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How is "ending world poverty" defined? I can't seem to find a good answer to that.
The world is going to change this is remarkable
- Thread starter raggie33
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Solving world poverty is a daunting task as long as people are people. You've got givers, you've got takers, you've got kleptos and gullible types. And people like me who if you hand 'em a million billion dollars will manage to spend it all.....
I used to hang out with a guy who would spend his whole paycheck in a day then spend the next week in a dark apartment eating rice because his power got turned off and had no money for food. Yet he had some really nice sneakers and the best whiskey money could buy. One time I saw him spend $20 on a really small jar of pumpkin butter. Two slices of toast later it was gone. It was his last $20. He lost his job because he had spent his gas money on that jar of pumpkin butter. But he was happy. "He said "worth it, as that was the best dam toast I ever ate". He lived to almost 40.....
I used to hang out with a guy who would spend his whole paycheck in a day then spend the next week in a dark apartment eating rice because his power got turned off and had no money for food. Yet he had some really nice sneakers and the best whiskey money could buy. One time I saw him spend $20 on a really small jar of pumpkin butter. Two slices of toast later it was gone. It was his last $20. He lost his job because he had spent his gas money on that jar of pumpkin butter. But he was happy. "He said "worth it, as that was the best dam toast I ever ate". He lived to almost 40.....
Someone was really great at becoming a Billionaire several times over.
Some folks have to learn the hard way. Others never learn at all, unfortunately. When you're a child, being happy is the only thing that matters. Things change as an adult. Children have no responsibilities to others nor to themselves.
turbodog
Flashaholic
It's more than that. A one-time infusion of money is incapable of 'ending' world poverty. That's a multifaceted problem with many nuances. You could throw unlimited money at it, trillions per year, and it would still take generations to resolve.
turbodog
Flashaholic
There are different levels, and none of them are even describable to someone from the us, europe, etc. Short answer... it's taking place right now, slowly but surely.
Some videos from this guy will usually upend what most people think about poverty.
Probably best 'intro' video about how _not_ to be ignorant about the world:
And some more of his best stuff:
chillinn
Flashlight Enthusiast
Everyone else assumes it, too. Lithium-6 yields a higher efficiency of tritium production, which means more heat, which means more electricity. Again, the D-D reaction is not efficient. And not for nothing, this
and this
are personal attacks and logical fallacies in the form of ad hominem apparently along with an appeal to authority, which is how you dismiss my citation and every time you insinuate that you know what you're talking about just by declaration. This kind of argument is not persuasive.
Irrelevant. The point is it is expensive, and fusion containment systems are even more expensive. This matters because electricity is just a commodity to be bought and sold. No one buys the expensive electricity when the less expensive electricity is just as good and 1/5th the cost.
We do know, and I already explained how we know a lot about how much they will cost. And Lithium-6 has a very high neutron cross-section and so readily fissions to yield tritium and helium. The D-D neutron reaction product has five times lower energy. That's why we don't use it, because it is less efficient at producing heat, thus will be even more expensive to produce the same amount of electricity as Lithium-6. And all of your personal attacks are unpersuasive, as they employ logical fallacy and, as such, reveal an inability to be rational and civil. Ignoring your opposition in argument and focusing on what was said will help avoid this particular logical fallacy.
The total investment in nuclear fission energy since the 1940's absolutely dwarfs the investment in solar, and nuclear never got cheap, and never would have and never will regardless of investment in alternative energies. Nuclear is so expensive, only nations have ever been able to build nuclear power plants. Without the massive investment by governments, nuclear never would have been developed, and without massive government subsidies, no nuclear power plant could ever have been built, nor ever will be built without because nuclear is so expensive it can't be profitable. The investment ratio of nuclear to solar is less than 1%.
Not that this has anything to do with fusion, but by the end of summer, California was able to produce virtually all of their energy needs from renewable sources for the first time ever. No one is complaining. More will follow. Every other state and every country on earth is trying to do the same, and they will succeed sooner than later. And this is a very good thing.
This is more blatant appeal to authority, and utility workers didn't develop the technology, they just work there. And if they want to continue to be employed, they will follow the technology, continue their education and retrain for more modern utility jobs. Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.
