Thank you for you concise explanation of material that Thunberg should have been taught in school, instead of warping the minds of the gullible. The saddest part is the bulk of humanity doesn't know how the physical world works and prefers the uninformed rabblings of celebrities. Your efforts might reach a few thousand who are already pre-declined to follow actual science. But this will hardly stem the flow of the herd who happily follow the charlatans. I think an Atlas Shrugged type of moment will be upon us at some point the way the World is going.
Thanks again for your efforts to stem the tide of ignorance.
Thanks for writing this - as a geologist, I can say there is plenty of Uranium, always has been. Some of the things people don't realize is a) you need very little uranium to make a LOT of energy and b) we have a lot more Uranium than you might think and c) our uranium costs are inconsequential to the cost of the resulting power, I.e. I can increase the price I pay for uranium several fold and have only marginal impact on the price of electricity from a nuclear power plant. Geologists know that the availability of an element is related tow two things - it's abundance AND how much you are willing to pay. As prices go up, more and more ore are found, and ore at lower concentrations is utilized. Hence "reserves" of a mineral is based on both factors. Double the price you pay for uranium, and your reserves will double, triple, or even increase by a factor of 10.
Just as an example, Uranium and Thorium are present in coal (carbon is very sticky). Burn the coal, and the uranium and thorium are concentrated in the ash. The energy available in that source of uranium and thorium is > the energy stored in the coal in the first place!
In 2007, Sparton Resources from Canada reported producing yellowcake (mostly U3O8) from fly ash from a coal-fired plant. Uranium levels were found to be about 160 ppm, corresponding to about 0.2 kg of yellowcake from a ton of ash. This compares to the 1,000 ppm or more in uranium ore. Sparton claimed to be able to extract a kilogram of uranium this way for $77. That might be > $100/kg now, and the current price is around $50/kg. So, with a modest price increase in uranium, coal ash becomes a viable source of uranium. And we have a LOT of coal ash - a hundred years' worth accumulated.
My guess is the fissionable materials we have available are essentially infinite - hundreds of thousands of years' worth.
Very good. We are in nearly complete agreement. I would add that there are two other problems with solar and wind because of its intermittency. 1st is seen in off-the grid solar homes with large batteries. Critical question: What is your coverage period and what is your recovery period? Typically, cheaper systems are sized for 3 days for both. This means that the system must be able to generate enough power during the lowest period (winter usually) to fill those batteries over 3 days, while meeting 24 hour load demands. Let's call our daily needs X. If we assume low period days are 50% (generous) of average days, then our capacity requirement is: [X+(x/3)]/0.5 = 2.66 x your average daily needs. Sounds fine?
Think about it. This means that most of the time, you will have 1.66 x your daily needs in excess. In the real world, you will have a low starvation period, and a summer high wild excess period. What do you do with that excess energy? Answer. You don't. You have to not accept it from your solar cells. Hey. That means that the energy required to make those solar cells doesn't get paid off by generating solar power for a lot longer. If that time is 2 years, now the real time to energy payback is around 5.32 years. If, that is, everything goes swimmingly.
Maybe we can do better by harvesting more of that excess energy through the year. That means expanding the battery banks tremendously. You now need to save energy in those batteries for 3-6 months. Batteries don't do that very well. The cost is astronomical. And, most batteries don't do well with severe deep cycling. That's why when you drive that Tesla, you leave 30 miles or more in the battery so you don't "brick" your car. It's around 12% or more that you want to keep. So, the longer the time period of coverage and storage, the more margin you need, and that costs.
Alternatively, you build solar + wind capacity so that you will almost always have excess. But to do that, if you take a look at a wind energy graph, you have to expand your capacity to 5-15 times your normal load on the grid. Then you can turn some of it off when you don't need it, which will be most of the time.
The basic problem here is that solar and wind generates energy when it wants to---not when you need it. So the process for control to meet demand is to cut off energy, not generate it. This is why Scottish windmills have made more money to not deliver power than to deliver it.
Very delayed comment. You said to restart after a blackout '... engineers get in touch by phone ...'
Well, the UK is rejigging its phone system to be 'all-digital' from Jan 2026. Sounds nice, as usual, but your home or mobile phone will then stop working after a 60 min .power cut assuming that the VoIP home phone is provided with a small battery.
Mobiles already stop working after about that time. Landlines have usually worked for many days. They're powered from the exchange, which has batteries and generator(s). OFCOM has only required one hour's backup for VoIP phones.
The author John M Greer said in 2012: 'Collapse now and avoid the rush'.
All to do with a crucial difference between copper and fibre-optic cables.
