Planet-changing technology

Subsidized research and massive subsidies for mediocre energy production for an entire country/world are an entirely different thing.

Not entirely so. Research in a lab and larger scale deployment “feed” each other. And then there is the whole (not just R&D) engineering issue which naturally depends on the former two.
Considering the whole development cycle of lets say wind turbines, one can be quite sure that large subsidizes were only started when it was reasonable to assume that this technology could carry itself in the foreseeable future. Whether this assumption was(is) correct, is a different discussion.

Back to the original question, my general feeling is that to change the planet (to something better, that was implied) before we need new technologies we need to stop doing obvious stupid shit right now, i.e. polluting/destroying the oceans, stop razing and burning forests, stop pouring tons of toxic chemicals on farming fields, etc.

If we manage to do that the planet will already be a lot better, without new fancy technologies.

Indeed. I prefer not to indulge in navel-gazing about whether aluminium cans are vital to the smooth running of modern civilization. Such talk - it’s extraordinarily popular at high levels of government - is usually just an excuse to avoid getting out one’s chair. Some things are so obviously dumb that we should either just stop doing them, or find other ways of achieving the same result.

I’d just add that when I said “technology”, I didn’t necessarily mean fancy machines that go “ping”. Technology, in the broadest sense, is just a recipe for achieving some desired outcome. Push-pull pest control technology is called “technology” for that reason, even though it involves nothing more complex than putting certain sorts of plants in certain places.

Not entirely so. Research in a lab and larger scale deployment “feed” each other. And then there is the whole (not just R&D) engineering issue which naturally depends on the former two.
Considering the whole development cycle of lets say wind turbines, one can be quite sure that large subsidizes were only started when it was reasonable to assume that this technology could carry itself in the foreseeable future. Whether this assumption was(is) correct, is a different discussion.[/quote]

We are talking about a few drops for research compared to multiple swimming pools for maintaining artificially low prices.

I’m also not talking about pumping more money into research and implementation for alternative energy. I’m not talking about letting energy prices move closer to their real costs. As long as things are cheap there is little incentive to use less. For example US gasoline consumption is down since gas prices started rising in the last decade. And not surprisingly businesses start funding their own research when there is money on the line.

-I was trying to be funny- :cry:
Brought it up cuz going back to glass bottles instead of PET or cans is a bad idea from an energy footprint point of view. Still many good green souls are ignorant about it, same as they are about e.g. french gasoline with 10% alcohol mixed in. Which “obviously dumb” approaches come to your mind?

[quote=“finley”]
I’d just add that when I said “technology”, I didn’t necessarily mean fancy machines that go “ping”. Technology, in the broadest sense, is just a recipe for achieving some desired outcome. Push-pull pest control technology is called “technology” for that reason, even though it involves nothing more complex than putting certain sorts of plants in certain places.[/quote]

Yeah, you are right. Just finding real good examples is difficult. The above is quite surely quite complex - and might be better resolved taking “the chemical way”.[/quote]

[quote=“Abacus”]
We are talking about a few drops for research compared to multiple swimming pools for maintaining artificially low prices. [/quote]
Which ones appear to be the worst from your point of view? [/quote]

[quote=“Abacus”]
I’m not talking about letting energy prices move closer to their real costs. As long as things are cheap there is little incentive to use less. For example US gasoline consumption is down since gas prices started rising in the last decade. And not surprisingly businesses start funding their own research when there is money on the line.[/quote]

I guess that “no” is a typo, right? Do you imply that energy prices are artificially kept low?
US gasoline is comparably dirt cheap - All it takes for businesses (i stick to automotive industry here) is to copy and paste designs from japanese or european companies. Which in turn developed them in response to artificially high gasoline prices - talking about subsidies :slight_smile:

Anywho -by far- the most eminent challenge is energy generation. Let’s assume electricity is for free all recycling, water, transportation, industrial waste issues - almost everything can be resolved even while turning a profit. Right now I’d say a feasible solution are solar cells. Not the classic ones debated so far but the emerging e.g. organic ones. It seems just now some Koreans have our backs with a perovskite (single junction) cell design approaching 26% efficiency. Those should be dirt cheap to produce and can be made on flexible (e.g. foil) substrates - so one can put em everywhere- like wallpaper.

Probably cos it would just be too much trouble :slight_smile:
[/quote]

But it would look so cool!

