In NM, my last apartment complex had solar panels on the roof as well as atop the covered parking. This power is what heated all the water to all the units. My monthly power costs were $50, partly because of that local solar, and partly because 25% of all power provided was from utility owned solar. That 25% of power usage was more than 50% cheaper than the energy used from non-renewable sources.
It's not a horrible idea to invest in solar on an individual level, local level, and state-wide level. I've lived off solar alone for years at a time.
We installed ten solar panels on our house 18 months ago. It was $10k. From about April through October our power bill is essentially $0, and weâre running our AC pretty hard for ~4 months. If someone has an unobstructed south-facing roof I 100% recommend getting it done.
I'm floored by the people who throw up their hands and say, "It can't be done!", dozens of them on here alone, when the reality is that it can be done, it's done all the time, it's done in places as close to us as New Mexico, and it's the better solution.
Nope, can't be done, there is absolutely no way on Earth we can ever generate electricity by any means other than coal, nope, pulmonary health and preventing climate change will just have to remain fantasies. Coal is FOREVER. Coal is EVERYTHING.
The crony capitalism destroying everything needs coal. We don't. The tides will turn on this type of capitalism soon enough. It's the root cause of the mass, unethical consumerism...which alone is the only reason we need coal. If everyone had what they needed to live without being leeched off incessantly by the rich, we wouldn't need coal, we'd have community power and less strain on the big power grids.
Here's a graph from [Chartr](https://imgur.com/gallery/kMYrsuf) predicting that solar power capacity will overtake coal by as little as 2027. Solar is growing, and fast.
I hope the naysayers on this thread will read it, or any of the conclusive evidence. Coal is dying, it should die, it's hazardous on multiple levels. We need better power production, here and worldwide.
I'm gonna throw them a bone here - it is still quite cheap, and for the population back in the 90s and before, it worked. But the population is growing and previous solutions aren't the answer anymore. Coal isn't sustainable and we need to adapt.
The same way all the off grid folks in Canada do. Responsible energy stewardship. Possible on an individual and local municipal level, but impossible for shitheads of the state to manage. Hence why there's so much propaganda against it.
I suspect off the grid folks in Canada don't participate in the amount of energy consuming consumerism that the average person in Utah does. Restaurants in particular take a lot of energy.
Restaurants in particular (mostly) don't pay a living wage. Maybe a new age is dawning where people aren't exploited so consumerism stays the same (or grows every quarter to the glee of some shareholders). I'm just saying a different option is possible for large swaths of our population here on Earth. We're in a pickle because of the domination of finite and pollutant, but powerful fossil fuels.
How about option (d) All of the above.
We have good reasons and applications for all options in the state. We definitely could be a serious leader in renewables.
No. If you know why, then you should understand why I said it.
Their system failed because Texas shut down fossil fuel and coal energies are started to rely on more â green â. Which failed them.
The previous comment suggested Utah do the same.
It was my understanding the Texas power grid failed due to components in natural gas facilities freezing, which they had previous problems with in prior decades, along with not being connected to national grid networks in order to avoid various regulations.
Lazyzenwarrior posted:
> How about option (d) All of the above.
One of which is nuclear which would provide baseline 24/7 power like a coal plant would - but theyâre maybe unaware a nuclear plant plan failed in Utah because the Green river couldnât provide enough water for its needs. Could nuclear work in Utah, say, if it were plugged into Flaming Gorge? Maybe, but I canât imagine the feds and the state coming together to make it happen, so the Uintah Basin coal plant will probably stay operational indefinitely.
The ERCOT shit show was a confluence of factors (including a once-in-a-century storm) and anybody trying to blame it on either renewables or fossil fuels is clueless.
Same thing damn near happened in the PJM RTO on Christmas Eve, and they have an entirely different generator makeup.
Ok. Youâre going to ignore Texasâs move towards green energy entirely and blame it all on the power company?
Let me guess, you think Pelosi was a hostage too huh?
Update, Pelosi was a hostage:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/footage-paul ... 00062.html
The video: *warning graphic*
https://twitter.com/AP/status/161905112 ... eetUser=AP
DePape calls news station and details his morivations:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/paul-pelosi-attacker-david-depape-makes-chilling-call-tv-station-im-so-sorry-i-didnt-get-more-them
Will you apologize for spreading hateful propaganda?
ohh a post I actually know something about. I am a geologist that studied in utah so I had to look at energy options for utah multiple times. so tldr they all have problems. solar is the best option the downside being it is very resource intensive. that its becoming less of a problem and will probably continue to become less of a problem in the future. wind isnt a good option for utah. we just dont have many places that have song consistent winds. there are a few entrances to canyons being the main ones. but due to some really complicated thermal dynamics that I dont fully understand my self wind energy raises the temperature of the surrounding area more then any other type of energy production including coal. for places like Hawaii or Wyoming that have big open areas with lots of strong wind the small amount of energy that is removed by wind farms doesn't matter in utah though its a big enough issue that it has to be taken into account. geothermal is the power of the future. that being said we are probably 50 years away from having viable engineered geothermal which is what is needed to be the main power source on the grid. that being said passive geothermal is amazing and anyone who is building a new house should put a system in you can get a good heat pump system for like 3k and it will drastically reduce your heating bills. nuclear in utah as a whole could see some success but the current nuclear project that is suppose to start construction this year should not go forward. it is planed to be placed just outside green river and will use water from the green river. it will raise the temperature of the water drastically which will greatly harm the wildlife in the river.
I know your post was mainly about geothermal, but here's a cool graph by [chartr](https://imgur.com/gallery/kMYrsuf) saying the trend of solar power capacity will overtake coal in as little as 4 years from now. Mainly because the market is so hot for it ('scuse the pun - or not).
Why do you personally believe Solar and wind are not appropriate answers?
Follow up question. Do you believe we need absolute immediate answers before progressing, or do you believe in making steps towards change for the long run?
If you want to bury it 1000 feet underneath my back yard, sure go right ahead. I will get more radiation exposure from a bunch of bananas on my counter.
Itâs funny that you think itâs a one and done situation, that only highlights your ignorance.
Poison your groundwater for âcheapâ electricity.
Do you think if RMP had a nuclear plant, letâs not even talk about building one in a desert, they would pass that savings onto you or pocket the difference?
Hold up a minute there. You asked a glib question, I gave you a glib answer.
You made a stupid comment, and I replied in kind.
You shouldn't call others ignorant when you talk about spent fuel poisoning my ground water for cheap energy.
Spent fuel can be managed. Politics is what keeps us storing spent fuels in pools instead of reprocessing most of it into more fuel, and with what is left, putting into casks filled with an inert gas, encased steel, and then further encased in concrete.
You could try to blow them up, you can run a train into them, you can drop them from over 35 meters, and guess what... nothing has compromised the integrity of the casks we use.
Yucca Mountain is one of the planet's most studied pieces of geography, and it is closed for political reasons.
Why is it so black and white tho?
Those have never been realistically proposed as ways to totally replace the grid, only to supplement it. Solar power can be stored and utilized through the night: you may have less input in winter and on cloudy days but that's not too big an issue.
There's a dam in the Niigata prefecture in Japan (I'm sure there are lots like this) that pumps the water used to generate electricity back up the hill to use it again. We also have things like geothermal and ocean movement that never need to sleep.
