Saudi Oil/Opec to World Producers, Streamline or Die in the Market

[DefCon1]

8 hours ago, John Tortorella said:

This is true yet a really frustrating argument to have. When the automobile was created it was slow and expensive. Now cars are very fast and can be very cheap. Called experience curve. And more counties of poverty are near equator so solar would work very well. The sun powers our planet and living creatures, surely it can power some refrigerators. 

Well, my point was some countries get lots of sunshine while other countries don't get enough. Its all about finding a universal energy source that is both affordable and suitable in any region at any time. There is wind power, solar power, turbines that create electricity but all of these alternatives are suited only in certain regions. A universal energy would be like nuclear energy or hydrogen energy.

[John Tortorella]

10 hours ago, DefCon1 said:

Well, my point was some countries get lots of sunshine while other countries don't get enough. Its all about finding a universal energy source that is both affordable and suitable in any region at any time. There is wind power, solar power, turbines that create electricity but all of these alternatives are suited only in certain regions. A universal energy would be like nuclear energy or hydrogen energy.

Nuclear is not and will not ever be 'clean'

i dont know enough about hydrogen but sounds like it may have adverse effect as still a 'fuel' and still gets released.

 

Countries around equator = solar

countries with consistant wind = wind

countries with endless coastlines = tital

countries with high level of geothermal energy below them = geothermal

countries with large fresh water reserves at high altitudes = hydro

 

so it becoms obvious what your country has for potential, just focus on building that energy resource. 

[SabreFan1]

Screw Canada!  I want to keep getting my cheap gas here in the US and my cheap goods in Ontario!  33 extra cents on the dollar!!!

[taxi]

26 minutes ago, John Tortorella said:

Nuclear is not and will not ever be 'clean'

i dont know enough about hydrogen but sounds like it may have adverse effect as still a 'fuel' and still gets released.

 

Countries around equator = solar

countries with consistant wind = wind

countries with endless coastlines = tital

countries with high level of geothermal energy below them = geothermal

countries with large fresh water reserves at high altitudes = hydro

 

so it becoms obvious what your country has for potential, just focus on building that energy resource. 

Unfortunately it doesn't look like any of those alternatives are ready to totally replace traditional fossil fuels yet. The infrastructure required to put them up is extremely costly, and can be environmentally destructive in itself. Solar panels, batteries, etc... all have a large environmental cost to produce. 

 

At best, we have a situation where these green energies can compliment a fossil fuel infrastructure. For example solar panels to heat hot water tanks. In situations where a constant supply of energy is needed (example a power grid), wind and solar have been found to be unreliable. You can deal with this by storing power in massive batteries, but the battery technology isn't quite there yet, and they require lots of heavy metals from places like China. 

 

Canada's current plan is to have wind power produce about 20% of our electricity by 2025. A major issue is going to be that much of that funding was coming from oil companies, who aren't doing so well right now.

 

Basically, what I'm saying is that it doesn't have to be an all or nothing thing. Although it's important to continue pushing renewable energy, we shouldn't be hasty either. For example, we don't want a situation where we've spent billions on solar cells, only to find out a few years later they are totally inefficient and obsolete.