Tom D. Tamarkin
Dec. 16, 2018
Abstract:
Green or renewable energy has become a trillion dollar plus annual industry. Tens of thousands of new businesses have been spawned worldwide based on “green and renewable” energy. Major fossil fuel companies such as Shell Energy have formed green energy divisions. These companies are virtually 100% dependent on the politically driven notion of AGW and man caused “climate change.” The media, public and political establishment constantly recite the incorrect fact that 97% of scientists state AGW is real and man has created CO2 based climate change. However increased concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere do not lead to global warming and climate change. CO2 is a trace gas in the atmosphere. The major “greenhouse gas” is water vapor. An intricate feedback system regulates the Earth’s temperature maintaining immunity from increases and decreases of such trace gases. Furthermore this incorrect notion is responsible for the potential massive redistribution of wealth to poor countries. This has led to the corrupt worldwide business of carbon tax credit trading. Green industries should not predicate their business models on the false notion of climate change. They should base their businesses and R&D budgets on the notion that fossil fuels will become less economically viable over the next few decades due to depletion of easily recovered reserves. Renewables such as solar and wind cannot provide material amounts of energy required worldwide. Utilities and energy companies must be free to use Petroleum, coal, natural gas and biofuels at market demand costs and they must increase nuclear energy production. New sources of high energy flux density generation must be created.
Today the “green energy” or “renewables” sector of the power generation industry is driven by the perceived but not scientifically proven notion that carbon dioxide resulting from the burning of fuels such as petroleum products, natural gas, coal, biomass and bio-fuels cause “global warming” or “climate change,” This is based on the incorrect labeling of carbon dioxide as a “greenhouse gas” and the real practical affects so called “greenhouse” gases cause when introduced into our atmosphere.
Water vapor is the gaseous form of hydrogen hydroxide or water and is the largest “greenhouse gas.” Its spectral absorption is wider than that of carbon dioxide meaning its absorption of photons from the Sun, as radiated by the Earth’s surface at night, across a wider EMR spectrum cause a higher rise in molecular vibrational momentum equating to higher thermal rise than carbon dioxide. Furthermore the water vapor content in the lower atmosphere varies from 10,000 PPM or 1% to 40,000 PPM or 4% whereas carbon dioxide is ≈ 400 PPM or 0.040% of the atmosphere. That is almost 2 orders of magnitude difference. This suggests that water vapor has a much greater effect as a “greenhouse gas” than carbon dioxide. Water vapor is responsible for well over 98% of any “greenhouse effect.”
Whereas it is possible that carbon dioxide and other non-condensable greenhouse gases like methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone can create minute increases in thermal absorption and therefore could increase the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere in a positive feedback cycle leading to warming and an increase in evaporation of sea water, the trace amounts of these gases would lead to virtually immeasurable temperature and water vapor increases.
However, adding more water vapor to the atmosphere would also produce a negative feedback effect. This could happen as more water vapor leads to more cloud formation. Clouds reflect sunlight and reduce the amount of energy that reaches the Earth’s surface to warm it. If the amount of solar warming decreases, then the temperature of the Earth would decrease. In that case, the effect of adding more water vapor would be cooling rather than warming. But cloud cover does mean more condensed water in the atmosphere, making for a stronger greenhouse effect than non-condensed water vapor alone – it is warmer on a cloudy winter day than on a clear one. Thus the possible positive and negative feedbacks associated with increased water vapor and cloud formation will cancel one another out and complicate the ability to model these feedback cycles using computer simulation and mathematical modeling.
Many in the “renewables energy” field may be disappointed in my publication of this short article because it may appear that I am undermining their reason to exist. That affects investor interest and sales opportunities. However, that is not true. We do need to find replacements for fossil fuels but not because of the “climate change” argument. The real driver is the absolutely non-disputable fact that we are depleting. economically viable sources of fossil fuels while at the same time increasing our demand for energy worldwide. The key word is economically viable as the industry will be required to pursue more difficult to recover deposits of oil and natural gas as well as an ever increasing amount of litigation.
Today the only viable energy source beyond fossil fuels is nuclear fission. Our nuclear energy industry must be rebuilt if America is to remain a leader in energy. Also we must continue our research and development in fusion energy which, if ever perfected, has many advantages over nuclear fission. To learn more about fusion energy and its promise, as well as the scientific difficulties, please visit our website objective science based analysis of solar power as a means to generate 100% of baseload power in the United States based on current demand. The results of this analysis are clear; solar power for baseload power is simply unrealistic. It is a virtual impossibility to power America from solar energy based on the science let alone the economics. The electrification of the transportation infrastructure will increase this impossibility several fold.
We must develop the next generation of very high energy flux density nuclear power…first nuclear fission…to be replaced possibly by fusion in the mid to late 21st Century, and we must learn to conserve… not to save the planet from man-made climate change, but rather to give man more time to develop high flux density energy generation science and technology. To learn more about what energy is and where it comes from on our planet, please read my article titled: “Energy Basics: Where Does Energy on our Planet Come From?”
It should be noted that in December 2018, both Excel Energy and Northern Indiana Public Service Company (NIPSCO) announced plans to convert to 100% renewable green energy generation by 2050. That is, of course a scientifically impossibility unless policy makers and environmentalist alike redefine nuclear energy as green. Why would they make such claims? In Excel’s case stock fraud comes to mine. Learn more about Excel Energy’s wholly unrealistic, if not fraudulent plans.
NIPSCO is a government-protected monopoly utility, with Indiana state government guaranteeing NIPSCO a profit of approximately 10 percent for every dollar it spends. Accordingly, NIPSCO has a financial self-interest to engage in costly business practices. Building expensive new power facilities, even when existing facilities are working perfectly well, is one of the most effective ways for NIPSCO to ramp up its spending and guaranteed profits, and it does so at the expense of consumers, many of whom will have no knowledge that their electricity bills are about to rise substantially. Learn more about NIPSCO’s wholly unrealistic, if not fraudulent plans.
Tom Tamarkin is founder and President of EnergyCite, Inc, located in Sacramento, California and is the founder and general manager of the “Fusion Energy Consortium.” Tom has been involved with the utility business and energy since 1985.