I vote for Nuclear as better over Coal anyday!!!

Why? well here is a good reason...

"A Nuclear power plant produces far less radioactive waste then a coal power plant releases into the atmosphere!"
Citation (http://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html)

I'd say solar or wind or hydro is the best, as it's renewable. I'm not a big advocate of nuclear energy, it's very effective and efficient and all, we just can't figure ut how to dispose of the waste very well though. No doubt, coal and oil and gas plants are much worse than nuclear plants anyday...

:D

simply the most adorable poll i have ever seen. i love all your little smilies. this guy -->:( always rips my heart out.

but, on the serious side, i'd have to say water and wind.

the :) means good... as in best source of power
the :( means bad... as in worst source of power

HEY I SET THIS POLL FOR MUTI CHOOSES WHAT GIVES!!!

Adm. can you fix this????

I would have to say that hydro is the best, and oil is the worst.

Hydro blocks up rivers and creates flooded valleys! Hydro is the lest expectable of all renewable power sources.
Here is my opion in score

Solar = 2
Wind = 3
Hydro = 4
Nuclear Fission = 6
Geothermal = 5
Coal = 9
Gas = 7
Oil = 8
Nuclear Fusion :) = 1! Most promising is Boron+H fusion

Now the BAD list

Solar = 9
Wind = 8
Hydro = 5
Nuclear Fission = 4
GeoThermal = 6
Coal :( = 1! The worst possible!
Gas = 3
Oil = 2
Nuclear Fusion = 7

I think I will pri. message a adm. about fixing the post... i wanted it in so you could pick a best and a worse

I think if you're going to use future fuels as well, such as fusion, you should break solar into earth solar and space solar, since there's a definite difference.

In that case, I'd put space solar and fusion neck and neck as best, depending on where you are.

As for today, I think fission is the best, despite its problems. Hydro causes disruption, geothermal, wind and earth solar are minimal sources and unpredictable. And the rest are basically burning things, which we've been doing since primitive times.

What about tidal as a good auxillary source of power? Experimental, but it's a constant source, and I don't think it's too disruptive.

Do we have yet any good way to store power? Or will it be demand run for a while yet?

Nope can't store power yet because there is no market for it! Best way would be H2O electrolysis to fuel cell loop: about 70% maximum possible efficiency. Most batteries don’t have that kind of efficiency and can’t store an infinite amount of power.

When I said Hydro power is was also referring to wave and tide generators. This can block off whole beaches and destroy marine life… or just take up lots of space like underwater wind mills. Space solar would be cool… lets see some one willing to pay the price tag!!!

Boron+H fusion has the advantages of producing no ionizing radiation, using very cheap fuels, using very little fuel, being able to take up little space per Megawatt produced compared to renewable sources, making no pollutants or none of any harm or in large amounts. Possibly making for a viable form of stellar and interstellar propulsion: making deep space travel a reality not a sci-fi dream! I feel fusion is quite possible if only people would be will to fund its development!

^^
Yes but how available is Boron? And would it simply be Boron, or a rarer isotope of Boron, versus the normal abundant isotope? If the boron needed is rare, would it's price and difficulty of obtaining be made up for in the power provided? etc

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
When I said Hydro power is was also referring to wave and tide generators. This can block off whole beaches and destroy marine life… or just take up lots of space like underwater wind mills.

Wasn't there plans to set something up at the straits of Gibralter? If it is disruptive, then I'd agree it's a bad thing.

Space solar would be cool… lets see some one willing to pay the price tag!!!

A big part of that is getting materials into space, plus having to create some type of residence for workers, both construction and maintenance afterwards. It's not a quick ROI thing, which means no one wants a part of it.

I think the answer is a combination of all renewable resources, eg hydro, solar, wind and geothermal. However all of these technologies, even simultaneously used , cannot provide all of the demanded power. There is still a long way to reach "clean" electric power production.

Welcome Kimon

I have to disagree I believe that if we combine all renewable including space based solar power and natural methanol and ethanol production we could power the world. The problem is it requires a vast change in infrastructure and that is not going to happen any time soon.

it's very effective and efficient and all, we just can't figure ut how to dispose of the waste very well though
Using breeding reactors to recycle the waste would permit you to use it dozens, perhaps hundreds of times before you need to dispose of it, and when you finally do, it is less radioactive, and there's less of it. The problem is people don't want trucks and trains shipping the stuff between reactors, and you need a good number of them(like France) to make it practical, another thing people are scared of(the greens wave chernobyl around, and everybody turns chicken). A combination would work best.

