.png)
A recent BNC guest post, Public advocacy on nuclear power and climate change, stirred up some really useful ideas. In that post’s comments thread, it was discussed how we, as a concerned and engaged internet community (the BNC crowd, and similar groups like Energy from Thorium), could engage more effectively with the broader public domain on the […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 176 Comments »
This is an invitation to BNC readers to join in, at an early stage, an Open Science experiment based around systems analysis of renewable energy. Okay, what’s all this about? Click here (or on the image above) to go directly to the front page, which currently says this: Once upon a time… We all wanted to understand renewables. […]
Filed under: Emissions, Renewables | 121 Comments »
Guest Post by Peter Lang. Peter is a retired geologist and engineer with 40 years experience on a wide range of energy projects throughout the world, including managing energy R&D and providing policy advice for government and opposition. His experience includes: coal, oil, gas, hydro, geothermal, nuclear power plants, nuclear waste disposal, and a wide […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 101 Comments »
As I noted in a recent post, my new goal with TCASE posts is for them to be shorter, more targeted and more regular, with the aim being to break big problems in sustainable energy down into very focused questions (each of the new TCASE posts will be a maximum of 1,000 words — my […]
Filed under: Renewables, TCASE | 58 Comments »
I note that the scalability and cost of solar thermal technologies, and it viability compared to nuclear power, has been a hot topic on the BNC comments forum (see especially here and here). While it is good to see this sort of ongoing discussion, I’d like to take a brief moment to offer a couple […]
Filed under: Nuclear, Renewables | 56 Comments »
In TCASE (thinking critically about sustainable energy) #5, I analysed a currently deployed technology for harnessing wave energy – the Pelamis device. If you haven’t read TCASE 5 then please do so now, since it explains some of the basic physical properties of wave energy, the extend of the global resource, etc. In writing the […]
Filed under: Renewables, TCASE | 39 Comments »
Guest Post by Peter Lang. Peter is a retired geologist and engineer with 40 years experience on a wide range of energy projects throughout the world, including managing energy R&D and providing policy advice for government and opposition. His experience includes: coal, oil, gas, hydro, geothermal, nuclear power plants, nuclear waste disposal, and a wide […]
Filed under: Nuclear, Renewables | 199 Comments »
The previous BNC post, a guest contribution by Douglas Wise, provided an excellent and thorough review of the political and technical issues facing the UK energy scene. Douglas’ post was also timely, because, last week, the esteemed Royal Academy of Engineering released a new 27-page report on this topic. Although useful as a crystal-ball-gazing exercise, the report has […]
Filed under: Nuclear, Renewables | 36 Comments »
Although the BraveNewClimate science blog has an unashamedly Australian flavour and focus, the climate and energy issues covered herein are very much international problems. As such, I’m strongly convinced that the solutions I canvass will be required for most nations this century. In this spirit, I’d like to present a detailed guest post which provides a […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 58 Comments »
As reported earlier on BNC, Dr James Hansen is currently in Australia (I had the pleasure of taking him out to dinner yesterday evening). Tonight he’ll be speaking on climate change and energy solutions at a public event at the Adelaide Convention Centre. There is still time to reserve a ticket and come along — […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 89 Comments »
The concept of energy return on investment (EROI), often called energy returned on energy invested (EROEI), is a simple and familiar one. Here is the short definition, from the Encyclopedia of Earth. To cite: ———————————————- Energy return on investment (EROI) is the ratio of the energy delivered by a process to the energy used directly and indirectly […]
Filed under: Nuclear, Renewables, TCASE | 20 Comments »
The following essay was published today on ABC The Drum’s Unleashed website. It’s a repackaging and honing of some of the key lines of argument that have been developed on BNC by me, my guest posters, and the blog’s many regular commenters. I hope you find it a useful pointer to the way forward — […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 70 Comments »
Guest Post by Dr John Rolls. John is an adjunct Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Sustainable Systems & Technology, University of South Australia. He an environmental scientist interested in global food systems and clean energy and is treasurer of the Australian Solar Energy Society (South Australian Branch). John attended both of Tom Blees’ […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 66 Comments »
“We must cut our carbon emissions immediately!“… “We have to transition rapidly to 100% renewable energy!“… “A massive nuclear build out is the only logical course of action!“… and so on. We get these well-meant but hand-waving arguments all the time, almost always bereft of real-world numbers — especially those with $$ attached. This greatly […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 341 Comments »
Here is an incomplete list of the sustainable energy and climate change books I read in 2009 (actually, a few also scraped in from late 2008). I’ve provided a 2 — 3 sentence summary of each book (from my perspective) and a Rating out of 5. Some books have been reviewed in more detail on […]
Filed under: Clim Ch Q&A, Emissions, Future, Impacts, Nuclear, Renewables | 28 Comments »
Guest Post by Tom Blees. Tom is author of Prescription for the Planet – The Painless Remedy for Our Energy & Environmental Crises. Tom is also the president of the Science Council for Global Initiatives. —————————————————————- Last month Bobby Kennedy Jr., a tireless advocate for the environment, gave a talk in New York City to a packed house. […]
Filed under: Emissions, Nuclear, Renewables | 82 Comments »
Andasol 1 is Europe’s first parabolic trough solar thermal power station, which went online in Nov 2008. It is located on a high desert site in Granada, Spain, which enjoys a high level of direct insolation – an average of 2,136 kWh / m2 / year. The mirror field — turbine infrastructure can yield a […]
Filed under: Renewables, TCASE | 120 Comments »
Recently, I published a guest post by Gene Preston on BNC, which examined the electricity cost comparison for remote solar PV vs small nuclear reactors. This generated considerable discussion (128 comments), much of which focused on whether this was a useful comparison in many circumstances; what if, for various reasons, the small-scale nuclear battery is […]
Filed under: Nuclear, Renewables | 62 Comments »
Heat engines require cooling, to turn heat energy into mechanical energy (and then, via a turbine-connected generator, to electrical energy). This is an unavoidable physical principle, and is typically exploited via the Carnot cycle. Usually, this cooling requirement uses water. Why do I raise this point? Because it seems to be a source of much confusion (innocent […]
Filed under: Nuclear, Renewables, TCASE | 49 Comments »
The November 2009 issue of Scientific American has a cover story by Mark Z. Jacobson (Professor, Stanford) and Mark A. Delucchi (researcher, UC Davis). It’s entitled “A path to sustainable energy by 2030” (p 58 – 65; they call it WWS: wind, water or sunlight). This popular article is supported by a technical analysis, which […]
Filed under: Renewables | 192 Comments »
 | Brian H on How realistic is The Economist… |
| Brian H on How realistic is The Economist… |
 | Cyril R. on How realistic is The Economist… |
 | David B. Benson on How realistic is The Economist… |
 | Ms.Perps on Environmentalism in the mud: r… |
 | Tom Blees on How realistic is The Economist… |
 | Marion Brook on Environmentalism in the mud: r… |
 | John Newlands on Open Thread 21 |
 | grlcowan on Open Thread 21 |
 | harrywr2 on The Fukushima Question: How cl… |
| John Newlands on Open Thread 21 |
 | Eclipse Now on Open Thread 21 |
| Cyril R on IFR FaD 10 – metal fuel and… |
| Cyril R on Environmentalism in the mud: r… |
 | Roger Clifton on IFR FaD 10 – metal fuel and… |
