » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:48 PM UTC

noonespecial wrote: post #72

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I couldn't disagree more. They popped up as I was growing up - littering the coastline and countryside. They can be seen from great distances and serve to make the place seem an awful lot smaller. I for one can't wait until we develop a way to live without them - the only condolence is that they move us away from the coal and gas industries. I do hope that solar leaves them in its wake and we can be done with the mon…

I guess it's a matter of perspective. I suppose the true end-game is for tech is to be completely invisible. The great thing about wind and solar is that when you're done with them, you can pretty much just pack them up and haul them off. Strip-mining? Not so much.

I agree they are much better than strip mining and I said as much, they just are not beautiful.

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#189

Post by rhino369 » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:48 PM UTC

tuna-piano wrote: post #102

When something is cheap, people buy more of it. If you are someone who wants more wind power to be produced, you want it to be cheap. You should be rooting for cheaper wind prices, which come with increased efficiency (including less employees per unit of energy produced). Of course, less employees per unit of energy could equate to more total employees if the increase in energy produced is greater than the increases…

Services also fall in price when the supply outstrips demand. You should be rooting for windmills to get cheap but wind prices on the market to stay high.

Wind has an issue where it is most productive during the night the grid doesn't really need power. So it will be priced lower.

Re: The U.S. wind industry now employs more than 100K people

#190

Post by Normal_gaussian » Sat, Apr 22, 2017, 9:58 PM UTC

metaobject wrote: post #57

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I couldn't disagree more. They popped up as I was growing up - littering the coastline and countryside. They can be seen from great distances and serve to make the place seem an awful lot smaller. I for one can't wait until we develop a way to live without them - the only condolence is that they move us away from the coal and gas industries. I do hope that solar leaves them in its wake and we can be done with the mon…

"littering the coastline" Your word choice is interesting.

I consider them and most of our industrial buildings a kind of litter on our landscape. Some (and I stress 'some') of the old Victorian bridges are exceptions, and there is the occasional building (mainly churches, pubs, and manors) which integrate in an aesthetically pleasing way, but then again we have already turned all the land to farmland so maybe there is little left to protect inland.