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Energy

blog.samaltman.com

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21–30 of 287 posts

Re: Energy

#21

Post by benaiah »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #12

Hmm, major reversals of conflict-of-interest policy? (ie. now chairman of two YC companies and personally investing in them) Large claims with no hard data comparisons? (eg. atomic power has major cost, density, and predictability advantages) This(?): >There will only be one cheapest source of energy Really? There can't be two sources at or near equilibrium? These systems are not deployed in isolated, designer enviro…

The hard data has been around for years, and is fairly easy to find. Not every blog post needs to have an accompanying statistical analysis.

Re: Energy

#22

Post by beat »

Eleutheria wrote: post #18

Distributed generation is where we should invest. Energy independence for the individual. Individual solar panels and batteries, personal windmills, personal reactors, etc. Imagine all the savings in infrastructure for energy transportation and reinvestment in other sectors. Imagine all the possibilities if people could switch their energy generation model as simple as buying a new product and installing it at home.…

Decentralization solves a lot of other problems as well - it's less vulnerable to accidental or intentional failure, it requires much less skill and expense to implement and operate, etc.

Solar has the advantage that it cannot be weaponized even in nonsense theory, greatly relaxing export regulation. This makes it a viable solution for developing countries and remote areas, not just the handful of nations with the wealth and sophistication to manage a reactor.

Re: Energy

#23

Post by jsprogrammer »

benaiah wrote: post #21
jsprogrammer wrote: post #12

Hmm, major reversals of conflict-of-interest policy? (ie. now chairman of two YC companies and personally investing in them) Large claims with no hard data comparisons? (eg. atomic power has major cost, density, and predictability advantages) This(?): >There will only be one cheapest source of energy Really? There can't be two sources at or near equilibrium? These systems are not deployed in isolated, designer enviro…

The hard data has been around for years, and is fairly easy to find. Not every blog post needs to have an accompanying statistical analysis.

So easy to find that it can't even be linked to on the web by two people that claim it exists?

Re: Energy

#24

Post by transfire »

There are other technologies. Nuclear isomers for example have a lot of potential, but the fossil fuel hegemony really keeps alternatives from flourishing. We can be very thankful that photovoltaics was invented pre-WII, otherwise I doubt we'd be seeing it today either.

Re: Energy

#25

Post by JshWright »

sskates wrote: post #19

I always wondered why more energy wasn't generated from nuclear. On paper it seems like a great energy source. Kudos to Sam for putting not just his money, but his time where his mouth is. If only the rest of the internet could do the same!

> If only the rest of the internet could do the same!

Sam is in a fairly unique position to be able to do that...

Re: Energy

#26

Post by andy_ppp »

Isn't decommissioning nuclear power plants still basically a huge bill underwritten by the tax payer? I'm not really sure about creating radioactive waste that has such huge half lives...

From Wikipedia:

    Of particular concern in nuclear waste management are two long-lived fission
    products, Tc-99 (half-life 220,000 years) and I-129 (half-life 15.7 million
    years), which dominate spent fuel radioactivity after a few thousand years.
    The most troublesome transuranic elements in spent fuel are Np-237 (half-life
    two million years) and Pu-239 (half-life 24,000 years).[39] Nuclear waste
    requires sophisticated treatment and management to successfully isolate it
    from interacting with the biosphere. This usually necessitates treatment,
    followed by a long-term management strategy involving storage, disposal or
    transformation of the waste into a non-toxic form.[40] Governments around the
    world are considering a range of waste management and disposal options, though
    there has been limited progress toward long-term waste management
    solutions.[41]
Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Management_o...

Re: Energy

#27

Post by codingdave »

jacquesm wrote: post #7
codingdave wrote: post #5

I worked on renewable energy projects a few years back, and while the idea of a large disruptive technology development sounds awesome, the reality is that there are already a plethora of renewable energy turbines and designs that would greatly improve the world... But the engineers and inventors running around with these ideas have no idea how to go from a small scale proof of concept into a fully built out manufact…

There is also a very large amount of snake oil in the renewable energy field and a ton of ideas that keep being recycled that have long ago been invalidated.

There is some of that. There are also very valid projects out there. I am running under the assumption that people can tell the difference.

Frankly, most of the sketchy folk that I ran into during my projects were the investors, not the engineers.

Re: Energy

#28

Post by jerf »

arenaninja wrote: post #11
jonathannorris wrote: post #4

It's great to see you invest your time and money in nuclear power Sam. We already have the nuclear technology to solve our energy emissions problem, we just lack the political will to make the shift away from coal/oil/gas. Great leaps in the efficiency and safety of nuclear power systems will hopefully make the shift politically achievable.

I thought the biggest hurdle with nuclear energy was waste management? As in, we've nowhere to put the toxic dump that's produced that will radiate a few tens of thousands of years? Unless that's been solved, in which case consumer education would be a next step

I've been convinced for a while that the reason this problem is not solved is that everybody is sure that the problem is not solved, and therefore nuclear is really hard, and therefore we shouldn't do research on nuclear, and therefore we shouldn't do any engineering on the topic of how to solve our waste issues. In other words, ultimately the reason is circular logic.

It's 2015, and we remain essentially stuck on 1950s B-Movie era stereotypes on how nuclear works, what it is, and how dangerous it is.

Re: Energy

#29

Post by falsestprophet »

The 20th century was the century of carbon-based energy. I am confident the 22nd century is going to be the century of atomic energy (i.e. terrestrial atomic generation and energy from sun’s fusion).

It's silly to describe solar as atomic energy from sun’s fusion as a distinct category from carbon-based energy, because of course carbon-based energy was formed by capturing solar energy from the sun's fusion.

Re: Energy

#30

Post by transfire »

cjbenedikt wrote: post #8
mbca wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. The essay mentions "predictability" as a problem with solar, but that becomes moot with good enough storage & transmission.

Precisely! The issue is storage. There are many ways to create energy: solar, wind, water, nuclear (thorium!)...but storage is still unsolved. And Lithium is NOT the answer, not at the scale we need.

The storage problem is almost solved. Batteries/Supercaps with double the capacity, charge rate and lifespan of current Lithium-ions should be on the market soon.
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