Solving Climate Change.

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Sculptor
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by Sculptor »

Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 2:05 pm
Sculptor wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 1:32 pm You are clueless. Please acquaint yourself with the relevant information. It seems at the momet you have some vauge idea of drilling a hole of unknown depth and unknown bore, chucking water down the hole and expecting to catch the steam to run a turbine. Good luck with that.
Ah, I see you've read my proposal. Thank you. Good luck to you too!

What a nice man!


p.s. Would you care to say a little more about your desire to "completely transform global financial markets" - if only to give some idea of what you consider credible or desirable!

Sculptor wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 7:43 pmI think a complete transformation of the global financial markets is going to have to be the first priority, else we are lost.
What are you going to transform them into?

A chicken?
There is a body of theory that is gaining much traction in the world of economics and being promoted by several top class academics such as Warren Mosler, Galbraith, Joseph Stiglitz and Stephanie Kelton, but I fear, given your flakey understanding of basic science you it might be a bit much for you to understand Modern Monetary Theory. MMT I might add is exacly the sort of tranformative move that would make government funded research project for things such as new energy sources possible.
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attofishpi
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:42 pm Sculptor is right though, this additiona of sea water means your exhaust pipe is going to be blasted with a quite satanic mix of salt and steam that will wear it away. So you need to demonstrate some sort of regular maintenance to replace those pipes, the location seems daunting though. Are you sure all the salt will even come out with the steam, these pipes won't be easy to clean either. Cold seawater is why wave energy is so difficult, red hot seawater is odd.
Although I agree with most points being made by yourself and Sculptor re this 'magma' thing. Vitruvius (welcome to PHN btw) has hit one particular point on the head.
Two things that we need - especially 'down-under' is fresh water - & we all need clean energy.

A thought I have had banging around in my head for many years is the idea of heliostat using SALT water rather than fresh water. Once at boiling point (a lower point since it contains salt), the steam produced would driver turbines - yippy - electricity, and then condense via arrays of sheets coated in a nano-coating substance - it was a long time ago, but basically these sheets can cause water vapour to condense and drain off as droplets at an extremely efficient rate.
Win Win - fresh water, and clean energy. I would envisage a cycling of a percentage of the saline heated water - that is to say the heated water would be regulated at a particular salinity amount, or even perhaps even fed off to fields to grow kelp!

Ah, but what to do with the salt and the corrosive aspect is part of the argument here...I would suggest forget metal piping, something like ceramics etc.., some material resistant to the corrosiveness of salt.

When the Sun don't shine - the energy could be stored in vast lithium battery arrays... In fact - there is a US energy firm actually using salt as a way to store HEAT, so the salt in fact could be useful aftera all - I haven't got the Co. name handy but the local govt are shoving wads of cash up their arse somewhere near Port Augusta trial plant.
If the fresh water produced is not of a capacity to be feasible for towns to use, well, grow yer bloody cotton or woteva!! - currently the river Murray is being drained in these times of drought for cotton production.

Things need to change, things need to adapt, and there is plenty of arid land north of me that is very flat and low close to sea level.
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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attofishpi wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 6:17 pm When the Sun don't shine - the energy could be stored in vast lithium battery arrays... In fact - there is a US energy firm actually using salt as a way to store HEAT, so the salt in fact could be useful aftera all - I haven't got the Co. name handy but the local govt are shoving wads of cash up their arse somewhere near Port Augusta trial plant.
If the fresh water produced is not of a capacity to be feasible for towns to use, well, grow yer bloody cotton or woteva!! - currently the river Murray is being drained in these times of drought for cotton production.

Things need to change, things need to adapt, and there is plenty of arid land north of me that is very flat and low close to sea level.
Molten salt energy storage is a thing, seems to be a pretty good thing at that. No idea if they are cool with getting the salt from seawater, bit fishy.
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by Vitruvius »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:42 pm Okay then. So you can describe how you can make it feasible without wishful thinking or batting aside questions with comments like "I've already thought about that".
It is feasible; I just said that. By feasible, I mean something like "probably possible" and that's all I really need. I'm a political philosopher. This myopic focus on the engineering is a pretty weird angle for a philosophy forum. I've given the matter some thought - but generally, most people are satisfied that there is a massive amount of energy down there, and that we can drill miles into the earth's crust. You're not wrong about me depending on others to fill in the technical details. I've given it some thought - but only enough thought to know that it's feasible.

