[ExI] Wind, solar could provide 99.9% of ALL POWER by 2030

[Eugen Leitl]

On Fri, Jan 18, 2013 at 08:52:43AM -0500, Mike Dougherty wrote:

> From your logic above you'd claim that people are solar powered
> whenever they eat plants.  Really?  I'm all for a specious rant now
> and again, but "everything is really solar powered" is a bit much.

Stellar processes are the only source of energy on this planet,
with the exception of fusion, and there's been only about a
a second of worth of sunlight in latter's case. And it doesn't
seem like there will be any anytime soon. 

So whenever you're using a derived, secondary source of energy, 
especially one that is limited (because it's a nonrenewable resource, or
is fundamentally limited, as biofuel due to HANPP) it always
make sense to consider tapping the primary. Because we know
it's good for gigayears, and it's 10^5 in excess of what we 
need right now, even just considered terrestrial flux.