Why bother when you can eat plants, which can already pull that trick? I know, some people won’t eat their veg, but that means they’ll die and people who DO eat their veg will survive. Natural selection in action :smiley: [/quote]

It could have useful applications for space travel.

Wouldn’t the big humans just keep the little humans as pets?[/quote][/quote]

Everyone would be small (except me, because I had been put in cryostasis - and then I could throw them around or be their leader).

Just think - combine the last two things and you’ve got little green men… perhaps the aliens were onto something. Where’s Benjamin when you need him?

Only when they’re all treated as disposable. The point about glass containers is that they can be reused several times. Aluminium and paper/cardboard can be recycled, up to a point. Plastic cannot.

The difficulty, of course, is getting people to return them. I suppose one possibility would be to impose a deposit on all types of manufactured container - say, US$1 - of which some fraction would be returned to you. For glass or paper you’d get back $0.90, aluminium $0.70, and plastic $0.50. Under those circumstances, people would still have the choice of using wasteful plastic packaging, but they’d be paying the true cost of doing so. Manufacturers would have an incentive to eliminate packaging completely because customers won’t like losing $0.10 (or more) per purchase. Where containers are necessary, manufacturers would do themselves a favour if they standardize on certain shapes and sizes, so that recycled containers are interchangeable.

Incidentally, the melting point of both glass and aluminium is quite low (~580’C), which suggests a solar furnace could be used for reworking/recycling.

Cars and industrial farming are my two biggest pet hates at the moment. Cars are the dumbest possible way of getting from A to B (especially in crowded cities, where the average vehicle speed is roughly walking pace). I won’t go into farming here because I’ve posted at length about it elsewhere (and there have been many books published on the subject).

What’s “complex” about planting two types of seed instead of one? I do realise that the main draw of industrial agriculture is that it removes the need to think. Plough this way, use this seed drill setting, apply this much fertilizer, spray this poison at this time and this other poison at some other time, and you get a crop. Magic. Except it’s extraordinarily inefficient - that’s (partially) why farming absorbs so much subsidy. It’s also boring. If you want to work in a factory, go and work in a factory. Don’t pretend to be a farmer.

Natural agriculture IS complex, but it’s much more rewarding, both in terms of profits and job satisfaction. I hate the modern ideal of removing all skill from a process and substituting “procedures” for experience and knowledge, so that any idiot can do it. People need to take pride in their work, and being an expert at something is part of that pride.

At least until the North Koreans hack the control system and get them all doing a Mexican wave.

Reminds me of the scene in H2G2 where all insurance agents are convinced that they must leave the planet to preserve the human race and are sent off into deep space.

Didn’t you ever read Gulliver’s Travels?

In most applications, the efficiency of PV cells is irrelevant, mainly because the land or surfaces on which they are installed is (or can be) otherwise worthless. Consider Mongolia, for example, which is cold but has a lot of clear sunny days and more goats than people: you could install a square kilometer of PV or heat collectors and nobody would even notice.

Other factors - such as longevity, local insolation, mounting/installation costs, storage, control systems, and cabling, are far more important in determining economic viability. In dry, sunny countries, thin-film types (~8%) are usually a good choice because they’re cheap, land is easily available, and they’re somewhat less prone to failure.

Anybody remember these?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk_float

They were awesome. I have fond memories of driving one. It’s about time they were resurrected with modern technology, which is a fraction of the cost of the 1980s equivalent and has much better performance.

I was also interested to see this link at the bottom of the Wikipedia page:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neighborho … ic_Vehicle

I didn’t know such a vehicle class existed (legally, I mean - obviously the vehicles themselves have been around for a while). It’s a great idea. This is the kind of innovation that countries like India need to be paying much more attention to, instead of fiddling about with diesel engines.

And on the subject of solar heating:

The combination of affordable materials, common tools and un-complicated techniques of fabrication to create a product with high-tech qualities enables interested groups to make something with their own hands which will benefit them in a sustainable way. A good example is the construction of the worlds largest solar-kitchen in Abu Road, Rajastan, by the Brahma Kumaris. Because they did most of the work involved themselves, the whole installation ( 800m² of Reflector surface + steam system + back-up boiler) could be built for only 100 000 €. As they cook for a maximum of 18 000 people this equals 125,-€ per m² or 5,5 € per person. That way 400 liter diesel per day can be saved.
At the moment the Brahma Kumaris run six such solar kitchens (the other five are smaller).

