Energy Matters Forums

[CarbonetiX]

Hey Guys I was just wishing to start up a discussion on the advantages/disadvantages of geothermal and wind power generation as opposed to solar power generation. While solar power is obviously the renewable energy of choice for most people, and is fantastic for domestic hot water purposes, on the face of it solar power is somewhat inefficient when compared to other sources such as geothermal and and wind. With the Victorian government recently committing to cut greenhouse emissions by 20% by 2020, a lot of the focus has been on investing in solar to help meet this target. I talk about it a bit here: http://www.carbonetix.com.au/labor_government_climage_change_future.php

The real question is whether this is the most efficient method of reducing emissions? Should Australian governments be focusing primarily on encouraging the use of solar, wind, geothermal or a mixture of all 3?

[Tracker]

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Should Australian governments be focusing primarily on encouraging the use of solar, wind, geothermal or a mixture of all 3?

Why only three - What about "hydro-electric", and "Wave=Power" and "Tidal Power"..

If the Chinese can dam a mighty river, why can't the Mexican's dam the Rip.

A "Knowing" geologist could tell us if "Geothermal" is realistic as a general rule in Australia..
I suspect that the cost of drilling so far down to tap heat, might make such energy, an impractical one, except in areas like Moree, where i presume, there is a "Hot-Spot"..
..
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[Joey]

Hey Guys I was just wishing to start up a discussion on the advantages/disadvantages of geothermal and wind power generation as opposed to solar power generation. While solar power is obviously the renewable energy of choice for most people, and is fantastic for domestic hot water purposes, on the face of it solar power is somewhat inefficient when compared to other sources such as geothermal and and wind. With the Victorian government recently committing to cut greenhouse emissions by 20% by 2020, a lot of the focus has been on investing in solar to help meet this target. I talk about it a bit here: http://www.carbonetix.com.au/labor_government_climage_change_future.php

The real question is whether this is the most efficient method of reducing emissions? Should Australian governments be focusing primarily on encouraging the use of solar, wind, geothermal or a mixture of all 3?

Hi Kristine ,

I see you are a paid employee of the company who's name you use as a user name , paid in the role of marketing manager , surprise surprise.
Energy efficiency is a great thing , energy efficiency cloaked with the inference it's purpose is to save anything but the bottom line while your company profits is something that really gets my back up!
It always amazes me how companies that have the loudest public voices are always the ones that never publicly enter any debate regarding the legitimacy of this CO2 causing climate change scam , obviously it would effect the bottom line , not to mention put a lot of people out of a job.
There are few discussion already with reference to how much money is being made from this whole CO2 vs Climate Change / Global Warming question , Ironically I don't see the names of any volunteers on your team ? plenty of reference to green, unfortunately for many people the only green we see from such organizations is the green that builds up in the bank accounts of those involved , CO2 emission and their effects are at best a hotly debated theory , The jury is far from out ! , but I guess while there is still so much uncertainly what better way to play on the gullibility of masses and make a few bucks.

As to your question , Wind , Geothermal , Solar etc , Whatever is cost effective and costs the end user the least amount to save the greatest amount of money , So far switching off and becoming energy efficient is number one , Solar is Number 2 and if the was a way for the general public the save or make more money that required producing large amounts of CO2 to do it , it would more that likely take over first place.
Being in the business you are in you should already know full well there is no more cost effective alternative to Solar Power , although I doubt this was even a serious question , more a lure to draw attention to your company.

[Tracker]

I see you are a paid employee of the company who's name you use as a user name

Thanks - Joey - I did not even bother to investigate, just wondered why some of the more sustainable energy sources were omitted from the list..

I guess the reason is obvious - that you can't flog a GeoThermal or Wave setup to an average householder.
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[CarbonetiX]

I see you are a paid employee of the company who's name you use as a user name

Hi Joey,

I find the passionate derision in your reply surprising.