"If wind and solar were adequate to address climate change, I wouldn't waste my time with magma energy."
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:42 pmThey're progressing rather nicely though, and can do so via incremental change. You need an as yet unknowable number of new technologies, fail in any one of them and your project goes nowhere.
I've explained why wind and solar cannot, EVER, meet our energy needs, several times. Sure, they're popping up everywhere - and producing some clean energy at commercial rates, but as energy policy they entrench a sub-optimal approach to sustainability that puts us forever behind the eight ball. We may be able to replace some fossil fuel energy generation with wind and solar, and so prevent some emissions, but we'll never have more energy. We'll never even meet our current needs from wind and solar. The UK alone would require something like 15,000 x £250m pound wind turbines - to be maintained, and replaced every 25 years. To say nothing of storing energy that's inconstant, or integrating that energy into existing grids. So, it follows that wind and solar - even pursued with extreme vigour, can only EVER take the leading edge off carbon emissions, and that's not enough.
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:42 pm But they both have the virtue of limitless energy from a pollution free source. The only thing your magma dream has that they don't is that you like one and you don't like the other. If you approached wind energy with the same pangalossian enthusiasm you reserve for this communist-volcano-irrigation tech of yours, you would say that is the cure for global warming.


Wind and solar are a limitless pollution free energy source, that's true, but your ability to capture them is not. I've talked about the scale of the infrastructure required above, so here I'll just point out that they are diffuse forms of energy, and so require a lot of infrastructure spread over a large area to gather; when the wind is blowing or sun shining - which isn't all the time. This irregularity of supply implies a storage requirement - which is more infrastructure, and storage of energy costs energy. These are harsh criticisms, but this a matter of existential necessity. I'm not going to soft peddle with the future of my species at stake. I'm trying to get you to see something - and your 'love of solar' based insistence that I'm wrong blinds you to it. Just ask yourself, what if we had limitless amounts of high grade, base load clean energy? It is feasible!
FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:42 pmThat's very dramatic, but we can end fossil fuel usage by developing a handful of technologies, and we have candidates for most them under development at competing institutions. If you are really into campaigning against carbon, I would suggest getting behind the carbon tax proposals which are less awe-inducing and sci-fi, but tangible, and would actually address the problem.
No-one need have a carbon footprint. I'll solve climate change for you - and you won't even notice! First, I'll develop magma energy, and use that to sequester carbon, desalinate, irrigate and recycle - not competing in the energy market, but building capacity while mitigating and adapting to the climate and ecological crisis. I don't presume to dictate terms but when this energy does hit the market, it might be wise to adopt a sectoral approach - like the cement industry, the steel industry, aluminium - big energy users first. Then you produce hydrogen fuel, and burn that instead of coal in the worst emitting power stations first, and proceed in that manner - from the supply side, functionally with regard the problem, such that cleaner fossil fuel infrastructure might remain for quite some time.

