Author Archives: energyskeptic

A third of Nuclear Reactors are going to die of old age in the next 10-20 years

Posted on April 3, 2015 by

70% of reactors are over 25 years old, 23% are over 35 years old, so within 10 to 20 years about a third will have to be decommissioned, far more than the 63 under construction.  Some are bound to fail … Continue reading →

Posted in ! PEAK EVERYTHING, Nuclear Power Energy | Tagged , | 7 Comments

EROI negative for Coal-to-Liquids (CTL) at Shenuha Direct Coal Liquefaction plant

Posted on March 29, 2015 by

Kong, Z. et al. 23 January 2015. EROI Analysis for Direct Coal Liquefaction without and with CCS: The Case of the Shenhua DCL Project in China. Energies 8(2): 786-807.   Many nations see coal-to-liquids (CTL) as a way to avoid … Continue reading →

Posted in Coal to Liquids (CTL), EROEI Energy Returned on Energy Invested | Comments Off on EROI negative for Coal-to-Liquids (CTL) at Shenuha Direct Coal Liquefaction plant

Kurt Cobb Cheap oil, complexity and counter-intuitive conclusions

Posted on March 23, 2015 by

Kurt Cobb. March 22, 2015.   Cheap oil, complexity and counterintuitive conclusions. Resource Insights. It is a staple of oil industry apologists to say that the recent swift decline in the price of oil is indicative of long-term abundance. This … Continue reading →

Posted in Inflation or Deflation, Kurt Cobb | Comments Off on Kurt Cobb Cheap oil, complexity and counter-intuitive conclusions

All About Coal

Posted on March 20, 2015 by

Preface. Below are my notes, statistics, and so on about coal from many publications. Way more fun to look at and understand the coal used to make steel (a different kind is used to generate electricity) is this site: 2022 … Continue reading →

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Richard Heinberg: Only less will do

Posted on March 19, 2015 by

Richard Heinberg. March 16, 2015. Only Less Will Do. Post Carbon Institute. [portions of this article were cut, reworded, and rearranged] Almost nobody likes to hear about the role of scale in our global environmental crisis, because if growth is … Continue reading →

Posted in Birth Control, By People, Climate Change, Overpopulation, Richard Heinberg | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Hydropower has a very low energy density

Posted on March 17, 2015 by

To store the energy contained in 1 gallon of gasoline requires over 55,000 gallons to be pumped up 726 feet (CCST 2012). As a thought experiment look at what it would take generate all of America’s 4,058 TWh electricity, where … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy Storage, Hydropower, Pumped Hydro Storage (PHS) | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Gail Tverberg The oil glut and low prices reflect an affordability problem

Posted on March 12, 2015 by

Tverberg, G. March 9, 2015. The oil glut and low prices reflect an affordability problem. ourfiniteworld.com For a long time, there has been a belief that the decline in oil supply will come by way of high oil prices. Demand … Continue reading →

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Jared Diamond Why Societies Collapse

Posted on March 12, 2015 by

[ Whoops, Diamond left out peak oil: Book review of “In order to live: A North Korean girl’s journey to freedom” by Yeonmi Park Inside North Korea’s Environmental Collapse Who Lives, Who dies in a never-ending energy crisis. Book review … Continue reading →

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The Empire of the United States, Roman Empire, War, etc.

Posted on March 12, 2015 by

[Several articles and comments from energy groups follow] Steven Strauss. December 31, 2012. 8 Striking Parallels Between the U.S. and the Roman Empire. Is our republic coming to an unceremonious end? History may not be on America’s side. Lawrence Lessig’s … Continue reading →

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CSP Barriers and Obstacles

Posted on March 9, 2015 by

Location must be in the desert Southwest Unlike solar PV, CSP can’t cope with humidity or cloud cover, so it is limited to the southwest were the solar irradiation is high and there is no dust, haze, or smog.  Solar … Continue reading →

Posted in CSP with thermal energy storage | Tagged , , , , , | Comments Off on CSP Barriers and Obstacles