nuclearboy: Its called the medieval warm period. Its really not that long ago. Man was alive and thrived during that period. In fact, what is know about it is that is was a period of relative calm as far as weather goes. Its not all that long ago and it implies that todays temperatures are within a normal range. It also implies that if things get warmer, we will not all die and we will probably have increased crop yeilds and fewer storms. C02 is plant food, afterall.

Funny, I heard it was called “The Little Ice Age”. Aparently that was just after. But if you follow the link, you will see that that peak is well below present. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age

Dagwood55: And as long as I’m thinking about it; I’ve been to China a couple times in the past few years. If you travel around China, you see evacuated-tube solar hot water heaters everywhere. I flew over a giant wind farm. The Chinese are reputed to be one of the biggest purchasers of solar panels. The Chinese are very appreciative of energy generating technologies that use “free” fuels.

Dagwood, I also say all of the rooftop solar water heaters. This was quite impressive that so many had them.

Matthew B: When I hear “there are solutions” that will turn back global warming I will immediately ask people if they think that is embracing nuclear hard.That is the only credible way to quickly and radically cut CO2 production. Wind power is being added at a “breakneck speed” of 1% capacity per year. At ~30% capacity factor, that is about .3% of production added per year. If you want to idle coal output that will take 150 years at the current rate of addition. I’m not saying it can’t be ramped up, but it hasn’t been demonstrated yet. In addition there are energy storage issues. Again this isn’t a technical impossibility, but there is fact that ZIP ZERO energy storage is being added right now… it is a probability not a certainty.At the rate we built nuclear power plants between 1977 and 1982, we could idle all of the coal plants in 15 years. That is a 55% reduction in CO2 output in 15 years. The fact that we already did it would put it in the certainty category, not the probably category.If global warming truly is dire, then the risks of nuclear pale by comparison.  (Quote)

I failed to mention something else… While I’m not opposed to nuclear, per se, it has about a ten year lead time, during which you have up to $10 billion in capital tied up. It’s 40 quarters from the time you start investing to the time you produce the first revenue-generating kilowatt-hour. Floating $10 billion in bonds is difficult and you might start the project with prevailing interest rates running at 4-5% and find that rates have risen to 10-12% before construction ocmpletes. Projects that have long time frames are inherently more risky than short ones. That is why nukes have not been favored by industry. This is why utilities push for legislation and regulation that allows them to raise rates to cover nuclear construction as they go. You should notice that they also seek caps on their liability in case of disaster. Nuclear has troublesome economics, to say the least.

You can adapt an existing factory and workforce to produce wind turbines in about a year, get them installed in another 90 days and be producing the first revenue-generating kilowatt-hour in about 6 quarters.

To build a thin-film solar plant, requires about a year and maybe $500 million. Such a plant can then be creating about a gigawatt (peak rating) of solar cells per year, each of which can be put into production in about 90 days. Time to first revenue-generating kilowatt-hour is about 6 quarters.

And as long as I’m thinking about it; I’ve been to China a couple times in the past few years. If you travel around China, you see evacuated-tube solar hot water heaters everywhere. I flew over a giant wind farm. The Chinese are reputed to be one of the biggest purchasers of solar panels. The Chinese are very appreciative of energy generating technologies that use “free” fuels. Are we going to sit on our duffs and let them beat us at everything? If we don’t get busy on this tech, we’ll be buying it from them in five years.

But by not announcing the price makes me wonder what they are hiding. Is 40 miles on a charge only possible if you drive 20-25 mph? Is the car not ready yet? If you have a good product it will sell itself in which case a manufacturer would have no problem in annoucing a price. So it’s not clear if they are simply playing the market for all it’s worth to see how much they can charge or if there is something they are not telling us. If the ongoing tests show consistant good performance time and time again, no glitches, no hiccups, then it’s time to announce the price. There is something missing and it’s starting to smell.

Matthew B: When I hear “there are solutions” that will turn back global warming I will immediately ask people if they think that is embracing nuclear hard.That is the only credible way to quickly and radically cut CO2 production. Wind power is being added at a “breakneck speed” of 1% capacity per year. At ~30% capacity factor, that is about .3% of production added per year. If you want to idle coal output that will take 150 years at the current rate of addition. I’m not saying it can’t be ramped up, but it hasn’t been demonstrated yet. In addition there are energy storage issues. Again this isn’t a technical impossibility, but there is fact that ZIP ZERO energy storage is being added right now… it is a probability not a certainty.At the rate we built nuclear power plants between 1977 and 1982, we could idle all of the coal plants in 15 years. That is a 55% reduction in CO2 output in 15 years. The fact that we already did it would put it in the certainty category, not the probably category.If global warming truly is dire, then the risks of nuclear pale by comparison.  (Quote)

During WWII, we built quite a lot of tanks and aircraft. Aircraft, in particular, are far more complex than a wind turbine (look at the part count).

At the moment, we have 9% unemployment, quite a lot of idle industrial capacity and, in spite of the recession, quite a few companies have large cash reserves.

We have the human resources, we have the capacity and we have the money to transform the economy into a green economy. We don’t have the will, thanks to strategically funded Denialists who make their money off fossil fuels.

Want to revive Detroit? Put it to work. There are quite a few very interesting projects that would lend themselves nicely to aspects of Detroit’s automotive expertise (as, for example, the Stirling Energy Systems 25KW generator).