There's a lot of interesting ideas here that are not about what kind of one way valves will stand up to salt encrustation, or whatever, I thought perhaps might have formed the focus of a discussion on a philosophy forum. I don't need to provide blueprints for this to be an interesting idea worth talking about. The energy definitely is down there, and we need it just as certainly. Technologically, it seems feasible. I see no reason why it must be impossible. And there are not to my knowledge other technologies in development that could be applied as quickly, on a large enough scale to address climate change - less yet overcome it, transcend limits to growth and prosper into the long distant future. If magma energy has the potential I think it does, magma really could usher in a new phase of human existence - not unlike the energy revolutions that have accompanied every previous leap forward in our evolutionary history. In face of this existential threat, I think it is the right move to look beyond ourselves, and it's there - an endless amount of high grade, base load clean energy, and you ask me about the nuts and bolts? Why? That's not a rhetorical question. I'd like an answer. It's time for you to come clean about your motives. Why the constant attempt to side-track into a non productive and not particularly interesting area?
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 8:37 pm In face of this existential threat, I think it is the right move to look beyond ourselves, and it's there - an endless amount of high grade, base load clean energy, and you ask me about the nuts and bolts? Why? That's not a rhetorical question. I'd like an answer. It's time for you to come clean about your motives. Why the constant attempt to side-track into a non productive and not particularly interesting area?
Because your plan is stupid and won't work. I don't need ulterior motives, I think you are delusional.
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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Sculptor wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 5:37 pm There is a body of theory that is gaining much traction in the world of economics and being promoted by several top class academics such as Warren Mosler, Galbraith, Joseph Stiglitz and Stephanie Kelton, but I fear, given your flakey understanding of basic science you it might be a bit much for you to understand Modern Monetary Theory. MMT I might add is exacly the sort of tranformative move that would make government funded research project for things such as new energy sources possible.
A transformative move - in what sense, do you mean if everyone in government signed up to MMT? That seems unlikely. These perspectives compete to inform policy, and MMT is tempting, but I think of Biden spending $6 trillion on windmills, and I wonder if governments shouldn't be operationally constrained by revenues? All that money to spend, to never produce an erg more energy than now - and be right back where you started in 25 years. That's some unconstrained spending right there! He sure is popular!
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by Vitruvius »

attofishpi wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 6:17 pm Although I agree with most points being made by yourself and Sculptor re this 'magma' thing. Vitruvius (welcome to PHN btw) has hit one particular point on the head. Two things that we need - especially 'down-under' is fresh water - & we all need clean energy.
Thanks for the welcome. I'm not feeling it, but thanks! I read your post, and found it interesting. Ivanpah suggests heliostats are problematic; but they can produce a lot of base load power, relative to wind or solar panels, heliostats are pretty good, half the time. They don't produce energy at night, or when it's cloudy - and require a daily kickstart with gas, but when they do work, they are heavy duty. Linking technologies like energy production, desalination, carbon capture and storage is the way to go though; I think so too. Australia has a lot of open spaces and sunshine, that's true, but they also have a lot of coal they're exporting to Asia - used to produce electricity by some of the poorest and populous countries on the planet. Will they build their own heliostats, or just keep buying coal from you, while you admire your self reflected in all the pretty mirrors?
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by Vitruvius »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 9:39 pmBecause your plan is stupid and won't work. I don't need ulterior motives, I think you are delusional.
Maybe I am delusional. I don't believe so, but let's consider the possibility. How so? Is there not a big ball of energy beneath our feet? Maybe there isn't. Maybe it's all a delusion. Maybe the earth is flat and I'm a brain in a jar! I don't believe so, and find have no choice but to proceed on the basis of my conscientious convictions, despite the number of times you tell me what I consider feasible is stupid, and that I am deluded! How do you know you are not deluded? The problem is this; there would be no point in saying it if it were true, so the question of your motives remains pertinent. Why the rampant hostility?
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 10:05 pm
Sculptor wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 5:37 pm There is a body of theory that is gaining much traction in the world of economics and being promoted by several top class academics such as Warren Mosler, Galbraith, Joseph Stiglitz and Stephanie Kelton, but I fear, given your flakey understanding of basic science you it might be a bit much for you to understand Modern Monetary Theory. MMT I might add is exacly the sort of tranformative move that would make government funded research project for things such as new energy sources possible.
A transformative move - in what sense, do you mean if everyone in government signed up to MMT? That seems unlikely. These perspectives compete to inform policy, and MMT is tempting, but I think of Biden spending $6 trillion on windmills, and I wonder if governments shouldn't be operationally constrained by revenues? All that money to spend, to never produce an erg more energy than now - and be right back where you started in 25 years. That's some unconstrained spending right there! He sure is popular!
It's not about money. Money is not wealth. In 2008 the wealth of nations did not change. What happened is that a stupid gamble failed and poor people lost out to big finance. Money moved from the poor to the rich and what Keynes would have called "animal spirits" failed and went pesimistic.
There have been far too much constraint on government spending and far too much money creation (at the push of a button) by banks. Its not government spending that fucked up the economy it was the banks selling sub- prime mortgages, whilst rewarding themselves with bonuses for FAILING.
Money is created by computers. It is vitally important HOW it is spent. But money is NOT wealth.
Biden is probably right to create money to buy windmills because oil is going out of fashion.