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If nuclear is so great, why'd they never make nuclear 2? That's what I thought.
Japan adopts plan to maximize nuclear energy, in major shift
Japan has adopted a plan to extend the lifespan of nuclear reactors, replace the old and even build new ones.
apnews.com
No indication of imminent fusion plans from Japan at this time, right?
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idleprocess
Flashaholic
Not sure where you're coming to this from so forgive me if I overexplain. I'm looking at this largely from a transportation perspective which is where most of the interest in hydrogen arises.Seems like Japan has been looking at hydrogen, and maybe not enough sun there for solar? Obviously there are members here who have extended knowledge about this. Not me.Japan adopts plan to maximize nuclear energy, in major shift
Japan has adopted a plan to extend the lifespan of nuclear reactors, replace the old and even build new ones.
Hydrogen is a store rather than a source of energy. For lack of sources of elemental hydrogen it must be produced; there are two common methods: reforming hydrocarbons and electrolysis. Reforming hydrocarbons (usually steam reformation of methane) is something that most oil refineries can do with existing plant for less energy than electrolysis, albeit with CO2 emissions that must then be sequestered or simply accepted. Electrolysis involved application of a large voltage between two electrodes within purified water - hydrogen gathers at one, oxygen the other.
Once you've produced the hydrogen you then must store it as a compressed gas or as a cryogenic liquid. Compression to a mere 700 bar (10,000 PSI) is one of the more common schemes since it allows for long-term storage - albeit at lower density. Cryogenic storage which reduces the hydrogen to a liquid state achieves more density, however practical cryogenic storage vessels can neither be well-enough insulated to prevent the hydrogen from boiling nor strong enough to contain the pressure once it starts to boil and must be vented off (I recall that 100-0 takes about 2 weeks), thus it's not a long-term storage solution.
Some other storage methods have been proposed - "solid" hydrogen and ammonia - but they've got problems. Solid (sometimes a fluid or paste) hydrogen has atrocious energy density since the storage medium will by definition outweigh the contained hydrogen by at least an order of magnitude (usually more) and has some challenges with releasing the hydrogen fast enough to be useful. Ammonia - alongside "solid" hydrogen - requires significant additional energy to release the contained hydrogen.
Transportation requirements can vary. Pipeline is an option, however it must be of a higher grade than most pipelines due to hydrogen's effusive nature which can escape all but the best seals and even weaken steel containment vessels. Tanker truck will prove challenging due to lower effective density than conventional liquid fuels.
Consumption side has some variety. It may be substituted for natural gas to provide process heat - although its ability to do so as a drop-in replacement is highly questionable. It could also be used as a fuel for combustion engines, however compressed storage will yield disappointing energy density and the costs of conversion and the hydrogen itself renders this an unlikely possibility. Low-temperature fuel cells exist for automobiles (ala Toyota Mirai, Hyundai Nexo) and their corresponding efficiency bump over internal combustion engines yields acceptable range with compressed fuel storage. High-temperature fuel cells are better-suited to applications such as stationary generation or large vehicles such as transoceanic shipping where the waste heat can be used for a combined-cycle plant to improve efficiency.
Insofar as what Japan's angle is I cannot say for certain. They've long had a number of government incentives towards hydrogen fuel cell development (a large factor in why the Toyota Mirai was developed and even sold in small numbers). It's possible that they're hoping to get around their lack of native hydrocarbon resources and kickstart the century plus sci fi trope of the hydrogen economy. This could be via the electrolysis route or using nuclear plants' prodigious thermal output - most likely waste heat - as process heat for hydrocarbon reformation given that they installed a series of gas turbines post Fukushima disaster and thus are already importing methane in quantity.
However, the hydrogen economy trope hasn't arisen because it's incredibly expensive for negligible at best benefit. Hydrogen production is expensive from an energy perspective. Storage is complex and takes a nontrivial percentage of its embodied energy. Distribution is challenging. Efficient consumption requires purpose-built fuel cells. And for transportation purposes pumping electricity into all of that bespoke infrastructure yields about a third of what it would have had it just been consumed directly ala electrifying railways or charging a BEV.
