51–60 of 309 posts
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> all the power to everything from small remote weather stations through houses to large islands Not without very large capacity gas/etc. plants available on standby (unless you’re fine with will below 99% availability)
We have to get fine with below 99% availability.
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> all the power to everything from small remote weather stations through houses to large islands Not without very large capacity gas/etc. plants available on standby (unless you’re fine with will below 99% availability)
We have to get fine with below 99% availability.
We already have a zero maintenance fusion power plant that will last billions of years and that outputs millions of times more energy per second than humanity uses in a year. We already have technology that can take the electromagnetic waves this fusion power plant produces and directly convert it into electricity without needing pesky intermediaries like boiling water to turn a turbine. This technology is relatively…
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Humanity will get the energy in one form or another, solar panels certainly seems less damaging than fossil fuels. The land will either be dug up for resources, or paved away for a power plant regardless. In addition, solar panels can be put up basically everywhere in an urban environment - an area already "destroyed" by human occupation - there are many many viable locations for solar outside of deserted wastelands.
replacing it with endless sheets of silicon wafers literally injected with heavy metals of your preference, be it gallium or cadmium or arsenic(PVs are photodiodes; it's created by doping silicon coated substrates), which is polar opposite of environmentalist attitude.
basically zero environmental resistance too[2] and don't last a year. In case it's not clear, `less than a year` is at most 10% of a decade.
Conversion efficiency of solar panels is also capped to ~30% by "chemistry" of Si-based PV, which is lower than even typical hybrid ICE cars.
Solar cells had only ever worked in extremely mild climate such as California, surfaces of Mars, and inner orbits[3] of Solar system. There's no prospect that that will change soon.
There’s a fusion reaction in the sky. All you have to do is harvest it. If you want to bring a fusion reaction home you have to deal with pesky things like INSANE AMOUNTS OF HEAT. Luckily the sky furnace is safely surrounded by 93M miles of insulting vacuum rendering the radiation harmless and even pleasant. We have a handy-dandy magnetic shield to handle surges, and atmospheric buffer for anything that sneaks throug…
There’s a fusion reaction in the sky. All you have to do is harvest it. If you want to bring a fusion reaction home you have to deal with pesky things like INSANE AMOUNTS OF HEAT. Luckily the sky furnace is safely surrounded by 93M miles of insulting vacuum rendering the radiation harmless and even pleasant. We have a handy-dandy magnetic shield to handle surges, and atmospheric buffer for anything that sneaks throug…
> insulting vacuum rendering the radiation harmless
Not even this is correct. Vacuum doesn't really "insulate" against radiation, at least not very effectively. It's the earth magnetic field and atmosphere that protects us. And even with that it's not harmless – surely you heard of "sunburn" and "skin cancer"?
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We have to get fine with below 99% availability.
Don't take this the wrong way, but I envy your naivete. You are extremely optimistic about people and politics.
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I would say it’s clear that solar panels are absolutely working extremely well today, at least as long as you don’t live too close to the poles. Renewables all together is growing faster than nuclear ever did. And solar is now a huge part of that. We have models where solar or solar+wind is providing all the power to everything from small remote weather stations through houses to large islands. Some small countries a…
> all the power to everything from small remote weather stations through houses to large islands Not without very large capacity gas/etc. plants available on standby (unless you’re fine with will below 99% availability)
"Ever" is a very long time. Will we get fusion power in the next few decades? I wouldn't bet on it, but I also wouldn't bet against it.
The bigger problem is that fusion plants aren't useful for making weapons. Fission plants were basically a side project of the nuclear arms race, which is why they're a dying industry now. The world already has all of the nuclear bombs it will ever need and despite all of the promises they never managed to compete on cost. It's so much easier and cheaper to install wind turbines, solar panels, and grid scale batteries that there will probably never be a market for a commercial fusion power plant.
We already have a zero maintenance fusion power plant that will last billions of years and that outputs millions of times more energy per second than humanity uses in a year. We already have technology that can take the electromagnetic waves this fusion power plant produces and directly convert it into electricity without needing pesky intermediaries like boiling water to turn a turbine. This technology is relatively…
I think it's clear that solar panels, while working today, clearly haven't been able to solve today's problems, or else this discussion wouldn't be happening. But we should keep investing in them, one way or another. Similarly, we should keep investing in the prospect of commercially viable fusion reactors. The harnessing of fusion reactors would be instantly revolutionary as opposed to the incremental progress solar…