All poverty is energy poverty • Hacker News Board

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#11

Post by affgrff2 » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:22 PM UTC

photochemsyn wrote: post #2

On this: > "There's probably about 3 million households in Rwanda, and a vanishingly small number have a fridge. A refrigerator uses about 2 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of energy per day, so if we were able to get one into every household, that would add about 2 billion kWh (2 terawatt-hours, or tWh) to Rwanda's annual energy usage. That's about as much energy as there is contained in 1 million barrels of oil — and fully on…

I don't think the author suggests to set up an oil-burning power plant, that number is just for visualization. And I guess you could even go without a battery at night by converting the energy from the daylight directly into cold.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#12

Post by seibelj » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:24 PM UTC

Victerius wrote: post #5

More reading: https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/The-Worlds-Energy-Prob... > No politician wants to tell us the real story of fossil fuel depletion. The real story is that we are already running short of oil, coal and natural gas because the direct and indirect costs of extraction are reaching a point where the selling price of food and other basic necessities needs to be unacceptably high to make the overall econ…

Technology increases productivity. Not all energy destroys the earth, see nuclear energy. More technology has enabled us to feed the earth with less people devoted to food production. Etc.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#13

Post by bowsamic » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:25 PM UTC

_vdpp wrote: post #10

I’ve long suspected that currencies are really just units of measurement convertible to the joule (or calorie).

Have you read Marx?

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#14

Post by woeh » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:28 PM UTC

> At its core, however, the math here is very simple. In the US, the average person uses 77,000 kWh per year. The average Finn uses only about 58,000 kWh. The Brits, good global citizens, use only about 30,000 kWh on average.

Does anyone understand how the article arrives at these figures? I might have missed something, but these numbers seem to me as a lot. According to my energy provider my 2 person household uses about 2100kWh annually. This is in my case without gas-powered heating, and external power use (such as personal transportation, or production of bought goods).

I can understand if these more indirect uses of energy are included in the average, however it would be helpful for the discussion if these numbers were explained. It might for instance help to explain how the West can slash it's energy use five fold, as the article suggests.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#15

Post by Ozzie_osman » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:29 PM UTC

Interesting to see the comment thread digging into all sorts of criticism of the article (is it 2 kWh / fridge? Or 1.1? Should the author discuss renewable earlier or more seriously?)

The main point I got from the article was a helpful reminder that a large part of the world doesn't have basic things that I take for granted (not just refrigeration, but you might also include air conditioning, transportation, etc). And that if we did want the entire world to live a life that includes things like that, we just don't have the energy right now.

EDIT: I kept thinking about this and it doesn't stop at just basics. It's also things like living in a comfortable, well-manufactured home. Being able to buy toys for your kids. Taking airplanes to visit family or to vacation. Enjoying the consumption of meat, or food delicacies. The list goes on as you expand the threshold from basic necessities, to comfort, to luxuries, and you can decide where you want to draw the line.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#16

Post by contravariant » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:32 PM UTC

bowsamic wrote: post #13

_vdpp wrote: post #10

I’ve long suspected that currencies are really just units of measurement convertible to the joule (or calorie).

Have you read Marx?

Kind of interesting to note that 'work' (as in physical energy) and 'labour' use the same word in German.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#17

Post by bottlepalm » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:33 PM UTC

In order to build systems to extract and use energy requires an educated society - that is the root deficiency. And it’s a lot more than just dropping books from airplanes.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#18

Post by ZeroGravitas » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:33 PM UTC

Ozzie_osman wrote: post #15

Interesting to see the comment thread digging into all sorts of criticism of the article (is it 2 kWh / fridge? Or 1.1? Should the author discuss renewable earlier or more seriously?) The main point I got from the article was a helpful reminder that a large part of the world doesn't have basic things that I take for granted (not just refrigeration, but you might also include air conditioning, transportation, etc). An…

We do have the energy right now, though.

And we'd have more, cheaper energy if we deployed new renewables.

But the author seems to lose his interest in helping the poor if it didn't involve fossil fuels being used inefficiently.

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#19

Post by thriftwy » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:34 PM UTC

_vdpp wrote: post #10

I’ve long suspected that currencies are really just units of measurement convertible to the joule (or calorie).

In the Alpha Centauri game setting, energy is literally money ("energy credits").

Re: All poverty is energy poverty

#20

Post by mcculley » Mon, Sep 05, 2022, 3:34 PM UTC

If we had energy cheap enough for every human to live at the highest current levels of consumption, wouldn’t we have to do something with the waste heat? Radiator fins on space elevators? Or can we send it out into space from the ground?