Tom B

5 Must Read Articles in Oil and Alternative Energy

"I've heard solar fairy tales for 30 years. "We'll be all solar by 1990.""

Oil wasn't $100/barrel in 1990.

"There are so many cellulosic ethanol players out there now promising that $1 production costs are *already* achievable with their technology. Then why do we need subsidies?"

Corn for Ethanol is evil-- in terms of carbon footprint AND waste of arable land. Cellulosic ethanol may be less so, but, from a green POV, I think we need to shift over to electicity-- and that may mean nukes, but not ONLY nukes. Offshore wind looks good. Cape wind has been held back more by NIMBY's than technology. I doubt gleaming white turbines 5 miles offshore is going to "wreck my view".

5 Must Read Articles in Oil and Alternative Energy

Science Friday reported recently on the idea of non-photovoltaic production of electricity using the sun. Photovoltaics are expensive-ish to make and have 20% conversion as pretty much the upper limit. The idea they discussed was concentrating sunlight with mirrors to superheat a fluid and using that fluid to make steam, turning traditional steam turbine generators. Sounds plausible to me-- all just a big engineering problem instead of a big science AND engineering problem.


www.sciencefriday.com/...