All of humanity could shift to solar, wind energy in less than 25 years, policy study group claims

Source: Raw Story
By Stephen C. Webster

Humankind has the technology, resources and capabilities to adapt to and help avert serious climate change and the crunch of a dwindling energy economy, if only the political will can be mustered -- and it's not just idealistic progressives who are saying so anymore.

In a recent report, the British non-profit Institute for Policy Research & Development (IPRD) claimed that, with targeted investments by world governments, solar power could become humanity's main source of portable energy in 25 years or less.

The catch: "Spending priorities" must change -- something that seems remarkably difficult even in the U.S., ostensibly one of the world's most advanced democracies.

Read More at: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/31/all-of-humanity-could-shift-to-solar-wind-energy-in-less-than-25-years-policy-study-group-claims/

Not enough money to be made by the already wealthy. Plus, it's just...just trust me, it'll never happen.

We could put solar panels on roofs, cover parking lots with them and add wind turbines to power our electric cars.

Add in some wave technology, reroute the power grid and fossil fuel is pretty much in a minor supporting role.

They have to figure out how to tax the sun and the wind. They have taxed water. And made boockoo bucks off water. Just as soon as they figure out a way to make money from sun and wind it will be done.

Taxes don't bother me, they are in general used to purchase things that are of benefit to society (at least you hope so).

Corporate profits...... Well, that's another area entirely.

I tend to view both taxes and profits the same.
Done the right way, both can be very good for US socialists.....
Taxes is what builds strong roads. (sic)

As soon as they figure out how to tax/profit the sun and wind.....we'll be doing it.
You've heard the idea of taxing mileage, right?

I heard of the mileage thing and while opposed to it, I understand that roads require money to build and maintain. There will have to be some means to support them if the gasoline tax goes away.

Until we do, I don't believe they will make the hard, aka; smart choices.

On this and many other issues, Congress and the WH go against the will of the people - it won't change until corporate whores on both sides of the aisle are voted out.

Until we the put the fear of the people in them, they won't have the necessary "courage" to overcome their greed and lust for power.

Sorry, we can't. We need energy storage solutions which we don't have.

Or i-pads.

Or cochlear implants.

"It doesn't exist now and therefore it never will" just doesn't fly anymore.

Building wooden fire escapes seemed like a good idea at the time, but they became obsolete, and oil-powered internal-combustion engines are destined to become obsolete, in spite of the grim grip of the fossil-fuel lovers.

What, we haven't invented batteries yet?

You do know that many if not most solar energy systems use battery storage, right? My solar garden lights soak up solar energy during the day and then glow at night. Gee, I wonder how they do that? I mean, the sun isn't shining at night by definition! So it's not possible!

Do you really think that people who have spent their professional lives analyzing energy sources, have not considered that sometimes the wind doesn't blow, or the sun doesn't shine? You think it's not part of their calculations? Really?

"No We Can't!" A very catchy slogan indeed, maybe it'll catch on.

We'll always have some large producers online for the rainy, windless days. Duh!

Problem is these large plants today are only 35% efficient. And they've had no reason to increase efficiency, until now. Until now, they never had competition.

I'm not sure we can store enough energy to match the output of an existing power plant, however.

Of course, when it comes to solar, point-of-use generation is much better anyway, and would work a lot better than finding land to build enormous solar arrays.

...and yes, point-of-use is probably the very best way to implement solar energy. Still, new solar arrays are being built as we speak -- one of them is about 50 miles outside of Las Vegas. So I'm not buying the "no we can't" position of the poster I replied to, not at all. I think we can, and I think we must -- implement solar solutions, wind solutions, geothermal solutions, wave solutions, etc. And wherever possible we should implement small scale, individual home / office building solutions, as well as community solutions, as well as wider solutions. I strongly favor more decentralized production of energy, obviously you lose less energy in transportation that way. But I can see that having larger production facilities and a grid may allow us to level demand and production of energy, and provide redundancy, so I'm not against centralized production so much as I'm for increasing the decentralized sources.

Sunshine nearly every day, so winter is not a problem. What concerns me is the rest of us not in the Southwest - I suppose, in theory, someone could build a solar plant big enough in the Nevada desert to supply power to the entire country, but it would be so big I would bet you could spot it from space.

