Fracking

For the past 43 years, to my knowledge, they've been saying fusion is twenty years away. Just an observation.

There carbon I agree with you. The answer, at least for the time being is fission not fusion.

This was in the Daily telegraph today

www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/10233955/The-town-where-fracking-is-already-happening.html

Yet another resurrected thread... very apt at the moment, though. And another "for it or against it" situation which will run and run, I suspect.

FlicketyB I've probably said this in the past but they should be using Thorium if doing fission. Thorium is much safer and more abundant and safer to mine. The reason they use uranium is because they can make plutonium in the process. China and India are all researching thorium but we don't seem to have even noticed. When they have it perfected are we then going to purchase the technology? ha ha Also Thorium does not need to be near water i.e. the sea which is going to RISE.
How strange thing is that people seem to be happy to accept the dangers (many) of nuclear, and also fracking (so long as not in their back yard so to speak). Yet make such a silly fuss about wind turbines?
Back from hols (they make wooden spoons in Wales)

As far as I am concerned if they want to frack the land close to my house I have no concerns whatsoever. Ditto building a nuclear electricity generation station. I have lived close to nuclear sites of various kinds for nearly 60 years without once worrying about it.

As James Lovelock himself has pointed out nuclear power stations are one of the safest ways of generating power compared with using hydrocarbons and hydropower.

My objection to wind turbines is that they are undependable and do not generate when we most need the power. There are roughly 4,500 turbines in Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales), on land and at sea. That is potentially the capacity to generate about 8,000Mw of power. One day in February this year, when there was a high pressure area over the UK and temperatures were around O degrees C, between them these 4,500 wind turbines were capable of producing only 29Mw of electricity because high pressure weather systems, and very low temperatures are generally accompanied by calm windless conditions.

Locally a windpower company has built a diesel powered electricity generator right next to a more efficient and cleaner gas-fired power station to generate the power it has committed itself to supply to the national grid when its windmills are not turning. It is not the only wind power company to have such facilities but diesel generators are being installed nationally to deal with the problems arising from the fluctuating supply caused by the use of wind power.
UK backs up its windfarms with diesel generators

Chuckle: "carconogenic crystalline silica"; that's SAND to sane people

Apparently we are using up sand at a phenomenal rate...........undermining beaches etc.

Most sand comes from gravel pits or offshore, by a mile or two. I know it can affect the habitats of some sea creatures but I had not heard of it undermining beaches before.

Demand for sand and other aggregates has fallen over the last few years because demand is closely associated with the construction industry, which has been in recession during the recession

Funnily enough as I write this I can see the Wickes lorry that delivered a sack containing a cubic metre of pea shingle to us disappearing down the road. It probably comes from a local gravel pit. Together with the mind boggling quantities of gravel that I and my immediate neighbours have had delivered and spread over our common access road. I feel confident that when all other sources of gravel are exhausted there will be several years supply available from that access road.

We desparately need the gas for power stations yet to be built for our electricity supply which we are in grave danger of losing. Without electricity no water would come into your home or be taken away after use for the pumps that serve you are powered by electricty. Without electricity you name it, it would cease to work. If wind and water power were so wonderful why did our forefathers give up windmills and water wheels; because they were unreliable. They went to steam, but we have progressed beyond even that. We need oil and gas until we can master nuclear fusion to save us going back beyond the dark ages.

Jack I am absolutely with you, what I find so frustrating is that those who most deplore fracking and the use of hydrocarbons, to supply power in the short and medium term 2015 - 2030 never tell us in any detail how else that power could be supplied, all we get is pious generalisations like; 'We must use renewables'

