(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Climate Part 2: NRG Transition [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-04-23 Energy: The capacity or power to do work We live and depend on a high energy civilization and without it our lives, our comfort, our “American Dream” are not really possible……even with massive NRG ability we still will have to alter our society or likely become a 1% with and 99% without authoritarian oligarchy/dictatorship (some have no issue with that thinking they will be the 1%). We, humans, have been altering the planet since we discovered fire and could make stone tools; we have assisted if not caused mass extinctions (Mega Fauna), we have performed rapid forced evolution on many creatures (Bison, cattle, sheep, goats, wolves, various bird species like chickens, etc.), we have altered landscapes and biomes. Yet our more recent growth, exploitation, and alteration of our world have revolved around energy development and use of, as Mr Hartman said, “The Last Days of Ancient Sunlight”……..all fossil fuels are nothing but stored ancient sunlight in the altered form of carbon compounds (oil, coal, gas)……and it is causing massive shifts in the climate and rapidly. We would be wise to stop doing this…after all we are Homo Sapiens (wise man). Some energy forms are much worse than others, the most common as follows: Wood: Yes, a lot of the world still uses and depends on wood which although renewable is still a resource we can easily strip and overuse…..we also tend to clear cut for other reasons like creating pastures for our preferred animals. Coal: the least energy dense of fossil fuels, the one which creates the most damage in obtaining it, processing it, burning it, and storing the waste…..this one is top on my list of “Stop using it”. Oil: the biggie, most energy dense, which we spend lots of technology, effort, brain power, resources to find, extract, refine, transport, protect and then…….burn? Natural Gas: Methane, mostly clean burning and comes from many sources yet is still finite resource which we need for making artificial fertilizers which our civilization now depends on to feed our masses…….and we burn it again. Now our NRG future really now needs to transition away from burning any of these, even wood (particulate matter, resource limitations, loss of carbon sequestration), and move to Electric as much as possible since electricity can be generated in many ways and is transportable through power lines and batteries. There are of course vested interest in not doing this, such as Internal Combustion Engine Companies (Auto Corporations), Big Oil (which wants no declines in demand), and others…ignore them, fight them, our biosphere is more important than their profits folks; there is no Planet B (Yahweh is not going to give you a nice new planet to destroy at the last second). To transition away from fossil fuel of course means we have to generate a lot more electricity without burning fossil fuels….which we can if the politics do not get in the way (Texas, N.D., Wyoming, Oklahoma senators in the pockets of big oil/gas/coal are a “PITA”). We can generate and do generate a lot of electricity in other ways and can do more if we push hard enough; let me use my benighted state,Idaho, as an example to think on. Idaho has no useable oil deposits, no real deposits of natural gas (caveat; we do have lots of cow poop to convert), no useable coal deposits (the few were stripped in the late 19th and early 20th century)….so no fossil fuels. Idaho does have and has exploited its hydo resources which gives us some of the cheapest electrical rates in the nation, though at the cost of killing off salmon runs on entire river systems such as the Middle Snake River, The Bruenuea River, the Owyhee River, the Boise River, the Malad river, the Payette river, and various smaller tributaries such as the Jarbridge……and YES the Dams killed the Salmon since the Hells Canyon Dam has no Fish ladder and Salmon just cannot seem too jump over that concrete Goliath. Side note Twin Falls (top of middle Snake) used to have Salmon cannery’s and salmon was considered the “poor mans steak” before the dams went in….now it is the rich mans delicacy. Idaho also has lots of unused geothermal potential; the problem there is cost of initial infrastructure and power lines (Federal Government could help?). Side note the State Capital and much of downtown Boise is powered by a geothermal closed loop heating system and has been since as early as the 1890’s www.cityofboise.org/… We can and should develop other sites, responsibly though to avoid destroying them…..oh side note the entire state is a “thermal hot spot/volcanic plume with at the upper snake valley a place called Yellowstone”….the geology of the state is amazing. Idaho also has wind….lots of it…..all the bloody time…..it blows up and down the Snake River Valley all year long…old joke is Idaho is windy because Wyoming s%cks and Oregon blows….. Wind is being developed although not without pushback from Nimbies (you are wrecking my view of pristine rolling sagebrush desert — you cannot eat landscape is the ranchers response) and from Big Oil/Gas/Coal. Why would fossil fuel companies care; well because they lose a consumer and gain a competitor of they allow the development. Note that wind Turbine companies employ lots of folks both short term and long term as blades need replacing (what we will do with the fiberglass monsters is still being debated) and generators need maintenance (do you have a good head for heights…we have a job for you!). Not all places are ideal for wind yet this is another way to generate electricity, gives paychecks to ranchers who opt for them on their lands, and give lots of folks all kinds of jobs in the high desert empty lands of Idaho-ho-ho. Some curmudgeons though whine about windmill cancer (not a thing), killing birds (like they really cared before?