There are good arguments for other more urgent uses for hydrogen - especially actual clean hydrogen made via electrolysis - but most transportation categories aren't included. This piece goes into where we should best deploy hydrogen in the future on an Unavoidable-Uncompetitive scale.
Not unless they've conducted some stunningly successful truly secret research.
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Yeah, just wondering if Japan is seeing that hydrogen may not pan out as hoped, so they are looking at more electrical generation, with fission taking a bigger role in the future?
idleprocess
Flashaholic
Outside of some boutique applications I'm not sure hydrogen is going to play a role in many forms of transportation within the next 20 years due to its inherently great expense and physical limitations. A handful of long-distance remote trains. Some experiments with trucking. Perhaps some construction/mining equipment. A few cautious experiments in aviation, transoceanic shipping (these will require cryogenic storage to be effective - less of an issue with aviation's generally predictable/short timelines but a significant challenge for shipping).
Japan backed off on their fission plant fleet hard after the Fukushima disaster. I gather much of this had to do with distrust of the operator's seemingly-cozy relationship with regulatory agencies. But as the AP piece states, pivoting to gas hurts their emissions goals and also exacerbates their lack of hydrocarbon resources, so reactivating their existing fleet of reactors - presumably with some tweaks to avoid issues like a Fukushima - costs relatively little. Deploying new advanced fission reactor designs will be another matter, however they may decide the energy security is worth the cost.
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I finally got around to watching these after christmas and all that stuff. Sadly with this there's still nothing even close to an answer in it, and sadly world poverty is such a nebulous term that it's in essence worthless. Poverty can mean how much money you have in the bank, how easy access you have to food, your living conditions, how much free time you have, healthcare, job opportunities, education and so on and such forth. I'm very sceptical towards anything claiming to be able to solve world poverty at all since there's no unified definition of what's wanted from it.
Besides, i happen to be well-aware of that due since i'm from the very same country he is, there's a lot of interesting things he brings up but it's just that, interesting, a curio in a workshop rather than a solid tool. It might get people to think about their poop but it doesn't offer any long-term help.
Members here are discussing profitability & dismissing fusion or other green energy out of hand for that reason, but im not entirely sure its even that relevant.
In the face of global warming/climate change we will have to switch to 100% green energy sooner or later. I see this being archived with huge government subsidies & funding (simply because otherwise, nothing will get done). It is not unreasonable to believe such projects may be almost entirely financed by tax money, making the economical viability of fusion a secondary concern. The surplus cost would (have to) be eaten. Such plants may never turn a profit, but thats kinda missing the point. Fusion has significant advantages over other renewables, in that it is not location dependent & provides extremely stable energy output. Nuclear does this too, but at the cost of producing radioactive waste, which requires storage facilities & the fact that it is inherently unstable. Fusion is also more efficient then any other currently feasible renewable.
If you believe that this is naive & that such "altruistic" projects could never go through; think about all the things we take for granted today that would have seemed overly optimistic even just a few centuries ago. Democracy, abolition of slavery, equal rights, human/workers rights, work contracts, paid leave, international safety & health standards, 5-day/8h work weeks, free education (tax funded)... and many more. Almost none of these things benefit the elite directly, in many cases quite the opposite. I can easily see fusion being tax funded for the purpose of saving the planet, a thing we all benefit from in the long term. Of cause hydro, wind, solar & thermal plants will continue to be used wherever practical, but that simply isnt everywhere. I wouldn't dismiss this possibility to quickly.
In the face of global warming/climate change we will have to switch to 100% green energy sooner or later. I see this being archived with huge government subsidies & funding (simply because otherwise, nothing will get done). It is not unreasonable to believe such projects may be almost entirely financed by tax money, making the economical viability of fusion a secondary concern. The surplus cost would (have to) be eaten. Such plants may never turn a profit, but thats kinda missing the point. Fusion has significant advantages over other renewables, in that it is not location dependent & provides extremely stable energy output. Nuclear does this too, but at the cost of producing radioactive waste, which requires storage facilities & the fact that it is inherently unstable. Fusion is also more efficient then any other currently feasible renewable.
