Voted for
Wind Energy
at 10:53am on May 24th, 2008
The next big development in renewable energy is kite power!! It's true, using relatively cheap materials with low maintenance requirements it is able to produce large amounts of power from kites flying at high altitudes. Watch this space!
Voted for
Solar Energy
at 3:02pm on March 3rd, 2008
Umm... The reason we are all alive... all the other choices rely on the suns energy. Oh, and after we destroy the planet and screw up the natural cycles of the planet, the sun will still be shining.
Voted for
Geothermal Ener...
at 4:34pm on March 1st, 2008
Geothermal has a lot of potential. There are experiments currently going on now to harness the vast energy deep in the earths crust (miles and miles below the surface) where the temperature gets extremely hot. The idea is to shoot water down to those level and heat it to steam, which is then brought back up to the surface to power turbines to generate electricity. This is similar to the way nuclear powerplants often work (hey, why isn't nuclear an option? Nuclear works NOW, and is far cleaner than fossil fuels...)
Anyways, the articles I have read expect the energy cost of this type of powerplant to drop to within the cost range per kilowatt-hour currently seen in the U.S. for electricity within 10-20 years. And there is enough untapped energy to currently meet the entire U.S.'s electrical needs easily. To get cars off of oil though, you need hydrogen fuels cells or some other alternate fuel technology where basically cars will run on electricity.
the retard below has no idea what he is talking about.
my vote is for oil as long as we can use it. that stuff has more energy per unit volume or mass than a heck of a lot of other energy sources.
solar energy:
you are screwed by clouds; expensive; minimal power generation
tidal energy:
are you freaking serious?!
geothermal energy:
plausible, but only in certain regions; expensive
wind:
minimal energy generation; expensive; only in certain regions
methane:
less energy per unit vol or mass than any oil derivative; expensive to produce (gov't currently subsidizes); cows eat the stuff they make methane from, do not take my cow products away from me.
so, in essence, we are screwed. enjoy driving your gas powered car while you can.
In reality the best energy source would be to combination of matter and anti-matter. For example if you had two piles of sand in each hand one of anti-matter and one of matter if you were to combine them it would result in the annihilation of the molecules but would release enough energy to power the state of California for 6 months. If we were able to efficiently use matter and antimatter in this way it would be the best way since the particles annihilate each other leaving only energy, this is true because of E=mc^2.
This is a difficult question that depends largely on location. The best overall energy source for supplying mass power in any region is nuclear. It doesn't depend on anything natural, and nuclear power plants are a whole lot safer than they are made out to be. The only major issue is what to do with the spent fuel.
The question is not whether which one is the best energy source. Rather, which one is the best where you live. You're not gonna use wind if there's no wind, geothermal where there's tons of sun, and solar where there's no sun somewhere in the artic. Another point that should be considered is this; some of the meterials to produce solar cells are toxic if there's enough buildup of them - particularly indium. The question becomes, how do you dispose of them? To make those two year lasting lightbulbs, manufacturers have to use mecrury and most people don't read the label. There's a lot of trade offs and a lot of people see this as a silver bullet typeanswer, which, unfortunately, there isn't. How do you know that wind currents are not gonna change in the next 20 years? There are an infinite amount of variables. The biggest thing to remember is the law of conservation of energy.
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