400 litres of diesel has a pre-tax price of ~€250 in most of the world, so this contraption pays for itself in less than two years. Yes, I know fuel is massively subsidized in India, but that just means hardworking taxpayers are subsidizing waste.

Link: solare-bruecke.org/index.php … =2&lang=en

[quote=“M. Ando”][

[quote=“Abacus”]
We are talking about a few drops for research compared to multiple swimming pools for maintaining artificially low prices. [/quote]
Which ones appear to be the worst from your point of view? [/quote]

[quote=“Abacus”]
I’m not talking about letting energy prices move closer to their real costs. As long as things are cheap there is little incentive to use less. For example US gasoline consumption is down since gas prices started rising in the last decade. And not surprisingly businesses start funding their own research when there is money on the line.[/quote]

I guess that “no” is a typo, right? Do you imply that energy prices are artificially kept low?
US gasoline is comparably dirt cheap - All it takes for businesses (i stick to automotive industry here) is to copy and paste designs from japanese or european companies. Which in turn developed them in response to artificially high gasoline prices - talking about subsidies :slight_smile:

[quote]Also from M Ando
Anywho -by far- the most eminent challenge is energy generation. Let’s assume electricity is for free all recycling, water, transportation, industrial waste issues - almost everything can be resolved even while turning a profit. Right now I’d say a feasible solution are solar cells. Not the classic ones debated so far but the emerging e.g. organic ones. It seems just now some Koreans have our backs with a perovskite (single junction) cell design approaching 26% efficiency. Those should be dirt cheap to produce and can be made on flexible (e.g. foil) substrates - so one can put em everywhere- like wallpaper.[/quote]

The scope of artificially low prices is way bigger than the US. Look at Taiwan for example. Gas is almost the same as the US and from what I have heard electricity is significantly cheaper. This is common throughout the world. Additionally subsidizing energy goes way beyond the raw material (oil, coal, NG). Refineries, pipelines and the entire infrastructure is subsidized. The gov’t does need to ensure that there is a stable supply of energy but maintaining a below market cost forever kills innovation and encourages consumption. [/quote]

I think you have greatly oversimplified the auto industry with the copy and paste type of innovation. At some point those Japanese and European companies had to determine that making those designs was going to be profitable. That was decided by higher energy prices. And now the American companies are also designing more fuel efficient designs. Some of it is copy and paste but some of it is new research. Additionally the foreign companies have a bigger incentive to invest in more fuel efficient designs because fuel prices all over the globe increased.

Higher prices generally lead to increased innovation to lower consumption regardless of how you arrive at the higher price.

If anyone is interested in current PV research Nat Mat has a bunch of free articles about some of the newer technologies. They’re focusing on the importance or accurate reporting of device performance, but none the less there is some interesting free articles.

nature.com/nmat/focus/photov … index.html

Oi, Finley inmho it seems that despite the length and time which i presume went into your answer it has several problems, is sometimes not well thought out, and or is oblivious to developments in places u might not be familiar with.

Only when they’re all treated as disposable. The point about glass containers is that they can be reused several times. Aluminium and paper/cardboard can be recycled, up to a point. Plastic cannot. [/quote]

Just no. Even one way cans hold up pretty well against reusable glass bottles. One could nitpick here about a lot of details, but one point is the sheer weight to useful stuff inside ratio of e.g. a glass bottle. Mind you, that does not only refer to transportation cost but also e.g. if ya enjoy drinking refrigerated beverages.

There are indeed reusable plastic bottles and they are quite common, in let’s say the Netherlands or France.

Plastic can and is recycled. Riding the MRT in Taipei you might have noticed that blue recycling trash cans where people throw their e.g. plastic bottles inside. That is actually not fake :slight_smile: If you have an interest in that topic just google it.

Again just living in Taiwan you might have noticed that while taking your trash out there usually will be some (often elderly) person “snatching” your recyclables (yes also plastic and PET bottles). They don’t do that for fun - they do get money from trash yard for it. Why? Recycling!
That is pretty much the idea you describe above - just that we end consumers are not confronted with it.
Buy a big glass bottle of Taiwan beer at e.g. 7/11, drink it and give it back to the cashier. U ll get out of there with 2NT in your hand.
Please let’s not nitpick about the amount a container is worth cuz i belive that nobody on this forum is in the bottle recycling industry.
Lastly you might be surprised to hear, that a system pretty much same as you suggest exists in various countries, Germany seems to be a forerunner.