There are such things as paradigm shifts.
The current failing ecnomic paradigm, of Milton Friedman has failed spectacularly a couple of times, but massively in 2008. It takes time for these changes to filter through the academic system. But as young srudents study these failures a new consensus develops. Progressively minded universities are now teaching MMT, but even the old traditional universities are teaching MMT alongside Milton Friedman's Monetarism/Reaganomics/Thatcheromics. What has happened since 1980 is a massive increase in inequality, which is damaging to the economy since wealth becomes polarised and demand drops. It makes more sense to not tax the poor, and dumb arse stupid to continue to give tax breaks to the rich who just store cash. Stored cash is a time-bomb of inflation. Put hand out to the poor and that money cirulates into the economy and boost business.
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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Sculptor wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 11:09 pmIt's not about money. Money is not wealth.
To me, wealth is having the energy to spend to desalinate water to develop wastelands for agriculture and habitation, rather than burning down the forest and depleting natural water sources. The wasteland gains value, in addition to the productive activities its development allows for. That's real wealth, and it follows from applying the right technologies for the right reasons; starting with limitless clean energy from magma. That's the input the global economy needs, not oceans of cash with nowhere to go!
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 11:04 pmMaybe I am delusional. I don't believe so, but let's consider the possibility. How so? Is there not a big ball of energy beneath our feet?
I think you are a bit optimistic rather than delusional. It hasn't gone unnoticed that there is a lot of hot rock beneath our feet. The problem is "Across most of the planet the hot material is simply too deep down to be economically within reach." https://theconversation.com/magma-power ... ergy-67725 Even if you ignore the economics, you still need the right sort of rock. If it is impervious, pumping water down "will simply cool the area immediately around the borehole, making it pointless in geothermal terms." How much of a contribution magma can make towards our energy needs isn't clear, but some researchers share your enthusiasm https://www.insidescience.org/news/quest-magma
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by Sculptor »

Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 11:26 pm
Sculptor wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 11:09 pmIt's not about money. Money is not wealth.
To me, wealth is having the energy to spend to desalinate water to develop wastelands for agriculture and habitation, rather than burning down the forest and depleting natural water sources. The wasteland gains value, in addition to the productive activities its development allows for. That's real wealth, and it follows from applying the right technologies for the right reasons; starting with limitless clean energy from magma. That's the input the global economy needs, not oceans of cash with nowhere to go!
All that is exactly what has put us in danger of ecological anihilation.
Leave the wetlands alone. Leave it for the wildlife that relies on it.
We have already enough people. We already make more food than we can eat. The problem is the economic system which prevent people who need the food from getting it.
Whatever else you may think Magna energy is not going to be clean and without serious consequences.
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by attofishpi »

FlashDangerpants wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 8:01 pm
attofishpi wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 6:17 pm When the Sun don't shine - the energy could be stored in vast lithium battery arrays... In fact - there is a US energy firm actually using salt as a way to store HEAT, so the salt in fact could be useful aftera all - I haven't got the Co. name handy but the local govt are shoving wads of cash up their arse somewhere near Port Augusta trial plant.
If the fresh water produced is not of a capacity to be feasible for towns to use, well, grow yer bloody cotton or woteva!! - currently the river Murray is being drained in these times of drought for cotton production.

Things need to change, things need to adapt, and there is plenty of arid land north of me that is very flat and low close to sea level.
Molten salt energy storage is a thing, seems to be a pretty good thing at that. No idea if they are cool with getting the salt from seawater, bit fishy.
..yes, my point was not so much about '"the getting the salt from seawater." - it pretty much is more of a waste product - nice on chips though.

