Quote:
Originally Posted by IamIan
It's just a question of time scale.
Fossil fuels got that carbon from living creatures that sequestered it.
On a Large enough time scale total planet Carbon does not change... but on shorter time scales it does ... and living creatures are a big part of why and how that happens.
There is far more to pollution and 'Green' than just the carbon footprint.
And per unit of work that gets done , ICEs in vehicles produce significantly more of those other non-Carbon pollutants per year , or per unit of fuel energy input.
Not the biggest piece ... but a disproportionally larger contributor compared to the work that gets done from / by them.
For Nuclear as well.
Don't forget to include all the pollution of building the nuclear ... mining the materials ... refining the material ... transporting the materials ... operation ... containment / disposal of all waste ... even the waste they often just vent into the air ... etc.
When the whole life cycle is all added in ... Nuclear is no where near 0 emissions any more.
Although individual studies give various results ... some painting the nuclear picture you describe , others painting the opposite ... I have not read them all ... but the trend I've seen seems to be ... that the difference in results comes from how much of the whole system , the study looks at ... smaller snap shoots more favor nuclear being very clean , even compared to RE ... larger snap shoots of the entire nuclear power system over longer period of time seem to paint a far less clean image of it compared to RE.
They do not 'need' plastics ... wind mills and hydro power were in use before the invention of plastics.
They use some plastic ... so does nuclear ... but it is a comparatively small % ... the vast majority of a Wind Mill for example is steel ... not plastic.
I'll agree the total net needs to be included ... including the production of the device... but the pollution and or carbon foot print of the RE production is not nearly as large as you seem to suggest there ... All combined , they are often net cleaner than any of the non-RE options.
As for Solar + Wind "couldn't met the needs of society"... that is incorrect... we don't yet have enough deployed to do so ... but there is way more than enough to be able to do so.
In 2007 annual energy consumption for the entire U.S. was ~100 Quadrillion BTUs ... transportation is a small % of that total ... that total is less than 0.5% of the total solar energy available in the US ... plus more is also available from wind , hydro , etc.(EPA Annual Energy Outlook 2009)
100% agree.
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First I read the current epa report on energy consumption, coal is the leader with an astounding amount. Other wise it's been calculated by numerous people capable of providing valid results, covering the glob in solar panels wouldn't come close to meeting a small percent of our needs. The same for wind and water, the wind isn't predictable enough and harvesting power from water ways is to limited.