Solar energy

Using induction? Wouldn't be too hard, but I think the huge magnetic fields required for that would wreak havoc some how.

We could use microwave transmissions, but that too has problems with things crossing the beams.

@Aurora, One we already have huge cables crossing the atlantic connecting the North American and European continents. Phone lines and such.

2 with resistance, he meant electrical resistance, there would be a huge voltage drop on the other side of the planet from the single power plant.

 

Eh? We have phone lines crossing the atlantic? I thought traffic between continents was per sattelite.-_-'

 

omg really? No the cable man was paid to do his job, like loong time ago.

 

Soon enough all we'll have to rely on is solar and weather and water power. Fossil and nuclear fuels won't last. The climate effects of exhausting all the fossil fuels would be dangerous too. Do we want humanity to still be here in one million years?

In our ancient past, there wasn't any oxygen. There was lots of carbon dioxide. Much of it dissolved in our oceans. The reason we have oxygen now is because the carbon was removed and stored in living biomass, and then fossilized underground. That is what fossil fuels are (along with carbonate rocks, like limestone).

To pull that carbon out of the earth and pump it back into the air is heading back towards the primordial earth.

It is crucial that we lose our dependency on carbon based energy.

Hydrogen has to be made -- so it isn't an energy source, merely a method of storing energy.

 

That's true, but you only need electricity and water to make it. If that power is generated by solar and wind energy, then hydrogen is a limitless fuel supply. Also, it's much more effective then cars powered by electricity. And then I'm not even mentioning the chemicals required to make those batteries Seriously, driving an Hummer is better for the environment then driving a Toyota Prius. The reason those are sold more, is because all laws against polution target carbon dioxide emmisions. Duh.

 

The monetary manufacturing costs are typically a reflection of the energy cost of manufacture. Compare incandescent bulbs vs CFL. While the running cost of the latter may be lower, when you factor in the energy cost of manufacture, it isn't necessarily a greener technology.

One of the properties of the free market, is that energy cost of manufacture is strongly correlated with the monetary cost of manufacture. Mass production can reduce energy costs, which is why mass produced things are typically cheaper in the shops. Government subsidies of certain technologies does distort the reality of just how green it is. It can sometimes be counter productive.

A CFL might cost £3 in the shops, but the cost of manufacture might be £10. The government subsidizes the other £7. So ask yourself why does it cost £10 to make, when an incandescent bulb costs only £1? If it has expensive components, then why are those components expensive? What are they made from? Expensive minerals? Why are they expensive? Rare? So they are harder to dig up? Which means the digger has to burn more diesel digging up the dirt? The refinery has to burn more coke to purify the metal? Energy.

 

I wont pull out statistics our of my arse like many others do but to my knowledge there is no shortage of uranium nor thorium. Ive never heard anyone mentioning the shortage of the nuclear fuel as a con to the nuclear power plants. Suma sumarum nuclear fission fuel should last for a long time. If we utilize fusion the fuel becomes abundant.

 

From memory only, I think the known Uranium reserves can last us to about year 2100, but up to year 3000 if we convert to plutonium breeder reactors. Upper estimates place the reserves at 10x these figures, but the bulk of that fuel may be much harder to extract. Thorium is more readily attainable, but we have yet to perfect thorium based uranium breeder reactors. I expect that will be a common reality later this century. It's a long way short of 1 million years though... so it is true that it won't last if we plan to be around that long. Fusion is still a dream. We can't plan to be dependent on a dream.

 

The odds of the human race lasting anything close to a mil years?

HIlarious..

The odds of the human race lasting anything close to 100K years.

Similarly hilarious..

 

Defeatist.

 

self-fulfilling prophecies ftw

 

Liquid hydrogen typically has to be stored at 20 Kelvin or -253C. how u solve this? By wasting energy?

 

The problem with nuclear power isn't how abundant it is, but by the waste made from it.

 

Uhm, no? Thats another false issue people make up. Yes nobody wants to have waste products from nuclear fission dumped on their backyard but thats not what happens. The underground storage complexes can store decades worth of used fuel endangering no one.
Ill rather have few wholes here and there than releasing all that carbon into the atmosphere and eventually running out of it.

 

For decades? Wouldn't it last longer then that?

I'd rather something that didn't create toxic waste.

 

Hey, id like just as much as the next person to believe that humanity will exsist for a very very very long time and eventually explore the universe and colonize etc etc etc,

but I just don't see it happening, not with the current affairs are and look to be continueing, too much selfishness, ignorance, senseless violence and over population.

Not to mention the screwed up economic systems, capitalism just does not work..

 

Nope. They store it in concrete and steel vats. Eventually the material gets out and reaches to the surface. Why do you think there are so many organisations watching and protesting against the way we handle these materials? Maybe it's a bit "over the top", but I can't understand why they don't just throw it into a vulcano or something. :s

 

Radioactive stuff is vaporized in the lava and we get fallout. Plus you'd have radioactive volcanic rock running down the hills.

Better to have a deep shaft in the earth, like 5 kilometers down. We already have machinery to take deep earth core samples. We could use something like that. Load the shaft up with waste, back fill, then forget about it.

But on the other hand, the high level waste is depleted fuel, which is potentially useful. We might be better off saving it for a time we might find a use for it. It could be a mistake to dispose of it, just because we classify it as waste out of ignorance.

The sort of stuff that is waste that can be gotten rid of is the low and medium level waste -- the concrete and steel of the reactor chamber and immediate piping, the primary coolant (sodium or heavy water), the magnesium casing of the fuel rods, the graphite moderator rods, the control rods, etc.

Whether any of that stuff is salvageable or worth keeping for the future is open for debate.

 

my conclusion:
don't worry about the future, you wont be able to see it anyways

 

We could always use the waste to develope new weaponry.