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Comment by beembeem | Hacker News Reader

> Right now there's no sustainable source for baseload power.

To push back on this, there is a centurys' old technology for this in hydro. There's also an emerging field of geothermal.

The Pacific Northwest (both sides of the border) has an abundance of hydropower that was installed decades ago and provides clean, reliable, baseload power.

Geothermal has its challenges, especially at utility scale where geographic location is important and not typically close to population centers. On a smaller scale it is not geographically a problem, but not as economically viable for individual homeowners. It makes more sense when a large corporate is investing in it [1].

[1] https://news.microsoft.com/2022/04/20/microsoft-redmond-camp...

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Hydropower is generally renewable but really is not considered sustainable. I know I slipped that in and moved the goalpost because TFA is titled "renewable" but I said "sustainable" on purpose. So your comments on hydro are fair, and I'm glad you brought it up because it's an important discussion to be had.

Geothermal completely slipped my mind! facepalm Obviously the consensus view is that geothermal is sustainable. I have some mild concerns about how many years a installation in a non-geologically/thermally active area can run before it changes the temperature of its lithic heat sink enough to significantly reduce power output, but many installations are proving the success of the technology overall, and that's more an economic challenge (lifetime/ROI of installation) than a question of sustainability.

> Hydropower is generally renewable but really is not considered sustainable.

Unfamiliar readers have to note that here sustainable is not used in its normal meaning but in the one used by some environmentalists. Hydropower can definitely be sustained indefinitely. It does cause flooding in some area previously I flooded and disturbs fish which some people view as an issue.

It’s really hard to have a good discussion about climate change because some people constantly push unrelated agenda into the mix.

> Hydropower can definitely be sustained indefinitely.

That’s absolutely not what “sustainable” means.

The difference between “renewable” and “sustainable” isn’t a fringe concept. It’s been pretty well accepted for about 55 years now.

That’s exactly what sustainable means: “able to be maintained at a certain rate or level”.

And even in the specific meaning you are pushing, the actual impact of hydro is questionable. Until you take a die hard position that no ecosystem whatsoever should be disturbed the benefit vs loss analysis is more than compelling.

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/sustainability

Definition #2:

> the quality of not being harmful to the environment or depleting natural resources, and thereby supporting long-term ecological balance:

> how many years a installation in a non-geologically/thermally active area can run before it changes the temperature of its lithic heat sink

I would imagine this varies, but is a much smaller problem than e.g. heating up water habitats (data center cooling) or burning fossil fuels.

To push back on the push back, being in Quebec, I always thought we were safe because of the Hydro (we're at 98% Hydro power - really this and the abundant supply of water are why I still stay here), but it looks like we're hitting the limit and will have trouble meeting demand in 10 years time [0], especially considering exports to New York and other northeast states.

Also, dams are expensive. You're looking at $2B per project, at least here, and you need to flood an immense amount of land.

Really, we should get over our paranoia and lift the artificial hurdles on nuclear so the plants can be built faster and cheaper. Or, at least in the states, bite the bullet and leverage your extensive gas fields to develop a solar industry [1]

[0] https://www.electricityforum.com/news/canada-energy-shortage

[1] https://doomberg.substack.com/p/a-serious-proposal-on-us-ene...

Thanks for linking those sources. I think this is the key part of the article:

> increased demand over the coming years, including data centres, cryptocurrency miners and greenhouses.

Price them out. Don't give sweetheart deals to uses that aren't beneficial to the local economy. Additionally, these uses don't necessitate baseload. Crypto should be using cheap, renewable variable power sources. I'm genuinely curious what greenhouses means in this case. Heating indoor crops in the winter? Geothermal would be more effective for this. [1]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZD_3_gsgsnk

i thought hydropower screws up the ecosystem of rivers pretty badly. LIke fish unable to spawn and all that.

I present you the most amazing solution to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2z3ZyGlqUkA

Not to mention that the dams in Washington state do account for spawning/migration and slow down flows at certain points of the year.

These have to be manned? Like 24/7 or...how much human labor is involved here? What % of salmon make it into human hands and through these tubes?

Earlier attempts at fish ladders saw rates as low as like 3% for certain species of fish, per ladder/dam. Even if 50% of salmon got up them, if they have to pass 5 of them on the way to the spawning ground that meant 97% of salmon wouldn't make to the spawning grounds.

Also, obviously, the ecological effects aren't just "tasty fish can't make babies". The impact on seasonal floodplains and sedimentation is huge by itself.

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