Renewables Now Surpass Nuclear Power in the U.S.

sarcasm btw

The Navy uses bioblended fuel in some jets.

You make a good point, IceKat. Thanks.
There's no doubt that if you fight Mother Nature, you're in for a struggle. In defense of Nome though, it appears that they do schedule their deliveries to avoid ice but got screwed by storms in November. Must have been extreme weather due to global warming, eh? (just kidding, dude!)
No one argues that renewables meet all needs but we've got to get seriously going down that road. At the same time we've got to re-evaluate our needs.

And just how long should that reevaluation take since the IEA which is usually conservative in their views has stated we only have five years before a drastic tipping point occurs? And how nice is it to sit and talk to people who have done nothing but push the very status quo that has delayed action until we reached this point and who still state we will simply just have to live with fossil fuels even at this point as if their propaganda is credible. They actually now want to drill up in the Arctic where they can't even more oil in extreme conditions. Imagine a spill? I say, BS. We are running out of time before our pushing the envelope combined with peak oil and our addiction to it pushes it to the breaking point and should that occur it won't be pretty... only in the world of the CO2 loving rose colored glass wearers who are so repulsed by vision and progress. It's time for them to go.

Noted.

"No one argues that renewables meet all needs but we've got to get seriously going down that road. "

And I totally agree, much to the surprise of some people. I'm all for as much renewable or alternative energy as possible, but only when it becomes viable, truly sustainable and affordable without needing massive government subsidies.

I'm glad we agree. It's a start. :)

The government is us. Subsidies are our money. Massive subsidies to existing major energy players are already in place in the form of outright subsidies, accounting practices favorable to their interests, direct consumer taxation, and public absorption of enormous externalities essential to their operation, including outight war (Iraq), diplomatic efforts to grease-the-skids for them or clean up their economic or human-rights messes afterwards, military protection for their operations, clean-up of their domestic messes or economic losses resulting from their failures, and massive bureaucracies necessary to oversee industries that have no intention of being environmentally or humanly responsible. The list goes on. Subsidies to promote renewables would likely force the reduction in some or all of these existing subsidies. Works for me.
As for becoming viable. It's been viable since at least the 70's. Only will, and public education is necessary. The wrongheadedness that allows you to suggest they are not viable is our insistence that renewable resources must be harvested by conventional, massively capitalized operations. Renewables in one form or another are available virtually everywhere. We centralize when common sense dictates decentralization. We sacrifice inalienable rights ostensibly because of the need to protect centralized infrastructure when decentralization inherently solves the problem. No brainer.
In 1942 we initiated the manhattan Project with little more than an mathematical equation. In 1945 we wiped out two Japanese cities with the A-bomb. Only three years. Ahhh, but that was a weapon.

The same tanker could have hauled renewable technologies and not faced the same logistical nightmare and, perhaps, eliminated the need for future similarly difficult trips.

Well, I'm sure you'd be happy to have the nuclear waste stored in your backyard.

Thanks for the post, swisher. Very valid. Thanks.
Thorium tech is something most folks have never even heard of. We tech types who were active in the no-nukes movement of the 70's were aware of it but our position was to avoid nuclear altogether. I think history bears out the appropriateness of that position. In a perfect world Thorium may have been pursued anyway but that world was consumed with nuclear weapons production for the Cold War. Uranium based tech is way more appropriate for that.
It's interesting that this isn't an issue that comes up with the Iran controversy. Iran could, of course, proceed with Thorium technology and arguably avoid Panetta's "red line....nuclear capability". But the issue is not raised. Perhaps because he wants the confrontation. Perhaps because if we made that point we'd have to publicly discuss why WE didn't go there 40 years ago.

Just trying to keep it real. Look at a country like Japan. They've just decided that Nuclear plants will be closed after 40 years of use. That's a good thing, I believe, but what then? You could argue that an intensive solar/wind program could be implemented, but the problem with those renewables is that they require back-up power of nearly equal magnitude (life doesn't stop when the wind stops). The alternative? Oil and/or gas, which they're turning to now at great expense, or they could look at a safer nuclear alternative. I'm all for wind/solar, but they alone will not solve our energy needs, at least for the foreseeable future.

Good point. 40 years ago, or even now.

Well, you know, we've never had a problem with creativity. Our problem has always been intelligently managing what we create.
And, like maybe Iran and any number of other issues, becoming politically trapped in our own BS.

A combination of geothermal (heat pumps where it is safe and individual heat pumps for houses), hydroelectric, wind, solar, and for countries which have a coastline by a sea or ocean there is waves, currents and tides that can be exploited for energy. Basically, individual homes and residential buildings can be largely self-sufficient using this combination. What is lacking is the political will.

Zero emissions? Ah, no, just not emissions every day. When there ARE emissions (and there have been many in many places) they are doozies and tend to be rather dangerous to life.

