semck83: Check out the lead times on nuclear plant builds. Even if you think they're safe (and they're certainly better than coal plants for safety record), rolling them out takes *ages*.

You want an interesting graph, go look at the wind and solar power installation rates in China vs nuclear installation rates. Renewables are going up way faster - they scale quicker, you can put them literally everywhere, etc.

The new Spanish "vertical pole" wind turbines are amazing, and there's a bunch of people working very hard on "micro wind" turbines suitable for domestic use.

Solar just keeps getting better and better. *Today*, if you own a house, in most parts of the world, it's *immediately profitable* to get money on personal finance terms and pay for a solar installation, because of the savings in power you would otherwise have to buy from the grid. And if you can get money at home loan rates (or cheaper), it's an absolute just do it today.

And battery tech is only a year or two off the price-point at which it becomes viable for general domestic use to enable you to install enough solar to cover your overnight use as well.

Lots of Africa isn't even building a grid - you can buy solar panels and batteries in the supermarket.

Was I talking about literally becoming Venus? No of course not.

Was I talking about ecological meltdown, leaving mostly extremophiles? Yes. And that could happen if the clathrate gun goes off, which will happen if we don't do anything about emissions. Does this mean nothing to you? Even if it there was just a 1% chance of it, it would merit restructuring our entire economy to avoid that possibility - because it is an existential threat. Yet, instead, we have your ilk, who cling to the best case scenarios in the models as if its our right for it to always work out. If we continue with that ideology, it will not always work out. Count on it.

thorfi,

Renewable energy sources are nice, but they are not a drop in the bucket.

Thucy,

I wasn't "clinging to best case scenarios." I was pointing out that what you were asserting was *certain* was merely a bare theoretical possibility.

As for the clathrate gun -- let me again point out that there is again a big difference between "that is exactly what will happen" or "will happen if we don't do anything about emissions," and a 1% chance. In truth, all of these are somewhat wrong, though the latter is closest. The clathrate gun is a controversial theory even in climate science. Should we aggressively study it, run models, and try to find out more about its liklihood? Of course. As you say, we can not assume the best case scenario. But should we tear apart our society because a few scientists have a theory that *might* be right about something that *could* happen, with near-inscrutable odds? No. There are far too many such theories around, and always have been. By your reasoning, we would all have listened to Malthus over a century ago.

The overall cost of nuclear (fission) including uranium extraction, concrete useage (and the CO2 it emits) and waste product storage, is something i have seen. Thorfi mentions the time it takes to bring new plants online... I don't recall the figures - other than being much safer than coal (due to death from ling related illnesses which coal plants and coal mining contribute to)

To do a proper analysis, you can include solar death due to installers falling off roofs... And nuclear seems pretty damn safe, even compared to solar; but battery technology may be the winner here, on all things. For transport, if we replace a system of gas stations with electricity supply points and huge amounts of battery storage, we're likely to get to a point where countries like ireland are powered entirely by wind (while more southerly climates shift to predominantly solar) Solar needs a lot of work, though Spain's Solar Power Towers look amazing ( and have the momentum of a turbine )

I can see a lot of new renewable technologies coming online, but witout storage they will not be fit for purpose for our current economy. Like really massive amounts of storage. Having a transport network which symergizes with the power supply network could amount to massive savings and efficiencies (even with current generation nuclear/gas - you have to leave the plants on at 70% at night - having cars charging their batteries all night to store all this excess production would make a pretty massive efficiency gain - so i suspect we will see battery tech making some advances, basically everyone benefits; especially whoever makes the big breakthrough!)

Some people did listen to Malthus, an ~1 million Irish died in a famine, while the island was a net exporter of food; an the government said, based on Malthus, sure they'll be better off in the long run...

I'm really really disappointed in all of you; so materialistic, so drab. One of the diseases of the modern age is unmoderated pragmatic materialism, the uninspiring, workaday, earnest, boring unremitting focus on the mundane. I watched the first Moon landings with tears in my eyes; that uplift of the soul and the heart - the feeling of hope provided by representatives of our race going into space to explore and discover is invaluable. Let's go into space to frack a fucking asteroid? Dear me, you lot are such a disappointment. LOOK UP!

@Chumbles
Ok mate, you go off into the forest and live your anti-materialistic, colourful life. The rest of us are going to go blow up asteroids.
But seriously I agree with you, in fact at some point most of us above have said the space exploration is seriously cool and inspiring. However the moon landing will be nothing compared to the first time we capture and start mining an asteroid. Now that is a serious achievement worthy of a species capable of space travel. Despite this "disease of the modern age" as you describe it, it is materialism which has led us to this point and it is materialism which will lead us to the next advance in space travel. Already space tourism and private companies are becoming serious players in this field. So get off you high horse, and join the rest of us, we are already looking up!

"By your reasoning, we would all have listened to Malthus over a century ago."

If we had, we might not be staring down the barrel we are today. He figured our the P of the IPAT equation, but really it's the A that is the most dangerous.

Semck83: As I said. Look up the installation rates in China. Renewables are blowing everything (including nuclear) off the radar *today*. This idea of them being short on power is rubbish.

The limiting factor for renewables is currently *storage*, not generation. Until we can store enough power to get ourselves through the night, they aren't the total game.

@thorfi currently we have more than enough energy generation at night.

In fact there is an oversupply; night-time demand is much lower. Also solar is not the only renewable; wind and hydro can provide night-time power.

In Ireland we currently used pumped storage ( water pumped to the top of a hill ) which is used to top up power generation during peak demand - but regardless, storage is vital, solar is great in places with sun (ie not ireland) wind is actually better than solar in some places - but needs storage for calm days.

But our biggest storage issue is with transport - we currently use gas/petrol to store energy in a fuel tank. There is very few decent alternatives. Bio-diesel may be one, but new battery technologies appear to be the best hope. And once they become affordable all other storage issues are likely to go away. (Also transport is a huge % of total energy consumption in developed nations)