Energy Scarcity? Give Me a Break
January 21st, 2007This guy built a wave generator buoy out of PVC pipe and bicycle parts:
The next time your lights go out, or you think your electricity bill is too expensive, or you hear news about greehouse gasses, just remember this video.
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Yea, well, he is powering some leds.. no big deal since each led take about 10 milliwatts of power.
Holy shit, cool!
djeff,
You might want to learn what the word ‘scalable’ means.
Yea, right, we could have 50 jumpings freaks to light about 1 typical 60W light.
This kind of technology have been used for the last century and have been proved to be inefficient at low input power (you need something to power them, like coal, wind or water). My point is that “energy scarcity” is real and this video have nothing to do with a plausible solution.
djeff,
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/research/1766936.html?page=4&c=y
Wave energy offers significant advantages over renewables such as wind, von Jouanne says. Waves are more predictable and have an energy density up to 50 times greater than wind. Unregulated AC voltage from a network of buoys could be tied to one junction box, converted to DC and stepped up to around 12,000 volts, and then sent to shore and converted back into AC at a utility substation. Von Jouanne estimates that about 500 buoys could power downtown Portland, Ore.
Any questions?
Your religious belief in energy scarcity is blinding you to the obvious truth: this energy situation we’re facing is engineered to happen.
That’s obvious.
The more interesting question is: what do they have planned for us?
Kev,
Don’t take this the wrong way but the feeling that the energy situation can be solved “if we did like this guy or did X, Y, and Z” is actually more of a religious belief than the other way around. It’s the faith based reasoning that if the evildoers just get out of the way the good guys (like the guy in the video) will come up with solutions and life will be happy again.
(This line of thinking dates back to our tribal days.)
As far as it “being obvious”, that’s only if you ignore the fundamental fact that we live on a round planet with limited resources. You don’t believe in flat earth theory, do you?
Will there be manipulation of the masses, of the market, etc? Of course, I think it obvious we both agree on that. But the energy crisis at it’s base is a real fundamental physical problem. As far as what they have in store, I suspect a bioweapon.See this for an example, they were talking about this in Australia in the 1950s:
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/03/09/1015365752044.html?oneclick=true
This video of reminds of me of the stack of back issues of “Infinite Energy Magazine” I have sitting in my closet. Here we are with a global wide civilization, a finite amount of resources, a population that doubles every 25 years and the cover picture is of some yahoo in his garage holding a tube with some fizz coming out of it with a headline proclaiming “the energy crisis is bunk . . .!
Best,
Matt
No, it’s not obvious since the wave project (as shown on popular machanics) could not be engineered for now. Can you imagine how complex it is to transmit 12Kv under water? worse… saline water. Maintenance cost? Implantation cost? Breakdown effect on the stability of the network?
There is nothing new with this, it use the same old technology as the thermal plant… Have you ever think why our ancestor didnt build buoy farms instead of coal plant?
Effeciency!
Think about it, we can generate electricity from turbine(oil, coal, nuclear or water based) with about 98% efficiency… because of it size and it speed. It is impossible to gather enough momentum in a wave to create such speed.
anyway, I do admit that it is easier to claim any conspiracy that to understand the concept behind power generation.
Matt,
I never said that we don’t have physical resource scarcity problems, or a pathological denial of the concept of enough.
So we agree: we have a problem with human nature. There is, however, no shortage of readily available energy.
FYI: Water, top soil loss, copper and wheat issues are going to impact peoples’ reality before any of the energy scarcity issues do.
Kevin
djeff,
You wrote:
“we can generate electricity from turbine(oil, coal, nuclear or water based) with about 98% efficiency”
HAHAHA!
The only thing that’s 98% efficient is the shit you’re smoking, djeff, but here’s the way it is in the real world:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_combustion_engine#Internal_Combustion_Engine_Efficiency
It is generally accepted that most internal combustion engines, even when aided with turbochargers and other efficiency aids, are about 30-35% efficient. Most internal combustion engines waste approximately 1/3 of the energy in the fuels they burn with heat and another 1/3 through the exhaust.
What other shit for brains theories do you have for us?
Note: Since I’ve decisively shown you to be a complete idiot, I won’t be responding to you again. Feel free, however, to keep posting your fantasies about your 98% efficient engines. Others might find that information entertaining.
[…] Like I said in a recent comment: “We have a problem with human nature. There is, however, no shortage of readily available energy… Water, top soil loss, copper and wheat issues are going to impact peoples’ reality before any of the energy scarcity issues do.” […]
Your cheapshots have no effect on me, if you stop taking me out of context you might learn something.
Anyway, what have you prooved in this reply? That you can’t make the difference between a turbine and a combustible engine?
The alternators (also called a turbine in engineering) in LaGrande2(Canada) have about 95% efficiency, on dry land, based on an everlasting power source (water). We could have build anything else to light our towns, but in the 90′, it was the cheapest power source possible.
Right now, the energy commission is considering wind power for their next project since there been a lot of development in low speed generator efficiency in the last 10 years. So, it is now economically profitable to build these… and it wasn’t 10 years ago.
There is a logic begind powerplant evolution and you are free to learn it.