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[Trekkin]

The problem is, it's a shitty form of solar panels, and we already have non-shitty solar panels.

It's a shitty form of solar panels that we get as a by-product of growing things, though, and one that can be piped around and stored for later use without batteries.

[PTTG??]

The problem is, it's a shitty form of solar panels, and we already have non-shitty solar panels.

It's a shitty form of solar panels that we get as a by-product of growing things, though, and one that can be piped around and stored for later use without batteries.

Except it replaces the main product, uses fertilizers and pesticides, and we don't use it as a power supply -- it's just used to supplement gasoline. And that, badly.

If we were talking switchgrass and bio-waste recycling directly into ethanol to be burned alone, specifically because disaster has made manufacturing solar panels and energy storage impossible, then, yeah ok. But given that it's more expensive than solar panels and less space-efficient, I'm not buying it.

[Bumber]

What blows my mind about nuclear power is that we essentially have these giant reactors just to boil water, to make steam, to turn turbines.

We need that future tech were fission products are directly translated into usable electricity, rather than what we currently do which is have a huge, elaborate process for making steam which generates radioactive waste water. (Can't do much about the disposal of fuel cells.) I get that it's better than using coal fuel, and requires less total volume and space than either hydroelectric or wind power. But it's still amazing to me that all the power of science and nuclear fission essentially comes down, still, to just making steam.

You mean fission fragment reactors?

No, what you need is FUSION.

Did you know that helium is a rapidly disappearing commodity? Do you understand the implications of not having access to helium, once its all gone?  Maybe you should.

Know what fusion produces?

Helium.

Being able to 1) Produce power in large amounts, cheaply, efficiently and 2) Have a a READY market for your waste product that shows no signs of drying up, EVER-- Sounds like a win-win.  That was the point.

It's a great idea for the far future, but we've only just begun to crack it at a net loss of energy. How long until we can break even? How long until it can out-perform our other energy options? What's the cost of building and maintaining each fusion power plant?

Also, it's probably more practical to get the tritium you need as a fission byproduct rather than try to produce enough through D-T breeding in the fusion reactor. (As a bonus, it helps get rid of all the heavy water produced.) In other words, we might end up relying on fission anyways.

On the bright side, fission power needn't be from U-235. We're probably much closer to Thorium fission than fusion at this point, so we could just use that in the near future (if we were inclined to disregard profitability in favor of the environment.) Worst case, we could activate Thorium fission using particle accelerators or our not-break-even fusion reactors. We could even burn U-238 and nuclear waste.

[Trekkin]

The problem is, it's a shitty form of solar panels, and we already have non-shitty solar panels.

It's a shitty form of solar panels that we get as a by-product of growing things, though, and one that can be piped around and stored for later use without batteries.

Except it replaces the main product, uses fertilizers and pesticides, and we don't use it as a power supply -- it's just used to supplement gasoline. And that, badly.

If we were talking switchgrass and bio-waste recycling directly into ethanol to be burned alone, specifically because disaster has made manufacturing solar panels and energy storage impossible, then, yeah ok. But given that it's more expensive than solar panels and less space-efficient, I'm not buying it.

And this is the problem I mentioned before with non-cellulosic biofuels in particular. Biodiesel standby plants would be a more eco-friendly alternative to petrodiesel, and one with much of the requisite infrastructure already in place, but it can't compete with solar for efficiency, and without cellulolysis it has to in order to be viable.

[Max™]

It's funny that wind and solar get brought up as alternatives available everywhere right after I pointed out it isn't windy or sunny everywhere all the time, much less when people need power. That was the joke about "what the hell is nebraska even" because who cares how much of a percent their power is produced by wind, it's four hicks and a cow watching black and white I love lucy on tv, literally nobody.

Going back to politics, fuck nebraskansakotahomawamingahontana completely, those garbage states exist to let republicans keep a hold of the senate.

