Hydro, nuclear, windmills, or solar?

Question

Which of these do you think would be best. I may have missed some (geothermal?), so mention any others you recommend.

Answer 1

tree hugger`s don`t want any of these, they all s***w up mother nature

Answer 2

solar energy is good but  I would prefer windmills. Solar panels use loads of energy to create but mills use less and damage the surroundings less.

Answer 3

I would go for solar because if we place them on existing roof tops of homes and businesses we would be making use of existing area structures and the power lines are all in place to transport the generated power.Wind is good but the sound of the turbine fins going "WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP'' all night long would be annoying and to cut down a forest or clear an existing field to make room for a wind farm makes no sense plus then you need to build the power lines to transport the power to the city it is mainly needed.Solar on roof tops would make more sense in the short term

Answer 4

IT IS GOING TO TAKE ALL types

You missed wave power and ocean thermal

Answer 5

nuclear power and electric cars are the ultimate solution.

It is ridigilous to hope nuclear power to "go away" or something.

in this world there are 443 nuclear plants. the waste is burried safely and plenty of other horrors to find at world if we start to fearing how the waste stays at earths crust drilled to kilometers of depth.

as soon as the oil runs off, we`ll get rid of 5 liter,  2000 kilogram chevys, two-stroke mopeds and traffic noise.

Answer 6

I'm all for solar and wind!  They use natural resources to produce (naturally), but require fewer to maintain and have greater margin of benefits to costs than other forms of power.  

We (all humans!) need to make the decision to transition to these forms of power now.  

It's already too late to have a soft landing when we come down from our oil dependency, but we can make it a shorter fall.

N&J

http://badhuman.wordpress.com

Answer 7

definatly not nuclear, i like solar energy and windmills

Answer 8

alright well if we are talking about converting to a total oil independent society then hydro power is definitely out.  all of the places where hydroelectric dams can be built already have them, so increasing the amount of hydro power is next to impossible.  as for windmills, they are pretty expensive, and we would need TONS of them, all of the windmills in the united states only acount for 0.5% of our energy.  1/2 of a percent!  I believe that solar power is an up and coming technology.  recent developments have enabled scientists to make invisible solar film, which can be embeded in windows or walls of houses and buildings.  I think that every house should get most of their energy from this kind of technology.  However we haven't come up with a good method for storing the energy of the cells so scientists would need to develop that technology to allow for nighttime power.  Now nuclear although bashed by environmentalists, I believe is the best option.  Reactors can produce enormous amounts of energy and in 50 years or so scientists plan to build a cold fusion reactor, which will produce incredibile amounts of energy with reduced waste.  As for the nuclear waste, I believe that we can solve that problem quite easily.  Instead of storing the waste hear on earth, my idea is that we should eject the thousands of tons of hazardous waste out into space, heck why not just shoot it straight at the sun where it can burn up harmlessly.  I know people don't want to polute space but why not use the sun as a huge incinerator, which we can use free of charge.  I think the only thing from holding this idea back is cost.  It would cost such a large amount to get it out of the earth's atmosphere that people just don't want to do it.  However if we could then nuclear energy would be the best form.

Answer 9

I go for solar and wind. Nuclear waste can be a major hassle. Solar seems better than wind because it requires less space. Most windmill fields require a lot of space and can damage many ecosystems. Solar energy is very expensive (imagine... the 1X2 centimeter solar panel on a calculator costs 17$ nowadays... Imagine the huge solar panels needed to power a big city. Hydroelectric is limited to areas with large rivers and can change the river's caudal system.

Answer 10

All of the above.  

Each has application to geography, natual resources present etc.

Geothermal is the most easily adaptable as an alternative to natural gas heat and electric AC.

Solar would be next since almost anywhere can get some solar power and companies are now starting to rent solar. www.jointhesolution.com/sagebgreenenergy

Windmills have application in certain geographic areas and only to certain residential locations.

Hydro is great for areas that have tidal currents and moving water.  

Does that help!

Answer 11

Been there, done that, I think the best source of future energy is the oceans.  They cover 3/4 of the planet and are a huge heat sink containing the increasing energy due to AGW.

I think wave and tidal power are the sources of the future and a method that will mitigate the effects of Global Warming, as well as providing a method for desalination of salt water for irrigation and drinking.

To give you an idea of how much energy is in the oceans:

The average temperature of the oceans has risen 1 degC.  That is a known fact.

What does that mean?  How much energy does it take to raise the temperature of all the water on the planet 1degC?

Well, if you do the calculation (below) it turns out that it would take the same energy as 1.358 BILLION (yes, with a B) atomic bombs.

That energy fuels the water cycle which in turn effects weather globally.

The temperature of the oceans is projected to rise 5degC in the next 50-100 years.  That is the equivalent to one atom bomb for every man, woman and child alive on the planet today.  That energy will be expressed as increassingly devastating weather events.  

It is going to be a rough century kiddies!

Answer 12

All have their advantages and disadvantages, none are perfect!

Nuclear may seem good on paper, but if you get a leak or a meltdown, it's catastrophic. The raw fuel costs are negligible, however the cost of building and maintaining a SAFE plant are huge, and do you trust some guy in private enterprise to not ensure he gets maximum bonus by "reclassifying" some safety procedure?

Wind, what do you do when it's calm? Try telling your nan she can't watch her soaps because it's nice outside! Each wind turbine only produces a tiny amount of electricity, just one or two MW compared to several thousand MW for a coal or nuclear plant, so you will need several thousand wind turbines to replace each coal fired station. What of the impact to our beautiful countryside of all those propellers? The zealots tell us that they will generate electricity in a light breeze, true, but only a light fraction of their rated power! So you still need other sources.

Hydro. People oftan underestimate the amount of water needed. If you have a huge river (e.g. the Nile at Aswan) or a huge head of preasure (e.g. the Hover dam), then your laughing, but most countries don't have enough suitable sites to provide more than 1 or 2 %.

Solar. The technology just isn't there yet, silicon photovoltaic cells cost a fortune and generate tiny amounts. In the USA the Clinton administration was supporting research in this field with several experimental power stations, but one of  Ã¢Â€ÂœTexas oilman” George W. Bush's first acts was to remove funding.

Geothermal. Fine if you live in Iceland where the geothermal activity is near the surface, but if you have to drill through 5 km of bedrock first....

Wave. See wind power.

Tidal. You need to block of some large estuaries for this. Whilst you could install locks for shipping, someone is always going to complain about the birds on the mudflats etc. Also try telling your nan to get up at 3:00 am. to watch her soaps because the tides out.

Answer 13

i would think hydro..seems like the best.

Well, it actually depends on the region.