The third industrial revolution, (the solar electric age)?

I believe that also works for predicting the outcome of horse races!

I agree with you that the uncertainty is enormous. The best economists,
political theorists, and technology pundits all completely missed the enormous
impacts of the rise of China and India, and the mobile phone/computer
revolution.

 

I don't think they missed it so much, as miss judged how big and/or how fast things would occur, which isn't that uncommon. For example, I wasn't impacted by the economic downturn nearly as bad as many, because I saw what was an unsustainable set of situations. I didn't think it would be as bad as it was, but I did sell property, just 6 months before the bottom fell out of the real estate market and moved investments from funds and market speculations into commodities, once the markets did start to turn. Needing to do something with significant capital, I bought gold at $550 at the end of 2006 and sold in the fall 2012 for a considerable advantage. Most folks that actually pay attention also saw the various bubbles and over valuations, coming to a head and made appropriate moves. Folks with a lot more money than I were able to take advantage of "investment devices" that I, as an insignificant player couldn't partake (damnit). These people made huge advances, while I had to be happy with a 3:1 payout. For example, I purchased AMX at about $24, when everyone was thinking is was all over and they'd be one of the belly ups. It's at $63 today.

When I say knowing how to bet, it's not like a game of poker, it's literally like how much you pay attention. In most cases you'll see it coming, though the length and veracity of trends and movement is hard to predict, you can be on the appropriate side of it, when it does move.

The same is true (to a lesser degree) to political and social changes, though the time frame is usually much longer, in hindsight easy to see those that did make the predictions and the big mouths that just yelled and screamed of the horrors about to come. Communications and China are perfect examples. Predictions of an explosion were cast aside by the usual lot of pundits, but not serious investors (in both cases), which is only visible from the other end of the time line. No, they didn't know exactly how big, how long, etc., but they did know it was coming, which is the best you can hope for in most cases.

In this same vein, the middle east is finally shedding themselves (my assumption and time will tell if I right), of the imposed political and social bondage, they were forced into after WWI. This has been in the making for literally a century and every history fan, has known it was in the works. When, where and how big or long, is still just guesswork, but positioning yourself if you have interests there, isn't that difficult to understand. Currently, many are hedging their bets, as the usual rule of following the money, just might bite their butt, so watch for significant investment in Shiite interests, in coming months and years, which is counter to mainstream "betting" strategies.

Leo, as I'm sure you know, this is a tremendously difficult and convoluted set of circumstances, that most just can't get their head around (in the west). The net has helped to a small amount, with education into some of it, at least from a historical angle, but actually understanding much of it, takes real interest or a real anal desire to learn, as it is in my case. For what it's worth, I never bet horse races, just no good set of parameters to lean against for the investment. Of course if I sat at the local track daily and personally timed each pony as they tested and warmed up, I might feel differently, having a reasonable data base to work with, but generally I assuming the law of probabilities will prevail, which isn't worth playing with.

 

The UK is lucky in that most tidal range is quite high, 8.5 meters or so even at London Bridge. There are also quite a few other tidal technologies such as the turbines in Strangford Lough, suck and blow turbines etc. Agreed you can't use all the coast and the population ie grid losses is hardly evenly distributed. However the National Grid is becomig more branched as other sources come online ie wind turbines and solar farms. Ther are subtle small local schemes such as tidal mills etc and maybe weir wheels or turbines in some rivers which could help.

This first article says 20% is an underestimate...and yes, you can't change the laws of physics especially the first one of thermodynamics...
The second one is even more optomistic....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-20983645

http://tidalenergytoday.com/2015/02/17/estimate-of-global-potential-tidal-resources/

 

Thanks for those, SukiSolo.

Unfortunately, they don't define what they mean by phrases like "tidal
stream energy could theoretically supply...".
I've been in this game long enough now to be very suspicious of such
claims.

For example, the Betz limit for wind and water turbines is about 60%.
That's roughly the fraction of power you can extract from a stream.
(I'm happy to concede that the two articles use that type of limit rather
than 100%, which I have seen in many articles over the last 30 years.)

Now, no turbine is 100% efficient so you can't extract as much as the
theoretical Betz limit. Typically, you can expect about half of that
(often much less). Therefore, the quoted figure of "15% (to 20%) of UK needs"
in the first article could be about 10%, and possibly even lower than that.

We can knock that down further; for example, by taking into account down-
time for maintenance. And even further by considering the amount of energy
needed to move silt and sediment away from the turbines.