Btw. cans are pretty standardized aren’t they?

Anyway the above is kinda off topic, since it will hardly be Planet-changing.

[quote=“finley”]

Cars and industrial farming are my two biggest pet hates at the moment. Cars are the dumbest possible way of getting from A to B (especially in crowded cities, where the average vehicle speed is roughly walking pace). I won’t go into farming here because I’ve posted at length about it elsewhere (and there have been many books published on the subject).[/quote]

Whilst cars, for sure are not the optimal mode of transportation, people do love em for a multitude of reasons beyond simple A to B. Also, I kinda live in a crowded city (Taipei) and still driving is way faster than walking :slight_smile: Other people clearly agree. I do take the MRT a lot cuz its faster during rush hour but than again i also often go by car or cab, cuz its way more comfortable. That’s actually important considering the bigger picture. I heard the Russkis tried to “optimize” urban lifestyle once. Complete with extensive public transportation and people living in high rise apartments, as after all living in your own house with your own lawn is the dumbest possible way of living :slight_smile: - turned out to be a bad idea.

However, do you have another feasible alternative on your mind?

[quote=“finley”]

What’s “complex” about planting two types of seed instead of one? I do realise that the main draw of industrial agriculture is that it removes the need to think. Plough this way, use this seed drill setting, apply this much fertilizer, spray this poison at this time and this other poison at some other time, and you get a crop. Magic. Except it’s extraordinarily inefficient - that’s (partially) why farming absorbs so much subsidy. It’s also boring. If you want to work in a factory, go and work in a factory. Don’t pretend to be a farmer.

Natural agriculture IS complex, but it’s much more rewarding, both in terms of profits and job satisfaction. I hate the modern ideal of removing all skill from a process and substituting “procedures” for experience and knowledge, so that any idiot can do it. People need to take pride in their work, and being an expert at something is part of that pride.[/quote]

I applaud your attitude towards agriculture, but despite this I believe the craft beer brewing hipster is strong in you. I write this as your post seemingly refers to ones little “backyard garden” or that double as expensive whole organic food segment (they do follow standard procedures though). Modern agriculture is a business. The invention of artificial fertilizer, pesticides and standard procedures (the guys coming up with those surly had a lot of skill beyond the reach of a single farmer and it shows) is as important to our present style of live as was the invention of steam/combustion engines and the deployment of large scale sanitation.
In short agrobusiness is an essential part of what is widely summarized as the big bang or the industrial revolution. It is worth to check some world population graph over the last centuries. So e.g. planting plants together with other plants just might cause problems in large monocultures or lessen crop yield and so on - it get’s quite complex on larger scales.
I do not intend ;and neither can; defend the manifold of problems and straight up evilness which nowadays became more and more prominent, but back on topic of this thread, surely industrial agriculture is and was a planet changing technology.

Drinking my 45NT canned Asahi beer yesterday night confirms this :wink:

[quote=“finley”]
In most applications, the efficiency of PV cells is irrelevant, mainly because the land or surfaces on which they are installed is (or can be) otherwise worthless. Consider Mongolia, for example, which is cold but has a lot of clear sunny days and more goats than people: you could install a square kilometer of PV or heat collectors and nobody would even notice.
Other factors - such as longevity, local insolation, mounting/installation costs, storage, control systems, and cabling, are far more important in determining economic viability. In dry, sunny countries, thin-film types (~8%) are usually a good choice because they’re cheap, land is easily available, and they’re somewhat less prone to failure.[/quote]

Here, you mention a lot off things none of which are wrong in itself. Some of em reveal that you know something about the topic, but you mix em up and sadly it seems you fail to realize(?) that all of these are interdependent. I ll not try to be comprehensive, but:

[Wh/Cost]= X One wants to maximize X. That’s all, believe me.

Returning to your post:
If e.g. one systems durability is a 10 and another ones is 5, the latter might still deliver larger X
If e.g. a m2 of efficiency 10 has all other things equal half the installation cost (like wires :slight_smile:) than 2m2 of efficiency 5 hence giving you a larger X
and so on and on… Oh yeah, installation cost i kinda concisely addressed by saying “Wallpaper” i was only a quarter kidding.