Frack by all means, bring on the nuclear power stations, they were needed yesterday. The cost for the delays will be enormous. A vociferous few are costing us billions. Being more than vociferous more obstreperous they grab attention, seem to be representative of more than they are, and frighten the government who are mainly interested in votes.
Wind power is a complete waste of money, water power is very limited in its application, we are frightened of ,(were we capable of doing so,) opening up the pits again. To be honest little else remains. I have not bothered to look at those scaremongering sites, many are biased and based on conjecture and few facts.
Let me give you a fact,one that I can personally vouch for, I heard it myself. Off the seafront at Llandudno a "farm" of wind turbines has sprung up, and like in other places has done nothing for the view.And has probably produced an insignificant amount of electricity compared to the cost of the installation.
A visitor to this seaside resort, apparently a longstanding visitor was remarking , within earshot," Those look ugly, they spoil the place, and the wind they blow in makes it a lot colder on the front than it used to be" How can anyone possibly refute this evidence, straight from the horses mouth?

deserving

I bet, then when cracking finally gets the go ahead, middle England and other middle class communities will be the last to have it taking place near them!

(And please, I am not getting at any GNs who happen to live in such places - I did myself until recently.)

And - thank you to those who have researched all this for teaching me about it!

Deserving thanks for a great laugh:
"the wind they blow in makes it a lot colder on the front than it used to be How can anyone possibly refute this evidence, straight from the horses mouth?"

It they make more wind than they use to create power, they must be connected up back to front. How to refute such evidence is difficult indeed, in fact impossible!

Indeed elegran - such high quality evidence is indisputable.
I have heard this misconception once before and laughed then too. Of course they remove a little energy from the wind not create it.
As a "local" now I think the wind farms along the N Wales coast are beautiful.
The sad thing is that there is so much energy squandered and that successive governments have no cojones when it comes to legislating.

Government will not reach decisions on energy because they know that whatever decisions they reach will cause ructions in a sizeable proportion of the public, from those who object to wind farms/nuclear reactors/or any power generation scheme anywhere near them, to the natural environment groups worried about newts or seabirds, and those who object to the power source of any generating plant because either it is renewable - or not renewable.

I understand the politician's dilemma, but they are elected to make the hard decisions. Sadly, as JessM so elegantly puts it, the current lot and there predecessors, lack cojones

Fracking protestors and their oil-derived possessions

It would be interesting to watch the current bunch get tied in knots over planning if it was not so tragic. They like the word "localism" a lot. When trying to become elected they said they were going to make planning decisions more local and democratic. This was in theory a charter for people who live in rural areas to block any building or development of any kind. Trouble is ministers also want to be in charge and make decisions about big things. And they are signed up to increase the % of renewables. So you throw out the idea of a Severn barrage, you bow to the locals who don't want windfarms on their "natural" landscapes and seascapes and the minute you get into power you cut the subsidies for smaller scale renewables (photovoltaics mainly), just when the industry is getting off the ground.
I bet there have been lots of rows between DECC and DCLG. Meanwhile, as you say FlicketyB there are no popular decisions on long term energy.

But they have got to be made. We are already facing the possibility of power cuts. It will start first with industries with interruptible power contracts, causing industry shutdowns and output shortfalls, then we too will be receiving power blackouts. Since most gas appliances use electricity in their controls we will all be left in the dark and in the cold.

I agree flicketyB. As far as renewable component goes I would like to see more investment in wave and tide power. I would have bitten the bullet, much as I love birds, and gone for the Severn barrage. Wind unreliable, sunshine unreliable, biofuels debatable but the tides are completely reliable. In my new abode they are very obvious, hammering up and down the Strait so fast at times, that people were out doing white water canoeing.

Re Sand. Could not find the article I mentioned - so I googled it. Sand shortage in India and South Florida. Of course there is sand all over the place but it needs to be where you can get at it (just like FOOD). Local shortages are just another symptom of resource depletion generally. (due to overpopulation by humans)

JessM totally agree with you, especially over the Severn barrage.

CC on sand, in the UK hardcore from demolished buildings, ground and graded is being used more and more in the construction industry to replace not just sand but gravel and other geological materials, which are used, probably more extensively, than sand. This re-use of raw materials will undoubtedly spread to other countries.

My local coal-fired power station has just closed down and after recycling as much of the equipment and other materials like iron and steel as possible the remaining buildings are to be demolished, ground and graded and left on site for use in the construction of the industrial park that will now be built on the site. This will reduce carbon emissions because transport will not be needed to move it off site.