Quote:
Originally Posted by Larryp
Well Andy, did you just not say the same as I did, but in a more roundabout way?
Maybe these technologies will improve with time, but they are not there yet. The other thing with wave technology is the size of the machinery necessary to produce a meaningful amount of power.
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Err, no I didn't. I'm afraid you were dismissive about technology I doubt you're aware of, whether you intended to be or not. And having seen up close and personal a number of wave and tidal power developments, they're a
lot smaller than your average coal-fired power station. You're welcome to do the volume/quantity of steel & concrete calculations per megawatt generated, and I still suspect coal will come out worse. And that's before considering some of the coal station's externalities, such as toxic coal ash (including
radioactivity), the powerful global warming agent CO2, and of course the requirement for a continuous supply of fuel. Mining that fuel requires further resources, equipment, degradation, pollution and human risk.
Given all that, it might do good to be positive about developing and deploying
much cleaner sources of energy? And given the relative price trajectories of renewable vs non-remewable energy sources, they'll soon enough be cheaper too. Surely everyone's positive about that? Grid parity is being reached by some renewable technologies already, and that is only increasing as dirty fossil fuels become more expensive and scarce.