Apr 24 2013: I completely understand your concerns. The problem is who is willing to pay for these systems are the people who want big ones. And yeah, I think it's rather a poor choice to put these things only 1-2 meters off the ground. You could take the propellers off windmills and just use a solar collector. No moving parts! No threat to birds or bats ! The advantage of concentrated solar is that you get hot water and need a smaller solar panel which is much cheaper that traditional non-concentrated solar.
Apr 23 2013: Thorium isn't renewable. But yes, something like a sub critical traveling wave reactor is ideal and can be made from existing radioactive waste.
Apr 23 2013: What? Wind? The thing with the big big blades that kills birds and bats?
Concentrated solar. Same footprint as wind, but is much much safer for wildlife. Also, because it is concentrated, you only need 4x4cm solar panel that can take 500 times its area of reflector. This makes solar cells much less impact on the environment.
Nov 7 2012: Well we have to figure out plastics. Only a few of our plastics are from biological origins (i.e. ping-ping balls) our light-weight plastics are all derived from petrol. So we have to go back to woods, glass or metal, or have some other large-scale process to fill in the material gap.
Oct 10 2012: Well the choice of candidates is usually depressing, especially here in America where the two-party system is maintained to shut out 3rd parties. I cannot believe that Mit Romney is the best candidate the Republican party can find, or if not talent even the most electable. The same goes for Obama.
I propose we allow people to vote "none of the above" and if "none of the above" collects more votes than the above combined, we take the person with the most write-in votes. That would get people out to vote. Micky Mouse is generally the most written-in name, though I think Neil Degrass Tyson has a chance to beat it this year.
Also, this whole electoral college thing keeps people apathetic. My state always votes democratic. I have no reason to vote for the presidency. However, mix that up with a popular count, and no one can rest easy that their state will go one way or the other.
There are some efforts underway t get Instant Runoff Voting methods in my state, which should also make it more exciting as well.
Sep 14 2012: No,we all see colors differently. While we all have rods & cones, we do not have the same amounts. In addition, women and some males have the ability to see an additional blue. That is rather than R-G-B (trichromat), they have R-G-B1-B2 (tetrachromat), which provides the ability to more highly discriminate between shades of blue.
Jul 27 2012: I looked at the page, but I'm still skeptical A megawatt beam is a lot of concentrated energy. And if you're generating megawatts of laser, you also have to cool it. It's hard to cool in space without a convective atmosphere.
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A comment on Conversation: What form of renewable energy has or will have the lowest impact on biodiversity?
A reply on Conversation: What form of renewable energy has or will have the lowest impact on biodiversity?
A comment on Conversation: What form of renewable energy has or will have the lowest impact on biodiversity?
A comment on Conversation: What form of renewable energy has or will have the lowest impact on biodiversity?
A reply on Conversation: What form of renewable energy has or will have the lowest impact on biodiversity?
Concentrated solar. Same footprint as wind, but is much much safer for wildlife. Also, because it is concentrated, you only need 4x4cm solar panel that can take 500 times its area of reflector. This makes solar cells much less impact on the environment.
A comment on Conversation: Could you grow a house?
A comment on Conversation: What is the change or shift that you think will occur as we come to the end of oil?
A comment on Conversation: What is your argument for or against "Voter Apathy"?
I propose we allow people to vote "none of the above" and if "none of the above" collects more votes than the above combined, we take the person with the most write-in votes. That would get people out to vote. Micky Mouse is generally the most written-in name, though I think Neil Degrass Tyson has a chance to beat it this year.
Also, this whole electoral college thing keeps people apathetic. My state always votes democratic. I have no reason to vote for the presidency. However, mix that up with a popular count, and no one can rest easy that their state will go one way or the other.
There are some efforts underway t get Instant Runoff Voting methods in my state, which should also make it more exciting as well.
A comment on Conversation: Do we see the exact same color?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_vision#Subjectivity_of_color_perception
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/health/some-women-may-see-100-million-colors-thanks-to-their-genes-450179/
Also some people, like myself, can see polarized light.
A comment on Conversation: What will be the best renewable source of energy in 2050?