Yes I am an employee of CarbonetiX, and yes, I am the Marketing Manager. The reason however that the user name I've chosen is our company name, is that the posts to this forum will not only be posted by me, but others in the organisation. So as not to mis-represent them, I didn't want to put their words to my name. Using the generic CarbonetiX username means that our posts can benefit from the full breadth of experience as a company, rather than simply my own.

Energy efficiency is a great thing, energy efficiency cloaked with the inference it's purpose is to save anything but the bottom line while your company profits is something that really gets my back up! It always amazes me how companies that have the loudest public voices are always the ones that never publicly enter any debate regarding the legitimacy of this CO2 causing climate change scam...

I think you might find internationally renowned climate change scientist Stephen Schneider's comments on a recent SBS Insight show of interest (http://news.sbs.com.au/insight/episode/ ... 2#overview). In this interview, he explains that the world has a natural level of CO2 (lets say +30), and also has the mechanism to dispose of the naturally occurring CO2 (say -30). Then humans come into the picture, and we add our CO2 (say +3). The natural environment takes care of its own, but what we emit stays, and is added upon each year (say +3 over 20 years = +60). This is what is causing the imbalance and dramatic increase in natural disasters recently. Are you honestly saying that there is no case for reducing our CO2 emissions? If so, I would ask you to please post your research and evidence to the contrary, as there is plenty of evidence that supports the increase in human produced CO2 to climate change.

Energy efficiency is the low-hanging fruit in reducing emissions, and so is cost effective for businesses in a monetary sense. For examples of this, I invite you to review some of the results that we have achieved over our 8 years of operation at our website: www.carbonetix.com.au. That we are a business and of course have an economic interest as well does not preclude us from having a genuine interest in reducing CO2 emissions. In fact, we have at times assisted organisations for a monetary loss, in order to gain the carbon emissions reductions.

Ironically I don't see the names of any volunteers on your team?

In fact, we have 2 volunteers that work within our company.

Being in the business you are in you should already know full well there is no more cost effective alternative to Solar Power , although I doubt this was even a serious question , more a lure to draw attention to your company.

There are many more cost effective alternatives to Solar Power, however, Solar Power is visible, and so the government has chosen to invest heavily in this technology and to be "seen" to be doing something for the environment.

As mentioned earlier, energy efficiency is cost effective and achieves more carbon emissions reductions, however it's not "sexy", you can't see it, and so there is no leadership from government to become more energy efficient. Behaviour change is another area that achieves large reductions, but is also overlooked. This was a serious question, and a debate that we feel should be explored further instead of grasping at the first "visible" alternative before properly investigating other options.

We have many posts exploring climate change on our company blog (www.carbonetix.com.au/blog) and whilst we always seek to further the brand of our company, you will find (if you take the time to investigate properly) that we also have an interest in furthering education and awareness about these issues.

[CarbonetiX]

Thanks - Joey - I did not even bother to investigate, just wondered why some of the more sustainable energy sources were omitted from the list..

I guess the reason is obvious - that you can't flog a GeoThermal or Wave setup to an average householder.

Hi Tracker,

We don't service households, and have no connection to selling GeoThermal or Wave setups. We are in fact an energy efficiency and energy conservation focussed organisation that is interested in furthering debate about all climate change options.

[Joey]

I see you are a paid employee of the company who's name you use as a user name

Hi Joey,

I find the passionate derision in your reply surprising.

Yes I am an employee of CarbonetiX, and yes, I am the Marketing Manager. The reason however that the user name I've chosen is our company name, is that the posts to this forum will not only be posted by me, but others in the organisation. So as not to mis-represent them, I didn't want to put their words to my name. Using the generic CarbonetiX username means that our posts can benefit from the full breadth of experience as a company, rather than simply my own.

Technology has advanced to such a degree that forums are now able to accommodate several users from the same company , You could even post as Kristina.

