I was about to type this out in another thread but I feel like it could deserve it's own and I'm interested in the discussion it might spur.
I'm a BSME that's worked in HVAC for 17 years, which doesn't make me a climatologist or a geologist or any of those other things that might qualify someone as some sort of global warming expert. But what it has done is it's shaped my brain in such a way that every system I see is viewed from a standpoint of energy, how it moves, how it's stored, how it's converted. I have no idea if my perspective is actually unique but when I see threads discussing the topic I never really see it from this angle.
The energy sources we know of basically break down into two types:
1. "new" energy that is moving around us, that we capture and store in order to use
2. "old" energy that is already here, that we unlock in order to use
The energy sources commonly described as "alternative" or "green" are all in the first type. Solar energy captures energy in the form of light from the sun, converts it to electrical energy. Wind converts into electrical from kinetic energy from the wind, which is driven by the Earths' weather patterns, which are powered by....the sun. Hydro power is likewise sourced from kinetic energy from water falling down, which was lifted up (given potential energy) through evaporation and moved by weather patterns....powered by the sun. Common theme here, right? Every one of them eventually traces back to the sun, and the maximum rate at which it becomes available is the rate at which it arrives here, from the sun. After that the maximum availability is reduced at every step by our own resources. How much land is suitable and can be dedicated to solar arrays? Wind turbines? Hydro generators? How much do we lose due to inefficiencies in conversion?
Fossil fuels and nuclear are #2. With fossil fuels we're getting stuff out of the ground that has been dead for a long time, was once alive and was either some sort of plant or was a microorganism or a fungus or an animal that ate plants. Plants that got their energy from....the sun. So fossil fuels are similar to other forms in that if you go back far enough, it's just another form of solar but the critical difference is that we're not limited by the rate of supply and we don't have to store it. We can take as much out as we can get out of the ground, as fast as we can do it, and we've been getting better at doing that for over a century. Nuclear energy, likewise is already here, locked up in the ground in the very atoms that make up our planet and it's so highly concentrated that it takes very little to get a lot.
Fossil fuels are nothing but a big, solar charged battery that's been charging for a billion and a half years and we can pull energy out of that battery as quickly as we can pump oil or gas or dig coal out of the ground. That gives it a huge advantage in efficiency because what comes out was already here, we didn't have to really "generate" or capture it in the same sense that we do other forms.
I'm a BSME that's worked in HVAC for 17 years, which doesn't make me a climatologist or a geologist or any of those other things that might qualify someone as some sort of global warming expert. But what it has done is it's shaped my brain in such a way that every system I see is viewed from a standpoint of energy, how it moves, how it's stored, how it's converted. I have no idea if my perspective is actually unique but when I see threads discussing the topic I never really see it from this angle.
The energy sources we know of basically break down into two types:
1. "new" energy that is moving around us, that we capture and store in order to use
2. "old" energy that is already here, that we unlock in order to use
The energy sources commonly described as "alternative" or "green" are all in the first type. Solar energy captures energy in the form of light from the sun, converts it to electrical energy. Wind converts into electrical from kinetic energy from the wind, which is driven by the Earths' weather patterns, which are powered by....the sun. Hydro power is likewise sourced from kinetic energy from water falling down, which was lifted up (given potential energy) through evaporation and moved by weather patterns....powered by the sun. Common theme here, right? Every one of them eventually traces back to the sun, and the maximum rate at which it becomes available is the rate at which it arrives here, from the sun. After that the maximum availability is reduced at every step by our own resources. How much land is suitable and can be dedicated to solar arrays? Wind turbines? Hydro generators? How much do we lose due to inefficiencies in conversion?
Fossil fuels and nuclear are #2. With fossil fuels we're getting stuff out of the ground that has been dead for a long time, was once alive and was either some sort of plant or was a microorganism or a fungus or an animal that ate plants. Plants that got their energy from....the sun. So fossil fuels are similar to other forms in that if you go back far enough, it's just another form of solar but the critical difference is that we're not limited by the rate of supply and we don't have to store it. We can take as much out as we can get out of the ground, as fast as we can do it, and we've been getting better at doing that for over a century. Nuclear energy, likewise is already here, locked up in the ground in the very atoms that make up our planet and it's so highly concentrated that it takes very little to get a lot.
Fossil fuels are nothing but a big, solar charged battery that's been charging for a billion and a half years and we can pull energy out of that battery as quickly as we can pump oil or gas or dig coal out of the ground. That gives it a huge advantage in efficiency because what comes out was already here, we didn't have to really "generate" or capture it in the same sense that we do other forms.