Then we need to take into account many other factors, like the
environmental impact on wildlife and human activity by building barrages,
whether it is feasible to have a barrage completely spanning an estuary,
and how much energy must be expended to build the barrages, assemble the
raw materials to make the components of the turbines. If they use aluminium,
where does that come from? And how much electricity will be used to make the
aluminium? How much fuel will the trucks and other construction equipment
use?

And finally, we still don't know if the quoted figures of 15%-20% in
the first article, and the more optimistic figures in the second one, are
for the entire coastline or all available estuaries.
I wouldn't be surprised if that "15%-20% of UK needs" estimate in the first
article is actually about 1%, or even less.

So, thanks again, but I hate those types of airy-fairy, wishful articles
because they can do the alternative energy industry a great disservice by
providing ammunition to the opponents.

Just for the record, I do have some recent experience in tidal turbine
modelling: I'm not being negative because I am opposed to renewable
energy on principle.

"Modeling passive variable pitch cross flow hydrokinetic turbines to maximize
performance and smooth operation",
L. Lazauskas and B.K. Kirke, Renewable Energy, Vol. 45, Sept. 2012, pp. 41-50.

"Limitations of fixed pitch Darrieus hydrokinetic turbines and the challenge
of variable pitch",
B.K. Kirke and L. Lazauskas, Renewable Energy, Vol. 36, No. 3, Mar. 2011.

"Variable pitch Darrieus water turbines",
B.K. Kirke and L. Lazauskas, J. Fluid Science and Tech., Vol. 3, No. 3, June
2008, pp. 430-438.

 

Thanks Leo, and good work on the modelling. Nice to know the subject is taken seriously your side of the world.

On the constuction cost side, it will depend on the scheme, after all no one has fully decomissioned (or properly cotsed) a nuclear facility.....and the first phase at Dounreay is 90 odd years! The costs for gas powered are known in terms of the hardware and running, bar the fuel cost. The same would be pretty much true with wood chip/pellet/biomass which is not a bad alternative, and pretty efficient (90%+) at source. The Swedes are using a lot of coppiced willow as fuel 130,000 hectares + as of a few years ago.

The Rance scheme is well documented but they do have the advantage of fairly clear water in terms of sediment, unlike the proposed Severn barrage. Also the environmental impact has been very minor in that case. You will also be aware of the massive T shaped facility the Chinese are building (a Dutch design) to create tidal height variation sufficient to generate power from turbines across the long part of the T. Scale wise this is 3Km long to generate enough difference.

There are a few other ways to harness tidal energy other than directly exposing a turbine (no matter how efficient) to sea water. The other technology that would make a massive difference would be a 'Grid Battery'. I know a £10m prototype was built (in the UK) about 10 years ago, but I'm afraid I have not kept up with it.

Even if you got 30-35% efficiency out of tidal energy overall, directly (as delivered) to the consumer, you would equal the current Grid system in the UK. Not much better than an internal combustion engne or at least the one transporting you down the road....

The consistency and predictability of tidal energy is one of the most attractive things about it. However it is a harsh environment, as I'm sure some of our offshore wind turbine guys have and are finding out.....

 

Yes, the nuclear industry has often been very deceptive and
duplicitous about costs. There are many in the alternative
energy field who are doing exactly the same.

Hard to say, because we still don't know how many installations are
required. Are the estimates of the potential available power in the
articles you linked to based on putting them all around the island
or just a few locations?

Debatable. There has been an improvement since construction, but the
"environment" changed. Some species disappeared completely and others
filled the niches.
The barrage has caused silting of the Rance ecosystem. Some articles
and presentations I have read gloss over that aspect. It's that kind of
deceptive sneaky behaviour that does the industry a disservice.

That is certainly an advantage over wind turbines where one has to
contend with great variability, and also design for 1 in 100 year wind
gusts etc.

 

Today we can observe the third industrial revolution in all spheres of our lives. It's just that we don't pay attention to it and it's not right.
Today's world is changing, alternative fuel sources are being used on a larger scale.
And for some reason it seems to me that solar energy will not be the only one, because there are many different types of alternative energy, namely: kinetic energy of air masses (wind), the kinetic energy of water flow (rivers), the energy of tides, heat energy of hot springs, alternative energy also includes heat production in the process of burning renewable fuel - biogas, bioethanol, fuel pellets, etc.
The industrial revolution is leading to great changes in all spheres. You can read a little explanation about this process in different periods.
I think that soon the boat construction industry will change very much and we will be surprised by such changes for a long time.

 

Good to bring a potential solutions thread back to life William, thanks !

 

For some reason, it seemed to me that now this topic is more relevant than it was 4 years ago. I think during these 4 years many important things have happened, which are creating the third industrial revolution.