Obama could kill fossil fuels overnight with a nuclear dash for thorium
- Thread starter vallorn
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The problem with "killing oil" is one of energy density. To put it bluntly, one can pack more energy into a given mass and volume of petroleum product than we can currently pack in batteries. It is this more than any reason that the Electric Car has been unpopular.Romidude said:
Batteries are heavy. Really heavy in fact. Yet they are utterly required to run an electric engine with our current infrastructure. Unfortunately, the storage capacity of a given mass and volume of battery increases incredibly slowly. While I have no doubt that this problem can be solved, no such solution exists at the moment. Nuclear magnetic resonance offers the possibility to actively charge vehicles on the move (or at least reduce the total draw required from the battery) but the technology relies on a very short ranged effect (that is, the technology is based upon magnetic pulses) which would require an enormous investment in the infrastructure required to put such devices into operation for a significant portion of the world's roads.
A solution to the "electricity" problem is a start but it does not solve the problem of energy as a whole. We still need portable storage systems for energy and at the moment the best solution remains petroleum products. It is this reason more than any other that would ensure the oil industry remains necessary even if new energy sources were put into place.
The reason we will forever be using oil and the reason why for the most part cars are actually getting less fuel efficient is because that's how the oil companies want it, if you use less fuel then they make less money. Oil companies have already spent millions maybe even billions to stop progress towards better fuels.
The oil companies would happily do everything in there power to keep there mega profits from oil up.
Its a shame. It would be an amazing breakthrough especially for smaller, industrialised countries like here(Ireland) you could pretty much run the country on a ton or less if this is to be believed
Its a shame. It would be an amazing breakthrough especially for smaller, industrialised countries like here(Ireland) you could pretty much run the country on a ton or less if this is to be believed
Does it say anything about how long it takes Thorium to reform? As if we all used Uranium we would all eventually run out of that with increased energy needs.vallorn said:
OT: I personally think for just use on this planet we should use things that are actually 100% renewable and not ores that will probably eventually run out as we overmine them to meet our ever growing energy needs.
It'd be great if Obama could, however it'd be kinda hard to convince folks to invest in what is right now only a speculative energy source. Sure it's got research behind it, but people like to see things like that powering their homes before they really start to trust it.
Also nuclear power is sort of a political no-go, nuclear energy simply lost a lot of appeal after Three Mile Island. At least for now, I wouldn't call it a politically-viable strategy, once the recession starts to ease and once we start to be able to see the end of it coming up then we should try it, i.e. at a time when Republicans won't jump all over Obama for spending money on some "damned fool energy" in the middle of a recession, it would be the equivalent of handing them a loaded gun and pointing them at their enemy, it's just not a good idea.
Also nuclear power is sort of a political no-go, nuclear energy simply lost a lot of appeal after Three Mile Island. At least for now, I wouldn't call it a politically-viable strategy, once the recession starts to ease and once we start to be able to see the end of it coming up then we should try it, i.e. at a time when Republicans won't jump all over Obama for spending money on some "damned fool energy" in the middle of a recession, it would be the equivalent of handing them a loaded gun and pointing them at their enemy, it's just not a good idea.
Umm... actually the USA does have the money to pursue such a task (keeping in mind that it's only for the US not the world, which was assigned the 20 trillion figure) given that despite the fact that China is weathering the recession pretty well, their GDP still has a long way to go before it catches up to ours. It's mostly the fact that it's politically difficult to do so for the US that's going to give China the advantage, provided it starts now, their government may not be entirely popular, but the people aren't quite as involved in the decision-making as a name like People's Republic of China would lead you to believe.deadman91 said:
If you want to save the planet, you need to eliminate money all together, but no one wants to do that.
And yet despite how great that article makes this energy sound, it still doesn't solve what I view as the bigger problem; that our society is ultimately dependent on a finite source of energy. Even if thorium yields much more energy, it still has limited quantity. Eventually it will run into the same problem as oil when supplies begin to drop. The article makes it sound like it has a ridiculous energy output, which I'm skeptical of, but even if it is true it is still finite.
I dislike the idea of switching over to another resource that is finite. More investment should be put into developing renewable energy resources, which only become more viable as they advance over time. Do they have their downsides? Of course they do, and I'm not going to pretend that any one energy source is perfect. But I do know that finite energy sources can't be the foundation for the future, as they can not support the future indefinitely.
You might say that we could just use this technology as something to solve the current energy crisis and then develop renewable energy sources. But if the problem with this is that countries have invested to much into other energy sources to take a chance with this, wouldn't we just end up with the same problem in the future? One of the reasons why renewable energy sources are being developed because we are facing the problem of running out of a finite resource. If we just invest in another finite resource rather than develop those, we will run into the same problem. Maybe not for a long time, but it would be inevitable.
I don't know. I just find it hard to buy into the idea the thorium could solve the energy crisis and that if society invested heavily into it renewable energy sources would continue to be developed. However, I don't claim to be incredibly knowledgeable on this matter. What I'm saying is based on what I've learned about the environment over the years, and I'm hesitant to let one article change my entire perspective. Perhaps my mind just isn't in the right place.
I dislike the idea of switching over to another resource that is finite. More investment should be put into developing renewable energy resources, which only become more viable as they advance over time. Do they have their downsides? Of course they do, and I'm not going to pretend that any one energy source is perfect. But I do know that finite energy sources can't be the foundation for the future, as they can not support the future indefinitely.
You might say that we could just use this technology as something to solve the current energy crisis and then develop renewable energy sources. But if the problem with this is that countries have invested to much into other energy sources to take a chance with this, wouldn't we just end up with the same problem in the future? One of the reasons why renewable energy sources are being developed because we are facing the problem of running out of a finite resource. If we just invest in another finite resource rather than develop those, we will run into the same problem. Maybe not for a long time, but it would be inevitable.
I don't know. I just find it hard to buy into the idea the thorium could solve the energy crisis and that if society invested heavily into it renewable energy sources would continue to be developed. However, I don't claim to be incredibly knowledgeable on this matter. What I'm saying is based on what I've learned about the environment over the years, and I'm hesitant to let one article change my entire perspective. Perhaps my mind just isn't in the right place.
I suspect this is meant to be one of the "transition energies", i.e. non-renewable or less effective energies that we already have access to that we use to ease the burden of use of declining fossil fuel while a new energy source is developed.
Eeeey. give it to Iran, they've been working round the clock on getting some nuclear power going. How would it look if the discovery of a new clean powersource came not from the big, bad west, but from their own people. And suddenly, folks over here suddenly want to get their asses in gear lest we get beat out by the folks who already have oil. Get a Green-energy-race going, that's what got a man on the moon.
We already have the technology to use the solar energy, wind and water and we could use all of that everywhere in the world to power anything with it if we wanted to. Unfortunately there are few greedy evil people in this world who would rather watch the entire planet's population suffer so that they could make more money then they could possibly spend in 100 lifetimes. Those people need to die first if we want to move forward with this energy thing. Give me a gun and a list of their names and I'll gladly do it.
