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Comment by gerdesj | Hacker News Reader

Hi cynical! Overhead is the sun - it is a massively more abundant energy resource than coal could ever be. It has run for billions of years and has at least one more left in it. Coal is a finite resource and not a very pleasant one to mine.

Solar generation is generally quite dispersed instead of few monolithic coal plants.

That's just solar. There is also wind and wave, geo-thermal and many more ways to generate electricity (power). That's diversification and that surely is easier to defend.

I would suggest that relying on one power source is painting yourself into a corner and then drinking the paint.

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> I would suggest that relying on one power source is painting yourself into a corner and then drinking the paint.

You’re aware that that is exactly what the GP poster was arguing against, right?

What "one power source" do you think they're arguing against? The person you're replying to has noted that renewables are diverse and abundant, while refuting the notion that coal is important to the US because of its abundance because it's less abundant than many other sources of energy.

Its like bloody whack a mole here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38945399

They seemed (to me, by omission) to really want to maintain the status quo.

I understand a "back out plan" but it turns out that there are unfortunate side effects to burning fossils, so it isn't a really decent plan.

Not once did GGP suggest an alternative. No one really wants to drink paint but in the immortal words of Mr F Gump: "Stupid is as stupid does".

What I think is that solar will become the primary power source, so coal might be good for backup (for the US). GP didn't blamed solar.

Fair enough, but bear in mind that "solar" effectively created coal and oil! We don't need a backup as such - but the renewables need a bit more time. We have burned oil for millennia. Solar is only about 50 years old.

I still drive a petrol (gas) powered car and even when I eventually get my eye wateringly expensive electric car, I might have range issues, despite living on a small island group off of Europe - the UK.

However, that new car (with loads of plastics etc etc) will run on unicorn farts ... electricity. What generates that 'leccy is another matter too.

You and I cannot change the world but we can at least point ourselves in the direction that we would like it to go. For me that would involve less fossil fuels.

I think the counter argument is that renewables are never going to replace coal/oil/gas completely as there will always be the boogey man of “what if there is no wind/sun”. Having a small amount of fossil fuel based capacity in reserve would make a huge difference politically and of the options, coal is probably the best for that.

It is less environmentally damaging than maintaining fracking operations for oil/nat gas, extremely abundant in the U.S., and can be spun up or down on the order of hours so emissions can be kept minimal when plants are not needed.

The backup capacity can eventually burn e-fuels, not fossil fuels, so that counterargument fails.

Totally fair and I agree. But what about between now and eventually?

Eventually renewables will be all we use and eventually fossil fuels will no longer be needed. But between now and eventually, maintaining backup capacity is necessary and coal is probably the best option for that for the continental U.S. Nuclear only works as a base load, fracking/oil has even worse side effects, fusion isn’t ready, and we don’t have much untapped hydrothermal/geothermal

Coal is certainly not the best option for the continental US. That would be natural gas. Natural gas can be burned directly in combustion turbines with a fraction of the capital cost of a coal burning powerplant. They are also faster to turn on/off, being basically jet engines.

Most natural gas in the U.S. comes as a byproduct of fracking oil, which imo is worse than coal as reserve power because you have to maintain fracking sites and usually pump a fair amount of oil and briny water alongside the gas. Coal is easier to mine in small amounts afaik and has less local harms (e.g. water contamination, earthquake risk, etc.).

No, actually most natural gas in the US is produced as "non-associated" gas, not gas associated with petroleum production.

Coal's been driven out of the market because it can't compete with natural gas. Solids are not as easily handled as gases.

That is incorrect. Somewhere in the order of 90% of US nat gas is shale gas/fracking related.

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/natural-gas/where-our-na...

Yes. And most of that is not associated with petroleum. It's fracking of formations that contain only natural gas, no petroleum. Fracking is also used on oil-bearing formations, but not only there.

What sort of earth has no sun or wind but bags of coal, which has to be dug up, transported and burned?

Sun and wind are different to coal and oil as power generation sources, however oil n that are finite and diminishing. OK so they probably won't run out in your or my lifetime but that is hardly "never".

I'm a big fan of solar and renewables, but at the same time, in the past there have been massive volcanic eruptions that have blocked out the sun for extended periods of time [1]. So in my mind, the post you were responding to makes a very good point.

[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tambora-1815-volcanic-eruption/

I mentioned a few other too and as you say - the clue is in the name - renewables. Coal isn't renewable. The Carboniferous period only gifted us only so much to play with.

There have been some impressive sun blocks in the past but if, say, Yellowstone went off in a doomsday scenario, then we would not be worrying about electricity generation. It is far more likely that we (humanity as a whole) would be back in the stone age but with jolly refined language skills!

If we have all the other renewables available we do stand some sort of a chance of keeping going, despite a cataclysm.

I don't think that banking on coal n that is a good idea.

Technology-wise, isn't it a lot easier to build a coal plant than it is to build PV panels? Obviously this is not a problem right now, but imagine a disaster scenario where a good amount of high-tech industry is non-operational. Or even a geopolitical crisis where we lose access to enough of the raw materials or manufacturing capacity to make the panels.

(Does the US even manufacture PV panels? Or are they mostly -- or even all -- built overseas?)

Coal and oil are not renewable - they are finite. What do you do when they run out?

If you disregard the environmental aspects of energy security, surely: banking on a non renewable, finite and diminishing resource is silly.

We will probably not run out in my life time but I for one give a shit about my grand daughters's future quality of life. They will need 'leccy so they can sulk at the dinner table whilst doom scrolling on their phones (one is close). By the time they are old enough to get really pissy about the climate and granddad is a deposit for a mortgage, oil will probably have run out and coal will be distinctly brown coloured.

Even the UK is dragging manufacture of stuff back in-house from abroad. Many of my customers make things here. I'm sure the US is doing the same.

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