Point being, clean ELECTRICITY & FRESH WATER - we could have fields of arid land turned into viable (DROUGHT RESISTANT) farmland.

Thoughts?
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

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Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 10:44 pm
attofishpi wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 6:17 pm Although I agree with most points being made by yourself and Sculptor re this 'magma' thing. Vitruvius (welcome to PHN btw) has hit one particular point on the head. Two things that we need - especially 'down-under' is fresh water - & we all need clean energy.
Thanks for the welcome. I'm not feeling it, but thanks! I read your post, and found it interesting. Ivanpah suggests heliostats are problematic; but they can produce a lot of base load power, relative to wind or solar panels, heliostats are pretty good, half the time. They don't produce energy at night, or when it's cloudy - and require a daily kickstart with gas, but when they do work, they are heavy duty.
Well, that's kinda redundant when there are ways of storing energy.

Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 10:44 pmLinking technologies like energy production, desalination, carbon capture and storage is the way to go though;
Fuck carbon capture beyond forestation and the like.

Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 10:44 pmI think so too. Australia has a lot of open spaces and sunshine, that's true, but they also have a lot of coal they're exporting to Asia - used to produce electricity by some of the poorest and populous countries on the planet. Will they build their own heliostats, or just keep buying coal from you, while you admire your self reflected in all the pretty mirrors?
Investment is being pulled from coal mining - BHP are heading in the direction of Nickel and Lithium for the electric switch. Electrolysis for Hydrogen - via heliostat generated electricity is Oz future...and yeah the sooner we stop sending coal off to Asia the better.
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Re: Solving Climate Change.

Post by Vitruvius »

Vitruvius wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 11:04 pmMaybe I am delusional. I don't believe so, but let's consider the possibility. How so? Is there not a big ball of energy beneath our feet?
uwot wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 5:15 amI think you are a bit optimistic rather than delusional. It hasn't gone unnoticed that there is a lot of hot rock beneath our feet.
I'm not optimistic. I think COP 26 will deliver a basket of half assed, hard to deliver promises based on limits to growth, and the future will be a tightening noose of environmental regulation that will strangle business to death while not reducing carbon emissions sufficiently to make a difference to the progress of climate change. Worst of both worlds - ending in extinction! I might be accused of grasping at straws, but optimism - I hardly knew ye!
uwot wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 5:15 am The problem is "Across most of the planet the hot material is simply too deep down to be economically within reach." https://theconversation.com/magma-power ... ergy-67725
I suggest developing magma energy as a global good, specifically to address climate change - and so commercial considerations are secondary to the true potential of the technology.
uwot wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 5:15 amEven if you ignore the economics, you still need the right sort of rock. If it is impervious, pumping water down "will simply cool the area immediately around the borehole, making it pointless in geothermal terms."
I have suggested containing the liquid evaporate within pipes, and so this isn't relevant either, I'm sorry to say. I've read quite a lot about current methods, and pumping water into a hole in the ground causes geological instabilities - but furthermore, introduces limits - not least the replacement rate. This is the amount of energy you can extract from a body of underground water, before it cools and becomes useless. My sketchbook design avoids a lot of these problems - even if it is more of an engineering challenge.
uwot wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 5:15 amHow much of a contribution magma can make towards our energy needs isn't clear, but some researchers share your enthusiasm https://www.insidescience.org/news/quest-magma
I'd read the conversation piece before. I haven't read this one. It's more detailed than the other - I'll have to study it. Having a glance, this caught my eye:

"At that time in the 1980s, magma energy proponents envisioned sinking some kind of pipe into the magma and sending water through it to be transformed into super-heated steam. These days, attention has moved away from such direct heat exchange systems, although they remain a possibility for the future."

I'm not the first person to think of it. There were people arguing for the same approach I am - over 40 years ago, and you say:
uwot wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 5:15 amI think you are a bit optimistic rather than delusional. It hasn't gone unnoticed that there is a lot of hot rock beneath our feet.
I'm really not optimistic.
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