Categories
-
Recent Posts
- Rare Earth updates: recent research on why complex & intelligent life are rare in the Universe
- Book review of “Chip War” and the Fragility of microchips
- The tremendous material and energy toll of the digital economy
- Nuclear attack on U.S. could kill 90% of Americans
- What percent of Americans are rational?
- Book review of Lights Out. A Cyberattack. A Nation Unprepared. Surviving the Aftermath
- Off-Road vehicles & equipment need diesel fuel
- Book review of “Prime Movers of Globalization: the History & Impact of Diesel Engines & Gas Turbines”
- Mental Health. Coping with the future: notes from Jackson & Jensen’s “An Inconvenient Apocalypse”
- Tesla Semi trucks hauling corn chips
- What is the plan for an electric grid outage that lasts for months?
- Where to be? Links to Superfund, hazardous waste and other toxic sites in U.S.
- Why methanol cannot replace petroleum in shipping
- Why is everyone afraid of AI taking over? It makes stuff up!
- Do you want to eat, drink, or fly?
Monthly Archives: April 2013
Oil can never be replaced with alternative energy
People who think that wind, solar, biofuels, hydrogen, batteries, and so on will save us simply don’t understand how much energy is contained in oil and other fossil fuels, how much we rely on it, how it is at the … Continue reading
Posted in Oil
Comments Off on Oil can never be replaced with alternative energy
Natural Gas and Trucking
What we are facing is a liquids fuels crisis, since 97% of transportation depends on oil (especially to plant, harvest, and distribute food, long-haul trucking, trains, etc). To the extent that natural gas can fill in for oil, that will … Continue reading
Posted in Natural Gas Vehicles
Comments Off on Natural Gas and Trucking
Peak Oil Acknowledged by Middle Eastern countries — they’re scared
Very interesting reflections on a peak oil conference in the Middle east of the countries that export oil. I think it must mean we’re past peak, don’t believe “the near future”. Peak Oil as seen through the eyes of Arab … Continue reading
Posted in How Much Left
Comments Off on Peak Oil Acknowledged by Middle Eastern countries — they’re scared
The Big 5 Personality Traits – psychobabble or science?
Alice Friedemann’s review of : Daniel Nettle. 2008. “Personality, What makes you the way you are”. Oxford University Press. Scientists have considered psychology to be a very soft science at best and quackery or psychobabble at worst. But psychology is … Continue reading
Posted in Evolution
Comments Off on The Big 5 Personality Traits – psychobabble or science?
Renewable Energy can’t supply more than 30% of electricity without revolutionary battery breakthrough
Wind and solar are too intermittent to comprise much of electric grid power now, according to Steven Chu, former US energy secretary. In 2010, Chu said, “Without technological breakthroughs in efficient, large-scale energy storage, it will be difficult to rely … Continue reading
Posted in Alternative Energy, Batteries
1 Comment