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Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

complexsystemspodcast.com

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Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#31

Post by sl-1 »

sn9 wrote: post #20
schiffern wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes no difference. Saudi Arabia won't stop pumping gas because it's not carbon neutral. edit Depleting their entire reserves of gas would be stopping because it's unsustainable , not because it's not carbon neutral. Also that sounds like a really bad idea.

Running out of gas in the ground will do that though.

Sadly there seems to be reserves[1] for quite a long time. The real question is how much of the reserves are profitable to exploit.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_g...

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#32

Post by XorNot »

sn9 wrote: post #20
schiffern wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes no difference. Saudi Arabia won't stop pumping gas because it's not carbon neutral. edit Depleting their entire reserves of gas would be stopping because it's unsustainable , not because it's not carbon neutral. Also that sounds like a really bad idea.

Running out of gas in the ground will do that though.

We will not run out for hundreds to thousands of years.

We also can't afford to stop using it by "running out" since that implies we burned it all.

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#33

Post by verzali »

Veserv wrote: post #19
churchill wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Synthetic hydrocarbons will likely fail, simply because of the same reasons vertical farming failed. Once you're spending money on infrastructure to capture solar energy, losing 80% to inefficiency, before piping into your vertical farm via LEDs (losing another 50% to 80%), a farmer who draws free sunshine will outcompete you because he's using free energy while you're spending millions to power a small factory sized…

Their thesis is probably that solar electricity will soon be (as an example) 1/10th the price of natural gas electricity and that they believe they can get 10-30% storage/conversion efficiency. Therefore, the price of synthetic natural gas will be cheaper than current natural gas. There are a number of acknowledged assumptions in that model and other potential problems that may make their thesis incorrect, but you ha…

I've read through his thesis on his blog. There are several flaws in his analysis. The most glaring is in the cost of natural gas, for which he uses the most pessimistic value possible (that during the Ukraine war shortages) and then compares it to the most optimistic price of solar. A fairer comparison would take the cost of production and shipping of gas (which is very cheap) and compare that to the cost of synthetic gas. But if you do that synthetic gas is always more expensive than natural gas. Furthermore, many of his cost assumptions rely on government subsidies. Yes, it is possible to get cheap synthetic gas if the government subsidises it. But no, this is not a scalable product.

Even if you ignore this problem, his thesis still only makes sense if we live in a world which massively overbuilds solar panels. Some of this other pieces talk about covering the world's oceans in solar panels, which, frankly, makes little overall economic sense.

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#34

Post by wrsh07 »

verzali wrote: post #33
Veserv wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their thesis is probably that solar electricity will soon be (as an example) 1/10th the price of natural gas electricity and that they believe they can get 10-30% storage/conversion efficiency. Therefore, the price of synthetic natural gas will be cheaper than current natural gas. There are a number of acknowledged assumptions in that model and other potential problems that may make their thesis incorrect, but you ha…

I've read through his thesis on his blog. There are several flaws in his analysis. The most glaring is in the cost of natural gas, for which he uses the most pessimistic value possible (that during the Ukraine war shortages) and then compares it to the most optimistic price of solar. A fairer comparison would take the cost of production and shipping of gas (which is very cheap) and compare that to the cost of synthet…

When you're projecting future costs of solar, you should be using very optimistic estimates, right?

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#35

Post by wrsh07 »

churchill wrote: post #5
aesch wrote: post #4

Casey Handmer's company is creating synthetic hydrocarbons from renewable energy. Here is a good video where he gives a tour of the company and talks about its goals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NngCHTImH1g . Curious what people think about the idea of synthetic hydrocarbons? It is a seemingly obvious idea that I hadn't heard about until recently, as long as you can use energy efficiently to create the synthetic…

Synthetic hydrocarbons will likely fail, simply because of the same reasons vertical farming failed. Once you're spending money on infrastructure to capture solar energy, losing 80% to inefficiency, before piping into your vertical farm via LEDs (losing another 50% to 80%), a farmer who draws free sunshine will outcompete you because he's using free energy while you're spending millions to power a small factory sized…

"will likely fail" is a surprising claim when it's not clear to me that vertical farming won't still have a chance to succeed

For vertical farming, the question at the limit shouldn't be comparing solar and a farmer directly using sun, it should be: can we vertical farm on land that was unsuitable for farming? Is the cost of land increasing while the cost of solar decreases?