Plus, there are small environmental concerns with large arrays like that, specifically for endangered animal habitats in the desert. That's not an excuse to put the kibosh on everything, but it's something to consider.

I agree that we can do it, it's a question of political will (nonexistent), infrastructure and costs. That's what I want to see more discussion of, not rosy predictions of the world using solar power exclusively in 20 years. I want the discussion to be how we do it.

Potentials are measured in the tens of terawatts. I think that's enough.

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010AGUFM.A43H..08A

When you're talking about terawatts, line-loss becomes a non-issue. You just pump more electricity onshore. For storage, one of the best methods is pumped-storage hydroelectricity. Now, I'm no engineer, but it seems to me this stored potential could also be 'tapped' from any water-tower across the country. No, it's not "baseload", but it is stored electrical potential.

left from mountaintop-removal. I don't know if the coal companies fill them in (my guess is they don't.) The geology can't be replaced or put back, so why not make use of these new depressions as pumped-hydro reservoirs?

I do hope to see a day when coal is dead and this heinous mining practice is no more, but using them as reservoirs could at least put one by-product of the mining to good use.

:sarcasm:

I was reading one recently, as an example. It proposed that we build simple earthen dams and reservoirs near the coastal areas of the country. Solar and wind power would be used to pump seawater into the reservoirs while that power is available. The reservoirs contain more traditional hydropower generators, which would convert the flow of the water back into electricity as it ran back toward the ocean. It's not as efficient as direct PV or wind, but the idea has a serious advantage in that it allows power generation to continue even if wind and solar conditions aren't ideal for generation weeks or months at a time. The only limitation is in the size of the reservoir.

There are other solutions as well, but this is a simple example of a change that would have limited environmental impact, while eliminating fossil fuels.

For most of our energy needs.

Jimmy Carter delivered this televised speech on April 18, 1977: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/primary-resources/carter-energy/

But the Repubs could not stand to have even a token of alternative energy in their plans - Ronald Reagan removed the White House solar panels as soon as he got in office and dismantled all of Carter's programs to develop energy independence.

but could have been "oil-based fuel free". The one thing that most people either forget or just don't know in the first place, is that half of the oil we use goes to making plastics and chemicals. It's kind of mind-blowing just how often I find people that don't know where plastic comes from ;)

Only about 7-18% of crude oil (it varies depending on the reference) ends up in plastics and other products (you'd be surprised where, distilled crude contains a lot of chemicals that can be used in a lot of places).

http://www.ei.lehigh.edu/learners/energy/fossils4.html

That doesn't happen very often around here, does it? ;)

I am familiar with plenty of the products that come from crude, given where I live and what industry I'm in. And even here, in Houston, I still find people that have no clue where plastics come from...

all sorts of things besides plastics. I only mention the latter because it's so ubiquitous in society and so few understand its origins.

All sorts of very nasty and toxic chemicals come from crude, too. I've lived here all my life and had to stop watching the local news because they never could be bothered to understand what is truly dangerous and what is not worth reporting as a hazard (such as a liquid sulfur spill on a railroad.)

Manufacturing chemicals results in some nasty stuff, there's just not much you can do other than try to minimize it. Of course, if we only need about 10% of what we use now, that's much nicer.

Farmer Jimmy was right in so many ways.

As it stands, we are screwed, the future is a mess, mark my word. If we could go back 20 years or 30 years and go a different way with energy the future would be a lot better now.

I wanna add tidal energy to this discussion! it's goin places :headbang:

project instead of life as usual. But that won't happen either.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand that's the problem.

I wish this could happen, but I have to little faith in politicians, especially in the U.S., to think that it ever will.

...it's impossible.

I've been told by the TV box that we must use coal, oil, and nukular.

And I do what I am told...

Then you work up from there. How many solar panels does it take to recharge your cell phone or light a few LED's so you don't fall down going to the bathroom at night?

Then get rid of your car. Don't sell it. Smash it up with a sledge hammer and sell it for scrap. There you go. You don't have to buy gasoline anymore.

Next step, plant a garden...

If nobody buys stuff like electricity or gasoline, they'll stop making it.

Easy, right???