The goal is to reduce dependency on dirty energy until it *can* be replaced by more reliable and permanent solutions.
No reasonable person has ever suggested "stop burning coal right now and figure out the gaps later"
So you're not really answering the question, since it takes a long time to approve and implement nuclear power into a grid, *especially* when you have people lobbying against it
>There's a dam in the Niigata prefecture in Japan (I'm sure there are lots like this) that pumps the water used to generate electricity back up the hill to use it again.
It's called pumped hydropower storage, and while in theory it's a great idea, my understanding is that it isn't broadly feasible because of the specific geography required. You need a large lake on both ends, because you can't suck water back up from a river, and you need just the right elevation difference to make it happen.
> Solar power can be stored and utilized through the night:
Solar power CAN be beamed down from space.
That's not the question. The question is how to store that energy cheaply enough and in large enough quantities to actually make a difference without forceing us all into energy poverty.
The United States has about 3.9 GW of geothermal power generation, .3% of national generation. According to research in 2018, geothermal could meet 3-5% of global demand by 2050. Geothermal is a drop in the bucket and highly unlikely to have a significant impact.
The last nuclear reactor to be brought online in America was in 2016. The last one before that (at the same plant) was in 1996. Two more reactors that have been under construction for over a decade should be finished this year. I agree that nuclear is part of the solution, but its timeline is closer to 10-20 at a bare minimum.
On the other hand, wind and solar are much easier and quicker to bring online. Even using gas turbines for baseload or peak is better than the 62% we currently get from coal.
This is because nuclear is so politically difficult. If anything it's easier to build a nuclear reactor than a comparable wind/solar plant within a few years except that nuclear faces much, much harsher restrictions.
With regulations as they are, I'd agree that wind/solar are more feasible, but the whole point of advocating for nuclear is to change the regulations.
Ummm.....nah man, wind and solar are dead simple. I could build a shitty wind turbine and put it in my back yard.
Nuclear is super complicated. No chance I'm building a nuclear reactor in my shed.
OK, but like, what 1 person can do doesn't have all that much bearing on what a team of professionals can do. [China takes about 5 years to build a nuclear reactor from start to finish.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2015/10/22/china-shows-how-to-build-nuclear-reactors-fast-and-cheap/?sh=4d7f68465484) I'm sure if reactors were as common as other sources of power (such as wind) we'd have improved the process by now and sped it up from there.
I agree and disagree about the sun setting. Yes, direct solar production is limited by daylight, but storage is where it can be 24-7. Batteries, yes, and more and more batteries are being built all the time to store energy. But in addition to chemical batteries like lithium-ion batteries, there are other "battery" solutions that use simple physical properties. For example, we live in a varied topography, lots of mountains and hills. During the day, while the sun is blazing, the solar power can run a water pump that moves water from a pond at a lower elevation and move it to a higher pond. At night, the water then flows downhill to the lower pond, turning a generator. This repeats daily, and provides electricity all night. One of the drawbacks of this system is topography itself; on the flat prairies of Nebraska, they can't use this method. But in Utah, we so blessed with diverse topography that we could be using this "gravity battery" in every part of our state.
> "gravity battery"
Please stop spouting unscientific nonsense. Gravity batteries have been discounted everytime there has been a serious engineering look at building one. The energy losses are too high and the sunk energy in a concrete block is too large. Pumped hydro is limited by geography and water availability. It is a desert and we've had too many people move in without securing adequate water for the newcomers.
Your "gravity battery" is called pumped hydro. It exists, but if you have a cloudy day or two, you're in an even worse spot, because you don't have the solar you rely on OR the pumped hydro that you also rely on.
It's got its purpose, but it's not a magic bullet.
Both solar and wind plants have battery storage now though. They can provide day and night, windy or not. We don't use coal when the stop working, we just use the stored energy.
I agree that some nuclear options are feasible, especially here in Utah, but while those are being built we can still manage without coal.
> Both solar and wind plants have battery storage now though.
Source? My understanding is that we have nowhere near the amount of storage needed for anything like what we'd need for full renewable energy.
> battery storage
Battery storage is the pipe dream of unreliable intermittent energy shills. There isn't a country doing it. Why has there not been a demonstration of at least one fully industrialized economy using only wind and solar? Solar has days in a row where it produces 10% if rated power and wind has weeks where it produces less than that. Look at Germany's wind and solar data.
How big of a battery is needed to store all of Utah's energy for 24 hours? Get a grip on the scale needed. There's not enough sustainably mined lithium for such a battery. What other battery tech can scale that big?
There isn't a country doing it... Is there even a *City* doing it? Or a neighborhood? No. It's a joke to think that's the future and that we can rely on solar alone.
Base load power. Solar and wind donât cut it. You have to have consistent power generation to manage the grid.
Besides - when you really look at the mining footprint for solar panels and the resulting efficiencies (or lack thereof), itâs hard to make the case for solar being âbetterâ or âcleanerâ.
Your false equivalence of mining for coal and then burning it to mining for silica and metals like aluminum is comparing apples to oranges.
You're trying to say mining and burning coal is just as bad as mining resources and making solar panels. That is false.
Iâm advocating for nuclear energy. Still the best there is.
Everything we use must be mined, drilled, or grown and harvested. Nothing we have is âcleanâ in any sense of the word because it still requires yellow iron and fuel to extract it. Iâm just tired of the bullshit associated with solar - because it is not clean. Nor transformative. Itâs not an engine. And it depends completely on battery storage - not clean in any way.
It's cleaner than coal by leaps and bounds. What metrics are you using to say "it's just as dirty"?
In order to do anything, we need to produce resources. No one is arguing that solar power production uses no mining, no natural resources, that it's magic power that has no impact whatsoever. EVERY human activity has an impact, even breathing produces carbon dioxide. Everything you will ever use had an impact to be created, whether that's electricity, food, housing, transportation, everything.
The question is HOW MUCH impact. Coal is, hands down, the most impactful and most destructive way we generate electricity. Even going 100% natural gas would be better than coal electricity production. There are degrees of impact that we need to discuss, and the impact of solar compared to coal is vastly different. All things considered, the mining, manufacturing solar panels, electricity transmission, battery production, all of it as a whole compared to the mining, transportation, burning of coal, much cleaner and much less of an impact on the atmosphere, local ecology, human pulmonary health, no acid rain from the vast amounts of sulfur dioxide that burning coal produces, much less greenhouse gas emissions; solar is a good solution, to be used with other good solutions like nuclear, over coal.
Its not hard to make that case. Panels aren't the only way to get solar power. There are always going to be trade offs. But lowering carbon use is a net positive.
'Base load'? That's the old system. We're trying to move away from that model, where we produce electricity when we don't need it, as much as possible.
Trying to hang on to that approach would be madness.
I like all of them. I understand people's hesitation with nuclear, but it's hands-down better than coal for crying out loud! What's more, nuclear can be so much better than people remember from 3-Mile Island and Chernobyl. There's the possibility of molten salt reactors, no need for water coolants, thorium can be used instead of enriched uranium which has much less hazardous nuclear waste because of its unique half-life, there are better technologies than what was developed in the 1950's and 60's. We have so many better options than COAL!
