Guppycur Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 Bordering on politics; it's an interesting thread but best to step away from that aspect of the subject. The thing is, while renewables sound great on paper, the technology just isn't there yet. Batteries suck. Period. Until those are radically improved, it's just not worth it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maharin Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 2 hours ago, Guppycur said: Bordering on politics; it's an interesting thread but best to step away from that aspect of the subject. The thing is, while renewables sound great on paper, the technology just isn't there yet. Batteries suck. Period. Until those are radically improved, it's just not worth it. The funny thing about batteries is that they would significantly help EVERY electrical grid regardless of how electricity is generated. If you could store your excess electricity, and there will always be some because there has to be, then you would have nearly free ways to "generate" electricity when other systems fail. Better battery technology helps everyone and not just the renewables crowd. We should all encourage investment in better battery technology. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odetta Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 Clay Pot Heater: grab a clay pot, make sure it has a hole on bottom. Place a lit candle down and cover it with the clay pot. Works with a tealight also. The pot is a great insulator and will act as a radiator. 360 degree heater. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jost Amman Posted February 19, 2021 Author Share Posted February 19, 2021 4 hours ago, Odetta said: Clay Pot Heater: grab a clay pot, make sure it has a hole on bottom. Place a lit candle down and cover it with the clay pot. Works with a tealight also. The pot is a great insulator and will act as a radiator. 360 degree heater. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 For the record, the clay pot does nothing at all to increase heat in a room. The candle with or without the clay pot will put out the exact same amount of heat, only difference is the pot absorbs some of the heat slowing the radiant heating process down but also making the heat last a bit longer once the candle runs out, balancing the equation. Realistically though, the whole pot / candle concept is just a gimmick to anyone who doesn't understand science. Also, keep in mind that, like all fires, the air feeding the candle has to come from somewhere. So by lighting a candle (or fireplace), you're also pulling cold air from outside into your home, unless you somehow have an airtight home, in which case the fire / candle will just die out and so would you. Fires are effective at warming you up only if you're within the proximity of the radiant heat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odetta Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 https://www.skilledsurvival.com/clay-pot-candle-heater/#:~:text=Once constructed%2C the heater body,to heat the clay pots. Tldr if you don't want to read entire article. The pot acts as a heat battery basically keeping the warm air close to the floor and not the ceiling. Enough to warm your hands, etc. Meaning after the pot saves up enough heat you'll be able to feel it radiate off. Candles by themselves send the heat straight up where it gets stuck. They do work at making the heat of a candle more useful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vampirenostra Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 -21 C here at night, no trouble at all as we are used to such temps, thus it is not common for us for years now. I do remember winters in my childhood when we had -25-29C and it was common. Now days I do not even turn on the heaters if it is not -5 outside... It all is a matter of getting used and being prepared to something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BFT2020 Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 The state did not prepare properly for a cold snap that affected all their power sources, including natural gas which they not only use internally for their power needs but export to other locations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppycur Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 On 2/18/2021 at 8:26 PM, Maharin said: The funny thing about batteries is that they would significantly help EVERY electrical grid regardless of how electricity is generated. If you could store your excess electricity, and there will always be some because there has to be, then you would have nearly free ways to "generate" electricity when other systems fail. Better battery technology helps everyone and not just the renewables crowd. We should all encourage investment in better battery technology. Absolutely; the difference between say, a coal plant and a wind/solar source is that batteries are *required* on the latter. That makes those techs not yet a viable solution. I'm happy with Nuclear, tbh. Well, it's still sub-freezing here and I've been cutting away my dead banana tree (it *was* big enough to bear fruit) but we'll supposedly be back in the 70's (f) this weekend. Then I'll have a true grasp of how many plants I lost. I've been fortunate, we only lost power for 4 hours and so far nothing has burst. So far. We keep the heat on high and the fireplace going to produce enough ambient temp to *hopefully* keep the pipes thawed. We haven't lost any pressure so I'm optimistic. The issue with pipes isn't the freezing, it's the thawing. The copper expands WITH the frozen water, but that process thins it out too much and it can no longer handle the full pressure of running water. So we're not out of the woods yet. Roads are fine, but stores are bare and gas is hard to find, which is odd since no one is supposed to be traveling, but whatever... I guess for generators, and of course those caught up in the fear mongering. I've plenty of food so ain't worried about that... I'm more concerned about my plants than anything. 