ok, so i said that to make a point: we should not abandon wind power as a viable source of energy
simply because of the related bird deaths. if we were to abandon everything that results in bird deaths we would have stopped:

1) building houses (lots more birds fly into all the windows of houses every year)
2) buying oil (the exxon valdez spill resulted in almost 500,000 bird deaths, including 10% of the

bald eagle population)
3) building solar power plants (yes, birds run into these too)
4) building power lines
5) CATS!!!!

every technology is not perfect. anyone can argue against some sort of alternative energy bringing
up its short-comings. (e.g. the process of making solar power cells is anything BUT green. )

nutsmackr, in response to your comments:

Quote :

"green means power that has the least impact on the environment and is renewable"

this implies that only ONE technology is green, which one is it?

Quote :

"I'm talking about the geothermal units people have in their houses. that does not require you to be near a hotspot."

you can heat and cool a home with those, but you can't power a home with those. hell, even the manufacturers of these systems don't claim them to be green, but rather "renewable" because they are usually paired with fossil fuel power systems.

[Edited on April 8, 2007 at 8:34 PM. Reason : .]

[Edited on April 8, 2007 at 8:34 PM. Reason : .]

4/8/2007 8:33:40 PM

Quote :

"The general consensus on the "greenness" of ethanol is that its CO2 balance is about 20% better than that of gasoline - nothing too dramatic, but still a bit better."

Would this 20% include manufacturing CO2 emissions? I know that "consensus" means I can't question it, but then again I'm a heretic so there it is.

Also, my point before about the ethanol and the cruelty to the Mexican people is not to suggest it is a permanent problem. Of course if the government gets rid of the various trade restrictions the market will probably correct itself. But then again since it was the government that made the problem of artificially creating this demand for ethanol maybe they should have fixed the trade issues before messing up the price of tortillas in Mexico. And if ethanol will be so easy to produce in a few years then lets just wait a few years then use it, I don't have anything against "green power" in particular. I'd just like to see the technologies prove themselves without a government handout/mandate.

And lets build some nukes already and stop wasting the coal. That is all.

4/9/2007 2:48:05 AM

Quote :

"I'd just like to see the technologies prove themselves without a government handout/mandate."

Ha, we should have just let the airlines fend for themselves after 9/11 too, and also ditch all the handouts to the oil companies.

4/9/2007 2:51:40 AM

^yes.

4/9/2007 4:21:58 PM

Quote :

"I'd just like to see the technologies prove themselves without a government handout/mandate."

let's go back to the internet being in only select locations with people using 14 baud modems.

4/9/2007 6:53:12 PM

Quote :

"I'd just like to see the technologies prove themselves without a government handout/mandate. And lets build some nukes already and stop wasting the coal. That is all."

you think nuclear power plants don't have government handouts or mandates?

4/9/2007 7:32:27 PM

They have a shit-ton of regulations, thats for sure.

If not for the high cost of pushing them through regulations and insuring them, several private contractors would be building them right now.

4/9/2007 7:40:47 PM

if the private contractors could build them, run them responsibly and be able to pay for the decommission, and PROPER disposal of all waste, then i might jump on board with them being able to build them without all the regulations. but really, without regulations, there is no way in hell they would do that. lets push technologies that are not going to have high external costs (in the form of pollution) in the future.

4/9/2007 7:48:36 PM

Yucca Mountain ftw!

j/k, the biggest costs are the start-up and insurance required to build a nuclear plant. It takes years and years of legal wrangling with environmental groups before the plants are ever approved. And the insurance is something that absolutely must be subsidized by the government, since this is a prohibitive cost right now.

But honestly, nuclear power can be made safely without polluting the environment. These are not current problems. They are problems of the past. In fact, most modern environmentalists are advocates of nuclear power as a way of weaning ourselves off of fossil fuels. Just look at all the nuclear power plants being built in Europe.