Nuke is not what it was promised to be. And it has been heavily subsidized for my whole lifetime. Imagine how much safer and further along toward better off we would be if that $$ had gone to R&D for really safe and renewable.

The status quo has to go.

Each household could be self sufficient. But the giant corporations do not want that to ever happen, whether we are talking power or foods. The global corps. want us all to remain junkies so the guys at the top of the global corps can continue to rule the world.

There will be no real freedom until we have some reasonable levels of self sufficiency, both as a nation re energy, and as a people re individuals. It is no surprise that corporate lobbyists are putting more and more pressure on lawmakers to put more and more pressure on independent food producers.

I wish for both your and Vierotchka's future, but in the best of governments, it's an insurmountable task. How do you see the possibility of each household being self sufficient?

Germany is not going to use Nuclear, the US is planning to use Nuclear. A big mistake.

Right to core of truth, Jan. Yesterday I was checking on the cost of adding a simple solar water collector to heat a stand-alone 200 gal. tub. I got a quote of $12,000.
(And this as from a very helpful fellow in the nearest city to me.)
This is the same type and size of collector I used to build in college for less than $200.
Ahem. Something is very wrong with this picture.

How hot are you wanting the water, it shouldn't be real expensive to build.

That's insane! Did this "very helpful fellow" have a last name something like "Halliburton" or "Bechtel"? :

No sh*t!

Heating a spa tub to 104 degrees shouldn't be expensive at all, that's exactly my point.
Even given a a couple of mark-ups from factory to sales to consumer with some transportation costs it's hard for me to see how a generic solar hot water heater should cost more than $1000.
They were making bread-box solar collectors (in a local utility even) in San Diego in the 1930's that would be perfectly sufficient for this.
I've never been a tourist to Israel but I understand this type of simple collector is on every domestic roof there.
Perhaps we in the US have fallen so far from hands-on production we've become penned geese in a cage, suitable only for use as incubators for our prized diseased livers.
In any case, I'll find the time to build my own or run a copper line from on on-line gas heater instead.

Just another hippie in a local company selling stuff from the new major marketeers of solar that Jan mentioned.
There is an opportunity here if one had the energy and tenacity to tackle it.
I myself, (like many of us I expect) am far too comfortable to spend my precious time trying to right the wrongs of the market and provide energy solutions for my fellow man.
I can and will do it for myself and my family but it does irk one to see such distortions.

I understand completely.
It sounds like a good home project if you have the determination for it. There's lots of stuff online about that sort of thing built from purchased components, converted standard stuff, or scrounged stuff. The key is to spend time on the front end understanding exactly what you're trying to do and what is possible in your location. Then work backwards.

I'm trying to get some info for you, when I get a call I'll let you know where to get the solar water heater cheap. I was asked to build one for someone and then they found a company that is reasonable. They are in use in many Countries and should be available at a reasonable price. All houses in Israel must have solar water heaters.

I don't know anything about these but this is cheaper than you can buy copper tubing and build it yourself. 3/4 x 10' copper tubing is $17 each.

Thanks, Oldbanjo. I've been reading through the firstsolarproducts website and will sort through more of it. It looks promising. One ironic aside I ran into was that firstsolar is by Marshall Pan--a Chinese American in Missouri who has links to China where they actually do produce affordable solar panels. He noted there was nothing being done here in the US about that on an affordable level (just Jan's point earlier) and felt he could put something together.
Interesting, eh?
Ah well, let's hear it for the doers.

Good luck.

I'm willing to bet that, if you're unable or unwilling to build it yourself, you can likely hire an enterprising young engineer or a knowledgeable handyman to do it for a fraction of the cost. I find interesting plans for such things online all the time. Most are built by repurposing used materials or with new materials very cheaply. Again, if you can get materials cheaply but need someone to build it, you ought to be able to find help much more cheaply than to have so-called professionals install a prefab system.

I like your solve-my-own problem approach. I quite agree, sometimes seems not enough of that these days. Then again, the internet seems to tell a different story - i.e., Instructables, Maker Faire, etc.

You know, the search for competent tradesman has been the constant biggest problem I've had in the past ten years.
I've built or supervised every system we've put in so far on my fully sustainable off-grid home. I am a sustainable architect and am familiar with all of these systems.
I live several hours away from any urban center. In my experience, finding a reliable professional or skilled worker in any field here is the rarest of finds. In a decade I've found maybe two or three.
It's not really a matter of cost, but availability. My most reliable, competent, and honest workers have been one family of Mexicans who drive a fair distance to work here and do the work admirably and well. (Naturalized, not illegal immigrants, please note.)
In my area of California the local product has demonstrated over and over again with painfully and costly consistency to be stoned, ignorant of the basic principles of their purported trade, lazy, and comically dishonest.
I can well get how our culture breeds despair and a self-destructive selfishness.
Maybe this is what happens when irresponsibility and half-assed capitalism collide.
In any case, I will of course also construct this system as I've done the others.
It just adds to the sadness of the situation that with huge and critical need for this type of development in America almost no Americans have the will or the skill to tackle it.
At best there are a few who sit in idly in a store and market a packaged product produced by BP and actually know nothing about the actual functions of the system or how it goes together.
You can talk to anyone in the last two generations and they can demonstrated amazing knowledge of movies and film stars but can't actually do much of anything.
I'm not blameless in this. I accepted being shunted into Latin class rather than shop class in high school, being inculcated with the same silly prejudice that deprecated hands-on work in favor of manipulating symbols and language.
I've had to learn everything else since.
When someone talks about the fall of empires understand that it begins in every household.
If we've produced two generations of consumers and mandarins there isn't going to be much to build with in the third generation.