….cats and buildings are biggest killer of birds…www.sibleyguides.com/...), or “massive noise of wind turbines” (what you people are out there?….about 50db at ground level, a little noisier than your fridge..www.ge.com/...)….the bloody wind is louder! These are all delaying tactics often funded by, wait for it….Big Oil/Gas/Coal (though so called Think Tanks like the Heartland Institute who used to be the American Tobacco Institute)…..stopping competition keeps profit margins high. Idaho, last but not least, has lots of Sunlight, Boise has on average 210 sunny days per year and yes solar panels even generate power on cloudy days (just not as much)….side note, with todays efficient panels we would have to cover and area about 100 miles by 100 miles (a corner of Nevada) to power the entire USA….not that I recommend that, being a fan of multiple distributed systems (not all your eggs in one, or three, baskets). Now we have lots of already disturbed lands we can cover, from roofs to parking lots and this would make great sense, be economical, reduce our need to burn the big three and bring us closer to “Net zero emissions” which is part of restoring our climate (but only part). Who would fight such a rational thing…well the big three and…well here it is Idaho Power itself that try’s to quash it since, well they make money by generating power cheap and selling it “dear” (relatively speaking) and do not want to buy my power at market prices (thus no net metering in Idaho). Now I understand this, being a rational and well read fellow, since Idaho Power needs to generate revenue for maintenance of dams, power lines, substations, new construction, paying stock owners, etc. and my puddly little $5 per month service charge is not going to do it (yes my power bill is $5 per month because I have a solar panel array which basically over a year makes as much as I use — we do get solar credits during high generation months to use later). Now on the other hand Idaho Power is building large solar farms in various places, has multiple wind Turbine farms and gets cheap power through the Bonneville Power Administration (Thank you big Government for the subsidization even if you did kill all the Salmon). They still try to fight small distributed roof systems through various GrOPer Curmudgeons in the legislature (MAGA Q-Nuts one and all) but are mostly losing over time as power rates go up and solar panel costs come down…..now if the battery tech can catch up. Idaho also can develop some amount of Bio-Gas since we have lots of feedlots, dairy operations, and organic matter here and there…..but, caveat….it is limited and will not meet all out demands. Still better to use it than the waste it; the problem again is $$$$ to build infrastructure and most of these Factory Dairy operations really hate spending money on such things….so, yes we, Joe Urban Public, will have to fund it and I have no problem with that. Idaho also strangely enough, or not so, has the many Nuclear Power Plants……many of which are blown up, burned up, and melted down….thank you (/s) DOE/Bechtel/GE for doing this and also storing unknown amounts of plutonium waste above the Snake River Aquifer (another whole story there)……but we do not generate any electrical power with it…..go figure. Now a BIG Caveat here: I would hesitate to expand Nuclear Power generation (even though low carbon) for a host of reasons from cost to waste storage (the N.M. WIPP was a good idea though being glass and salt beds are ideal for isolation)…..until we resolve many Nuclear issues I would say “caution and Danger Will Robinson”…..it is costly although we may need it as both a base load system over the long term as we will need some Natural Gas Modern power plants for peak and off hour spot use. There are many ways to generate electricity folks and distributed systems are hard to attack (Hey DOD think on that). We can move to a mostly electric civilization and we should ASAP otherwise we are likely to kill our civilization all too quickly…..what is stopping us is entrenched Fossil Fuel Corporations, GrOPErs (yes the GOP are the main political party in the way), and sadly modern Conservatism which wants a mythical past that never was and fears change. Most of the issues to move away from carbon intense NRG are not technical or science or economic…..they are political and greed. Wow…..sorry that went on so long….Mea Culpa (I am also guilty)…in this case of diary bloat. Well on to diatribe #3 about what we can do to mimic nature and lock away carbon without spending a lot of $$$$. (Thank you Peter Fiekowsky “Climate Restoration”) [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/23/2165349/-Climate-Part-2-NRG-Transition Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/