Why renewable energy won't work.

[mrstickball]

Kasz216 said:

Rath said:

I'm not commenting on the current economics of PV, I'm just saying that all the people who claim that you can't reduce the amount of land needed because there is only a finite amount of power per area have missed the fact that at the moment we are not able to use all of that power per area.

Fair enough we can't now however.

Whether we will or not... is unknown.  Be it 2030 or 2200.

Building solar plants now that will have to be completely torn down and replaced whenever we do figure it out (if we do) is just... unebelievably wastefull... and probably worse for the enviroment.

Afterall, that construction equipment runs on gasoline, as well the demolition equipment... and the matierals used to make the solar panels... are they recylclable?  I'm not sure... not all matierals are... and some that are only are so if that's kept in mind when built.

They're very rare so i'd be wasteful to use them up if they aren't.

Of course... we'd also need new battery technology as well... since we don't have enough resources on the planet to support enough batteries to support reneweble energies for cars... let alone all the other uses such matierals and batteries have and are needed for.

Not just a refining... but an outright all new battery.

 

Not sure what if anything would be the solution for cars.  At best one could hope for natural gas cars.  Which obviously still would have lots of emissions.

Nat gas cars are entirely an issue of political will and nothing more. You can convert any gas-guzzler to NatGas for about $500. My brother wrote an E-Book on the entire process. Its quite energy-dense, as the CNG gallon of gas equivalent is 5.6lb.

Problem is, the EPA doesn't want home owners to compress their own gas for usage. If that weren't the case, you could merely buy a compressor for the NG that many homes use.