Jeffrey Sachs Believes In Fairy Dust, Too

The Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia U tells us we can harness the excess solar energy radiating on the Mohave Desert to provide half of the U.S.'s energy needs.

Of course, all of that sunny sun has been going to *waste* all of this time. Has Sachs done any research - nay, simply devoted a whimsical thought experiment - to what impact subtracting the energy of a few thousand square miles of baking sand from the ecosphere might have?

I'm guessing not.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• energy
• oil
• biofuels
• ecology
• solar

[Teratornis]

Before Europeans arrived in North America, the eastern part was so densely forested that people said a squirrel could run from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River without ever touching the ground. Today only a tiny fraction of that land is still forested. Similarly, the U.S. has paved an enormous area of highways, parking lots, etc. The point is that a few thousand square miles of solar plants are unlikely to change the energy flows as much as we've already changed.

[ZPetro]

Very interesting point. If I am reading you correctly, you suggest that we would only have to dial back a small amount on our current disruptions to "pay" for any solar plant disruption.

I'll be honest - I had not thought of that. I am going to cogitate some on that, perhaps to emerge as a post on my blog.

Any other points you might have, Teratornis, are welcome.

[Teratornis]

Solar power plants do not "subtract" power. All the solar power they collect goes back into the environment in the form of heat, at the point of use. They just move the heat around.

Humans already have similar effects by chopping down forests and paving roads. These localized effects on how heat travels around the planet do not change the overall heat balance appreciably. CO2 in the atmosphere does, however, by increasing the atmosphere's ability to retain heat.

[ZPetro]

Hey, thanks for commenting :).

Heat is only the terminal expression of solar energy. On the way to heat, it may be the catalyst for veg generation, or it may be pushing a shiny metal box from here to there. That's a difference. Where the heat "settles" is a difference. There are more variables than the zero-sum nod to the preservation of energy.

I'd like to note, with humour, that using "chopping down forests" and "paving" as the lead-in to your point is perhaps not the best way to go. :)

[Teratornis]

Once people get used to things like a superhighway, the superhighway doesn't seem so bad, but a superhighway blights the environment far more than a solar plant.

[Teratornis]

Building the solar plant would itself constitute "dialing back" on the greater disruption caused by building, say, another coal-burning plant.

People tend to look at things in isolation - Oh noes! A wind turbine! - while forgetting or never realizing in the first place what the wind turbine replaces.

The stuff we are used to does not "seem" disruptive, not because it isn't disruptive, but because we are used to it.

Scientists view the world differently than the average person does.