Someone on here suggested something called benthic energy, fermenting kelp into alcohol for fuel. As for hydrogen, storage is the problem, as natural gas lines and appliances should require little modification to use it.

There are two basic types of energy. Portable, which would be for cars and planes and such, and non-portable, which would be distributed through power lines and such.

Nobody adressed my questions on Boron yet.. :rolleyes:

Boron with 6 neutrons or Boron11. Can be made from sea salt or soap mines! After fusion I think it fizzes into 3 helium atoms do to instability. Only radiation that would be admitted would be x-rays from the hot plasma, which can be easily block unlike neutrons and radioactive waste from nuclear fission reactors.

Okay, WCF,
But soap mines? I don't understand what you mean there. Do you mean soda mines?

borax its a soap, its mined and its also a major source of boron

I put hydro as in wave and tidal power. In the right place neither poses too much disruption.
Fission is too ineficient, due to its low operating temperture of most reactors, they have 30% efficency, less then a new coal power station.
For the future solar power from space would be good. I thouht fusion power would be good but considering the problems they are always having I feel it will be never as good as most hope. Recently there has been worry that the decommisoning of a fusion reactor would pose similar problems to a fission reactor. After years of neutron bombardment the reactor would be fairly radioactive.
Biomass could theoretically supply all our energy needs but I assume it would not be feasible.

Duncan

Like I said only Boron+H fusion is clean.
D+T though has the lowest operating temps it produce neutrons
and Tritium is radioactive

D+He3 is produces neutrons from D+D side fusion.

Boron(5p 6n )+ hydrogen(1p) = Carbon(6p 6n) or decay into 3He(2p 2n) makes no neutrons and no radioactive waste.

I havent studied/read about nuclear power in a while..here goes...

WCF, what's wrong with the neutron output of Deuterium+Helium3? I know it's not good, neutrons flying about, but is it extremely hazardous?

Also, i've read that a good sourse of helium-3 is the moon, lunar atmosphere (yes it has one..low pressure though). Is that true, a good source of He-3?

Neutrons form D+D going on in background of D+He3 are very powerful and take many decameters of lead to stop. Also they can stick to atoms and from radioactive isotopes.

He3 would be found in the surface luner soil form eons of collecting solar winds. Approximately (off memory from a book by Ben Bova called “MoonBase”) about 1 gram out of one metric ton of soil. This is very good because all that needs to be done is take the soil and cook it in cement mixing like apparatus or better yet wash it with water, boil the water and mining volatiles off and through the dirt back.

Anyone ever heard of a pebble bed reactor? It’s a nuclear fission reactor just like the ones today but the uranium is stored in graphite balls the size of coconuts. The reactor is also cooled by helium. Supposable this type of reactor is meltdown proof, more efficient, cheaper and safer then any nuclear reactor ever before. Does anyone want to see it happen?

http://www.eskom.co.za/nuclear_energy/pebble_bed/pebble_bed.html

D+T though has the lowest operating temps it produce neutrons and Tritium is radioactive
They use tritium to make watch hands glow in the dark.

My dad read about a reaction that can produce a strong magnetic field. This means that all you need a coils around the reactor, and you don't need to generate steam to generate the electricity. I think the temps were over a billion for it, though.

batteries or a wall plug!!! :confused: (i thought everyone knew that!)

We've got a huge thermonuclear reactor in the center of our solar system. We'd be foolish to ignore it.

The main sticking point is the cost of getting there. Mostly, that has to do with the cost of energy. It seems to me that, with an admittedly large initial expenditure, we could solve that problem, and even space flight would be relatively cheap.

The hard part is not obtaining the energy, but transmitting it back to Earth. Microwave energy is one possibility. I've heard it's perfectly safe, but given the scale, we need to make sure we know what we're doing, from an environmental standpoint.

