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US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

bbc.com

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Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#571

Post by quink »

s_dev wrote: post #196
juntoalaluna wrote: post #12

Insane. Over the last year, wind - mostly offshore - has generated more than 35% of electricity here. Gas is down to 27%. It's really, really good. And it looks cool.

What's more mental you talk to any Germans about deprecating their Nuclear power stations they will bang on about their plan for renewables and then you read these sorts of headlines. What the hell is happening over there? Why can't they get 'energy' despite being a scientifically literate nation. France has a far superior energy policy so it's not like you even have to travel beyond a few miles to see a wildly diffe…

Nuclear scepticism… did you know that nuclear power plants need cooling? Germany is learning that lesson the hard way right now, just check the news, it really speaks for reducing their dependency on nuclear as having been a very very good idea.

No wait, they’re not learning it the hard way because they’ve already got rid of them. Phew…

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#572

Post by perpetuallunch »

u02sgb wrote: post #444
xtiansimon wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “… without deeper understanding or knowledge.” Ha! Like the common sense to dam migratory river systems to make hydroelectric power. Good idea at the time, and who cares about salmon. I have a toaster, and a percolator, and a new fangled “ice” box (formerly chilled by ice, now a maker of ice). S/ My common sense says 1.2B compensation to not do something we otherwise need is bananas as opposed to the common sense—p…

We have a hydroelectric dam near us with a salmon leap next to it. Good visitor attraction too. It'll provide power for decades with little maintenance and not much further in the way of environmental issues now that it's built.

Dams are subject to silt buildup up, which requires maintenance.

They’re so destructive to local ecosystems that environmental groups have blocked any new hydroelectric dams being built in Australia for over 40 years.

All modern concrete eventually fails, and dams are notoriously difficult to remove and replace.

Fortunately they last long enough that if you paint them pink and plug a torch battery in to them they can remain somebody else’s problem for quite some time.

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#573

Post by wizzwizz4 »

1234letshaveatw wrote: post #493
wizzwizz4 wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This site only recently (a few years ago) got multithreading . I'm pretty sure it could run off a second-hand laptop. It doesn't require a datacentre: just the two(?) moderators' salaries, and some rounding-error electricity and ISP costs.

I'm fond of Netflix?

Wouldn't need datacentres if we had IP multicast routing. And actually, Netflix doesn't need that anyway: anycast and telco CDNs get most of the advantages, albeit at the cost of only being available to established players. Netflix uses AWS because it's cheaper and easier for them, not because it's technically necessary: if AWS shut down (with enough notice), Netflix would migrate to an alternative system, and nothing much would change.

I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of Netflix's true overhead were actually DRM and account management, rather than the international distribution of perhaps a petabyte of multimedia data, most of which doesn't change. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33456782 estimates half that; https://redlib.catsarch.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/6mf... estimates a tenth of that.)

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#574

Post by glaslong »

ghosty141 wrote: post #533
glaslong wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Using the HN homework from earlier about multi-objective optimization... perhaps a Pareto optimal trade space of evil and dumb, to the maximum extent the two can coexist

Hehe, I think evil often stems from dumb in the sense that rarely is evil the choice that leads to good long term outcomes. For example the famous prisoners dilemma where the best strategy is tit for tat with occasional forgiveness. ofc smart/evil/dumb are all simplifying things way too much since its not like humans have video game like attribute sliders. Im very aware of that, this is not meant to be taken that ser…

Yeah, it's unfortunately fun to theorycraft the data and over-intellectualize a bit. Sorta takes the sting out of the reality ya kno?

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#575

Post by pessimizer »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #476
whack wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never attribute to stupidity what can be attributed to self-interest. It sure looks stupid when you look at America or the Roman Empire as a whole. But when you look at the specific individuals doing these "stupid" things, and the individuals enabling them, it is perfectly aligned with their own best interests.

It's almost as if acting solely in one's own self-interest is stupid.

Those that acted in their own self-interest thrived, and others died.

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#576

Post by delecti »

zeezer0 wrote: post #197
jfengel wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, we're not expecting someone else to stop it. We voted for this. The evil is not imposed on us. It is us. Not everyone, but a majority. The minority is looking for ways to stop it, but it requires getting literally everyone else to work together. Which means any disagreement among them results in a loss, and more of the same evil.

It's not a majority at all. it's a manipulating minority.

I don't think "manipulating" is valid. A bit over a third voted one way, a bit under a third voted another, and a third didn't vote. The third that didn't vote was saying "sure, whatever".

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#577

Post by Zenst »

jeltz wrote: post #51
saagarjha wrote: post #4

> Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement posted on X that Americans deserve an energy system built on common sense and not one dependent on "costly subsidies". I agree. This is why we are building offshore wind and not subsidizing fossil fuels, right?

All kinds of power generation are typically heavily subdized in some way. I do not think this "common sense" strategy exists.

Subsidies (via tax or lack thereof) on aeroplane fuel is one that really does get overlooked. Yet on the other hand, use a few gallons in a car and you're demonised as a climate villain in name and taxes. Nobody factors in life of the car, the cost to dispose and replace the batteries in electric cars, or the whole aspect that cars made today are less serviceable than cars of old that its gone from being able to rebuild the car in your garage to waiting for spare parts from a dealer as it's all just replace or scrap today. So much focus on the short term, without focus on the larger picture and impact.

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#578

Post by kwanbix »

1dontknow_ wrote: post #483
saagarjha wrote: post #4

> Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement posted on X that Americans deserve an energy system built on common sense and not one dependent on "costly subsidies". I agree. This is why we are building offshore wind and not subsidizing fossil fuels, right?

Please do not forget the /s since there are young people here or those people who arent native English speakers and they might not catch the sarcasm given its an important topic, esp for the wellbeing of our future generations.

Upvoted because you are right.

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#579

Post by jrflo »

WarmWash wrote: post #546

Just a hypothetical... Building new infra will extend beyond trumps term, so it's possible they do "planning" for 2 years, new admin comes in, and they abandon the plan and go back to putting the money in wind.

Thank you for this, I'm going to just accept this theory and close the thread because it makes me so upset, lol

Re: US strikes $1.2B deal to pay German firm to halt offshore wind projects

#580

Post by kwanbix »

tialaramex wrote: post #328
saagarjha wrote: post #4

> Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement posted on X that Americans deserve an energy system built on common sense and not one dependent on "costly subsidies". I agree. This is why we are building offshore wind and not subsidizing fossil fuels, right?

To be fair offshore wind is relatively expensive. A brand new wind farm is probably cheaper than burning methane because Trump started another pointless war, but it's closer than for like Solar PV. Of course "common sense" ought to probably include "Not cooking ourselves".

It might be more expensive to build/run, but is cheaper on the environment.
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