Thank you for you concise explanation of material that Thunberg should have been taught in school, instead of warping the minds of the gullible. The saddest part is the bulk of humanity doesn't know how the physical world works and prefers the uninformed rabblings of celebrities. Your efforts might reach a few thousand who are already pre-declined to follow actual science. But this will hardly stem the flow of the herd who happily follow the charlatans. I think an Atlas Shrugged type of moment will be upon us at some point the way the World is going.
Thanks again for your efforts to stem the tide of ignorance.
Thanks for writing this - as a geologist, I can say there is plenty of Uranium, always has been. Some of the things people don't realize is a) you need very little uranium to make a LOT of energy and b) we have a lot more Uranium than you might think and c) our uranium costs are inconsequential to the cost of the resulting power, I.e. I can increase the price I pay for uranium several fold and have only marginal impact on the price of electricity from a nuclear power plant. Geologists know that the availability of an element is related tow two things - it's abundance AND how much you are willing to pay. As prices go up, more and more ore are found, and ore at lower concentrations is utilized. Hence "reserves" of a mineral is based on both factors. Double the price you pay for uranium, and your reserves will double, triple, or even increase by a factor of 10.
Just as an example, Uranium and Thorium are present in coal (carbon is very sticky). Burn the coal, and the uranium and thorium are concentrated in the ash. The energy available in that source of uranium and thorium is > the energy stored in the coal in the first place!
In 2007, Sparton Resources from Canada reported producing yellowcake (mostly U3O8) from fly ash from a coal-fired plant. Uranium levels were found to be about 160 ppm, corresponding to about 0.2 kg of yellowcake from a ton of ash. This compares to the 1,000 ppm or more in uranium ore. Sparton claimed to be able to extract a kilogram of uranium this way for $77. That might be > $100/kg now, and the current price is around $50/kg. So, with a modest price increase in uranium, coal ash becomes a viable source of uranium. And we have a LOT of coal ash - a hundred years' worth accumulated.
My guess is the fissionable materials we have available are essentially infinite - hundreds of thousands of years' worth.
Very good. We are in nearly complete agreement. I would add that there are two other problems with solar and wind because of its intermittency. 1st is seen in off-the grid solar homes with large batteries. Critical question: What is your coverage period and what is your recovery period? Typically, cheaper systems are sized for 3 days for both. This means that the system must be able to generate enough power during the lowest period (winter usually) to fill those batteries over 3 days, while meeting 24 hour load demands. Let's call our daily needs X. If we assume low period days are 50% (generous) of average days, then our capacity requirement is: [X+(x/3)]/0.5 = 2.66 x your average daily needs. Sounds fine?
Think about it. This means that most of the time, you will have 1.66 x your daily needs in excess. In the real world, you will have a low starvation period, and a summer high wild excess period. What do you do with that excess energy? Answer. You don't. You have to not accept it from your solar cells. Hey. That means that the energy required to make those solar cells doesn't get paid off by generating solar power for a lot longer. If that time is 2 years, now the real time to energy payback is around 5.32 years. If, that is, everything goes swimmingly.
Maybe we can do better by harvesting more of that excess energy through the year. That means expanding the battery banks tremendously. You now need to save energy in those batteries for 3-6 months. Batteries don't do that very well. The cost is astronomical. And, most batteries don't do well with severe deep cycling. That's why when you drive that Tesla, you leave 30 miles or more in the battery so you don't "brick" your car. It's around 12% or more that you want to keep. So, the longer the time period of coverage and storage, the more margin you need, and that costs.
Alternatively, you build solar + wind capacity so that you will almost always have excess. But to do that, if you take a look at a wind energy graph, you have to expand your capacity to 5-15 times your normal load on the grid. Then you can turn some of it off when you don't need it, which will be most of the time.
The basic problem here is that solar and wind generates energy when it wants to---not when you need it. So the process for control to meet demand is to cut off energy, not generate it. This is why Scottish windmills have made more money to not deliver power than to deliver it.
My substack article Adequate Storage For Renewable Energy is Not Possible has some of this. thanks for the additional details.
Very delayed comment. You said to restart after a blackout '... engineers get in touch by phone ...'
Well, the UK is rejigging its phone system to be 'all-digital' from Jan 2026. Sounds nice, as usual, but your home or mobile phone will then stop working after a 60 min .power cut assuming that the VoIP home phone is provided with a small battery.
Mobiles already stop working after about that time. Landlines have usually worked for many days. They're powered from the exchange, which has batteries and generator(s). OFCOM has only required one hour's backup for VoIP phones.
The author John M Greer said in 2012: 'Collapse now and avoid the rush'.
All to do with a crucial difference between copper and fibre-optic cables.