The expectation behind emerging photovoltaic techniques is not so much as to rescue the world, but to undercut today’s electricity grid prizes. It ain’t looking half bad.
As of now and towards the foreseeable future, silicon based solar cells wont be able to compete there. This is not talking about providing electricity somewhere in
remote Africa or Mongolia. It is about leaving fossil fuels behind - while also turning a profit.
Hence i brought it up in this thread.

P.S.: Solar powered furnaces? With “advanced” mirrors? During sunny days only? Or what? C’mon - have a sense of dimension.

Yeah, that’s right on the spot. Since it needs to ensure stable supply and cheap prizes (one of the core reason for a government’s existence)and it knows that that ll kill innovation - it just pours subsidies into innovation projects. And the circle closes - yes the taxpayer pays for it but it is also in the taxpayers interest. Despite all the nepotism and corruption going on it is how the system works. And i am not sure if there is a better way (better way considering all its implications) to handle it

[quote=“Abacus”]
I think you have greatly oversimplified the auto industry with the copy and paste type of innovation. At some point those Japanese and European companies had to determine that making those designs was going to be profitable. That was decided by higher energy prices. And now the American companies are also designing more fuel efficient designs. Some of it is copy and paste but some of it is new research. Additionally the foreign companies have a bigger incentive to invest in more fuel efficient designs because fuel prices all over the globe increased.

Higher prices generally lead to increased innovation to lower consumption regardless of how you arrive at the higher price.[/quote]

I thought i addressed that by

I meant to say: These companies developed it ahead of “real” demand since artificially heighten prices (the hidden subsidy) made it profitable. Sure copy and paste sounds easier than doing it, but if you look where e.g. US automotive industry engine design is heading, the parallels are obvious. Just take a look at Vauxhall/Opel and GM or Chrysler/Fiat. Uh on a side note, as of this week its even moving close to 60USD/Barrel, I should get myself a nice naturally aspirated V8 engine ride :slight_smile:

Ando, while I’m happy to discuss the technical merits or limitations of emerging technology, I’m not interested in any defence of the status quo, simply because it cannot exist for much longer. It will be replaced, as all things are. Oil is finite. We can argue endlessly about how finite, but a lot of people are not prepared to wait and find out, especially since it’s now more expensive than the alternatives, at least in some applications: I pointed to solar heating as a simple example, because the cost calculation is trivial.

Plastics, oil-fired burners, cars with ICEs - they will disappear eventually, and replacements will take time to evolve. Some journalists think we should just sit and quietly twiddle our fingers and wait for “science” to deliver the perfect solution. Technology just doesn’t work like that.

Also, I recommend checking out first-hand the destruction being wrought on third-world countries by “modern” technology. If you’re not shocked by what you see, you’re not looking properly. These places are awash with non-biodegradable trash (or the smoke from burning them), choked by cars and their fumes, and rendered more poor than they ought to be by the sheer uphill struggle of getting simple things done (such as moving a dozen sacks of rice from A to B). It doesn’t have to be that way. You might argue that that’s not “our” problem, but it will be when they’re starting wars over water resources or cropland.

There’s an old joke:

A physicist, a chemist, and an economist are stranded on a desert island. The physicist figures it may be possible to start a signal fire by focusing the sun through a glass bottle. The chemist reckons he can find some dry, resinous plant material to use as fuel. The economist just rolls his eyes and says, hang on you guys, you’re wasting your time; first, assume we have a boat …

The point of this thread is not to say “that’ll never work”, but “this has got to work, so how do we make it work?”.

No, I didn’t know that. Pity more people aren’t copying the Germans, then.

One acronym: PRT. There are many, many ways to implement this, but they’re all similar in that they are inherently cheap, safe, low-energy, and easy to build and maintain.

I’m talking about real businesses. Industrial agriculture appears cheap because zealots believe that it ought to be cheaper, and therefore make regulations to ensure that it is so. They subsidize the fertilizers and the fuel, and allow “farmers” to pollute waterways and destroy the soil. They allow animals to be cruelly mistreated. Someone has to pay for all that: either the taxpayer, or future generations of taxpayers. And after all that support, there are still farmers out there selling natural food, of much higher quality, for approximately the same prices, completely unsubsidised and often harassed by the state (read “The Rebel Farmer” if you think I’m making that last bit up).