Thanks for that reference to the Instructables.

BP just got out of the solar panel business after being #1 for 30 years.

In Montana, there was a push (and help) from the state for local groups, companies, communities to put up more wind energy producing machines. I live along a state highway, and am happy to report there is a steady stream of the parts to put up the towers during the good weather time of the year.

We have several colonies of Hutterites in MT. They always run great farms, well maintained, productive. Guess what? Yep some of them have put up LOTS of windmills for producing energy on their lands. I was lucky enough to be traveling down a highway by one such colony when they were just getting the first few towers running, producing energy to heat new hen houses. There were several more towers being constructed.

The farm/colony is near a river, a rare bit of luck for MT food producers, as most farming is dry land around here, totally reliant on rain and what tiny help pumping ground water might give in some places. This particular colony owns water rights to the nearby river, but their lands are some distance, and elevation, from the river. The wind power they were generating was providing a lot of power for more water pumping. IOW, they now had the power to get and use the water they had rights to! Being remote, the construction of power lines to the colony farms is really expensive. With energy they produce with the help of wind, they do not have to get those expensive transmission lines put in, unless they want to sell their excess power back to the local power companies!

The day I was lucky enough to be driving by, the young men putting up the towers were giving a tour to the colony elders. It was great to see the enthusiasm of the men, and the smiling and nodding of the elders as they admired the new hen houses that had been added (best damned eggs ever!) and the new fields that could now be irrigated and put into production.

It takes help and a bit of push from the top. It takes financial incentives, but look at the help the extraction and fossil fuel industries have had for over a hundred years. Look at the taxes they DON'T PAY! Look at the costs the nation has racked up re foreign wars and constant defense/support of regimes which are completely vile to their own people.

It pisses me off mightily when proponents of the status quo whine that renewable energy is too costly and won't work! Such people are self serving, or they think I can't do math and see out of my own eyes.

If renewables work in the hinter lands of Montana, with our extreme climate and difficult distances, geology (lots of heat pumps here too, and lots of solar) it will work just about anywhere!

Did some research on simple to make solar ovens for a project with some kids here. Along with that project, me and the kids found great stuff on solar stills to distill water in places where there is no safe drinking water. Wow! Amazing what can be done with a little odd material and the willingness to just try!

Thanks for posting that link! It is great, and proves the nay-sayers wrong yet again.

TIWFD, did you see about the advancements in solar collectors, up to and including a new form of paint that will act as a solar collector technology! So many things, which can, and will, be used together to add up to more energy from the sun, wind, water.

I will take a look. Thanks for the suggestion.

And we would be speaking another language.

Yep. Were it not for the corporate sponsored nay-sayers, and ownership of so many pols, America would be cleaner, better powered and full of people who have had careers making renewable energy the primary source. We would have a second generation of people with jobs doing more and better things.

The old robber barons' scions are the ones who thwarted progress. The same gang that wants real low taxes for themselves and the burden carried by the masses they have been holding down for their own profits for generations.

Agree.

Congrats on your story going #1 attila! :)

Ain't my story, leen! It's the story of the REAL America, and proof that we can make things better. But thanks. Sorry I was offline and missed the big bump. LOL Just glad there are SOME news facts that give us good news. We sure need them!

"It's the story of the REAL America, and proof that we can make things better." I know, attila. I was just happy YOU posted it and it got the attention it deserved. :) "Just glad there are SOME news facts that give us good news. We sure need them!" I totally agree!

Leen, honey, you have mail! LOL

I got my mail! LOL!!!!

Only to folks like us, who seek a better Future... =(

So true, KB. SN!

Bastards!!! Let Them SN!!! =)

Right on!

~ smles ~ =)

seriously the best year of my life... not even 2 weeks into the year and 6 amazing things have happened :D

I was your ten :)

It's great news and I'd really like to see your words come true this year. Jobs. Now.

Cool! Maybe there is something to hope for. :)

Well, thank you, bailey. :)

That's what we are all hoping for and fighting against the GOP guvs to do just that.

the revolution started last year... this is just starting :D

Agreed!!! :D

Your Welcome :)