GM to be all electric by 2035

Tru dat

 

For the nuclear naysayers, how many Nuclear plants are running in the world that haven't had an issue in decades? Everyone points to Chernobyl. Yes, it happened, and yes it was bad. Does that mean we should give up? Apparently nations around the world don't think so. Here's the US for example.




If it were as dangerous and unstable as it is purported to be, shouldn't we all be dead or zombies by now?

 

Really good post.

From my perspective in upstream o&g this will really kick you in the kidney--we flare (burn) all the natural gas that comes along with oil production.

24/7, 365,billions of cubic feet of gas because there is no economic way to get the gas to other consumers like power gen or heating.

The power bills would be steady or decreasing even if this gas could get piped and compressed to your plant and others like it.

 

I saw so much nat gas getting flared off up on the north slope. All over. There were a couple large flare stacks near Pump Station 1 in Prudhoe. We pulled over and got out. The noise of the gas getting flared off was deafening. Crazy stuff. At night you can see flares all over. Saw the same thing in Canada. Yukon Energy was flaring nat gas in mass quantities too.

 

My problem with envisioning an all electric vehicle world.

Yes the car itself will be zero emissions. great. fantastic. thumbs up.
Tesla has shown that an electric car can be some what cool. I've seen the P90 run 10s with slicks...great.

However...the downsides are the following and I don't see anyone or any institution really dealing with these. Instead they are too pumped about the trendy electric car thing.

Upstream issues. Increasing load on power grid will be painful. Alot of brownouts or blackouts unless capacity is increased and improved.
Power plants will need to increase their power generation and most of this comes from a hydrocarbon of sorts.
The full cycle efficiency would clearly be improved. gas turbines are a much more efficient than an automobile engine.
However the total output of CO2 and other emissions would have to be similar from a mass flow point. Maybe I'm wrong...but if this is true the emissions won't actually improve.

Sourcing the lithium isn't as advanced as o&g. and there will likely be a limit much sooner than oil.

The downstream side...

The waste from the batteries looks to be a public menace. Lithium ion batteries are freaky in their fire hazards. No one is really looking into the logistics of this...not the adverse effect of the battery waste.

Until these issues are ironed out I think its best the energy stays in a gas tank.

 

I kid you not...not a bit...in some parts of west texas you don't need headlights to drive.

 

What do you do with the waste?

 

Yucca Mountain Nuke Waste Storage Facility. It's been ready to go.

 

Drop it in afghanistan.

 

True, I am from California and am currently looking at places in Alaska. I considered all those other states mentioned as well, but everyone is already moving there, soon those will be Commieforniaized too. Alaska is a far bigger commitment and takes a special breed to tolerate year around. I cant wait.

Whatever "pleasant" idea of Cali people think there are, are no more. The sun tax is just not worth it and i hardly ever go to the beach. I hate having 1 season. I hate the taxes, the heat, the traffic, the population density, the gun laws, the ONLY thing Cali has going for it is my family is here, but I hardly see them anyway. Shit, i would probably see them more if i lived out of state. Come back home for a couple weeks to visit and everyone will hang out for those 2 weeks.

 

Another consideration is that most of the worlds rare earth metal extraction, which are essential for most advanced tech, is located in China. I for one dont want China to benefit from this move because of short sighted politicians. I am fine with China profiting off my kids toys and random shit we use everyday, but i for one dont want them growing because some retard politician wants to get a standing ovation during a rally speech.

 

my uncle was one of the engineers at san onofre when it was shut down. He said there were zero concerns that couldn’t be easily fixed/upgraded, no reason to close it.

 

More seriously, the US produces 160,000 cubic feet of nuclear waste per year. Big number, but hard to imagine without some kind of scale. The Roman Colosseum is 5,786,000 cubic feet, if I did my math right. (160 feet tall and 30,000 square feet) It would take 36 years to fill the Colosseum at our current rate.

In contrast, how many square miles of solar panels and wind turbines would it take to get the same energy output? How much would that "green" energy cost if it weren't being subsidized?

 

The space needed to store all the world's nuclear waste is less than the size of the tailing pond in china which holds the effluent from even one of the mines pulling rare-earth metals. The issue of storage is more of a social problem (no one wants it near them - which is understandable) but placement should be based on science. Find the driest place on earth where there is no ground water, is stable, and bury it there. I'm sure there are hundreds of old mines which would work.

Here's a bit of light reading on rare earth metals

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...called-green-world-depends-mining-metals.html

 

To me this whole ev thing is like meatless burgers at McDonald's – who asked for them??

 

That's why the Yucca Mountain facility is where it's at. A geologically stable deep repository located out in the desert in Nevada. A very large repository.

 

Curious to see how long a battery stays charged at 8000 ft in the middle of winter.

 

Seriously......

 

....and I hate McDonald's

 

Countries with large nuclear power infrastructure like France reprocess its fuel. There is a butt load of energy still in used nuclear fuel bundles but commercial plants in the US are prohibited from reprocessing (nuclear proliferation concerns).

 

The waste of mining for rare earth metals is infinitely bigger

the fossil fuels burned to create solar panels and batteries is YUGE

 

total agreement. i've spent enough time in moscow over the past few years to recognize this. still love the city though.

 

batteries are funny that way. I cycled up rock cut in RMNP up to just over 12,000 feet. My older iPhone battery died even though it was on full charge when I left camp at 8000 feet. You try and turn it on and it just turns off right away. I cycled back down and the phone had 45%

Down at ~1000 feet in tobermory doing winter showshoeing, even in the inside pocket of my jacket, the phone was cold enough that it died there too.

On the other hand I drove back up in RMNP with the kids after cycling and the battery in my canon dslr worked flawlessly. As it should for a tool used for nature photography by countless photographers in places even higher.

I'm assuming EV's will definitely lose something in a colorado winter where both altitude and temp congregate in the same place. Although I've never been there in the winter. Not likely to have too many people driving up passes at 12,000 feet in the winter...

 

Growing up in the cold war, I'd love to walk around red square. it would just feel surreal. I'd also like to see st-pete and the caucus mountains and a bunch of other places in russia as well.

 

It requires constant monitoring and is lethal for thousands of year. There have already been containment issues.

 

Adventurous? Here you go>>>>>>>

CHORNOBYL TOUR® - Official provider of the Chornobyl zone, ChNPP, Pripyat-town. Top-quality trips. (chernobyl-tour.com)

 

McDonald's has been meatless for years.

 

Well, I've already had my kids so, nothin' to loose! No need to worry about damaging the swimmers! lol

 

Of course it needs constant monitoring as with any similar site due to the nature of what is being stored there. The site is under enormous regulatory pressure from several agencies. There is literally a small army of scientists constantly assessing containment issues to come up with viable storage methods. These are very smart folks in dealing with these issues. I'm not in a position to second guess their efforts.