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

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

#931

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and we definitely need to be careful that we handle the transition without screwing people over. Well we’re certifiably not going that . No need to wait decades to look at the recent data. London can’t even work out how to properly ventilate their underground rail network. The solution is obvious: built nuclear power and refrigeration (heat pumps). Where it’s too cold either nuclear and heat pumps and / or district…

> Well we’re certifiably not doing that. Don't disagree with you there. > London can’t even work out how to properly ventilate their underground rail network. This seems unrelated. It's not an energy problem: it's a problem with lack of space in the tunnels and lack of places to build ventilation shafts due to the issue not being considered 100 years ago when the tunnels were built. > Or people can melt in the summer…

London’s tube system had an eminent domain, technology, political will problem. It’s entirely fixable.

Cold weather kills more people than hot weather. By a huge margin.

People frequently move from cooler areas to areas that have comparatively hotter climates than even the worst (completely fabricated) global warming predictions.

But they rarely do the opposite.

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

#932

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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".

The third that didn't vote does not exist. The net result was roughly 50/50.

Now, maybe this third will start to exist and vote if they either wake up, are seriously hit financially or someone annoys them enough.

Until then they decided to erase themselves from any decision making and if the world was fair they , would not have the right to any comment regarding whatever is related to their country.

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

#933

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“People are irrational, emotion-driven, and trapped by rigid mental models.” ... of course they are ... everyone except you toomuchtodo :) ..

The drugs I take inhibit most, if not all, of any emotions I might have, leaving me aggressively data driven by evidence, observations, data, and facts. I am a complex expert system with a pulse.

weird flex but cool

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

#934
post #788

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly, the biggest group pushing for an alternative is FairVote, who exclusively push RCV/IRV, which doesn't fix most of the issues of FPTP and introduces new ones. I'm bombarded by their ads, where they outright lie about its properties ("RCV ends the spoiler effect", "RCV means no more voting for the lesser evil").

What doesn't RCV fix about FPTP? And what issues does it introduce? I've seen discussions around how it can be more confusing than the current system, and can reduce confidence in the election.

It doesn't fix the spoiler effect (it makes its own version of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_squeeze ), and it removes monotonicity. The second one is a big deal for me, at least in FPTP a vote for a candidate always helps them. With RCV, a vote for a candidate can hurt them, and sometimes not voting makes the outcome you want more likely than if you did vote for it.

The 2022 Alaska election was a great example of it failing: https://realrcv.equal.vote/alaska22/ FairVote called that election a success because people managed to fill in their ballots, even if they didn't get the outcome they thought they were voting for.

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

#935

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Artificial" geothermal works well enough to store energy from sunlight months for use during colder months. Artificial in the sense of using solar energy (direct or electric) to heat mass insulated by earth and later extracting that heat to use (directly in district heating, or indirectly via heat -> electric conversion).

Show me an example where this is being used in the real word, at scale, in a cost effective manner. It’s not even a good idea. Water has a greater capacity to store heat than rocks and dirt.

I'm obviously going to ignore the conditional goal posts at scale and cost effective ... burgeoning technology does not typically land with all the problems ironed out or have economy of scale.

I used my searchfoo and Sage Industries lands in more of the top results [1] [2] (may require careful attention to distinguish between natural and artificial geothermal) As well as an interview [youtube]

There's obviously different methods that have been employed / tried by other companies given [3] which outlines different methods of storage also includes some simple graphics ...

[1] https://www.aveva.com/en/our-industrial-life/type/article/tu...

[2] https://new.abb.com/news/detail/123160/abb-and-sage-geosyste...

[youtube] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSt-MiiX0Fg (Transmission 43 mins Geothermal: Turning Oil Wells Into Energy Storage - Sage Geosystems) [podcast]

[3] https://www.energy.gov/hgeo/geothermal/geothermal-energy-sto...

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

#936

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Artificial" geothermal works well enough to store energy from sunlight months for use during colder months. Artificial in the sense of using solar energy (direct or electric) to heat mass insulated by earth and later extracting that heat to use (directly in district heating, or indirectly via heat -> electric conversion).

Show me an example where this is being used in the real word, at scale, in a cost effective manner. It’s not even a good idea. Water has a greater capacity to store heat than rocks and dirt.

> real word, at scale, in a cost effective manner.

- https://web.archive.org/web/20151208232728/http://ing.dk/art...

from [2015 - now( ... (still operating) for one example.

> Water has a greater capacity to store heat than rocks and dirt.

Weirdly all three fall under the description used ( "mass" ) and yet none of the three you mentioned are molten salt or silicon which perform even better than water.

If the point you're making is that you've made little effort to think this through or look to where this has been used, is being used, or at pilot plants going to longer time scales then congratulations, you've convinced me.

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

#937

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> on ramming Net Zero down our power lines except this is AFIK just plain wrong much more relevant factors seem - spikes in energy need, mainly AI in recent years - extremely badly handling of power grids in a high multitude of ways not related to net zero (like seriously, the German grid is pretty bad compared to an optimal grid. But compared to the nonsense many parts of the US have, it looks like a pristine optima…

Modern coal fired power plants are much cleaner than those that contributed to acid rain. You seriously believe coal fired power hasn’t evolved in the last 40 years? You’re saying that renewables are cheap but only if you include gravity storage. What gravity storage? The only useful one is pumped hydro, and that works approximately nowhere because of a lack of suitable geography. Australia’s Snowy 2.0 pumped hydro i…

> You seriously believe coal fired power hasn’t evolved in the last 40 years?

no but even with evolution it still is way worse then literally every other (practical used/usable) alternative

e.g. the quality of German brown coal is so bad that there is a saying that burning plastic wast gives you both more and cleaner energy

> approximately nowhere

you mean no where except everywhere where you have decent sized hills or mountains (and even in flat land under some circumstances) and is already build and in use in Germany in multiple case (and also not just Germany)

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

#938
post #697

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s kind of amazing and horrifying at the same time that a democratic country like the U.S. is doing all these shenanigans like blocking clean zero carbon energy, while a communist authoritarian country is massively moving towards clean energy. Based on what our media and our education system teaches us, one would have assumed that common sense and sound logic would prevail in a democracy, but rather what we see is…

I work in renewables in the US. The current picture is actually a lot more positive than people believe. But good news are usually boring at not good for click bait, so they aren’t covered by the media. There’s a lot of work on solar energy currently and the forecast is VERY good. We do have some issues like grid connectivity and shifting policies but the market economics are working extremely well. The fact is solar…

I do perfectly believe that there's a lot of progress in renewables and am happy about it. I also think of how much farther we would have come if it wasn't in spite of 40-50 years of obstruction by governments to satisfy coporate entities stuck in the old world.

So I still appreciate knowing the bad news.

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

#939

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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".

The third that didn't vote does not exist. The net result was roughly 50/50. Now, maybe this third will start to exist and vote if they either wake up, are seriously hit financially or someone annoys them enough. Until then they decided to erase themselves from any decision making and if the world was fair they , would not have the right to any comment regarding whatever is related to their country.

> The third that didn't vote does not exist. The net result was roughly 50/50.

The later does not preclude the former. They exist, and they don't vote. I'm not sure what nitpick you're trying to make.

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

#940

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus they are building coal plants as backups for when other sources fail.

That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, coal plants take at least 10 hours (but can take up to 48 hours) to start, warm up and synchronise from cold. That’s why hydro, gas, and increasingly large batteries are generally used for peaking.

It makes sense for China because of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malacca_dilemma

The modern coal plants they're building support faster changes, and they have enough indigenous coal but they don't have gas.

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