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#36

Post by wrsh07 »

aesch wrote: post #4

Casey Handmer's company is creating synthetic hydrocarbons from renewable energy. Here is a good video where he gives a tour of the company and talks about its goals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NngCHTImH1g . Curious what people think about the idea of synthetic hydrocarbons? It is a seemingly obvious idea that I hadn't heard about until recently, as long as you can use energy efficiently to create the synthetic…

One of the most exciting things not really mentioned elsewhere in the thread (as far as I see!) is that you can make synthetic hydro carbons wherever you want.

If you wanted to have a refueling airport in the middle of the ocean, you could put up a bunch of renewable energy generation (expensive!), use that energy to produce jet fuel (this handwaves a lot / might not be feasible as stated), sell jet fuel that you haven't had to transport

Similarly, while our global logistics are incredible, some of the cost of oil etc is that we need good systems for transporting it (pipelines, ships). Instead, imagine producing it on location.

Finally, my favorite model for new technologies (not really useful if you believe the Weinersmith "A city on Mars" thesis) is: will this technology be useful on Mars or the moon?

Eg Hyperloop makes much more sense if you already are operating in a vacuum

From that lens, I think technology like this is pretty useful to create.

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#37

Post by verzali »

wrsh07 wrote: post #34
verzali wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've read through his thesis on his blog. There are several flaws in his analysis. The most glaring is in the cost of natural gas, for which he uses the most pessimistic value possible (that during the Ukraine war shortages) and then compares it to the most optimistic price of solar. A fairer comparison would take the cost of production and shipping of gas (which is very cheap) and compare that to the cost of synthet…

When you're projecting future costs of solar, you should be using very optimistic estimates, right?

Yes, but you should also use realistic prices for gas. Especially for a future in which abundant solar has driven down demand for gas.

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#38

Post by XorNot »

wrsh07 wrote: post #35
churchill wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Synthetic hydrocarbons will likely fail, simply because of the same reasons vertical farming failed. Once you're spending money on infrastructure to capture solar energy, losing 80% to inefficiency, before piping into your vertical farm via LEDs (losing another 50% to 80%), a farmer who draws free sunshine will outcompete you because he's using free energy while you're spending millions to power a small factory sized…

"will likely fail" is a surprising claim when it's not clear to me that vertical farming won't still have a chance to succeed For vertical farming, the question at the limit shouldn't be comparing solar and a farmer directly using sun, it should be: can we vertical farm on land that was unsuitable for farming? Is the cost of land increasing while the cost of solar decreases?

The cost of land in the city for living on is increasing much faster then the cost of rural agrarian land.

Which we absolutely should not destroy to try and build skyscraper vertical farms on.

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#39

Post by ragebol »

pfdietz wrote: post #24
wesleyd wrote: post #2

Listened to this yesterday. Super enjoyable. Made the point that electricity in the future will be consumed much closer geographically to where it is generated than today - and so we probably don’t need huge interconnects - but much less close in time (because batteries).

This has considerable geopolitical implications. Fossil fuels are very mobile, so one can be flexible in siting energy-intensive industries. But in a solar world, heavy industry will be at those places with the best solar resource. If you live in a renewable energy armpit, like say the eastern parts of Europe, your heavy industry is out of luck.

> renewable energy armpit

armpit? What is that supposed to mean exactly? (I consider myself a near native English speaker...) A bad place to be in I suppose, but never heard this phasing.

Re: Energy economics and rocket science with Casey Handmer

#40

Post by __Joker »

ragebol wrote: post #39
pfdietz wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has considerable geopolitical implications. Fossil fuels are very mobile, so one can be flexible in siting energy-intensive industries. But in a solar world, heavy industry will be at those places with the best solar resource. If you live in a renewable energy armpit, like say the eastern parts of Europe, your heavy industry is out of luck.

> renewable energy armpit armpit? What is that supposed to mean exactly? (I consider myself a near native English speaker...) A bad place to be in I suppose, but never heard this phasing.

I assume least desirable place in this context.

Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/armpit

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