silence7

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah, wind and solar seem to be able to go for 50+ years too. The main reason they're not doing that so far is that newer installations can kick out more electricity (and money) in the same footprint.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (3 children)

Right, but nuclear remains far more expensive than wind and solar, which is why almost no new nuclear gets built.

I'll also note that a chunk of the data is from 2007 and 2008, and the price (and greenhouse gas emissions associated with) both wind and solar have declined markedly since then.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 days ago

He hasn't promised to be true to his oath of office.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Yeah, it's roughly at a peak, with the first actual drop seeming more likely to happen next year, rather than this year.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

The point isn't to take advice; it's to push responsibility and blame onto somebody else.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

The main problem with carbon removal is that it's expensive, and removing it doesn't produce a product you can sell. So in practice, doing something like what you describe within a generation requires a system of taxation which absorbs 40% or so of total economic output, and uses it to sequester carbon. That seems, to put it mildly, politically very difficult.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago (3 children)

If we actually cut emissions to zero, we can expect to see the Impact within a lifetime to be substantially limited. It's not that far off if we actually succeed.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 days ago (2 children)

If you lived in a swing state, you probably got multiple texts and phone calls from Democrats and other left-leaning groups, and very likely somebody knocking at your door too. Shifted the outcome by something like 3 percentage points.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 days ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 days ago

The fuel becomes hot because the nuclear reaction in it is producing both light (eg: gamma rays) and fast-moving subatomic particles. These both interact with the rest of the fuel to heat it up.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (10 children)

In most places, at most times of day, a lot less.

Why? First, because a lot of electricity is generated using wind, water, solar, and nuclear. Those don't have that problem (ok, nuclear wastes a lot of heat, but really, who cares). The second reason is that power plants that burn stuff tend to be a lot more efficient than internal combustion engines; the best case is combined-cycle gas turbine power plants, which turn over 60% of the energy available into electricity, as compared with a gasoline engine which turns about 20% of the energy in the gas into motion.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Sure. Still means that a ton of Americans were trying to figure out what it meant the day after the election. Which is a day later than they needed to.

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