The bottom line is, bulk food is cheap (at the farm gate) however you produce it. 80% of the retail price of food is markups introduced by the distribution chain. Industrial agriculture has achieved nothing. The corollary is that improved marketing methods - reducing that markup to something sensible - could make proper food more accessible. I don’t believe food needs to be ‘cheap’, but obviously a lot of people do.

I would also add that industrial-style agriculture simply doesn’t work at all in the tropics; not just because the technology is unaffordable and inaccessible to the average farmer, but because the ecosystems are more fragile: they can’t cope with the onslaught of ploughing and poisons. I have some experience here, an the performance you get from natural methods is astounding.

Of course it was, and mostly not for the better. The payback has been less than the investment. However, its time is over and gone, and this thread is about replacements for technologies that have run out of steam.

They have a very narrow skill, which will be of no use whatsoever when there is no oil or gas to make and transport the fertilizers, phosphate deposits have been exhausted, pollinators are extinct, and millions of hectares of blasted cropland are standing idle. And there is, incidentally, no such thing as a “pesticide”. The word is a marketing term, not a description. There is no chemical yet invented that can distinguish harmful insects. Since the vast majority of insects are either useful or harmless, that’s pretty damn important.

I do know something about it. I design control and metering systems for off-grid PV, and I can tell you categorically that it’s nowhere near that simple. I am fully aware of the whole sort of general mishmash of things, as someone once put it, and I agree it’s a critical point, but this thread will turn into a book if we go off on that tangent.

Broadly speaking, yes, you want to maximize Wh/cost; but my point was that that does not imply maximizing cell efficiency. It helps, of course, but it’s a fairly minor consideration. You might also have reasons for going suboptimal: for example, you might choose to avoid cadmium telluride or CIGS cells because of the possibility of resource scarcity (or just price volatility). Silicon, we can be fairly confident, will be dirt-cheap and readily available forever.

Well, I was - because it’s places like that where most of the world’s population are living. OK, not Mongolia … but consider this. Say you have ten square kilometers of hilly ground in the middle of f’ing Mongolia which nobody wants. It’s cold and it gets 400mm of rain a year. What you could do is this: set rows of cheap PV panels on contour, such that rain runoff is directed into swale ditches, where crops are planted. The area under the panels will receive neither light nor moisture, but that’s OK, because about 10% of the land will now receive not just light but much higher “rainfall”. What about all that power? Well, for one thing, make sure some of it as collected as heat. Run that heat into insulated buildings. Keep animals in some of those buildings (in winter). Grow animal feed and recycle the manure. Build houses and offices and factories. Install electric transport. Several hundred people could live comfortably that way with no shortage of electricity, heat or food. It’s not going to be New York, but it’ll be a lot nicer than what was there before.

Idle speculation? I dunno, but I plan to try it someday.

No, it isn’t. It’s about making earth habitable when our current means of doing so become untenable. Profits will come; just not necessarily in the same way.

To reach 600’C doesn’t require anything very advanced.

Well, maybe they could close the plant for the day, go home, and have a beer and watch TV. Honestly, I don’t understand the modern obsession with 9-to-5 make-work. We don’t need 24-hour power. Get your job done when it needs doing, and when it’s possible to do it. If it doesn’t need doing, or you can’t - who cares?

  1. Industrial hemp + bamboo could solve many environmental issues. Hearst s**tcanned industrial hemp back in the 30s.

  2. Solar Paint:

engadget.com/2014/08/03/spra … lar-cells/

  1. It’s not so much about generating more energy, but reducing leccy consumption. I looked round at my house today, and nearly everything was on a trickle charge. How long before we get trickle charge fridges?

portablefridgesonline.com.au/

I agree. I don’t like the way New Scientist and other publications imply we should sit there and wait for the men in the white coats to come up with a solution to our problems. Over the next 20 years we might end up going back to simple technologies like rooftop hydroponics. We could’ve started a technological golden age 100 years ago. The first cars were electric, for example.

detroitelectric.org/

The next phase of scientific research won’t be waiting for new innovations, but trawling through our archives looking for forgotten ideas.