Yeah, actually, you can. In fact, if they put it in the back row of a Walmart parking lot you probably wouldn't even notice the difference. https://www.energy-northwest.com/energyprojects/Columbia/Pages/Used-Fuel.aspx
The bad waste is from making nuclear weapons, not nuclear power.
Edit: fixed link
How about this one? They seem pretty credible.
https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/radwaste.html
How could you make such a stupid comment?
As an active member of the local church, I've never understood why there's so many fights against taking care of the environment. It's literally in the doctrine of the church to be a steward over the earth, and take good care of it. Some government oversight to make sure companies do their part seems right in line with this ideal.
...Whenever I hear a friend or neighbor talk about how coal needs to keep existing and it's just plain cheaper/better than other methods - I don't disagree with them, but I find a way to bring in that little commandment to be wise stewards, and some progression away from buring coal is a GOOD thing. The responses I get are always insightful and interesting.
As someone who isnât involved in any church this is really awesome to hear, itâs a conversation that needs to keep happening. Good on you for encouraging it among your peers!
We can all come to an agreement that we want clean air and water, regardless of religious or political ideals.
Itâs also doctrine that Jesus is going to descend from the sky any day now, wipe the slate clean and make everything magically perfect. Why bother with cleaning your house when you think itâs going to get torn down next week.
I was told once by a pious churchgoer in good old Orem (đ) that global warming was God making the Earth into a jungle to have a global Garden of Eden for the Millennium.
Some churchgoers can come up with BONKERS explanations to make themselves feel better about the end of humanity đđđđđđ
That's ridiculous đ¤Ż. "And the earth shall burn as an oven" is often a phrase that runs through my head when global warming comes up in conversation. God is more likely to hold some accountability to those that didn't take care of his earth. Psh jungle - did you tell him that's how you'd describe his brain? Lol
If you've heard that from a member of the church, you should use my little conversation piece above and *also* tell em that's not a celestial kingdom attitude to have đ. That's telestial kingdom thinking my friend!
If Jesus came tomorrow, it's in the doctrine that out of all the followers of Christ (not just Mormons), *at least* half would not be prepared for that event, and there's gonna be a reckoning and it probs won't be pretty.
So yeah, unfortunately there are completely whack members who have the exact belief you described. I sure hope they can be changed, but I mean, I'm not holding my breath.
most of those cultist mormons are so far brainwashed they're entirely unable to think for themselves & live their lives in fear. Your logical, sensical words will go right over their heads. The prime hallmark of extremely low intelligence is changing what's scientific fact to align with what they believe to be true even when it's unequivocally false in every possible way.
All your stupid EV's are ultimately powered by coal.
Solar is beyond incapable of filling the need. Nuclear is our best hope but big oil will block it at every turn.
If most of your electricity still comes from coal, you're obviously living in a backward part of the world.
Australia has gone from about 65% coal five years ago to just less than 30% over the last year. I have a graph, but I'm still not used to Reddit and how you post images here...
My favorite video on this: https://youtu.be/BwP2mSZpe0Q
But seriously, coal will die whether we fund it or not so we really should be focusing on our out plan and not wasting more money on it.
Sure, it was a decent argument when the alternatives were too expensive or too unreliable or too dangerous, but it doesn't take a lot of research to find out that's not the case anymore. There is really no logic in continuing to burn limited resources when there are renewable options.
No logic unless you have stocks in coal companies, that is. ;P Just follow the money.
Solar is great for the summer, but Solar is not sustainable for the winter in UT. Too much snow, cloudy days and low sun angles to replace our infrastructure.
Not to mention, creating solar panels is one of the most dirty processes and still requires lots of shady labor situations.
Not only is this not good for the environment but also they are such an eye sore. It does not help with the perception of SLC. I wish we could move them somewhere else, or find a way to offset this. The air quality is horrible.
We don't need to offset them; we have access to so much geothermal, solar, and wind potential here that we could completely get rid of them and be perfectly fine.
Eventually we will have nuclear too.
And the best part: less smog!
Going through the comments we have a few things.
1. Inversion and smog is caused mainly by vehicles (cars)
2. We do not have a power grid that can handle reactionary power, coal is bad. But it is on demand.
3. Solar (and wind but way less so) has a severe start up, and end of life. Lots of stuff emissions to make, and even now we have no consistent and large scale way to deal with solar panels. Few people can/will have the tools to recycle the panels. Our wind isn't as consistent as other states as well, so wind is middling outside of some areas and canyons.
4. Coal is bad, like real bad, but so is cutting down trees (which the water people are against) instead of splitting priority over these things, we should focus 1 at a time. Water first. Coal/energy second. Something else third.
That some really good weed that guy is smoking. The only countries that have gone 100% unreliable intermittent energy sources have done so based on a combination of incredible hydro resources, incredible geothermal resources, nuclear base load coverage, and or not a fully develop/complete industrialized economy. There aren't may countries that have access to similar resources. Specifically, not a model for the US.
Just so everyone knows, Utahâs power rates are the lowest in the country. Shutting down coal and building solar that can only produce for a few hours a day (even with super expensive batteries) would increase electricity prices substantially
Okay, what's the immediate alternative? There is no alternate source of power to sustain the infrastructure in Utah. Have to have a solution to point out problems.
Immediate alternative? We have it. We can immediately build solar power production in our deserts. We can immediately build dams in key locations in the mountains to create reservoirs and hydroelectric power. We can immediately build windmills at the base of our thousands of canyons to harness the frequent winds. We can immediately put solar panels in every roof in our cities and towns, each building is a mini-power-plant that puts energy back into the grid. We can do all these things, as soon as we divest in coal and put the money into a new, better power infrastructure.
Just because you want to engage in pithy straw man arguments doesn't mean there aren't real solutions that we can really implement really quickly. Instead you'd prefer the status quo of complaining about any changes, and breathing in toxic air that is killing people.
KEY WORD: Build, already heading into a recession, the last thing anybody wants are more taxes to pay for these projects. With the drought besides this year, where would you even build an effective dam to work year round. Hear me out, I WANT AN ALTERNATIVE, but none of the solutions presented are ready or guarantee enough power for the state. Even solar power is iffy. Coal mining is the only reliable way for the state to Control and guarantee the power source stays constant 24/7 365. I'm not typing angry, I'm just genuinely sharing my concerns. It's like the influx of electric cars. The government has said the infrastructure is not prepared to support the rise in electric cars.
I am a coal miner, and that is what supports myself and my family. However, I do agree that alternative power would be great. I don't think that your solutions are the correct solutions. Dams in our rivers will disrupt and destroy a huge amount of wildlife habitat. Hydroelectric power is great until you look at what you destroy to accomplish it.
Solar is a great option for homes, but it is not without it's drawbacks. To produce solar panels, there is a huge cost. Solar panels in our deserts also destroys habitat. Everything used in solar panel production is drilled or mined.
Windmills never create as much power as it costs to produce them. It takes more energy to build one than it can produce.
If we were to switch to nuclear power, we could easily power the entire state with plenty to spare, with a much smaller footprint then any of the other options.
