[ExI] Energy Defeatism (was: Wind, solar could provide 99.9% of ALL POWER by 2030)

[Ben Zaiboc]

"spike" <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

>... On Behalf Of BillK

>...Wind, solar could provide 99.9% of ALL POWER by 2030 Even better: It
could do so at the same cost as fossil fuels

<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/12/15/renewables_study/>
...

>These kinds of schemes benefit greatly if we think of ways in which we could
>be more tolerant of temporary lack or shortage of electrical power.

Plus a load of other highly depressing stuff about the need to conserve energy.

This is supposed to be good news?

That we can possibly, maybe, get almost all of the energy that we are currently using from 'renewable' resources if we are very careful and reduce our need for energy as much as possible?

Sorry, but I thought this was the extropian list, not the 'sustainability' list (where sustainability is just an euphemism for the long, slow slide into barbarism and extinction, barring any catastrophic extinction events that get us first).

Note that the "ALL POWER" referred to, is all of our /current/ energy needs, not the considerably greater needs of a halfway-decent civisisation.  Maybe I'm on my own here, but I won't settle for anything less than a *superabundance* of energy, enough energy that everyone can run their own simulated civilisation at whatever speed they wish, with enough left over to send interstellar probes to other stars at decent fractions of C, to build routers for those hardy explorers who don't mind being out of touch with the cradle of civilisation for a few subjective millennia.  Plus keeping the TVs/internet connections/digital assistants/exoselves/whatever, of at least a few hundreds of billions of sophonts active *all the time*.  
I'm talking about a situation where the concept of 'brownout' is a quaint historical footnote that most people are blissfully unaware of, and the rest chuckle uneasily at the sheer poverty of the society that coined the term.

Again, sorry if I offend anyone here, but I regard the sentiment behind the subject line of the ancestor of this post to be Failure Mode No. 1.  As far as I can see, it signals the beginning of the end.

Resident geniuses (you know who you are), please feel free to disabuse me of this notion.

Or maybe there's some Cunning Plan that involves getting to energy superabundance via 'alternative' energy that I'm not aware of.  I sincerely hope so.

Ben Zaiboc,
Extropian

(who uses quotes around 'alternative' energy because there's no such thing.  Energy is energy.  There are just high- and low- density sources of it)