Lots of discussion lately on energy. Many of you know that I investigated a solar panel installation for our house and decided to go forward with a 38 panel setup from Direct Energy. Unfortunately, our transformer is not capable of supporting another solar installation and our project is on hold.
If you are curious, here is some of the information I gathered in making my decision.
Going solar will save us up to $150 per month for 10 years then up to $350 per month after that. Not too shabby. There is the added bonus of supporting the emerging residential solar energy market which seems like a fine idea.
Beyond helping me by reducing my electric bill, why go with solar power? The problem we face with energy production is the tragedy of the commons. See the wikipedia definition and this dated yet relevant article here. The second article makes many interesting and controversial points. I found the comments about pollution relevant to contemporary concerns.
So if we all agree that the environment is changing in a way that humans will not like and we all agree that our current energy production infrastructure is a contributor we can influence, then the rest of this discussion will make sense. If we don't all agree with these two assertions, the rest of this discussion will be entertaining at best.
Given my current understanding of the environmental concerns, there are three things humans must do.
1) reduce green house gas production - carbon is the dominant contributor
2) invest in green house gas free energy infrastructure - several options exist here
3) research green house gas reduction - required to remove existing surplus
A few controversial proposals exist. None of these are free and none of these will show substantial impact in less than a few decades. Here are my favorites - they seem most likely to have positive impact.
1) augment new power installations with wind and solar
This will reduce the growth of green house gas production but not reduce the surplus.
2) explore alternate energy sources with no green house production
Combined with wind and solar, alternate energy sources will further limit new emissions. Nuclear from TerraPower is one option. Compact Fusion from Lockheed Martin is another option. There are several others.
3) research algae, iron fertilization, and other carbon sink strategies
There are many companies exploring this space. These may not be the best strategies but research here will inform alternate areas to explore.
It is not clear how we can make the green house gas problem go away. It is clear that taking some action will produce data we can use to inform our next action.
