Ken Fabian

@sethoflagos My mistake, although they do share some characteristics. The larger Syncons are very massive, nearly as massive as dedicated flywheels, but yes, flywheels will do a different task and can be run down; Syncons look intended to maintain their rotation rate with enough inertia to limit the rate of loss or gain in speed from grid variability. Presumably they will consume power to keep that rotation rate close to steady? Until confidence in synthetic inertia is established a hybrid of Syncons with batteries might be better than including flywheels.

I've only just read this. Would it be a silly idea to run a couple of vast flywheels, just to add "ballast" to the system? One could even simply retain a couple of these big turbo-alternator sets, unpowered, and spun up and maintained to 50Hz off the grid. That sounds like a long established technology called Synchronous Condensers and Australia is currently adding them to cover the withdrawal of thermal (spinning) power plants. SynCons are expensive with a long lead time for manufacture and unlike batteries have limited ways to make revenue other than as system inertia and frequency control so there is incentive to perfect inverter controlled virtual inertia - which appears to primarily involve updated inverter software or possibly upgrading the inverters. Trust in virtual inertia is not all the way there; it is being used but it seems to still be on trial, to see how well they perform in the real world. We did discuss virtual inertia on another thread. It is also possible to retrofit gas power plants (any thermal generator? Seimens do them I think) with clutches, to allow the generator to disconnect from the 'engine' (gas turbines usually) and remain online, providing spinning inertia like when in full operation, as the equivalent of a SynCon.

@KJW I see no great fears of rechargeable batteries in homes - no more than flammable Ford Pintos stopped car sales. I think the heightened fire risk is more from the proliferation, from the numbers of chargers and devices themselves as much as the batteries. Shavers, toothbrushes, phones, headphones, laptops, phones, vacuums, power tools, bikes, scooters, toys and many more. And the greater risk is from low budget makers, sometimes with counterfeit components, including batteries (which are inclined to have overstated capacity as well). The most common sort of fires may be from improper disposal of small batteries - landfill sites and garbage trucks. Setting and enforcing standards is the solution and recalls can work as reassuring evidence that they are enforced as much as create fears of batteries in general. I do think the doubt, deny, delay opponents of decarbonising are inclined to manufacture and exaggerate alarmist fears out of battery fires - and pay little attention to the many other sources of fire risks. I do recall solar battery recalls - not a proliferation of battery recalls, just very specific ones and not recently. People with other brands of batteries found that reassuring. Solar batteries are being installed at prodigious rates on Australian home and LFP types, with lower fire risk than previous types, have emerged as dominant. But I admit I am somewhat cynical about policy that makes decarbonising with RE a "you care, you do it, at your own expense" with "Don't care? Don't have to" kind of policy; it seems like it is an alternative to requiring it of companies participating in electricity markets so that everyone's electricity is decarbonised, like decarbonising should be a 'free' choice by consumers but not a requirement for energy producers. Yet individual systems on rooftops is cost effective at the household scale, which makes me think it must be more cost effective at large scale; rather than fire fears holding them back some of the reluctance may be from the rate of improvement, where delaying a bit can wring some more profit out of existing generation and maybe get the same things or better cheaper. But there is no doubt things have changed at the grid level. No-one is investing in coal plants, there is very little investment in gas plants and the market advantage of gas 'filling the unfilled demand' and setting power prices by it is rapidly diminishing. I know that what we have on our home works and continues to work well and is paying for itself in power cost savings and can be installed a lot cheaper now than what it cost us. I also note that Australia's home PV, with or without batteries gets installed at a fraction of what US users pay; according to Saul Griffiths in an interview with David Roberts (Volts substack) installing 15 KW PV in Australia at the same time as 15 KW in San Francisco, around 5 to 6 times more expensive in the latter. (may vary widely depending where?). Australia's permitting is simple and quick too. Not so quick for the big grid batteries - and yes, the objections often focus of fire risks. But a lot of the objectors are opposing them out of deep rooted partisan climate science denial that has morphed into renewable energy denial.

