atomic_fungus (atomic_fungus) wrote,
atomic_fungus
atomic_fungus

#7709: California is still a third-world country

Renewable energy isn't really either one. Let's face it: the construction of windmills and solar plants require a great deal more energy than they ever produce. Ditto for biomass. That's just the Laws of Thermodynamics at work. Solar and wind are too diffuse.

Did you know, by the way, that biomass accounts for the vast majority of "renewable" energy in the US? "Biomass" means ethanol. Farmers use diesel to plant, fertilize, and harvest the corn that makes ethanol. (The fertilizer is likely made with petroleum inputs, too.) The corn is shipped to the ethanol plant via rail, which uses diesel. The ethanol and the brewer's grains are then shipped from the ethanol plant to their respective destinations via rail, which uses diesel. And then the ethanol is blended with gasoline and burned. This is not "green energy", guys, because each gallon of ethanol takes more than a gallon of diesel just to make and transport, and it just ends up being turned into carbon dioxide and water by the vehicle that burns it.

California is a textbook example of why "decarbonizing" can never work for an industrialized economy.

* * *

Well, didn't get anything done today except getting the cat dealt with. Meh.

Maybe tomorrow I can work on the bike.
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