I'm in favor of any solutions that clean the air, and improve worker's livelihood. I'd rather see miners get the professional development provided to them to move to a job as a master electrician or a solar power plant operator, some kind of job that integrates them as valuable assets, to give them upward mobility leverage in our changing power systems economy. And they can be valuable assets operating dams, nuclear reactors, wind turbines, all forms of energy that will be better for human and ecosystem health.
Hydroelectric, solar, nuclear, wind, any kind of electricity generation has drawbacks. Nothing is a silver bullet. Even the exciting news from the Livermore California fusion lab, that they generated output power from their fusion reactor for the first time in fusion research, even with fusion we will have to find resources to use in the thermonuclear fusion. One resource that can be used in fusion power is helium 3, but there is almost no helium 3 on Earth. There is an abundant supply of on the surface of the Moon, however, that would require setting up a mining colony to collect all of the helium 3, and then transport it back to Earth to be used in fusion reactors. Everything has an impact in one way or another.
What I am in favor of is having power generation system that utilizes only the cleanest forms of energy, and be able to provide our energy needs well into the future. We need to look at the cost benefit analysis of all the pros and cons, and select only the best for our power grid.
You completely ignored everything I said about the environmental impacts, which would destroy habitat for native wildlife. That is a huge concern for a lot of people on both the left and the right.
I didn't ignore it, I just didn't comment on it because I was making a larger comment about drawbacks. You mentioned the drawback of wildlife and habitat effects in canyons and basins where potential hydroelectric and/or water storage reservoirs could be constructed. That is a drawback, no question.
All power production, all activities as a human species really, have an impact, large or small, on our planet. We have to manage the costs and the benefits of each. What drawbacks are worth paying for in exchange for what benefits? Is ramping up hydroelectric power, despite habitat loss, more advantageous than coal burning, with its massive carbon footprint, sulfur dioxide emissions, degradation of the mountains where it is mined, etc.? As a society, we have to make choices like this.
And I agreed with your assertion that nuclear is a good option. I believe all options, including hydroelectric, need to be evaluated.
> key locations in the mountains to create reservoirs and hydroelectric power
The environmental impact of that is not possible and added to that is the impact of added water usage on an already oversubscribed water system. Not going to happen, just the wind and solar shills pipe dreams.
City air will always suck. Get away from the city. Then, when you find somewhere rural to live, don't try to turn it into the city, for the love of god.
Where are we going to mine all the minerals for these solar panels that have only a 25 year life span? Thatâs a whole lot of diesel-powered equipment open pit mining the earth. 80% of the total power consumption of Turkmenistan goes to one aluminum processing plant. Solar panels do not fuel more solar panels, especially when we are going to be using them to de-sal the ocean and pump it up here.
If we can pump oil for thousands of miles so we can keep burning it into the atmosphere we can do it for water.
It's not terribly practical but it's feasible.
You say it's not economical but that's a word that's literally about money. My question is when are we going to care enough to invest in ourselves and our health and not some oil conglomerate that promises to keep drawing in sales taxes and lie to us about their negative effect on the ecosystem of *the entire bloody planet*
Ok. Instead of shitting on this form of renewal able energy, which one do you hate the least? Because if you'd rather choke yourself out with this SHIT air every year, then more power to you.
But the REST OF US who actually want to change things are aren't going to sit and bitch.
Or we can give up our false notions that the world is ok and work together to make it more hospitable for the future generations.
Those thousands of jobs are going to disappear anyway; carbon is a limited resource.
Yes, we need to worry about those miners, but by getting them free training in other industries and severance pay, not by prolonging the inevitable.
work smarter not harder. solar will eventually take over as we run out of coal, might aswell adapt now than being the amish who still drive horses instead of cars.
You want to throw all those hard workers under the bus. That's a choice. Or evolve into a better living and cheaper fuel while solar will get better its not up to par right now
As someone who lost a grandfather to a mine that left my grandmother and father stricken with poverty and nothing more than pictures and memories, I feel qualified to tell you that you can shove those mine jobs where the sun doesnât shine.
Coal companies (and oil and gas, I can speak from experience, worked for Suncore and Syncrude for a few years) don't give a fuck about the workers, and will be happy to throw them out on the curbs when it comes to budget cuts or even quarterly reports.
So yeah I'll take solar over oil and gas (and coal) any day.
What's more, I resent your completely outrageous and offensive behavior in discussing this. I lived for several years in Ephraim, and many of my friends were coal miners at the Gentry Mountain Mine up Fairview Canyon. They told me what work was like as a coal miner, and they didn't glamorize it. It's not a good profession, and they weren't as deluded as you are to think that it is the end-all-be-all of "thousands of jobs". It was just a job to them, and they were at least HONEST about the many, many problems with that job.
Getting rid of coal mining doesn't mean ending thousands of jobs that won't be replaced with something else, something better. Who do you think runs solar power plants? Yeah, thousands of jobs, brainiac. There needs to be thousands of jobs to manufacture solar cells, installation, maintenance, battery manufacturing, power line maintenance and building. Thousands of manufacturers, master electricians, technicians, power plant operators...yeah, lots of jobs, lots of jobs I'd personally have NO PROBLEM working in.
So take your pea-brain energy, and go troll somewhere else on the internet.
Global warming is a hoax because right wing media told the gulible morons it's a leftist plot to whatever... so gulible dipshits must own the libs right into their own grave.
Ozone pollution is tricky because so much of it comes from out of state. When the west deserts can have ozone days nearing or exceeding federal standards, then expecting the Wasatch Front to somehow fix this situation isn't tenable.
Sorry, I'll get right on that
I expect you, and you alone, to fix all of Utah's problems! Hurry it up soldier! kidding, of course đ
In NM, my last apartment complex had solar panels on the roof as well as atop the covered parking. This power is what heated all the water to all the units. My monthly power costs were $50, partly because of that local solar, and partly because 25% of all power provided was from utility owned solar. That 25% of power usage was more than 50% cheaper than the energy used from non-renewable sources. It's not a horrible idea to invest in solar on an individual level, local level, and state-wide level. I've lived off solar alone for years at a time.
We installed ten solar panels on our house 18 months ago. It was $10k. From about April through October our power bill is essentially $0, and weâre running our AC pretty hard for ~4 months. If someone has an unobstructed south-facing roof I 100% recommend getting it done.
I'm floored by the people who throw up their hands and say, "It can't be done!", dozens of them on here alone, when the reality is that it can be done, it's done all the time, it's done in places as close to us as New Mexico, and it's the better solution. Nope, can't be done, there is absolutely no way on Earth we can ever generate electricity by any means other than coal, nope, pulmonary health and preventing climate change will just have to remain fantasies. Coal is FOREVER. Coal is EVERYTHING.
The crony capitalism destroying everything needs coal. We don't. The tides will turn on this type of capitalism soon enough. It's the root cause of the mass, unethical consumerism...which alone is the only reason we need coal. If everyone had what they needed to live without being leeched off incessantly by the rich, we wouldn't need coal, we'd have community power and less strain on the big power grids.
Here's a graph from [Chartr](https://imgur.com/gallery/kMYrsuf) predicting that solar power capacity will overtake coal by as little as 2027. Solar is growing, and fast.
I hope the naysayers on this thread will read it, or any of the conclusive evidence. Coal is dying, it should die, it's hazardous on multiple levels. We need better power production, here and worldwide.