Finley, it might help if you break your thinking down into food/water/energy sections, so readers can get a handle on where you’re going. Or show more concrete examples, so it’s easier to conceptualize. I know you’re just brainstorming, but titles are useful.

I’d add:

  • Wind turbines for when there wasn’t any sun.
  • Underground homes for warmth in winter and cool in the summer.
  • Alfalfa and other sprouts for an easy source of food (being careful of too many oxalates)
  • Fog fences or other similar passive water catching devices.
  • Bamboo bicycles

I’d monetize by letting governments and private tourists come and see what you’re doing. Charge for consulting.

Only when they’re all treated as disposable. The point about glass containers is that they can be reused several times. Aluminium and paper/cardboard can be recycled, up to a point. Plastic cannot.

The difficulty, of course, is getting people to return them. I suppose one possibility would be to impose a deposit on all types of manufactured container - say, US$1 - of which some fraction would be returned to you. For glass or paper you’d get back $0.90, aluminium $0.70, and plastic $0.50. Under those circumstances, people would still have the choice of using wasteful plastic packaging, but they’d be paying the true cost of doing so. Manufacturers would have an incentive to eliminate packaging completely because customers won’t like losing $0.10 (or more) per purchase. Where containers are necessary, manufacturers would do themselves a favour if they standardize on certain shapes and sizes, so that recycled containers are interchangeable.

Incidentally, the melting point of both glass and aluminium is quite low (~580’C), which suggests a solar furnace could be used for reworking/recycling.

Cars and industrial farming are my two biggest pet hates at the moment. Cars are the dumbest possible way of getting from A to B (especially in crowded cities, where the average vehicle speed is roughly walking pace). I won’t go into farming here because I’ve posted at length about it elsewhere (and there have been many books published on the subject).

What’s “complex” about planting two types of seed instead of one? I do realise that the main draw of industrial agriculture is that it removes the need to think. Plough this way, use this seed drill setting, apply this much fertilizer, spray this poison at this time and this other poison at some other time, and you get a crop. Magic. Except it’s extraordinarily inefficient - that’s (partially) why farming absorbs so much subsidy. It’s also boring. If you want to work in a factory, go and work in a factory. Don’t pretend to be a farmer.

Natural agriculture IS complex, but it’s much more rewarding, both in terms of profits and job satisfaction. I hate the modern ideal of removing all skill from a process and substituting “procedures” for experience and knowledge, so that any idiot can do it. People need to take pride in their work, and being an expert at something is part of that pride.

At least until the North Koreans hack the control system and get them all doing a Mexican wave.

Reminds me of the scene in H2G2 where all insurance agents are convinced that they must leave the planet to preserve the human race and are sent off into deep space.

Didn’t you ever read Gulliver’s Travels?

In most applications, the efficiency of PV cells is irrelevant, mainly because the land or surfaces on which they are installed is (or can be) otherwise worthless. Consider Mongolia, for example, which is cold but has a lot of clear sunny days and more goats than people: you could install a square kilometer of PV or heat collectors and nobody would even notice.

Other factors - such as longevity, local insolation, mounting/installation costs, storage, control systems, and cabling, are far more important in determining economic viability. In dry, sunny countries, thin-film types (~8%) are usually a good choice because they’re cheap, land is easily available, and they’re somewhat less prone to failure.[/quote]

I always chuckle at the idea of a mega solar farm in the Sahara. All well and good until a Saharan dust storm rolls in and the billion dollar farm is trashed.

We need to start with the low hanging fruit, insulated homes being the biggest one missing around here. Stop building new structures and redo old concrete structures to save building energy and Co2 emissions waste. Taiwan is bloody awful at using concrete for a solution to everything, but re-using the existing concrete would be sensible.

Forcing people to behave a certain way or to save energy may be the most effective way, even if it feels intrusive, governments force us to pay income tax and send our kids to school etc.

Makes sense to me.

[quote]Forcing people to behave a certain way or to save energy may be the most effective way, even if it feels intrusive, governments force us to pay income tax and send our kids to school etc.
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I think it’s more likely that we’ll wake up in a few years and everything will be on a trickle charge. I prefer innovation instead of intrusive gov regulations.

A Saharan dust storm might trash a sensitive solar panel farm, but I still think it’ll be feasible in 10 years or so. I hope the gulf states realize their white gold is worth more than their black gold.