I suspect that most places there was lack of confidence that the RE buildout would happen any time soon, even as recently as a decade ago and that flowed through as reluctance to pre-invest in the transmission and storage (pumped hydro probably looked best, with hydrogen hype in there too), that have lead-in times as long as that. There have also been persistent spoiling efforts from the doubt, deny, delay side of politics including supporting 'local' politically partisan opposition to building the infrastructure a high RE grid requires )to be sure their claims it can't work turn out true?) - denial has been well supported and the surprise is that RE has forged ahead despite it. And few 'serious, credible' pundits predicted the rise of batteries. Only 8 years ago Australia got a 'big Tesla battery' to widespread derision at around the same time as a commitment to a large pumped hydro project. Seems like the global consensus was batteries would never get cheap enough or scale large enough to be significant. The pumped hydro (Snowy 2.0) is delayed, hugely over budget and still in construction but batteries, big and small, are proliferating across Australia and the world - mega battery factories that make more storage than that pumped hydro project each year have been built from ground up, are in production and their products in service since then. Batteries may not ever achieve the per MWh costs of pumped hydro but their versatility and stackability and the other (voltage and frequency regulation) services are unrivalled. Short build times make them an interim 'quick fix' that is turning into a more permanent fix. Can provide system strength too, as 'grid forming' inverters capable of spinning inertia emulation become the norm. China, as a developing nation with large population still in poverty, had until 2060 before international agreements required declining emissions. Whether that was a wise agreement is a real question - I suspect for 'leaders' around the world there wasn't much real expectation built in and agreements for doing the least were considered a win and more aggressive targets a lose. In Australia the potential for China remaining a long term FF buyer probably played a part in willingness to agree. But they do appear to be exceeding their targets as well as indirectly helping a lot of other nations reach theirs. I note that here in Australia RE has been above 50% of electricity over the past quarter year, with lower wholesale prices and fewer outages during heatwaves - like another tipping point has been crossed. I know our household PV and (recently upsized) batteries run our A/C into the evening without drawing on the grid at all; that experience is becoming commonplace. What works at smaller scales will work even better at larger scales.

To me these kinds of conspiracy theories are more in the disturbing (that people promote them and believe them) but kinda amusing category. End of the world from Earth going out of orbit, contrails are a delivery system for mind control substances, arrival of aliens, presence of secret aliens etc. It is when conspiracy theories have strong media and political support that they are problematic, eg that global warming science is something made up by enemies of freedom and national sovereignty and legitimate businesses or vaccines are dangerous, should not be mandated and their use discouraged. Those kill people and, distressingly, can and will do so in large numbers.

It is all deeply alarming - properly terrifying even - and the 'need' looks entirely fabricated in this case. If bases for defending North America from Russia or China were needed - which seems very doubtful - all that was needed was to ask nicely, via NATO or through Denmark; via NATO the costs of Greenland defenses would be spread around. If US mining companies want to mine minerals there they would almost certainly be permitted. They would (horrifying!) have to pay local taxes - not sure to what extent those would go to Greenland vs to Denmark. Anything worth the mining will make profits after taxes. And if successfully 'conquered' and that is allowed by the EU that would be deeply alarming for Canada, Mexico, Cuba (and other Caribbean nations). Alarming for everyone. As an Australian should we be worried that our resources could be enticing to a USA that has abandoned any pretense promoting international cooperation? Coal and gas and iron ore and uranium - rare Earth's too - as well as all our wheat and beef and etc... A bit ironically I have less fear of China doing that to Australia than the USA. I note that so far Australia's government is mostly keeping heads down and mouths closed, apart from assuring everyone treaty agreements with the USA remain strongly supported and we are still 'buying' those nuclear submarines at inflated prices. Personally I'd like something that would reassure the rest of the world that Australia's government thinks what the US is doing is deeply objectionable as well as dangerous.