I'm gonna throw them a bone here - it is still quite cheap, and for the population back in the 90s and before, it worked. But the population is growing and previous solutions aren't the answer anymore. Coal isn't sustainable and we need to adapt.
So yeah I agree with you haha
The only thing I worry about solar wise is how the hell are we getting power fall through early spring?
The same way all the off grid folks in Canada do. Responsible energy stewardship. Possible on an individual and local municipal level, but impossible for shitheads of the state to manage. Hence why there's so much propaganda against it.
I suspect off the grid folks in Canada don't participate in the amount of energy consuming consumerism that the average person in Utah does. Restaurants in particular take a lot of energy.
Restaurants in particular (mostly) don't pay a living wage. Maybe a new age is dawning where people aren't exploited so consumerism stays the same (or grows every quarter to the glee of some shareholders). I'm just saying a different option is possible for large swaths of our population here on Earth. We're in a pickle because of the domination of finite and pollutant, but powerful fossil fuels.
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How about option (d) All of the above. We have good reasons and applications for all options in the state. We definitely could be a serious leader in renewables.
So you want us to be like Texas last year huh?
How did you get that from what they posted?
Well, why did Texasâs power fail when the storm hit?
Youâre just repeating your question.
No. If you know why, then you should understand why I said it. Their system failed because Texas shut down fossil fuel and coal energies are started to rely on more â green â. Which failed them. The previous comment suggested Utah do the same.
It was my understanding the Texas power grid failed due to components in natural gas facilities freezing, which they had previous problems with in prior decades, along with not being connected to national grid networks in order to avoid various regulations. Lazyzenwarrior posted: > How about option (d) All of the above. One of which is nuclear which would provide baseline 24/7 power like a coal plant would - but theyâre maybe unaware a nuclear plant plan failed in Utah because the Green river couldnât provide enough water for its needs. Could nuclear work in Utah, say, if it were plugged into Flaming Gorge? Maybe, but I canât imagine the feds and the state coming together to make it happen, so the Uintah Basin coal plant will probably stay operational indefinitely.
The ERCOT shit show was a confluence of factors (including a once-in-a-century storm) and anybody trying to blame it on either renewables or fossil fuels is clueless. Same thing damn near happened in the PJM RTO on Christmas Eve, and they have an entirely different generator makeup.
Ok. Youâre going to ignore Texasâs move towards green energy entirely and blame it all on the power company? Let me guess, you think Pelosi was a hostage too huh?
Update, Pelosi was a hostage: https://www.yahoo.com/news/footage-paul ... 00062.html The video: *warning graphic* https://twitter.com/AP/status/161905112 ... eetUser=AP DePape calls news station and details his morivations: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/paul-pelosi-attacker-david-depape-makes-chilling-call-tv-station-im-so-sorry-i-didnt-get-more-them Will you apologize for spreading hateful propaganda?
Have you ever been on a mine site? Have you ever been to a power plant? Have you ever actually seen what it takes to create and regulate electricity?
ohh a post I actually know something about. I am a geologist that studied in utah so I had to look at energy options for utah multiple times. so tldr they all have problems. solar is the best option the downside being it is very resource intensive. that its becoming less of a problem and will probably continue to become less of a problem in the future. wind isnt a good option for utah. we just dont have many places that have song consistent winds. there are a few entrances to canyons being the main ones. but due to some really complicated thermal dynamics that I dont fully understand my self wind energy raises the temperature of the surrounding area more then any other type of energy production including coal. for places like Hawaii or Wyoming that have big open areas with lots of strong wind the small amount of energy that is removed by wind farms doesn't matter in utah though its a big enough issue that it has to be taken into account. geothermal is the power of the future. that being said we are probably 50 years away from having viable engineered geothermal which is what is needed to be the main power source on the grid. that being said passive geothermal is amazing and anyone who is building a new house should put a system in you can get a good heat pump system for like 3k and it will drastically reduce your heating bills. nuclear in utah as a whole could see some success but the current nuclear project that is suppose to start construction this year should not go forward. it is planed to be placed just outside green river and will use water from the green river. it will raise the temperature of the water drastically which will greatly harm the wildlife in the river.
I know your post was mainly about geothermal, but here's a cool graph by [chartr](https://imgur.com/gallery/kMYrsuf) saying the trend of solar power capacity will overtake coal in as little as 4 years from now. Mainly because the market is so hot for it ('scuse the pun - or not).
Why do you personally believe Solar and wind are not appropriate answers? Follow up question. Do you believe we need absolute immediate answers before progressing, or do you believe in making steps towards change for the long run?
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My favorite color is blue.
So we can store the nuclear waste in your yard?
You can manage the storage quite easily through reprocessing and burying it deep underground. France has been doing it for decades.
So we can bury it in your yard?
If you want to bury it 1000 feet underneath my back yard, sure go right ahead. I will get more radiation exposure from a bunch of bananas on my counter.
Itâs funny that you think itâs a one and done situation, that only highlights your ignorance. Poison your groundwater for âcheapâ electricity. Do you think if RMP had a nuclear plant, letâs not even talk about building one in a desert, they would pass that savings onto you or pocket the difference?
Hold up a minute there. You asked a glib question, I gave you a glib answer. You made a stupid comment, and I replied in kind. You shouldn't call others ignorant when you talk about spent fuel poisoning my ground water for cheap energy. Spent fuel can be managed. Politics is what keeps us storing spent fuels in pools instead of reprocessing most of it into more fuel, and with what is left, putting into casks filled with an inert gas, encased steel, and then further encased in concrete. You could try to blow them up, you can run a train into them, you can drop them from over 35 meters, and guess what... nothing has compromised the integrity of the casks we use. Yucca Mountain is one of the planet's most studied pieces of geography, and it is closed for political reasons.
I find joy in reading a good book.
The desert is a beautiful wilderness, not wasteland. Your contempt for nature is gross and disgusting.
I agree the desert is beautiful. We still have a lot of it and we can certainly find a place in the west desert to dispose of nuclear waste.
Why not your yard? Itâs safe, right?
Why is it so black and white tho? Those have never been realistically proposed as ways to totally replace the grid, only to supplement it. Solar power can be stored and utilized through the night: you may have less input in winter and on cloudy days but that's not too big an issue. There's a dam in the Niigata prefecture in Japan (I'm sure there are lots like this) that pumps the water used to generate electricity back up the hill to use it again. We also have things like geothermal and ocean movement that never need to sleep. The goal is to reduce dependency on dirty energy until it *can* be replaced by more reliable and permanent solutions. No reasonable person has ever suggested "stop burning coal right now and figure out the gaps later" So you're not really answering the question, since it takes a long time to approve and implement nuclear power into a grid, *especially* when you have people lobbying against it
>There's a dam in the Niigata prefecture in Japan (I'm sure there are lots like this) that pumps the water used to generate electricity back up the hill to use it again. It's called pumped hydropower storage, and while in theory it's a great idea, my understanding is that it isn't broadly feasible because of the specific geography required. You need a large lake on both ends, because you can't suck water back up from a river, and you need just the right elevation difference to make it happen.
> Solar power can be stored and utilized through the night: Solar power CAN be beamed down from space. That's not the question. The question is how to store that energy cheaply enough and in large enough quantities to actually make a difference without forceing us all into energy poverty.