Another possibility is to simply ship hydrogen back to Earth. The danger from a catastrophic explosion could be minimized, by splashing it down in the ocean. The containers used to do that could even be manufactured in space, with materials and energy from space, and could be recycled back on Earth.

Even with this type of scheme, we need to be concerned about the possibility of altering the chemistry of our atmosphere. If we do this on a large scale, we might increase the amount of water on Earth to a negligible degree, but decrease the amount of atmospheric oxygen, to a not so negligible degree. Ok, so we ship oxygen as well as hydrogen.

The most environmentally friendly approach is to actually use this energy in space, and send it back to earth, in the form of manufactured goods. Much of the work could be done with robots, which are much cheaper to maintain in space than humans.

I'm deperessed to see that I'm the only one who voted for geothermal. Are there drawbacks to this that I don't realize?

Aside from having to dig huge holes in the ground it almost seems like free energy.

read above Persol

Geothermal is currently used, and it might become more popular, as improved technology increases its reach. However, there are problems with it.

It is relatively invexpensive to get a little bit of heat. If you dig down a little way, you might end up with temperatures that exceed the surface temperature by 30 degrees F, but how do you exploit that? Someone might very well end up getting rich, by designing something like that.

As for getting at the higher termperatures, that makes sense, if you do it in the righ geographical location. If we try to do it everywhere, the economics don't work.

Look at it this way, if someone offers you a bond, that pays a low rate of interest in perpetuity, that's not free money, despite the fact that you will eventually recoup your initial investment, many times over.

Geothermal can certainy work. The tricky part is making it cheaper than oil.

It is relatively invexpensive to get a little bit of heat. If you dig down a little way, you might end up with temperatures that exceed the surface temperature by 30 degrees F,
THere's a mechanism used in the ocean that uses propane or some other low boiling point material to expliot the temperature differences. The thing that makes a turbine work is to have a significant pressure difference across the turbine. As I recall, the system I mentioned above couldn't even power a small ship, let alone a city. The main problem with goethermal is that the temperatures you need to achieve the pressure gradient on the turbine are only easily accessible in certain areas.

Someone mentioned something called benthic energy. I can't remember who, but the idea is sound. The alcohol produced would be used to replace oil, and high efficiency fission(eventually, hopefully, fusion) and thing like wind, hydorelectric(river and wave)and goethermal could be used to supply grid power.

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
read above Persol Lol... I couldn't find anything above (maybe my glasses are broke;) )

Iceland currently gets a good portion of their power from geothermal... so it is possible.

They state 2 different figures on this site (http://iga.igg.cnr.it/iceland.php):The geothermal energy now produced is 1138 GWh annually, or 14.73% of the national energy total. It provides about 50% of the total primary energy supply

From what I can gather that means 15% of the electricty is from geothermal, but 50% of all energy (electricity, heat work).


Originally posted by Gifted
THere's a mechanism used in the ocean that uses propane or some other low boiling point material to expliot the temperature differences. I remember reading about this a LONG time ago in some magazine... but never saw anything after that.

Oh sorry I was thinking of another post! What nation is that? Iceland :D Geothermal is limited to rare geography… It would not be practical or competitive to dig deep enough in most places in the world.

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
Oh sorry I was thinking of another post! What nation is that? Iceland :D Geothermal is limited to rare geography… It would not be practical or competitive to dig deep enough in most places in the world. Yeah, it seems to be most effective around volcanic zones.

The source of energy varies according to phe porpouse for it, if we refer to earth surface, there is plenty to use from hydroelectric turbiunes, some of them prhaps the more efficients, can be build on the oceans and take advantage of the tidal movement, storing in the ups and releasing them when the ebb or the high tide reaches the zero motion. there wind power for certain areas and solar for the most. vehicles have to be provided with electric engines that can partially rechage whith solar or wind etc... there is also magnetic flux that can generate electricity. Then we have the out in space where the solar power would limit to certain distances, nuclear engines, graviton engines, hidrophotonic and cosmic engines. There are some in between choices more accessibles but we have a lot on the drawing table, lets first just plainly loose the dependency on fossil fuels. have anybody figured out yet that if you pile up all the gasoline tanks (including homes), in one day of consumption throughout the world, how big that lake of fuel would be? How much fuel then we would be spending in one year? Big lake... the worse of all is that it doesn't get replenished, how big do you think is the hole under us that contains all that fuel necessary to keep earth going? may be 1 to 5 years tops. then when all that fuel is gone there will be large caverns inside that will not support as well the earth crust, but that is another story.....

