In the video above, natural resource investor Adam Rozencwajg discusses the many reasons why renewable energy is a flat out loser and always will be. Rozencwajg has made a long study of energy resources and energy economics. He favors nuclear energy as the most environmentally friendly large scale power source. He also speaks widely on the need for a greater investment in the oil & gas sector in order to meet the looming energy demands he sees on the horizon.
On another topic, Jordan Peterson and historian Walter Russel Mead discuss the dire situations of Russia, China, and Iran in a video interview. Totalitarian governments led by personality cult leaders tend to lead nations into traps that they cannot escape, short of total obliteration of the political entity.
In another interesting video, Perun discusses Russia’s ability to fight toe to toe with Ukraine into the indefinite future, unless something earthshaking happens. It is interesting that Russia’s prospects have fallen so low that the best someone can say about Russia is that it may be able to conquer Bakhmut after six months of trying, and it may be able to continue fighting against superpower(!) Ukraine for many more years.
Meanwhile, high energy prices in Germany are helping to accelerate the exodus of German manufacturers to offshore locations. Corporations with intensive energy use, such as BASF, were already relocating to natural gas-rich regions. Others will leave as well, as Germany’s untenable energy situation grows ever clearer. Germany’s unicorn renewable energy fantasy can only kill the country’s long term prospects.
The above podcast comes from macrovoices.com, a website recommended in comments by a reader. The podcast is aimed at the general listener. It discusses some of the dangers from current generations of nuclear power, and reveals some of the promise of future generations of nuclear reactors. It is good entertainment, but each listener must make his own judgment as to the overall value of the presentation. My assessment of this particular macrovoices.com production is mixed.
The podcast initially rejects and condemns all reactors that are currently approved by the US NRC, and all those that are currently in use (pressurized water reactors). It goes on to praise and extol several other reactors that are not approved and are not in use. That approach is fine for those who are providing generally accurate information and entertainment. But for those who want to get something done today, rather than 20 or 30 years from now, it is worse than useless.
The blanket condemnation of pressurized water reactors is not helpful for easing the current regulatory blockage against nuclear power — in fact, by rejecting all current reactor designs and praising future unapproved reactors no matter how good they may eventually turn out to be , the attitude of the podcast makes it more likely that none of the future alternatives will ever be approved or developed.
Opponents to nuclear power tend to paint the entire industry with a broad brush. They will use any ammunition given them, and will use any excuse to reject all nuclear power permanently. None of the newer designs extolled by the podcast are approved or likely will be for decades.
By the time the podcast comes back around to explain that even conventional nuclear reactors in the west are safer than any other large energy source, the damage has been done. Most listeners will not stick around that long, once the speaker voices his initial condemnation of pressurized water reactors.
We have to make the approved reactor designs we have safer and more economical now. If we can do that, then the newer designs will find it much easier to work through the regulatory hysteria that exists currently.
The energy density of lithium ion batteries does not even signify, even among the lowest of the above energy densities. That is why electric planes cannot do useful work, and why electric cars are such a nightmare to drive cross country for any significant distance — particularly in bad weather. It also explains why the idea of using lithium ion batteries to back up a large power grid that is heavily dependent on wind & solar, is a horrifically nonsensical proposal.
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Reblogged this on Calculus of Decay .