351–360 of 464 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
exactly... you can have a farm in the middle of the city and a solar farm in the middle of the desert...
You can also have an airport in the middle of a city and an apartment complex in the middle of the desert - there's nothing that stops them technologically. The problem is that they don't make economical sense.
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When I read that timeline, it doesn't sound serious to me. If you're planning to do something in 40 years, then you don't have the faintest clue how to do it now, which means you don't know when you will know how to do it. It could be 5 years or 1,000 or never. You don't know what you don't know.
We have fusion making consistent and significant gains right now.
If you can produce electricity 50 km away and then produce produce in the city center, you are sparing the transport costs.
Artificial lighting saves land because plants can be grown above each other, but if the electricity for the lighting comes from solar panels, then the savings are canceled out by the land required to install the solar panels. The vertical farm is a paradox unless fossil fuels provide the energy. In that case, there’s not much sustainable about it. This entire piece is based on the assumption that the only sources of…
Ahead of its time, it was unjustly rejected and persecuted by the ignorant masses. Its advocates are bonded by the quiet pride that at least they weren't unthinkingly siding with those masses. (And they're right!) Meanwhile, as the Amiga stagnated for terribly unfair reasons, other, scrappier technologies like the i386 and UMG-Si grew from being worthless boondoggles (except in special circumstances, like spaceflight) to being actually far better and cheaper. But the Amiga advocates keep the faith, sharing their suffering and resentment. They inevitably try the alternatives a little and perhaps even start to like them. Gradually their denial recedes, decade by decade.
But they know that however much fab costs go down and leave their beloved Amiga behind in the dust, you'll never be able to run nuclear submarines and Antarctic research stations on solar panels.
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"First commercial fusion power station will start construction between 2050 and 2060" is mostly guess, but it is an educated guess based on some trends/predictions/achieved work. But compare it to "First commercial perpetum mobile power station will start construction between 2050 and 2060" or "First FTL spaceship will be launched in 2050s".
The educated guess for the last 50 years was 20-30 years away
My impression is that if humanity had focused on the question and not the politics we would already have fusion capacity.
But do not forget, we still do not know if it is financial benefit to use fusion in the future.
Total area needed to power entire world with solar would be ~ 532,900 square kilometres (square with sides 730 km) roughly area of Spain.
Space of just 3 deserts is:
Sahara 9,000,000+
Australian Desert 2,700,000
Arabian Desert 2,330,000
Gobi Desert 1,295,000
Further more, vertical farms are not just about space, correct me if I am wrong but vertical farm use less water and they have a better control of pests without usage of chemicals, they are easier to work with and automate food production.
Yes but you don't need to install your solar panels in arable land. In fact it's better than you don't, because it's cheaper (duh!) Or you're running it on wind or other power sources.
It's actually not surprising that "biological solar power" will kinda match the "electrical solar power" but that should not be the downside of vertical farms (and you know, you can have your solar power come through... windows)
And yes nobody is growing wheat on indoor farms.
TL:DR; the conclusion of the article is "The problem with agriculture is not that it happens in the countryside. The problem is that it relies heavily on fossil fuels. " which is a much more valid point than "vertical farms don't save space"
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>"So 1.5 GW of solar = 1.0 GW of nuclear." That's not how it works. PV capacity factor is 11-12% to the 90-95% of nuclear meaning you need to install about an order of magnitude more PV effect not 1.5x.
Also one batch of PV panels equivalent to a reactor cost 6x as much and with a lifetime of 20 years to the 60 for a nuclear reactor so you will need to replace these at least twice. All 32.5 Million of them.