Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumWhat Is the Most Efficient Source of Electricity?
http://blogs.wsj.com/numbers/what-is-the-most-efficient-source-of-electricity-1754/#?mod=wsj_valettop_emailEnergy Points, a company that does energy analysis for business, factors in the these myriad values in terms of what percentage of the energy inputfossil fuel energy, plus energy for production and energy for environmental mitigationwill become usable electricity.
The chart above shows that fossil fuels yield, on a national average, only a portion of their original energy when converted into electricity. Thats because they are fossil fuels that require other fossil fuels to make the conversion into electricity; their emissions, such as carbon dioxide, also require a lot of energy to be mitigated. Renewables, however, have energy sources that arent fossil fuel and their only other energy inputs are production and mitigating the waste from that production. That actually results in more energy produced than fossil fuels put in. Wind, the most efficient fuel for electricity, creates 1164% of its original energy inputs when converted into electricity; on the other end of the efficiency spectrum, coal retains just 29% of its original energy.
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Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)Are they saying that an average windmill will generate 11.6 times the energy over its lifetime than that it took to manufacture and place it?
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)But then when you think about it, it is obvious. For renewables there is an initial NRE, after that a small amount of ongoing maintenance, the rest of the energy output is cost free. Oil is now very expensive to extract, unless you are in Saudi Arabia, and even after extraction there are huge costs to produce usable fuel.
Demeter
(85,373 posts)Travis_0004
(5,417 posts)Being on the grid means you don't need to buy and maintain batteries.
nationalize the fed
(2,169 posts)Solar combined with Hydrogen storage and batteries.
No bills, just a monthly check in the summer.
Strizki is a legend. A pioneer.
TL;DV version- (10m)
Strizki stores hydrogen in propane tanks
Scientific American: Inside the Solar Hydrogen House- No More Power Bills -Ever
EAST AMWELL, N.J.Mike Strizki has not paid an electric, oil or gas billnor has he spent a nickel to fill up his Mercury Sablein nearly two years. Instead, the 51-year-old civil engineer makes all the fuel he needs using a system he built in the capacious garage of his home, which employs photovoltaic (PV) panels to turn sunlight into electricity that is harnessed in turn to extract hydrogen from tap water...
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/hydrogen-house/
Future fuel is here now
bananas
(27,509 posts)In the comments tab where a number of anti-science anti-renewable pro-nuclear pro-stupid comments,
then some sanity:
http://blogs.wsj.com/numbers/what-is-the-most-efficient-source-of-electricity-1754/tab/comments/
Ashamed of my Fellow GOPers wrote:
This article presents a false picture of energy generation cost, and the author has no qualifications related to energy. Translation: this article does not conform to Republican values; therefore, it is not true.
This article is based on the research conducted by Energy Points, a privately held for-profit organization honored as one of the top five of the top 10 in the rankings of The WSJs Next Big Thing in Clean Tech. The article summarized and, one might say, the article dumbed down the results of the research for secondary publication for a non-data audience.
Apparently, it didnt dumb down the research enough or the Republican audience is just too dang dogmatic to accept evidence that doesnt agree with their preconceived notions.