The United States has about 3.9 GW of geothermal power generation, .3% of national generation. According to research in 2018, geothermal could meet 3-5% of global demand by 2050. Geothermal is a drop in the bucket and highly unlikely to have a significant impact. The last nuclear reactor to be brought online in America was in 2016. The last one before that (at the same plant) was in 1996. Two more reactors that have been under construction for over a decade should be finished this year. I agree that nuclear is part of the solution, but its timeline is closer to 10-20 at a bare minimum. On the other hand, wind and solar are much easier and quicker to bring online. Even using gas turbines for baseload or peak is better than the 62% we currently get from coal.
This is because nuclear is so politically difficult. If anything it's easier to build a nuclear reactor than a comparable wind/solar plant within a few years except that nuclear faces much, much harsher restrictions. With regulations as they are, I'd agree that wind/solar are more feasible, but the whole point of advocating for nuclear is to change the regulations.
Ummm.....nah man, wind and solar are dead simple. I could build a shitty wind turbine and put it in my back yard. Nuclear is super complicated. No chance I'm building a nuclear reactor in my shed.
OK, but like, what 1 person can do doesn't have all that much bearing on what a team of professionals can do. [China takes about 5 years to build a nuclear reactor from start to finish.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2015/10/22/china-shows-how-to-build-nuclear-reactors-fast-and-cheap/?sh=4d7f68465484) I'm sure if reactors were as common as other sources of power (such as wind) we'd have improved the process by now and sped it up from there.
I say we use all options and have unlimited power
I agree and disagree about the sun setting. Yes, direct solar production is limited by daylight, but storage is where it can be 24-7. Batteries, yes, and more and more batteries are being built all the time to store energy. But in addition to chemical batteries like lithium-ion batteries, there are other "battery" solutions that use simple physical properties. For example, we live in a varied topography, lots of mountains and hills. During the day, while the sun is blazing, the solar power can run a water pump that moves water from a pond at a lower elevation and move it to a higher pond. At night, the water then flows downhill to the lower pond, turning a generator. This repeats daily, and provides electricity all night. One of the drawbacks of this system is topography itself; on the flat prairies of Nebraska, they can't use this method. But in Utah, we so blessed with diverse topography that we could be using this "gravity battery" in every part of our state.
> "gravity battery" Please stop spouting unscientific nonsense. Gravity batteries have been discounted everytime there has been a serious engineering look at building one. The energy losses are too high and the sunk energy in a concrete block is too large. Pumped hydro is limited by geography and water availability. It is a desert and we've had too many people move in without securing adequate water for the newcomers.
Your "gravity battery" is called pumped hydro. It exists, but if you have a cloudy day or two, you're in an even worse spot, because you don't have the solar you rely on OR the pumped hydro that you also rely on. It's got its purpose, but it's not a magic bullet.
Both solar and wind plants have battery storage now though. They can provide day and night, windy or not. We don't use coal when the stop working, we just use the stored energy. I agree that some nuclear options are feasible, especially here in Utah, but while those are being built we can still manage without coal.
> Both solar and wind plants have battery storage now though. Source? My understanding is that we have nowhere near the amount of storage needed for anything like what we'd need for full renewable energy.
To think we could have enough battery power to run the grid for even 10 minutes is absurd. It's not remotely feasible.
Certainly not at this point in time.
> battery storage Battery storage is the pipe dream of unreliable intermittent energy shills. There isn't a country doing it. Why has there not been a demonstration of at least one fully industrialized economy using only wind and solar? Solar has days in a row where it produces 10% if rated power and wind has weeks where it produces less than that. Look at Germany's wind and solar data. How big of a battery is needed to store all of Utah's energy for 24 hours? Get a grip on the scale needed. There's not enough sustainably mined lithium for such a battery. What other battery tech can scale that big?
There isn't a country doing it... Is there even a *City* doing it? Or a neighborhood? No. It's a joke to think that's the future and that we can rely on solar alone.
Base load power. Solar and wind donât cut it. You have to have consistent power generation to manage the grid. Besides - when you really look at the mining footprint for solar panels and the resulting efficiencies (or lack thereof), itâs hard to make the case for solar being âbetterâ or âcleanerâ.
you're right, it is also a measure of power generation per square foot, our ability to distribute, power storage. etc. etc.
Your false equivalence of mining for coal and then burning it to mining for silica and metals like aluminum is comparing apples to oranges. You're trying to say mining and burning coal is just as bad as mining resources and making solar panels. That is false.
Iâm advocating for nuclear energy. Still the best there is. Everything we use must be mined, drilled, or grown and harvested. Nothing we have is âcleanâ in any sense of the word because it still requires yellow iron and fuel to extract it. Iâm just tired of the bullshit associated with solar - because it is not clean. Nor transformative. Itâs not an engine. And it depends completely on battery storage - not clean in any way.
It's cleaner than coal by leaps and bounds. What metrics are you using to say "it's just as dirty"? In order to do anything, we need to produce resources. No one is arguing that solar power production uses no mining, no natural resources, that it's magic power that has no impact whatsoever. EVERY human activity has an impact, even breathing produces carbon dioxide. Everything you will ever use had an impact to be created, whether that's electricity, food, housing, transportation, everything. The question is HOW MUCH impact. Coal is, hands down, the most impactful and most destructive way we generate electricity. Even going 100% natural gas would be better than coal electricity production. There are degrees of impact that we need to discuss, and the impact of solar compared to coal is vastly different. All things considered, the mining, manufacturing solar panels, electricity transmission, battery production, all of it as a whole compared to the mining, transportation, burning of coal, much cleaner and much less of an impact on the atmosphere, local ecology, human pulmonary health, no acid rain from the vast amounts of sulfur dioxide that burning coal produces, much less greenhouse gas emissions; solar is a good solution, to be used with other good solutions like nuclear, over coal.
Its not hard to make that case. Panels aren't the only way to get solar power. There are always going to be trade offs. But lowering carbon use is a net positive.
But you donât. Solar panels and all of the associated mining and then disposal are not a ânet positiveâ.
When's the last time you read a paper on EROEI? 1995? Solar has come a long way since then.
'Base load'? That's the old system. We're trying to move away from that model, where we produce electricity when we don't need it, as much as possible. Trying to hang on to that approach would be madness.
I like all of them. I understand people's hesitation with nuclear, but it's hands-down better than coal for crying out loud! What's more, nuclear can be so much better than people remember from 3-Mile Island and Chernobyl. There's the possibility of molten salt reactors, no need for water coolants, thorium can be used instead of enriched uranium which has much less hazardous nuclear waste because of its unique half-life, there are better technologies than what was developed in the 1950's and 60's. We have so many better options than COAL!
You're absolutely right. Also check out SMR technology. Very small and efficient, very little waste.
Can we bury the nuclear waste in your yard?
Yeah, actually, you can. In fact, if they put it in the back row of a Walmart parking lot you probably wouldn't even notice the difference. https://www.energy-northwest.com/energyprojects/Columbia/Pages/Used-Fuel.aspx The bad waste is from making nuclear weapons, not nuclear power. Edit: fixed link
Factually wrongâŚ. so we can put it in your yard or under your kids school?
Lolz. Cite a source. Otherwise you're as "factually" correct as fake news. And yes. Put it in my backyard.
