Aceshardware

in case any of you are interested.

http://cleantechnica.com/

gareth

Awesome page, should make it much easier for me to find info on the latest in the field. Sorry Google, yer gonna be number 2 :p

This guy David McKay is giving a talk in Dublin this week.

http://www.withouthotair.com/

He has some nice slides, on the sidebar on the right on this page:

http://www.withouthotair.com/talks.html

gareth

Short video by Prof. David McKay.

http://www.800.cam.ac.uk/page/122/cambr ... tbulbs.htm

B.

The video argues that Britain needs about 300 nuclear power plants or 600000 wind units to satisfy the power needs of that population (125 lightbulbs per person).

Britain only has about ten nuclear plants and is approving about that many to be built. It also has a couple thousand wind units or so, the rest of Britain's power needs are based on the old-fashioned stuff.

Lots of nations are probably in the same boat, it's gonna be quite a longterm and costly process for them to overcome dependency on scare resources.

Also nuclear power is sorta "taboo" down here in the US, so that really makes things extra difficult for us unfortunately.

Realistically speaking, I don't think we're gonna be solving this in the next twenty years or so ;)

Interesting point,

I guess what McKay is saying too, is that it will require endeavours of greater scale and ambition, than what we are seeing to date, to sort it all out. And in that sense, your point about the 20+ timeframe seems pretty sound.

gareth

I find nuclear less of a scary idea than wind. Modern nuclear plant designs (pebble bed etc) don't have the same issues with meltdowns and disposal. But if you start deploying wind power on continental scales I worry the increased drag at the surface will alter rain patterns that are already being changed by global warming. A sudden drought in one of the main food producing regions of the globe would be a pretty bad problem.

Ray Anderson on Sustainability

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcRDUIbT4gw

I thought that Ray could put it in a lot of perspective for me.

gareth