Climate Policy

[kandrathe]

The world is not overpopulated (especially regarding energy needs), and many people are starving and freezing already. 10% of the total population require 10 times (or more) as much space as others, remember?

First, I don't agree. It depends on what you believe to be the appropriate density of people per square mile.

Second, people choose to live in higher densities, and some people live in extremely high densities. These areas still require a huge amount of energy, food, water, and materials to be transported to them resulting in higher risks when these supply chains are severed. If you wanted to be authoritarian, you could make them disperse. 4% of the US energy consumption is used to grow food, but 15% is used to move it to peoples plates.

Consider how a city like Phoenix, Arizona exists. It has no water, poor land for sustainable agriculture (yet with irrigation and fertilizer it ranks fairly high), but tons of unused solar power. Yet, they generate 4,000 MW at Palo Verde (nuclear), 2,040 MW at Four Corners (coal), 995 MW at Cholla (coal), 2250 MW at Navajo Reservation (coal), 1060 MW at Redhawk (ng), 1000 MW at West Phoenix(ng), 680 MW at Octillo (ng), 450 MW at Sundance (ng), 395 MW at Saguaro(ng), 16MW at Douglas (diesel), 150 MW at Yucca (ng) and a plethora of solar installations with a combined output of 5 MW. That is a generating capacity just over 13000 MW, of which 4000 MW is nuclear and 5 MW is solar.

Third, I think there is a national interest (for all countries) in maintaining the current population level, or one just slightly smaller. GDP, and national defense often rely upon a ready supply of people to run the workforce and military.

Fourth, food supplies are artificially high due to the use of fossil fuels. "If the fertilizers, partial irrigation [in part provided by oil energy], and pesticides were withdrawn, corn yields, for example, would drop from 130 bushels per acre to about 30 bushels." (source)

To put things into perspective, a recent investigation suggests that wind-generated energy alone could take care of our current electricity consumption. At 20% capacity...

http://www.pnas.org/content/106/27/10933

/facepalm

I spent quite a bit of time debunking that myth on the lounge before. Now, you said wind energy. But, first let's consider the source of wind energy, solar energy. Wind is even less reliable, and really only viable in some areas. The upside is that excess solar energy over the ocean, can provide some wind energy to the land.

"Over the course of a year the average solar radiation arriving at the top of the Earth's atmosphere is roughly 1366 watts per square meter (see solar constant). The radiant power is distributed across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, although most of the power is in the visible light portion of the spectrum. The Sun's rays are attenuated as they pass though the atmosphere, thus reducing the insolation at the Earth's surface to approximately 1000 watts per square meter for a surface perpendicular to the Sun's rays at sea level on a clear day." (source) Of course, that is assuming 100% perfect conditions, this map shows the calculated averages for the planet. If you look at where I live, the yearly mean value is 140 to 160 W/m2. Most people around here use 600 KWh/month (30 days), or 20 KWh/day, or 20,000 Wh / day. Assume about 20% efficiency for modern solar panels, and then using math, you can figure how many square meters of solar panels just one house would need. Using the optimistic number of 160 * 20% giving 32W/m2. Summer days are up to 15 hours (15h x 32W/m2 = 480Wh/m2), and winter days are 8 hours (8h x 32W/m2 = 256Wh/m2). I need heat, while AC is only a luxury, so I will need to assume the worst case here. To get 20,000 Wh/day I would need (20000/256 = ~78 square meters of solar panels), so figure 8 banks that are 2 meters x 5 meters in size. ~20% efficient solar panels cost about $2/watt, or figure about $40,000 for the solar panels, then we need AC/DC converters, regulators, and a bank of batteries to provide electricity for the 16 hours of darkness in the dead of winter. So, I think I figured before another $25,000 for the equipment besides solar panels. Now we are up to about $65,000 to run a typical home around here on solar power. Then, we should consider 1) we have a pretty hazardous power plant in our house, 2) we need to maintain it when it breaks, and 3) it has a limited life span ( lets be generous and say 20 years). So, without factoring in the cost of capital, and just dividing the $65K by 20 years we are spending $3250 / year on our power, or $270 /month, or $.45 per KWh. Compare that to current energy plant rates of $.12 to $.15 per KWh. But, perhaps you were thinking of a huge solar farm occupying thousands of square miles.

So as an exercise for you, calculate the 13000MW capacity of Arizona converting it to solar. How many square meters of panels, covering how many square miles of land? How do they handle night time demand?

Ok, now for that article on wind power. The USA currently produces 4,156,745,000 MWh of electricity. The article you linked to suggested a network of 2.5 MW turbines, meaning (and being very generous with the numbers) 69,279,084 (2.5 MW running 24 hours/day) wind turbines using about 10 acres each (pad, blade clearance, roads, shack). This means just to replace current generating capacity you will cover 1,082,486 square miles just for the wind turbines, less power lines. For comparison, Kansas occupies 82,277 square miles.