"Financial investor/partner wanted for patent/production of free-energy device proto-type, with gaurenteed fully explainable results. Please contact David Adams at da2da2@yahoo.com or samnrach@ntl.sympatico.ca or phone 705-338-2150."

cryogenic,

Exactly what type of "Free" energy device are we talking here? Are you talking about quantum vacuum flux or some thing more realistic like thermodynamics?

*looks at poll*
hum why do so many people think nuclear fusion is the worse source of power???

In that you inquired, I will elaborate further. It uses neither. I can produce ANY amount of electricity with no input. Gravity is the source. Im looking for an investor to assist with the production of a working model, in exchange for a partnership of any revenue aquired as a result of such a venture.

ok and how is it to suck infinite amounts of energy from gravity?

Gravity is everywhere. It is also free. Let gravity be your friend. How does one get electricity from the head and flow of a stream?

With a dam usually... that’s rather old technologically. Are you saying you came up with a much smaller cheaper version? Hum generate electricity from house hold gutters?

Actually, the answer is gravity. A dam simply provides more force. My design does not use water.

You can give us a basic over view of how it works without divulgating any patent rights can’t you?

I think I did that by stating that gravity is the source. My apologies, although I cannot elaborate further. As I said, I guarentee electricity, with no power source input.

I don't think I or anyone else is willing to fund until they have some idea at how it manages to accomplish this miracle!

Well WCF, that leaves you out.

Guess it does oh well. bye then

woopeeeeeee!!! someone has found the neverending source of power GRAVITY, and soon will put all those money suckers of the oil industry out of business!!! I thought for years that exporting giagantics blocks of ice to a plant in the middle of the Shahara, could provide with clean steam power to generate so much electric power.... but by all means I love the new concept of gravity. If it works, would be fantastic. Am i being too optimistic??? :)

Hydro. I think water can be used in multiple ways:
1) The classical dam-wheel or river-wheel
2) Whirlpool, anyone?
3) Fear the Tsunami! but actually its little siblings are fine...
Whaddya say?

And I hate coal too...... just too black....

And sciencefan2003, welcome!
Easily speaking, your idea is nice, the only question is (as you may have guessed) how?

Ever hear of fast breeder reactors?

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/nucene/fasbre.html



http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0213207/Fast%20Breeder-Scott.htm

Ahh, breeder reactors. I was wondering when they would be resurrected. Anyone for more plutionium floating about?
Anyone got word on that mad scientist who calims plutonium is safe to inhale, and is willing to prove it by inhaling some?
Methinks sciencefan2003 is taking the mickey.

Since your argument does not address these points I must ask: What’s wrong with breeder reactors and plutonium for energy purposes?

The fact you end up with more radioactive junk than you started with. Why has Japan shut down its breeder reactor? Why is Dounray on the north of scotland ( as far away from civilisaiton you can sensibly get in the UK) being shut?

guthrie,

Perhaps you could explain this in detail? If not, provide links instead?

uummm, I'll have to get round to it, its years since I read anything much about them. and I dont just want to read nuclear industry propaganda, or indeed just environmentalist propaganda.

At the moment, i think our best source of electricity is all of teh above, a judicious mixture of renewables and some, modern nuclear, bit of coal, go easy on the natural gas etc. But even better, design your buildings so they use as little power as possible, dont go building buildings that require air conditioning all year round. And various other energy conservation measure.
I know, this isnt being much help..

Well, half of the things on this list are nostrums, impractical at any level for mass energy production.

Out of the viable sources remaining, nuclear fission reigns superior for a laundry list of reasons. Chief amongst them is that it is flexible, not contingent upon nature, can be scaled infinitely, and has the highest yield of any known source of power.

Hydro and geothermal are great, where you can use them. The problem is that in many places you can't. Solar, wind, and pixie dust are all pipe dreams. They'll never be more than faddish sideshows, mainly because they simply cannot yield enough energy to be practical.

