| Archive for Downsizer For an ethical approach to consumption |
| Brownbear |
Giant Serpents will save us allStory |
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| Truffle |
About time! Lets hope this gets the backing it needs... | ||
| Nick |
For sure. I'm no physicist, nor any kind of 'energy expert', but it does strike me that there's a huge amount of water moving, reliably, continuously and predictably every single day all around us. It *must* be possible to harness and convert that energy. | ||
| cab |
Ain't the be all and end all, but its worth harnessing. A good, simple view is presented here: http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/withouthotair/c12/page_73.shtml http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/withouthotair/c14/page_81.shtml (and next few pages from each of those links) (David Mackay, whose page I'm linking to there, has done sterling work in putting some figures on the sustainable energy thing. Don't get too excited about his end conclusions though; he has demonstrated that a massive change in how we generate energy and use our land gets us somewhere close; when I asked him whether there would be enough land left to grow food he couldn't answer, and I put it to him that there would not be... Its an optimistic portrayal of a very bleak situation, and in places I think his figures are ropey, but well worth delving through nonetheless) |
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| Andy B |
If one will power a thousand homes, how many would be needed to power London and how much ocean would that cover? | ||
| cab |
7.7million people in London (all the boroughs and the City)
Average occupancy figure for ahome in England is 2.36 (2001 census) Lets round that up to 3.3million homes... 3.3 million divided by a thousand would be 3,300. Can't say what the area required would be without knowing the minimum effective spacing between them is. Find us that figure and its easy to work out. |
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| Jonnyboy |
Good old telegraph. 
Clever invention though. |
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| Northern_Lad |
There was something similar developed in the 70s, only it sat on the surface. On the seaward side the sea was choppy as normal but on the landward side it was flat as a mill-pond. It never went ahead because the company brought in to look at the figures just happened to be owned by an oil company and reduced it's effectiveness by 60% or so.
One of the best ones I've seen recently looked like an omi-derectional windmil but went under water in that big loch thingy in Northern Ireland. |
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| Truffle |
I wonder what the ecological impact is, with the opposition to wind farms (bird life etc), it'd be interesting to know if these have any potential problems.
I know oil-rig supports have become important grounds for some of our cold-water reef species- i guess these could do the same? ... they do look like excellent contraptions! |
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| Andy B |
It would be fair to say that the area needed would be big, could it be combined with no fish zone to protect spawning grounds? |
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| cab |
Possibly. Dunno. I'd want to know the impact of these things before coupling them in with another conservation measure though. |
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| cab |
Its fair to ask what the impact is, but so often I think we forget to ask what the impact of not investing in renewables is. We ask people 'do you want a wind farm?' and they say no. We ask them 'do you want nuclear power?' and they say no. We ask 'do you want global warming?' and they say no. Presumably, as they don't want their lights going out, they want energy to appear out of nowhere with no environmental impact 
I could well imagine that these things would have an impact on marine birds, and I could see them being most problematic for marine mammals. Dunno though; has there been anything similar tried on any large scale, anywhere? Strikes me that theres only one way to find out the extent of any environmental impact... |
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| Jonnyboy |
Strangford, the narrows are a fierce tidal race. |
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| dpack |
nice
development needs to de done but moving water or energy moving through water are a good place to look for non fossil energy |
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| catbaffler |
i don't fancy the proposed Severn Barrage but that could perhaps be an acceptable alternative - certainly wouldn't harm the Gwent Levels in the way that the barrage would. |