Someone at NASA thought they had to say something about it, like they should take it seriously? Especially with a nonsense 'prediction' that will come around soon and be demonstrated as nonsense all by itself. 'Gravity doesn't work like that' would have been a more than adequate response if responding at all was necessary. I'd be tempted to derision or parody or mockery which wouldn't help either. The urge to inform and educate is a good one but even granting this a response gives the claim a level of credulousness it does not rightfully deserve.

Needs much more precise alignments and timing than that to suggest 'deliberate' or 'artificial' to me. A couple of days before the Summer Solstice (Southern Hemisphere here) is not the same day ie not precise, and the closest it gets is nearly 2x the distance of Earth to the Sun (and never got closer to the sun than Earth) ie not close at all. Passing 'close' to the ecliptic is a consequence of the direction it came from, but again it is not that precise and that direction seems as likely as any other, ie coincidence. This object may have been traveling for billions of years, potentially for longer than Earth has existed as a planet; it would take extraordinary (prophetic) foresight and precision to aim such an object and time it's passage to coincide with this planet's solstice. As only the 3rd interstellar object detected any 'uniqueness' looks a consequence of small sample size. Very worthy of study but not so worthy of unfounded but imaginative speculations, no matter how much fun speculation can be.

Sometimes we don't need to run the numbers to have high confidence that something doesn't add up. Where is the extra energy coming from? Error seems much more likely than conservation of energy being wrong and you solving our energy/emissions/climate dilemma with your insights. When you have a working prototype and it does what you think it will and that is independently confirmed... you should submit the results to the leading physics journals. I'll look forward to the news about your Nobel Prize. There are attempts to use generators on rails as energy storage but the engineers correctly assume the energy going in will equal all the energy going out, which must include losses from inefficiencies. Which appear to be greater for this than we get using battery storage.

I am curious about the propensity and possibility for worlds evolving life naturally and how similar or different to life as we know it but I am not interested in the potential for human colonization. I think interstellar colonisation is an attractive fantasy - a good topic for imaginative fiction - but very not-realistic. It is not a reasonable goal or motivation, especially in the absence of the technological and economic capabilities needed. Even if we were close to the technological capabilities required for sending people there such a planet would have more attraction as something for people to study more directly - but not colonise. I think if we do achieve the technological and economic capability to send people to the worlds of other stars with enough equipment and resources to establish a colony we won't need planets to colonise for any species survival reasons. Artificial habitats in space, difficult as those are, seem more reasonable, offering greater potential, because they can be almost anywhere and be made with just right conditions inside for humans and biosystems that support human life. Assuming it is technologically and economically feasible to send people an exo-planet with life might rate a mission for studying and sampling using probes and rovers, from the safety and comfort of a space habita - but even uncrewed robotic missions seem extraordinarily difficult and expensive. The value of such a world will be diminished by attempting to colonise it even if not remaking the native biology (ie kill and replace or genetically modify) to be more human friendly. It seems rather primitive and short sighted to sacrifice that extraordinary scientific opportunity for such a self indulgent goal as conquest, terraforming and land ownership. I also suspect any planet with life will have a low probability of being biochemically compatible with terrestrial life. Even if it has an atmosphere roughly equivalent to Earth in Nitrogen, Oxygen, water vapour and etc (a product of life) it is optimistic to imagine humans could breathe unfiltered air safely; living biology is extraordinarily inventive when it comes to allergens, poisons, diseases and parasites. For most of Earth's living history this planet didn't have atmosphere humans could safely breathe. I expect it will be detection of bio-signatures that finds evidence of life beyond our solar system. We may yet find evidence of life within this solar system - and go on to determine if such life originated and was spread from Earth, emerged independently or is indicative of interstellar pan-spermia.

I usually try a hard 2 hand squeeze first, interlocking my fingers and squeezing with the heel of the palms to push the rim out of round. If that doesn't do it I do like Gordief does - punch a small hole in the lid to release the suction. Depending on contents I might put tape over the hole or transfer to another container.