I have to agree about solar, wind and water: their power supply is not constant (wind speed, light levels, tide) and there energy production per density is very low. At best natural electric power could make hydrogen but it would take a whole lot of natural electric power to provide the majority of electricity for a hydrogen economy.

Perhaps its best to consider natural electric power as a means of increase electric efficiency because conventional electric generators would run at low outputs and/or less often.

Originally posted by Neuromancer
Perhaps its best to consider natural electric power as a means of increase electric efficiency because conventional electric generators would run at low outputs and/or less often. That's how I see them. On a windy day, it's great to be able to dump 50-100 MWe into the grid and give a little bit of a supplemental kick to the normal foundational sources. And wherever a hillside gets a good funneled prevailing wind, wind farms can only do good.

I'm not keen on solar. Solar flux at the equator on a cloudless day at high noon is only 750 w/m^2, and current photoelectrics are at best 20% efficient. So you need an area the size of a beach towel to heat a cup of coffee. Solar in space is obviously another matter for many reasons, all of which are obvious.

Suddnly I got this idea: A power generator complex which utilizes every single bit of nature's power: Windy day, rain(or maybe even hail, but how bout snow?), sunlight, earth's internal heat, and all of them are used in turns.

Originally posted by curioucity
Suddnly I got this idea: A power generator complex which utilizes every single bit of nature's power: Windy day, rain(or maybe even hail, but how bout snow?), sunlight, earth's internal heat, and all of them are used in turns. The problem with that would be that many of them are mutually exclusive by location. For example, you might not have enough wind for a turbine farm where solar flux is high enough for power generation. Or, close to a hot spot or thermal vent where you could run a geothermal steam generator. It would be extremely difficult to find a location where you had access to even a few different natural energy sources, where one would supplement another and another.

Stokes Pennwalt,

Your forgot about solar most formidable problem: Nighttime.

The only answer to that would be to have solar power plants in high orbit, but the amount of money needed for that would probably be less then the amount need to research and build a functional fusion power plant, and we already know how hard that is!

One energy source that might have promise is OTEC;
Ocean Energy Thermal Conversion.
http://www.nrel.gov/otec/what.html

Since the ocean is acting as a huge energy collector for free, one might as well extract some of it...

ultimately, of course, we will have to grab some of the abundant energy in the solar system...
10,000 terawatt years of energy available from the He3 on the Moon alone, 13 billion terawatt years of He3 from the gas giants;

then there is deuterium, and boron fusion, and ultimately the Sun itself. Every second the Sun emits as much energy as two million tonnes of antimatter;
these sources are out there for the taking.

the total efficiency of the gathering process might be low at first, but this will improve as we gather more and more...

eventually we will have far more than enough energy to play with.

_________________
SF worldbuilding at
http://www.orionsarm.com/main.html

depending wich technological breakthrough makes it economical attractive first i would say:

- nucleair fusion or solar energy


Nucleair fusion in the long run seems to have the highest potential, because it can serve as a high thrust to weight ratio propulsion system for spaceships, allowing the human race to expand and colonize the solarsystem and beyond.


It is no coincidence DOE has positioned ITER as the #1 priority on their official wishlist (I don't know what they are cooking up unofficially;) )

Another step in the direction of economical fusion:

http://www.aip.org/enews/physnews/2003/split/662-1.html

As for solar energy, Dutch research can meet toe to toe with the big boys:

http://www.planet.nl/upload_mm/c/5/8/1992036827_1999989214_nunaII.jpg

NUNA II Vehicle, winner of the solarchallenge 2003, beating the eggheads of MIT with 1 hour.

But the Australians will likely win the real solar challenge with their gian solar tower

Well, that's not anything new to me..... solar automobile is just plain too common among 'unusually fueled vehicles'.

Hydrogen power......

http://www.ballard.com/tD.asp?pgid=28&dbid=0

Probably the BEST fuel for car transportation (from environmental view at least) , provided, the energy needed to create pure hydrogen does not come from burning coal/fosile fuel. In symphony with nuclear fusion for the electricity grid, hydrogen would be a most welcome fuel.

This was about electric power not fuel. but I'll go with it:

How will you efficiently and cheaply store hydrogen?

How well does hydrogen burn in an ICE?

Where or how do you plan to get the hydrogen?