If you believe that this is naive & that such "altruistic" projects could never go through; think about all the things we take for granted today that would have seemed overly optimistic even just a few centuries ago. Democracy, abolition of slavery, equal rights, human/workers rights, work contracts, paid leave, international safety & health standards, 5-day/8h work weeks, free education (tax funded)... and many more. Almost none of these things benefit the elite directly, in many cases quite the opposite. I can easily see fusion being tax funded for the purpose of saving the planet, a thing we all benefit from in the long term. Of cause hydro, wind, solar & thermal plants will continue to be used wherever practical, but that simply isnt everywhere. I wouldn't dismiss this possibility to quickly.
turbodog
Flashaholic
Plenty of proxies for poverty: literacy (improving), vaccines (improving), infant mortality (improving), cellular/internet access (improving), etc.
You must have misread my posts. Solving it in one fell swoop? Not gonna happen. Generations of poverty take generations to improve, but it is happening.
I can send you the info, but I can't make you understand it.
turbodog
Flashaholic
Your average person 1) can picket a nuke facility and 2) lacks even a basic understanding of what they are picketing.
Plenty of modern nuke plants. Bill Gates funded r&d into a plant that 1) can't melt down and 2) consumes nuclear waste and weapons.
It's held up due to some tariff/political issues but hopefully that will be resolved soon.
/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com/reuters/6R54R4B6YNJEPFEAOD3LMLMFCM.jpg)
America's new nuclear power industry has a Russian problem
U.S. firms developing a new generation of small nuclear power plants to help cut carbon emissions have a big problem: only one company sells the fuel they need, and it's Russian.
www.reuters.com
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idleprocess
Flashaholic
To the extent we can make predictions about fusion:
- It's an uncertain period of time away from engineering profitability - i.e. Qtotal>10, ideally >20 - likely measured on the decades timescale
- Once (1) has been achieved it's an additional uncertain period of time away from economic feasibility
Ergo, we'll need to lean on energy sources that are COTS technology or a step or two of applied research away from economic viability rather than uncertain basic research milestones.
I use the term economic viability not to mean that such a plant would turn a profit on a reasonable schedule for investors, but that such a plant would only require a level of OPEX and CAPEX that the host society can afford relative to other alternatives. On the CAPEX side there's the R&D burden, the costs of construction using materials methods and designs that presently do not exist, learning burdens on a series of development reactors on the way to a 'revenue' design.. On the OPEX side there's the labor cost of operations + maintenance, and fuel - i.e. deuterium separated from water as well as lithium to be enriched into tritium in situ.
A point that others have been making is that - and as I alluded to earlier - there are technologies available now or viable within years with applied research rather than uncertain decades of basic research - that have well understood cost, operations, and performance characteristics. There's no point waiting for nuclear fusion to be viable when we can use these technologies.
turbodog
Flashaholic
To be fair to fission... there was documentation that showed an analysis showed needed upgrades (increased elevation) for the emergency generators. This was not a failure of technology/science. The Japanese culture STRONGLY does not like to admit mistakes (nor do most cultures). This was, like 95% of these disasters, a human failure.
idleprocess
Flashaholic
A tad OT here...
TEPCO lost a lot of face in that incident and that distrust likely drove the prior policy of winding down nuclear plants.
I gather the GE BWR design is more or less the choice for Boiling-Water Reactors worldwide with highly-standardized construction regardless of site. Fukushima Daiichi used the Mark I containment system for units 1-5 which I gather calls for the emergency diesel generators to be located within the containment structure - either on the ground floor or the basement - which as we know did not resist the intrusion of seawater from the tsunami that overtopped the seawall (which also damaged critical controls/switchgear further complicating emergency core cooling). Additional high-reliability emergency power and controls are needed at such sites either outside of probable flooding or the structure needs to be hardened to the point that it cannot flood.
TEPCO lost a lot of face in that incident and that distrust likely drove the prior policy of winding down nuclear plants.
turbodog
Flashaholic
IIRC, there were ~5 reactors there and 2 had the generators raised (must have been built later). Those 2 survived intact.
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