This isn't something I foresee having widespread application. Whilst efficiency gains - using waste heat that would otherwise go to waste - are a significant element of decarbonising it is a stretch to call it 'clean, green'; that will depend on the sources of energy powering the data centre. Decarbonising the primary energy inputs needs to remain a priority. Ideally we want ever more energy efficient chips and data storage, ones that don't shed so much heat. Maintaining long running dependence on ongoing data centre inefficiency for the sake of the waste heat for other uses would be a mistake to my mind. Even district heating systems, that should be built with very long working life, will need to avoid dependence on waste industrial heat from sources that themselves need to transition to energy efficient low emissions alternatives.

The freedom to infringe the freedoms of others isn't the kind of freedom I aspire to. I currently enjoy a high degree of personal freedom, that I attribute to the presence of democratic governance and the rule of law. Those are far from perfect but not having them is worse. Some good points in comments. Poverty is not conducive to enjoying a sense of freedom and fixing either/both isn't a zero sum game - more like feedbacks that amplify each other.

@studiot The links are to interviews, so there is some reading or listening to find and get to the significant bits. That format may not be to everyone's taste but I found it informative. Unusual to get answers about emerging technologies from people doing them.

@studiot Thanks for the heads up. Yes, this is something I think has a lot of potential for cities and towns in climates that are less suited to air source heat pumps aka reverse cycle A/C. Wider application than that but warmer climates have other options with less up front costs. And there are air source types now that handle below freezing temperatures. A site that looks at the emerging possibilities, that I recommend is Volts Substack - https://www.volts.wtf/archive?sort=new - that does interviews with people involved in them, rather than the more usual press release with some (inexpert) commentary. David Roberts usually asks the questions that I want answered but often don't get asked. The boreholes in this case appear to tap into an aquifer and those have been a preferred option for borehole ground-source geothermal. Very good heat transfer, even potential for using the existing water as the working fluid, may not need very deep boreholes and potentially less of them than in dry ground and rock. In this case the boreholes are pre-existing, hopefully of a diameter suitable. It does sound like the aquifer is being warmed by the city above but not sure by what means. Groundwater inflows? An aquifer can be isolated or there could be continuous underground flows; if it has been gaining heat then it may be an isolated one or partially so. Which may in turn allow 'reversible' use, where summer cooling transfers heat to the underground water, which gives inter-seasonal energy storage. Where the water flows they don't provide storage per se, but have advantages like more constant temperature range. Some other variations I've encountered include the conversion of a city gas supply pipeline infrastructure, enhanced by industrial waste heat and added boreholes (without aquifer). https://www.volts.wtf/p/thermal-energy-networks-are-the-next The pipelines are not buried deep but are more like the pipes buried in trenches style, yet do appear to have reversibility, shedding heat into the ground when used for cooling as well as using the heat for homes and businesses. There is at least one US company doing retrofitted systems for larger city buildings with small drill rigs and continuous feed of one piece pipe lining. Some of their innovation is in building databases of underground conditions including mapping existing infrastructure to avoid; the advantage of that seems cumulative, ultimately allowing more accurate quoting of costs in place of the surcharges to cover unexpected conditions. https://www.volts.wtf/p/making-geothermal-heat-pumps-work Some improved drilling technology is a big part of that last example. For that other kind of geothermal - the sort intended for electricity production - we may see "millimetre microwave" deep drilling that overcomes some of the cost limitations of accessing heat enough to produce electricity at scale, potentially almost anywhere. Not a technology that gives advantage over conventional drilling at shallow depths - too much variability of ground geology there - but seems suitable for hard rock and at depths where the temperatures are a problem for conventional drilling. https://www.volts.wtf/p/super-deep-geothermal-drilling-with Note, I haven't re-read each of these interviews; I think I've got the correct ones.