😃 We just bought this house, and one reason was because the yard was full of mature plants. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maharin Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 1 minute ago, Guppycur said: Absolutely; the difference between say, a coal plant and a wind/solar source is that batteries are *required* on the latter. That makes those techs not yet a viable solution. I'm happy with Nuclear, tbh. Where I live there is a new coal plant put in a number of years ago (well before I moved here). Many local coal mines and other sources are far less available now (closures and such) so the price of electricity is steadily rising here. Coal is becoming less available and more expensive as more and more coal mines get shut down. I can't imagine this new-ish coal plant will still be used in 10 years because the price of coal produced electricity will not be able to compete. I think of battery technology as the fuel of renewable energy systems (even though it isn't, but it plays a similar role). At one point coal was easy to find and cheap to mine so we used that for quite a while. Natural gas became more plentiful and cheap so it started to be used more commonly. Nuclear was never cheap on the startup but has always had long term potential. As technology changes the dynamics of what makes more sense to generate electricity changes. Solar and other renewables make sense now but will become much more friendly to scale once battery tech gets cheaper with higher capacity. Renewables can make a lot of sense on smaller scales today. I have a solar setup that is smaller than it needs to be but I'm using it as a learning project. I plan to go completely off grid with my farm within a few years. Where I live solar makes the most sense and is the most accessible for my needs. I can't gain energy independence with anything except renewables at this point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppycur Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 It'd be nice to "get off the grid" so to speak, but a pipe dream for my situation atm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boidster Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 1 hour ago, Maharin said: Solar and other renewables make sense now but will become much more friendly to scale once battery tech gets cheaper with higher capacity. Note that "batteries" for solar/wind/biomass include things like pumped hydro, molten salt, compressed air, and other technologies. One company has been funded to try robots stacking heavy blocks - a sort of dry pumped hydro. Several countries are >90% renewable energy by combining direct generation + existing storage technology - sometimes actual electrochem batteries, of course. The technology is out there, what is lacking is willpower and investment. There is a lot of money behind not moving to renewable energy, which unfortunately creates drag on both. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meganoth Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 On 2/19/2021 at 1:19 PM, Boidster said: robots stacking heavy blocks - Thats a good one, never heard of this 😃. I'm a fan of the idea to cut out a big block out of the earth and pump water with high pressure under it too make it rise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lenny Lettuce Lips Posted February 20, 2021 Share Posted February 20, 2021 On 2/19/2021 at 5:53 AM, Vampirenostra said: -21 C here at night, no trouble at all as we are used to such temps, thus it is not common for us for years now. I do remember winters in my childhood when we had -25-29C and it was common. Now days I do not even turn on the heaters if it is not -5 outside... It all is a matter of getting used and being prepared to something. It's easy to mock from a position of self aggrandizement. Texas is typically hot. Ice is quite uncommon. They had no system in place for this kind of weather. I remember when I lived there and we had two inches of snow and everyone stayed home. It's not about a 150 car pile-up, it's about never having a chance to learn to drive on ice. Same as people who live in incredibly cold areas never learning to swim because the water is too cold. If you never have a chance to learn, you are likely going to fail spectacularly. I think we're all willfully missing the point and that is: we're fighting among ourselves over things we had no control over and it isn't helping anything. How do we get something useful from this now? What do we change from here? I'm more worried about ERCOT changing the price of energy from $25 per unit of electricity to $9,000. That is going to crush so many people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crater Creator Posted February 22, 2021 Share Posted February 22, 2021 I'm sure those affected appreciated the initial sympathies. But this thread got political, which is still against the rules, and that's why we're closing it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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