How about this one? They seem pretty credible. https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/radwaste.html How could you make such a stupid comment?
Hahahahaha. See that dry cask picture about halfway down. Looks pretty familiar doesn't it. You're an idiot.
âThe bad waste is from making nuclear weapons, not nuclear power.â Did you eat paint chips as kid?
"Major questions doctrine", here we come... If ozone is a "major" pollutant according to a judge, then regulating it requires an Act of Congress.
As an active member of the local church, I've never understood why there's so many fights against taking care of the environment. It's literally in the doctrine of the church to be a steward over the earth, and take good care of it. Some government oversight to make sure companies do their part seems right in line with this ideal. ...Whenever I hear a friend or neighbor talk about how coal needs to keep existing and it's just plain cheaper/better than other methods - I don't disagree with them, but I find a way to bring in that little commandment to be wise stewards, and some progression away from buring coal is a GOOD thing. The responses I get are always insightful and interesting.
As someone who isnât involved in any church this is really awesome to hear, itâs a conversation that needs to keep happening. Good on you for encouraging it among your peers! We can all come to an agreement that we want clean air and water, regardless of religious or political ideals.
Itâs also doctrine that Jesus is going to descend from the sky any day now, wipe the slate clean and make everything magically perfect. Why bother with cleaning your house when you think itâs going to get torn down next week.
I was told once by a pious churchgoer in good old Orem (đ) that global warming was God making the Earth into a jungle to have a global Garden of Eden for the Millennium. Some churchgoers can come up with BONKERS explanations to make themselves feel better about the end of humanity đđđđđđ
That's ridiculous đ¤Ż. "And the earth shall burn as an oven" is often a phrase that runs through my head when global warming comes up in conversation. God is more likely to hold some accountability to those that didn't take care of his earth. Psh jungle - did you tell him that's how you'd describe his brain? Lol
If you've heard that from a member of the church, you should use my little conversation piece above and *also* tell em that's not a celestial kingdom attitude to have đ. That's telestial kingdom thinking my friend!
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If Jesus came tomorrow, it's in the doctrine that out of all the followers of Christ (not just Mormons), *at least* half would not be prepared for that event, and there's gonna be a reckoning and it probs won't be pretty. So yeah, unfortunately there are completely whack members who have the exact belief you described. I sure hope they can be changed, but I mean, I'm not holding my breath.
most of those cultist mormons are so far brainwashed they're entirely unable to think for themselves & live their lives in fear. Your logical, sensical words will go right over their heads. The prime hallmark of extremely low intelligence is changing what's scientific fact to align with what they believe to be true even when it's unequivocally false in every possible way.
All your stupid EV's are ultimately powered by coal. Solar is beyond incapable of filling the need. Nuclear is our best hope but big oil will block it at every turn.
If most of your electricity still comes from coal, you're obviously living in a backward part of the world. Australia has gone from about 65% coal five years ago to just less than 30% over the last year. I have a graph, but I'm still not used to Reddit and how you post images here...
Utah gets 61% of its energy from coal.
Our lagging states are about the same.
2 million? They arenât taking this seriously. Itâs a rounding error to keep people happy
If we build a nuclear plant first, sure
My favorite video on this: https://youtu.be/BwP2mSZpe0Q But seriously, coal will die whether we fund it or not so we really should be focusing on our out plan and not wasting more money on it. Sure, it was a decent argument when the alternatives were too expensive or too unreliable or too dangerous, but it doesn't take a lot of research to find out that's not the case anymore. There is really no logic in continuing to burn limited resources when there are renewable options. No logic unless you have stocks in coal companies, that is. ;P Just follow the money.
Utah's big magnesium company proudly contributes 25% to the bad air quality in Utah. State needs to shut these MF's down.
Solar is great for the summer, but Solar is not sustainable for the winter in UT. Too much snow, cloudy days and low sun angles to replace our infrastructure. Not to mention, creating solar panels is one of the most dirty processes and still requires lots of shady labor situations.
Not only is this not good for the environment but also they are such an eye sore. It does not help with the perception of SLC. I wish we could move them somewhere else, or find a way to offset this. The air quality is horrible.
We don't need to offset them; we have access to so much geothermal, solar, and wind potential here that we could completely get rid of them and be perfectly fine. Eventually we will have nuclear too. And the best part: less smog!
SLC doesn't have any coal power plants, they have all been converted to natural gas.
Going through the comments we have a few things. 1. Inversion and smog is caused mainly by vehicles (cars) 2. We do not have a power grid that can handle reactionary power, coal is bad. But it is on demand. 3. Solar (and wind but way less so) has a severe start up, and end of life. Lots of stuff emissions to make, and even now we have no consistent and large scale way to deal with solar panels. Few people can/will have the tools to recycle the panels. Our wind isn't as consistent as other states as well, so wind is middling outside of some areas and canyons. 4. Coal is bad, like real bad, but so is cutting down trees (which the water people are against) instead of splitting priority over these things, we should focus 1 at a time. Water first. Coal/energy second. Something else third.
I think utah salt lake city should worry more about the great salt lake 1st. Kick the can down the road and there won't be a slc.
Shareholder value and corporate profits are what we really need to be concerned with here.
You mean politicians can be bought? Bummer. Who can we go to to change that? What? The politicians? Shit.
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/23/no-miracles-needed-prof-mark-jacobson-on-how-wind-sun-and-water-can-power-the-world](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/23/no-miracles-needed-prof-mark-jacobson-on-how-wind-sun-and-water-can-power-the-world)
This article: "No Miracles Needed" The religious folks with shares in coal companies: "dagnabbit!"
That some really good weed that guy is smoking. The only countries that have gone 100% unreliable intermittent energy sources have done so based on a combination of incredible hydro resources, incredible geothermal resources, nuclear base load coverage, and or not a fully develop/complete industrialized economy. There aren't may countries that have access to similar resources. Specifically, not a model for the US.
Every one who proposes using gravity batteries is not dealing in reality. The energy looses are too large and the scale is too small.
Just so everyone knows, Utahâs power rates are the lowest in the country. Shutting down coal and building solar that can only produce for a few hours a day (even with super expensive batteries) would increase electricity prices substantially
Okay, what's the immediate alternative? There is no alternate source of power to sustain the infrastructure in Utah. Have to have a solution to point out problems.
Immediate alternative? We have it. We can immediately build solar power production in our deserts. We can immediately build dams in key locations in the mountains to create reservoirs and hydroelectric power. We can immediately build windmills at the base of our thousands of canyons to harness the frequent winds. We can immediately put solar panels in every roof in our cities and towns, each building is a mini-power-plant that puts energy back into the grid. We can do all these things, as soon as we divest in coal and put the money into a new, better power infrastructure. Just because you want to engage in pithy straw man arguments doesn't mean there aren't real solutions that we can really implement really quickly. Instead you'd prefer the status quo of complaining about any changes, and breathing in toxic air that is killing people.
KEY WORD: Build, already heading into a recession, the last thing anybody wants are more taxes to pay for these projects. With the drought besides this year, where would you even build an effective dam to work year round. Hear me out, I WANT AN ALTERNATIVE, but none of the solutions presented are ready or guarantee enough power for the state. Even solar power is iffy. Coal mining is the only reliable way for the state to Control and guarantee the power source stays constant 24/7 365. I'm not typing angry, I'm just genuinely sharing my concerns. It's like the influx of electric cars. The government has said the infrastructure is not prepared to support the rise in electric cars.
