Environment
Category archives for Environment
Direct and Indirect Heating: Why Don’t Power Plants Change Local Climate?
Posted by Chad Orzel on February 19, 2013 This past weekend, I was at Boskone, where I appeared on a few science-y panels. One of these was on the possibility of beaming power down from space: Energy From Space Beam me down some juice, Scotty? Let’s talk about the possibilities — and practicalities — of really long-distance power transmission. Tom Easton (M), Jordin…
Energy Efficiency Question: Water Heaters
Posted by Chad Orzel on November 17, 2011 The water heater for Chateau Steelypips is significantly older than the usual useful life for such devices, and it’s really started to show. I’m getting pretty sick of lukewarm showers, so we probably need to replace it. As a good squishy liberal type, I of course want to replace it with something more efficient, and…
Greenhouse Physics and Car Shades
Posted by Chad Orzel on September 19, 2011 I got a new comment on an old post asking an interesting question about thermodynamics: I have a question that bears somewhat on this issue of keeping cars parked in the sun, cooler. You all know those accordion folded/aluminized shades you can put up inside the windshield and back window. Seems to me putting them…
1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created by Charles C. Mann
Posted by Chad Orzel on August 30, 2011 Back when I reviewed Mann’s pop-archaeology classic 1491, I mentioned that I’d held off reading it for a while for fear that it would be excessively polemical in a “Cortez the Killer” kind of way. Happily, it was not, so when I saw he had a sequel coming out, I didn’t hesitate to pick it…
Frickin’ Lasers: “Laser Advances in Nuclear Fuel Stir Terror Fear”
Posted by Chad Orzel on August 21, 2011 A physics story makes the front page of the New York Times today. Sadly, it’s with the headline Laser Advances in Nuclear Fuel Stir Terror Fear. Sigh. The key technological development, here, is that General Electric has been playing around with a laser-based isotope separation technique. This is an idea that’s been around for a…
Fracking Liars
Posted by Chad Orzel on August 4, 2011 Back at the AAAS Meeting, I was really annoyed by a session on fracking, the process by which natural gas is extracted from shale deep underground. As I wrote at the time, regarding the industry shills who spoke: I left before the whole thing had wrapped up, because it was that or start throwing stuff…
Beat the Heat with SCIENCE!
Posted by Chad Orzel on July 21, 2011 It’s really frickin’ hot in much of the US. Fortunately, we have central air at home, A/C in the car, and convenient local businesses with air conditioning and free wi-fi. The inadequate HVAC systems in the Science and Engineering building on campus aren’t anywhere near being able to cope with this, so I’m working from…
More Fun With Fracking
Posted by Chad Orzel on April 22, 2011 I intended to do a big book-sales post today, but our DSL modem may be dead, so there was no Internet in Chateau Steelypips this morning, and I forgot to copy the relevant files onto a thumb drive, so it will have to wait. Maybe this afternoon. In lieu of that, here’s some other stuff…
My Feelings on Fracking
Posted by Chad Orzel on April 19, 2011 The New York Times had another article on the environmental impacts of shale gas drilling, which reminded me that I had intended to write something else on the subject after February’s post on the fracking panel at AAAS, but never got around to it. The hook for the article is yet another study showing that…
Wind Power Economics and the Ability to Focus
Posted by Chad Orzel on March 22, 2011 Kevin Drum re-posts a chart on wind power made by Stuart Staniford showing that the number of new wind power plants installed in 2010 was way lower than in 2009 or 2008: This is meant as a starting point for discussion about the big economic issues that might’ve caused this. One of the many, many…
