Categories
-
Recent Posts
- Telling others about peak oil and limits to growth
- Why coal was only created once
- Failed State Index: nations ranked from failed to stable
- We already have a date for the zenith of civilization: 2025-2026
- Escape to Mars after we’ve trashed the Earth?
- Spermageddon: Sperm is declining around the world
- Thorium nuclear bombs and reactors have too many challenges
- Who Killed the Electric Car & more importantly, the Electric Truck?
- President Carter’s energy solutions 1977
- Peak Menhaden
- Hemp for paper, textiles, the war on drugs, and more
- Why towns have a hard time adding EV, solar, heat pumps
- Building a national super grid in America
- The Mayflower from the book The Barbarous Years
- The deep sea is a desperate place to drill for more
Category Archives: Energy
Why coal was only created once
Preface. Coal only formed once on Earth over hundreds of millions of years because they had lignin and cellulose that microbes hadn’t yet evolved to consume. Eventually they did, and today termites, cows and other creatures are able to digest … Continue reading
Escape to Mars after we’ve trashed the Earth?
The idea that we can go to Mars is touted by NASA, Elon Musk, and so many others that this dream seems just around the corner. If we destroy our planet with climate change, pollution, biodiversity loss, soil erosion, aquifer … Continue reading
Posted in Climate Change, Extinction, Far Out, Hopium, Human Nature, Planetary Boundaries, Where to Be or Not to Be
Tagged biosphere, colonize, Earth, Mars, radiation, space, terraform
11 Comments
Thorium nuclear bombs and reactors have too many challenges
Preface. I can not explain in a blog all the nuances and complexities of the harm and dangers of nuclear power and weapons. Yet it is such an important technology to understand, since it may be the greatest threat to … Continue reading
Posted in Thorium
Tagged nuclear war, nuclear winter, thorium reactors
Comments Off on Thorium nuclear bombs and reactors have too many challenges
Who Killed the Electric Car & more importantly, the Electric Truck?
Preface. Who cares about electric cars? Civilization ends when trucks stop running. Trucks can’t run on batteries because they’re too heavy, with 63 times less energy density than diesel. If all U.S. transportation were to be electrified, the existing electric … Continue reading
Posted in Automobiles, Batteries, Critical Thinking, Electric & Hydrogen trucks impossible, Electrification, Transportation, Transportation Infrastructure
Tagged battery, BEV, capacity, efficiency, electric car, electric truck, energy density, EV, lead-acid, lithium ion
Comments Off on Who Killed the Electric Car & more importantly, the Electric Truck?
The deep sea is a desperate place to drill for more
Preface. Peak crude oil is on a plateau that is likely to peak soon, but when it happens we won’t be out of oil, just halfway through. Giant fields continue to be found, but in the deep ocean or arctic … Continue reading
Book review of “Livewired. The inside story of the ever-changing brain”
Preface. This book conveys a sense of wonderment and awe about our brains work and how we become who we are. I think if you read the excerpts below you will understand why Artificial Intelligence will probably never come close … Continue reading
Posted in Artificial Intelligence, Evolution
Tagged artificial intelligence, brain, neurons
Comments Off on Book review of “Livewired. The inside story of the ever-changing brain”
Battery Energy storage batteries (BESS) too complex to ever be commercial
Source: RWE connects its first utility-scale battery storage project to the California grid Preface. In 2024 if all of the BESS battery storage time were added up, they could store 8 of the 8,760 hours of annual electricity generated in … Continue reading
Posted in Battery - Utility Scale
Tagged battery energy storage system, BESS, fire, thermal runaway
Comments Off on Battery Energy storage batteries (BESS) too complex to ever be commercial
Net Energy Cliff & the Collapse of Civilization
figure 1. The remaining oil is poor quality, and the energy to get this often remote oil so great that more and more energy (blue) goes into oil production itself, leaving far less — the grey area — available to … Continue reading