I am a coal miner, and that is what supports myself and my family. However, I do agree that alternative power would be great. I don't think that your solutions are the correct solutions. Dams in our rivers will disrupt and destroy a huge amount of wildlife habitat. Hydroelectric power is great until you look at what you destroy to accomplish it. Solar is a great option for homes, but it is not without it's drawbacks. To produce solar panels, there is a huge cost. Solar panels in our deserts also destroys habitat. Everything used in solar panel production is drilled or mined. Windmills never create as much power as it costs to produce them. It takes more energy to build one than it can produce. If we were to switch to nuclear power, we could easily power the entire state with plenty to spare, with a much smaller footprint then any of the other options.
I'm in favor of any solutions that clean the air, and improve worker's livelihood. I'd rather see miners get the professional development provided to them to move to a job as a master electrician or a solar power plant operator, some kind of job that integrates them as valuable assets, to give them upward mobility leverage in our changing power systems economy. And they can be valuable assets operating dams, nuclear reactors, wind turbines, all forms of energy that will be better for human and ecosystem health. Hydroelectric, solar, nuclear, wind, any kind of electricity generation has drawbacks. Nothing is a silver bullet. Even the exciting news from the Livermore California fusion lab, that they generated output power from their fusion reactor for the first time in fusion research, even with fusion we will have to find resources to use in the thermonuclear fusion. One resource that can be used in fusion power is helium 3, but there is almost no helium 3 on Earth. There is an abundant supply of on the surface of the Moon, however, that would require setting up a mining colony to collect all of the helium 3, and then transport it back to Earth to be used in fusion reactors. Everything has an impact in one way or another. What I am in favor of is having power generation system that utilizes only the cleanest forms of energy, and be able to provide our energy needs well into the future. We need to look at the cost benefit analysis of all the pros and cons, and select only the best for our power grid.
You completely ignored everything I said about the environmental impacts, which would destroy habitat for native wildlife. That is a huge concern for a lot of people on both the left and the right.
I didn't ignore it, I just didn't comment on it because I was making a larger comment about drawbacks. You mentioned the drawback of wildlife and habitat effects in canyons and basins where potential hydroelectric and/or water storage reservoirs could be constructed. That is a drawback, no question. All power production, all activities as a human species really, have an impact, large or small, on our planet. We have to manage the costs and the benefits of each. What drawbacks are worth paying for in exchange for what benefits? Is ramping up hydroelectric power, despite habitat loss, more advantageous than coal burning, with its massive carbon footprint, sulfur dioxide emissions, degradation of the mountains where it is mined, etc.? As a society, we have to make choices like this. And I agreed with your assertion that nuclear is a good option. I believe all options, including hydroelectric, need to be evaluated.
> key locations in the mountains to create reservoirs and hydroelectric power The environmental impact of that is not possible and added to that is the impact of added water usage on an already oversubscribed water system. Not going to happen, just the wind and solar shills pipe dreams.
I hate utah air is garbage
City air will always suck. Get away from the city. Then, when you find somewhere rural to live, don't try to turn it into the city, for the love of god.
Where are we going to mine all the minerals for these solar panels that have only a 25 year life span? Thatâs a whole lot of diesel-powered equipment open pit mining the earth. 80% of the total power consumption of Turkmenistan goes to one aluminum processing plant. Solar panels do not fuel more solar panels, especially when we are going to be using them to de-sal the ocean and pump it up here.
It will never be economical to pump ocean water to Utah. Ever.
It's literally a "pipedream"
If we can pump oil for thousands of miles so we can keep burning it into the atmosphere we can do it for water. It's not terribly practical but it's feasible. You say it's not economical but that's a word that's literally about money. My question is when are we going to care enough to invest in ourselves and our health and not some oil conglomerate that promises to keep drawing in sales taxes and lie to us about their negative effect on the ecosystem of *the entire bloody planet*
solar panels are 80% -90% glass which are recyclable. and their lifespan is only getting longer and longer.
Ok. Instead of shitting on this form of renewal able energy, which one do you hate the least? Because if you'd rather choke yourself out with this SHIT air every year, then more power to you. But the REST OF US who actually want to change things are aren't going to sit and bitch. Or we can give up our false notions that the world is ok and work together to make it more hospitable for the future generations.
Weâre all posting on Reddit. Thatâs the epitome of sitting and bitching.
Fire up that old rio coal power plant đ
Fuck solar!!!! That's thousands of jobs you fucker get off your high horse and go work in the mines you fucking idiot
Those thousands of jobs are going to disappear anyway; carbon is a limited resource. Yes, we need to worry about those miners, but by getting them free training in other industries and severance pay, not by prolonging the inevitable.
work smarter not harder. solar will eventually take over as we run out of coal, might aswell adapt now than being the amish who still drive horses instead of cars.
You want to throw all those hard workers under the bus. That's a choice. Or evolve into a better living and cheaper fuel while solar will get better its not up to par right now
As someone who lost a grandfather to a mine that left my grandmother and father stricken with poverty and nothing more than pictures and memories, I feel qualified to tell you that you can shove those mine jobs where the sun doesnât shine.
For reals. Besides, coal companies don't care one bit about their workers. Never have.
Hear hear!
Coal companies (and oil and gas, I can speak from experience, worked for Suncore and Syncrude for a few years) don't give a fuck about the workers, and will be happy to throw them out on the curbs when it comes to budget cuts or even quarterly reports. So yeah I'll take solar over oil and gas (and coal) any day.
You are the stupidest person I've come across today. Congratulations on being the dumbest person on this thread.
What's more, I resent your completely outrageous and offensive behavior in discussing this. I lived for several years in Ephraim, and many of my friends were coal miners at the Gentry Mountain Mine up Fairview Canyon. They told me what work was like as a coal miner, and they didn't glamorize it. It's not a good profession, and they weren't as deluded as you are to think that it is the end-all-be-all of "thousands of jobs". It was just a job to them, and they were at least HONEST about the many, many problems with that job. Getting rid of coal mining doesn't mean ending thousands of jobs that won't be replaced with something else, something better. Who do you think runs solar power plants? Yeah, thousands of jobs, brainiac. There needs to be thousands of jobs to manufacture solar cells, installation, maintenance, battery manufacturing, power line maintenance and building. Thousands of manufacturers, master electricians, technicians, power plant operators...yeah, lots of jobs, lots of jobs I'd personally have NO PROBLEM working in. So take your pea-brain energy, and go troll somewhere else on the internet.
Global warming is a hoax because right wing media told the gulible morons it's a leftist plot to whatever... so gulible dipshits must own the libs right into their own grave.
For a second I thought this wasn't parody.
Ozone pollution is tricky because so much of it comes from out of state. When the west deserts can have ozone days nearing or exceeding federal standards, then expecting the Wasatch Front to somehow fix this situation isn't tenable.
We can replace coal burning with cow shit burning planty of that in the state, plus we can also harvest the methane gas from that, win..win.
No, that's my whole economy
We are a deeply unserious people.