Alternative Electricity Generation Sources

[Irrev-Black]

Stores energy - useful for power grid management.

Greg Egan
@gregeganSF@mathstodon.xyz

Concentrated solar photovoltaic, but the water that cools the PV modules is retained as a heat store, and some of the electricity drives a chiller to cool a second mass of water. The temperature difference drives a turbine, for ~17hrs of stored power.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-31/ ... /102798366

[Irrev-Black]

Faux-ancient solar panels!

Jan Wildeboer :krulorange:
@jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net

These are traditional Italian style roof coverings. They are also solar panels. They have been installed at Pompeii to keep the look but also generate electricity. This is the future, IMHO. And it is already here. https://www.dyaqua.it/invisiblesolar/_en/index.php

[stylofone]

My 6.6 kw rooftop solar setup was installed on July 31st, and I'm getting a kick out of how efficient it is. My goal is to have free energy, also achieved by limiting electricity use. I don't have a dishwasher, tumble drier, or air conditioner. My fridge is small and efficient. I hope to have additional heat-preserving features in place by next winter. Even when using a little bit of electric heating in the last month of winter, I have been generating a lot more than I've been using.

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[stevebrooks]

So, a box that sits in the corner of your laundry, or anywhere else for that matter, it generates 10kw/h of electricity and works 24 hours per day, it has no moving parts, it doesn't use exotic materials, it creates no heat or radiation, basically energy from nothing, and it costs on release about the same as the equivalent power generation in solar panels with the possibility of becoming much cheaper with mass production. it's called hygroelectrical power and may be available as early as next year if work to scale up goes according to predictions.

It could replace solar panels, windmills, in fact any other power source, sound to good to be true? Well most things that sound to good to be true are in fact to good to be true, so let's watch this and see how it goes, if it works it will indeed revolutionise clean energy, it appears to have no downsides at all!

[stylofone]

So, a box that sits in the corner of your laundry, or anywhere else for that matter, it generates 10kw/h of electricity and works 24 hours per day, it has no moving parts, it doesn't use exotic materials, it creates no heat or radiation, basically energy from nothing, and it costs on release about the same as the equivalent power generation in solar panels with the possibility of becoming much cheaper with mass production. it's called hygroelectrical power and may be available as early as next year if work to scale up goes according to predictions.

It could replace solar panels, windmills, in fact any other power source, sound to good to be true? Well most things that sound to good to be true are in fact to good to be true, so let's watch this and see how it goes, if it works it will indeed revolutionise clean energy, it appears to have no downsides at all!

The presenter and the style of the video annoyed me too much, I couldn't bear to watch most of it. I suspect the aim of the video is to generate profitable engagement rather than objectively inform. Sorry to be a grinch. I agree, I hope it works out... but it sounds unlikely.

I'm partially influenced by a report I read recently which argued that unfounded faith in breakthrough technologies is actually bad because they take too long to develop and we don't have any time left. They create a false sense of comfort that some magic device will be invented to solve all our problems.

Absolute Zero | 1
Executive Summary
We can’t wait for breakthrough technologies to deliver net-zero emissions by 2050. Instead, we can
plan to respond to climate change using today’s technologies with incremental change. This will
reveal many opportunities for growth but requires a public discussion about future lifestyles

https://api.repository.cam.ac.uk/server ... 73/content

[Loki]

Lol. I only need to see the photo of that youtuber to know not to bother.

[stevebrooks]

He does videos on a number of different alternative power technologies, he's not the only source out there with this though so feel free to browse different presenters and sources, as I said, if something sound unlikely it may indeed be unlikely, but you shouldn't automatically dismiss something because you don't like the source.

[Irrev-Black]

A little bit of reproof for the whatabouters.

rickirobin@alaskan.social

Erica Watson @rickirobin@alaskan.social

"But there's a problem with the bird argument. It fails to put the number of birds killed by wind turbines in context. Given that wind energy is an alternative to fossil fuel energy, we also must ask: How many birds do fossil fuel power plants kill?"

(A: LOTS MORE THAN WIND TURBINES)

https://www.distilled.earth/p/fossil-fu ... s-kill-35x

[stevebrooks]

A little bit of reproof for the whatabouters.

rickirobin@alaskan.social

Erica Watson @rickirobin@alaskan.social

"But there's a problem with the bird argument. It fails to put the number of birds killed by wind turbines in context. Given that wind energy is an alternative to fossil fuel energy, we also must ask: How many birds do fossil fuel power plants kill?"

(A: LOTS MORE THAN WIND TURBINES)

https://www.distilled.earth/p/fossil-fu ... s-kill-35x

The other thing is there are alternative wind turbine designs that are less dangerous to birds and in some cases more efficient than the regular ones, the problem is scaling them up, we have a lot of experience with standard windmills and how to build them, alternative designs take a lot of research and testing, there aren't alternative designs of fossil fuel power stations that are less dangerous except in small degrees, and you still have the problem of water pollution with oil killing birds etc.

[Irrev-Black]

Damper on the much-touted (by Dutt and pals) Aussie nuke notion.

In tandem with the release of the draft report, the CSIRO has released a blog post directly addressing why nuclear won’t work down under. Put simply, the CSIRO references the collapse of a Small Modular Reactor (SMR) program in the U.S. in November, the Carbon Free Power Project, where project costs were estimated at 70 per cent above what was initially projected. It’s a pretty good example of why we can’t just simply introduce nuclear in Australia.

“We don’t disagree with the principle of SMRs.They are an attempt to speed up the building process of nuclear plants using standardised components in a modular system, and it may well be possible to achieve cost reductions over time. However, for now, the technology is yet to be deployed commercially,” GenCost author Paul Graham said.

https://gizmodo.com.au/2023/12/csiro-nuclear-australia/