[Edited on April 9, 2007 at 7:55 PM. Reason : 2]

4/9/2007 7:54:26 PM

bttt

4/28/2007 6:06:07 PM

i'm still wondering who exactly is against green power

4/28/2007 6:14:42 PM

Ethanol is foolish and will never work because it takes half a gallon of oil to produce a gallon of it. oil still ftw

^and anybody who says "im for it if its cheaper than dirty energy" is against green energy. the whole point is spending more money making sacrifices to be green.

also i think the person was talking about how the govt buys corn srupluses and ends up with surpluses and burns several tons of grain and corn each year just to get rid of it. so corn isnt the problem theres plenty of corn its just that ethanol is a shitty idea.

5/5/2007 3:17:55 AM

Quote :

"anybody who says "im for it if its cheaper than dirty energy" is against green energy. the whole point is spending more money making sacrifices to be green."

Whether you like it or not, the majority of people don't want to willingly pay MORE for their energy. It is important to clean up our power sources and reduce our carbon emissions, but it's never going to catch on if it's more expensive than the current solution. Even though environmental awareness is growing, you fail to recognize that human beings love to gain as much as they can while spending as little as they can. If there was a completely clean source of energy that could meet the entire world's needs but it would result in everybody's electric bills going up 5x their usual amount, people would say "fuck it" and continue to use the energy sources that they're using now.

5/5/2007 11:29:31 AM

Quote :

"recognize that human beingsAMERICANS love to gain as much as they can while spending as little as they can."

This concept worked in northern europe where they also have free healthcare, great free education, social security for everyone and the lowest crime rates in the world. Their society is just better all together. They did this with less wealth/resources than the united states. Everyone knows Americans are the most selfish wasteful people in the world. We're just not progressive at all.

5/5/2007 1:49:36 PM

Then I guess you better move to Europe, seeing as things are so much better over there.

5/5/2007 2:06:46 PM

Well I too, am a selfish wasteful backwards american.

To put it more into perspective

They use wind and nuclear power and have some of the highest energy prices- we use coal and pay little

they go to the store and look for the product with the green check on its label which encourages companies to get greener.- we go to walmart and look for the smiley face deal of the dey which encourages companies to use cheapest methods possible

they drive around in smart cars that get optimum fuel efficiency or hybrids.- we drve around in suvs or mustangs chargers that waste gas for power "arrrrrr shes got a hemy"

they recycle old cars and computers and reuse as much material as possible- we throw away everything (fast too can't have a product thats like sooo last year) or ship it to junkyards/other countries

We look pretty stupid.

5/5/2007 2:51:51 PM

Fair enough.

I'm with you on the SUV and trucks thing. Unless you need to haul a lot of cargo/passengers, why would you want to buy one of those things? It just seems to me that they'd be more expensive to keep and maintain if only because of how much it costs to fuel them. Compare that to something like my Sentra. It's probably not near as fuel efficient as the new hybrids, but I can get ~350 miles on a single tank in the summer and ~300 in the winter. I don't need to be able to accelerate from 0 to 60 in under 5 seconds, I just need to be able to get from point A to point B without any major headaches.

As for computers, I like to update my hardware every 4-5 years or so, but I don't have to have the absolute latest shit as soon as it comes out. I like being able to keep up with technology, but only to the extent that it allows my computer to handle my daily requirements.

5/5/2007 4:35:01 PM

Quote :

"and anybody who says "im for it if its cheaper than dirty energy" is against green energy. the whole point is spending more money making sacrifices to be green."

I don't see how the "point" of green energy is to spend more and make sacrifices. Right now, you do pay a premium for these forms of energy, but the point is to eventually make them more efficient both economically and environmentally.

5/5/2007 5:42:44 PM

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/12/18/scientists-produce-bio-crude-oil-in-less-than-60-minutes/

what is this hippy bullshit?

12/20/2013 9:06:05 PM

Gizmodo already covered it: http://gizmodo.com/government-scientists-created-crude-oil-from-algae-in-m-1485731339

[Edited on December 20, 2013 at 9:46 PM. Reason : It's still not quite ready for industrial production.

12/20/2013 9:46:21 PM

Yeah, I read it yesterday on Drudge or Fox News or some such. Neat if it works, but it will be a while.

12/20/2013 9:48:44 PM

bttt

5/20/2014 11:26:32 AM

HIPPY SHIT

lets all drive our vw buses on hemp oil and get HIIIIGGGHHH while we commute.

5/20/2014 4:23:02 PM