[Reelya]

But base-load power already has the "not generated when people need it' problem. And they solve that with off-peak pricing. The peak usage is when it's sunny, and utilities give money away to try and get people to use energy when it's less sunny. Think about that for a minute in terms of solar.

That can be applied to a cyclic source like solar the same as coal/nuclear pricing. With base-load power we artificially encourage people to use it at night, e.g. the very same time solar isn't on line. We can just eliminate or reverse that incentive, and much of the night-time power load goes away, especially considering the bulk of usage is big companies who deliberately consume power at night to take advantage of the pricing. Just swap that around, and watch the big companies shift their bulk power consumption into the sunny hours. "natural" base load power when most people are asleep is a lot less than what the data says, because we've used economic incentives built around when large power plants produce energy.

Also maybe it's not super-sunny everywhere, but few people live where it's permanently dark.

[Kagus]

Also maybe it's not super-sunny everywhere, but few people live where it's permanently dark.

Depends on where it is...

Err, I actually mean what time of year

[PTTG??]

Saying solar doesn't work because darkness happens is like saying that surgery can't possibly make people healthy because it involves cutting people up.

[nenjin]

It's funny that wind and solar get brought up as alternatives available everywhere right after I pointed out it isn't windy or sunny everywhere all the time, much less when people need power. That was the joke about "what the hell is nebraska even" because who cares how much of a percent their power is produced by wind, it's four hicks and a cow watching black and white I love lucy on tv, literally nobody.

Going back to politics, fuck nebraskansakotahomawamingahontana completely, those garbage states exist to let republicans keep a hold of the senate.

And I thought I hated my state. You sound like a liberal version of Trump.

[wierd]

I dont hate my state, I just hate the rampant ideologies here.

There's kinda a reason why Brownback got elected, and why our educational system is among the worst in the nation.  Sadly, it closes the loop on the feedback loop that causes people like brownback to be elected.

[Rolan7]

You're opposed to Trump?  You're just like Trump supporters!
"Orange man bad!!" that's you!  That's you now!
I need it to be true so it's true!

[wierd]

orange man *is* bad though.  He's the worst mixture of incompetent-populist-wastrel-in-office I can really envision short of a "yes Minister" episode.

This does not make Highly-successful-evil-psychopath-in-office "good", that's a false dichotomy.

[bloop_bleep]

You're opposed to Trump?  You're just like Trump supporters!
"Orange man bad!!" that's you!  That's you now!
I need it to be true so it's true!

I'm not sure how you equate "being offended at someone else not liking Trump" with "being offended at someone else telling half the goddamn country they live in 'garbage states,'" but strawmen gotta strawman, I guess.

[Max™]

I mean, the northern midwest states are literally states to give extra senate seats, this is the reality of things. The party in power at the time each state was admitted may have changed, but right now we're down two supreme court justices plus lots of lesser court justices because of those states allowing McConnel to block everything and push through as many appointments as he can.

If it makes you feel better, the vast majority of Texas is garbage, a higher class of garbage sure, but still garbage. I'm just from the weird little liberal enclave around Dallas.

What harm would there be if we replaced the block of the dakotas and nebrahomansas with Colorado size states? I mean it would suck for the old white dudes clinging desperately to power, obviously, but how is this a bad thing?

[smjjames]

I mean, the northern midwest states are literally states to give extra senate seats, this is the reality of things. The party in power at the time each state was admitted may have changed, but right now we're down two supreme court justices plus lots of lesser court justices because of those states allowing McConnel to block everything and push through as many appointments as he can.

If it makes you feel better, the vast majority of Texas is garbage, a higher class of garbage sure, but still garbage. I'm just from the weird little liberal enclave around Dallas.

What harm would there be if we replaced the block of the dakotas and nebrahomansas with Colorado size states? I mean it would suck for the old white dudes clinging desperately to power, obviously, but how is this a bad thing?

They'd still be Republican because they'd still be mostly rural? Changing the state size isn't going to make it more liberal.