@sethoflagos Perhaps not a point by point response but more like an attempt at explaining my thinking. I am unashamedly an RE optimist - one of the few aspects of the climate issue I do find cause to be optimistic about. To me it looks like RE with increased electrification is responsible for more emissions reductions - or at least reduced growth of emissions and getting nearer the necessary tipping point where FF use begins to decline and existing capacity displaced - than anything else.

The original use may have required a precise length/depth, thus the mounting 'knobs', that look like they would use grub screws to hold in place. And selling them on rather than sharpening would make sense. As pointed out in other comments the sharpening angles can be changed. The alloys used cannot; if a production drill in a demanding application then likely higher than usual quality alloy would explain their durability. Making them to replace when blunted (sold on after resharpening, not re-used) would make sense if length has to be precise. I am imagining a quite large regular chuck would be needed to hold them.

@sethoflagos - I'm not opposed to things that reduce emissions but I am unconvinced CCS is the best option or best use of resources. Or ultimately is a scalable option. This looks more like a pilot project to me, an investment in an experiment rather than in reliable emissions reductions - given CCS does not have good track record of delivering reliable results and even now more captured CO2 gets used for enhancing oil production than any other use. It risks an "oh, too bad, that didn't work as well as hoped" outcome that came tied to investing less in other options. I was thinking power plants burning wood pellet biofuels would be counted as low emissions and that, like most governments and affected businesses the UK's would not normally or willingly go above and beyond the minimum requried under international agreements (where their negotiators sought doing the least possible). If so count me surprised and amazed. Or confused. Are emissions from burning woodchips in the UK counted as UK emissions the same as if they were burning coal or gas? And the forest growth that produces woodchips gets counted as emissions reductions or offsets by the source nation? The producer nations will want the 'credits' for themselves, in their efforts to minimise their obligations. Carbon removal is certainly being promoted as a major emissions reduction option but looks primarily a keep on as we are with minimal change now and reduce atmospheric concentrations later option. Somehow later has to be paid for. With levies/carbon taxes they become financially dependent on continuing to make emissions - funding beyond that for atmospheric CDR looks problematic to me; the absolute quantities involved mean it needs to be an industry as large or larger than any other industry sector, to run for a long time into the future. I'd like to think we will do so despite the costs (which minimise the cumulative climate costs) but I am doubtful of it and see maximising growth of low emissions energy as better. Unwillingness to commit to major government expenditures on such things later - given they seek to avoid commitments now - seems likely. CO2 pipelines like that seem roughly equivalent in engineering terms to gas pipelines. That is not low cost or short life infrastructure and having spent that money, those doing it will be resistant to the low emissions options that obsolete them before their use by date. The running costs of power plants equipped for it have to include ongoing fuel supply as well as CO2 removal that seems likely to be as costly or more costly, which at best will be a lot less than 100% capture. Gas fields full of old boreholes may not have the geological integrity of pre-exploitation - this is an experiment, with long term results that are uncertain and probably unknown well beyond the time of the project. CCS will have running costs, including energy requirements. The weight of CO2 is very large and volumes large too, even if more dense than gas. The efficiencies will matter to assessing the effectiveness. If forest growth draw down persistently fails to equal the emissions, or combustion inefficiency results in post-use emissions that weren't counted we need to know that. Like I said it seems more about delaying and evading investment in low emissions energy than doing emissions reductions better. Some delaying - use of interim options - can make sense, to ease the transition ; I see businesses decarbonising and getting time (and government support) to do so as the alternative to having rising carbon pricing or ultimately climate liability imposed on them. @studiot I don't know how well other greenhouse/district heating options will do the job - ground source geothermal has a lot going for it but it takes significant foresight, planning and investment. Which is true of most elements of a transition to low emissions.

