Wind power, or the lack of it.

Nuclear is even faster, just 2 months to generate construction energy.

And 35,000 years to get rid of the radioactive waste the nuclear fission process generates. 🤔

Not using TS

volver

Yes, not sorry.

It is a very interesting topic. But unless the laws of physics have changed and I missed it, it's always going to be "no" to nuclear fission.

TS not fission

I read this morning that there's been some sort of breakthrough with nuclear fusion. It's a very small start indeed but it's a start!

There was a breakthrough in fusion when I was a student. 40 years on, and....

Whatever, I'm more of an optimist, I think eventually it will come to fruition.

Yes in California.

It's the most successful so far volver. Every little advance has got to be good.

karmalady

energy is being provided by 10% wind power right now, it is not an insignificant amount

Wind, solar (roof and ground mounted), hydro power and power storage, are all important to a green alternative power solution. Everything helps.

Yes, I agree Aveline. We've got to keep moving forward, but we shouldn't be expecting fusion to save us. It'll not be ready for decades, I think.

Right on cue, this just came up on BBC News.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-63950962

But the problem with wind is that it is immensely variable. A couple of % one day, 50%+ plus the next. It makes managing the National Grid very difficult. One NG controller described it as like riding a bucking bronco. It makes the grid unstable and could trigger shutdowns.

It also means that you need to have a lot of excess capacity that can be switched on or off like a light switch. The electricity generators do not want to build and own capacity that will be inherently loss making, so the National Grid has to pay them to own and keep operational unproductive capacity.

While I agree everything helps, many green resources are unreliable or, in some cases, dangerous. There have been explosions in battery arrays storing power, wind is unreliable, to put it mildly, solar only works in daylight hours.

volver Trumps windmills may be going like the clappers but windpower is only providing us with 6% of our power at the moment on one of the coldest days of winter. 57% is coming from gas.

It looks like Fusion could be here sooner than we think following the breakthrough in California. Some British firms reckon we are leaders in the field and could have it ready in 10 years. We shall see.

30 years minimum.

You heard it here first.

Surely they'll be able to put their big brains on to it and speed it up. It's urgently required.

Doesn't matter how big your brain is if you can't get funding for your research.

So far after 50+ years, this new breakthough has produced enough power to boil a couple of kettles. It now has to be developed so that it can produce enough power to meet all the power needs of a big city. Another 50+ years?

www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/dec/12/breakthrough-in-nuclear-fusion-could-mean-near-limitless-energy

The reports have been rather economical with the facts, they seem to have measured an energy gain from the reaction BUT the energy needed to contain it is not a accounted for.
Obviously containing energy that reached several million degrees is critical, it’s the energy that the sun produces that is contained by intense gravity, reproducing that on earth is not going to be quick.

There are better ways of storing power than chemical batteries.

Brahumbug What are they?

Pumped water storage, large heavy weights. Old mine shafts would be ideal for huge weights, of the order of hundreds or thousands of tonnes, moving up and down.

Not sure where your windfree home is Monica but here on the east coast we have strong winds 90% of the time
Also not sure where your 3% comes from this is what I read

Wind energy generation accounted for 24% of total electricity generation (including renewables and non-renewables) in 2020; with offshore wind accounting for 13% and onshore wind accounting for 11%.

This morning the UK is using 64% non Fossil fuel 44% of that is wind, no solar yet but that may increase the green energy mix

We fitted solar with a battery in January so far it has reduced our electricity by 3/4 - we are only taking 3KWh per day from the grid, far better than expected

There is no silver bullet solution to the building global energy crisis. Yes, we need to phase out the use of fossil fuels, otherwise global warming will rapidly make vast tracts of our planet virtually uninhabitable. We also need to phase out Nuclear Fission, an energy source which produces a waste product which is not only fatal to all life forms, but which will last for millennia. Its on-going "safe" storage is a poisonous legacy which generations of our descendants have been condemned to live, or perhaps even die with. Safety issues? Fukushima, Chernobyl... where next? So we need to focus on a combination of alternative power sources.. solar, wind, tidal.. yes, all of these have their own issues, but any negative impact on Mother earth will be a fraction of what we routinely produce now. Bottom line for me.. I fear that we may have already left this too late. I have not been impressed by the rhetoric from the various UN Climate Conferences, or even from the "worthy" aims of the Paris agreement. Plenty of talking the talk, but very little walking the walk..

www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-65240094

There is hope.

VioletSky

Every house that has suitable roofs pointed in the right direction should have solar panels

Yes, definitely.
And local Planning Committees should encourage new houses to have a decent-sized south-facing roof at an appropriate angle, with panels.