Renewable Energy

Expanding our moral universe

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Energy is a fundamental necessity for life, let alone a vigorous society or civilization. This fact has been recognized by humans for a very long time — Sun, Wind, Fire and Water (in the form of rivers and waterfalls and rain), worshipped by most cultures, are manifestations of energy in one form or the other. The main difference between pre-industrial times and the present day is that we have restricted our worship only to Fire, neglecting the others almost entirely. Why this became the case, and as humanity again pays due attention to the other Gods again, what entities must again return into our moral equations, is what this essay tries to describe.

ODAC Newsletter – Mar 30

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While awareness of peak oil has advanced light years since ODAC was founded over a decade ago, on the evidence of this week the same cannot be said for the conduct of British energy policy. Back in 2000, Tony Blair’s government was blindsided by petrol protests that brought the country to a standstill in 48 hours. Mr Blair bore the scars, and while there was much to criticise in New Labour’s energy policy—not least the invasion of Iraq—he developed emergency plans and did not allow a serious recurrence…

Carrying capacity dashboard for Australia is launched

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This online tool allows you to estimate the number of people a certain area in Australia may be able to support at a national, state and bio-regional scale. Our aim is to raise awareness of the importance of carrying capacity assessment as a forward planning tool – to help establish a sustainable balance between people and their localised environment. Given the dependence of societal systems on biophysical health, it is vital that land-use planning initiatives have the ability to more clearly define potential future demands on the environment. Carrying capacity assessment offers a way to assess our resource needs and also determine how best to meet these needs.

Tom Murphy Interview: Resource depletion is a bigger threat than climate change

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Rising geopolitical tensions and high oil prices are continuing to help renewable energy find favour amongst investors and politicians. Yet how much faith should we place in renewables to make up the shortfall in fossil fuels? Can science really solve our energy problems, and which sectors offers the best hope for our energy future? To help us get to the bottom of this we spoke with energy specialist Dr. Tom Murphy, an associate professor of physics at the University of California. Tom runs the popular energy blog Do the Math which takes an astrophysicist’s-eye view of societal issues relating to energy production, climate change, and economic growth.

If only we had free energy

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I thought I’d do a thought experiment. Suppose tomorrow morning a hypothetical university—let’s call it T.I.M.—sends out their weekly press release claiming a “revolutionary breakthrough” that will change the way we think about energy. Unlike every other time in the past decade they’ve made this claim, though, suppose this time it’s actually true: they’ve discovered a way of producing extremely cheap energy—as near to “free energy” as can be imagined.

Space-Based Solar Power

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A solar panel reaps only a small portion of its potential due to night, weather, and seasons, simultaneously introducing intermittency so that large-scale storage is required to make solar power work at a large scale. A perennial proposition for surmounting these impediments is that we launch solar collectors into space—where the sun always shines, clouds are impossible, and the tilt of the Earth’s axis is irrelevant.

Energy in East Africa

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In most East African countries access to electricity is very low. Besides electricity, there is a basic need for energy. In Eastern African countries most of the energy consumed is produced from traditional solid biomasses, such as the burning of wood.

The search for combustibles begins early in the morning, includes several hours of walking, and, in cases where no trees are to be found, digging for roots with bare hands; in some regions this activity is accompanied by the constant danger of violent and sexual assaults. In areas where there is no wood left for burning, cow dung or other waste is used for fuel.

World energy consumption since 1820 in charts

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In this post, I provide…charts showing long-term changes in energy supply, together with some observations regarding implications. One such implication is how economists can be misled by past patterns, if they do not realize that past patterns reflect very different energy growth patterns than we will likely see in the future.

ODAC Newsletter – Mar 16

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Finally, a plausible explanation for the Obama-Cameron political orgy — ‘love-in’ doesn’t quite do it — in Washington this week. For Cameron the benefit of this floorshow was obvious — like Blair with Bush, revelling in the reflected glory of US power — but Obama’s motive remained a mystery. What could possibly justify gifting all that folderol and face time with the world’s most powerful man? Yesterday we got the answer: international cover for a politically motivated release from strategic petroleum reserves, that’s what.

Review: Petroplague by Amy Rogers

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We have a brand-new entrant to the oil-eating-bug-runs-amok tradition: the self-published novel Petroplague. It’s a Crichton-esque thriller written by microbiology professor-turned author Amy Rogers, who says she aims to “blur the line between fact and fiction so well that you need a Ph.D. to figure out where one ends and the other begins.” The plot involves a batch of experimental, oil-hungry bacteria inadvertently loosed upon Los Angeles, which proceed to wreak a near biblical swath of destruction. Part ecology lesson and part cautionary tale, Petroplague is an entertaining entrée into the subject of oil depletion and its implications for society, human health and the environment.