I am deeply dubious of the viability of CCS and have an overabundance of cynicism for schemes that seem intended for saving fossil fuels from global warming. 2 to 3 tons of CO2 for each ton of fuel (which seems an underestimate given production emissions are greater than what happens at end use combustion and that burning is inefficient but un-burned 'wastes' probably decompose later to produce more emissions), where the costs of dealing with the CO2 will almost certainly exceed the fuel costs and both CCS and fuel costs are ongoing? If the fuel is woodchips and CO2 drawdown by forest regrowth is the carbon capture and it is in balance (which is not necessarily the case) it would be zero emissions and the argument would surely be that doing CCS is superfluous - or else paid for by taxpayers as part of a wider CO2 drawdown program (which I am also deeply doubtful of). The amount of infrastructure investment and ongoing running costs (including significant energy requirements) seem very large. And there are opportunity costs - what could have been with the same resources. Right now it looks like investment in solar, wind and batteries get more for the same money than any other options - and most directly displaces the sources of emissions.

@Externet I think the basic idea does have enough merit to deserve a closer look - but does the underwater water motion in the opposite direction to the wave actually move "backwards" (in an absolute sense) or is it more a case of moves forward with the crest but closer to stationary in reverse? Engaging my brain a bit longer suggests it must move in reverse - net water motion = zero.

It looks like these are for a specific type of 'chuckless' drilling machine - normal cutting tips but how they are mounted is unusual. As a WAG I'd say for a production line drilling machine.

This would have earned a downvote from me, except the downvote option isn't working for me. It does get you reported to moderators for bigotry that comes across as hateful.

There is no urgency; the problem (if species and planets being 'mortal' is a problem) is so far in the future that attempts to address it now seem unlikely to have lasting significance. Surviving on Earth until then seems to be single the most important thing we can do to give humanity a long future and more than challenging enough to occupy our future 'building' efforts. What humans can do in the face of imminent extinction won't include moving the planet; SF may feature imagination unbounded but reality is a lot more constrained. Given rockets moving between inner solar system to outer solar system typically require more fuel/reaction mass than payload supplying more than an Earth mass of fuel seems insurmountable. Space habitats built out of asteroid/comet resources that do exist in great abundance - far easier to move (and can be designed for it) - seem a more credible 'life beyond Earth' scenario. And even that is only likely as an emergent outcome of large scale, long running profitable economic activities in space. Planned colonies/societies/economies in extreme conditions with 'lead us to immortality in the promised land' motivations don't inspire me or fill me with confidence.

Removing and excluding grazing livestock in previously forested areas seems like the least effort way to get more forests. Where deforestation was relatively recent there will be seed stored in soils and some wind borne, animal borne or other vectors result in seeding, otherwise mass seeding and planting will become necessary. It is unlikely to be enough to restore what deforestation (including from livestock grazing) preceded it and the resultant ecosystem will be species poor in comparison to pre-deforestation. A lot of the deforestation goes back a long way and preceded industrialisation. Agriculture will only give up land where improved productivity allows reduced land requirements; agricultural productivity is critical to expanding re-forestation. Given the needs of agriculture I remain doubtful enough suitable land will be freed up for total biomass to grow beyond pre-deforestation levels and do not think any sustainable increase in total global biomass that is less than that should count as offsetting ongoing emissions. It is one thing to have plants draw down lots of CO2, another to have that continue indefinitely without topping out. Another thing again to cost effectively store/sequester biomass carbon (via permanent burial?) - which biomass could otherwise be biofuel. Where biomass does get burned or otherwise used it is almost certainly going to return carbon to the atmosphere - what emissions reductions bio-fuels can give over fossil fuels counts for the displacing the fossil fuel emissions but won't reduce atmospheric concentrations.

We may be unable to change the fanatics' minds but it is probably a good thing that they know what they believe is not universally believed and why we disagree. If that makes us an enemy of their faith/ideology in their eyes it is useful to know that. Where their fanaticism comes with belief that 'promoting and defending The Faith' trumps society's laws - where insist their beliefs should be society's laws and seek to confine the holding of societies Offices of responsibility and power to those who share their 'belief' - it is useful for them to know we do not think their beliefs put them above the law and they will face opposition and legal action.