I think you might find internationally renowned climate change scientist Stephen Schneider's comments on a recent SBS Insight show of interest (http://news.sbs.com.au/insight/episode/ ... 2#overview). In this interview, he explains that the world has a natural level of CO2 (lets say +30), and also has the mechanism to dispose of the naturally occurring CO2 (say -30). Then humans come into the picture, and we add our CO2 (say +3). The natural environment takes care of its own, but what we emit stays, and is added upon each year (say +3 over 20 years = +60). This is what is causing the imbalance and dramatic increase in natural disasters recently. Are you honestly saying that there is no case for reducing our CO2 emissions? If so, I would ask you to please post your research and evidence to the contrary, as there is plenty of evidence that supports the increase in human produced CO2 to climate change.

Stephen Schneider's rides the same gravy train you do , funnily enough the people that are not profiting from this scam have opposing views stating the truth that there is no correlation between C02 levels and past or present natural disasters.
The same graphs can be drawn to suit any argument , EG: Graph the internet speed vs CO2 , or Internet Speed vs natural disasters , strange isn't internet speeds around the world have got faster and natural disaster have escalated at the same rate as C02 , Heck you can even make a graph that shows as the amount of solar panels have increased so have all of the above.

In fact, we have at times assisted organisations for a monetary loss, in order to gain the carbon emissions reductions.

These are examples I would like to see ? but I wont hold my breath waiting for them.

Ironically I don't see the names of any volunteers on your team?

In fact, we have 2 volunteers that work within our company.

What a great display of gratitude not listing them as part of them team ?

Being in the business you are in you should already know full well there is no more cost effective alternative to Solar Power , although I doubt this was even a serious question , more a lure to draw attention to your company.

There are many more cost effective alternatives to Solar Power, however, Solar Power is visible, and so the government has chosen to invest heavily in this technology and to be "seen" to be doing something for the environment.

Really? please share ?

As mentioned earlier, energy efficiency is cost effective and achieves more carbon emissions reductions, however it's not "sexy", you can't see it, and so there is no leadership from government to become more energy efficient. Behaviour change is another area that achieves large reductions, but is also overlooked. This was a serious question, and a debate that we feel should be explored further instead of grasping at the first "visible" alternative before properly investigating other options.

We have many posts exploring climate change on our company blog (http://www.carbonetix.com.au/blog) and whilst we always seek to further the brand of our company, you will find (if you take the time to investigate properly) that we also have an interest in furthering education and awareness about these issues.

It takes very little proper investigation to find that your companies primary objective is to make money , creating awareness and education based on CO2 being harmful and bad , and of course selling software packages based on all this being fact when in fact this is only a theory.

[CarbonetiX]

I think it's clear Joey, that you and I hold different beliefs on the causes of climate change. Shall we agree to disagree?

[Willandra]

Excellent comment Joey, and highlighting again the fact that climate change is an economy based 'science' not an environmentally based 'science'.

We are asked to believe that the best scientific brains in the world are dreadfully worried that carbon emmissions are likely to cause our world to end, yet not one of them has made a comment about the fact that the world population is expected to continue doubling every 40 years. It doesn't matter how many "50/50 by 2020" type policies are promoted, if the worlds population is to double every 40 years anthropogenic climate change would never be beaten. If the scientists were conscience driven, or real fear driven instead of dollar driven they would clearly be making noises about population control.

However, it should be obvious to everyone that spewing pollution of any kind into our environment is a dumbo action. We DO need ways of stopping our pollution, but we need real solutions that actually reduce emmissions, not the ineffective dollar-driven solutions we are being offered.

Take the solar panels on domestic roofs program. Imagine if all those panels were in one spot - the economies of scale would make it vastly more cost effective and there would be vastly less embodied energy. However, the current arrangement is very visible and thus we can all feel warm and fuzzy about how our government is helping to save the world.

As to wind farms, less said the better, but until someone invents a viable way of storing electricity these things are complete duds, but again very visible to the punters and very lucrative to the big end of town.

Bah, we are being conned!

[Joey]

I think it's clear Joey, that you and I hold different beliefs on the causes of climate change. Shall we agree to disagree?

Kristina , we can definitely agree we hold different beliefs on the causes of Weather ( as you call it climate change ).
I feel for you that you have been conned and are now making a living from something many of the worlds greatest scientist no longer support , I challenge you to investigate along with the growing numbers of intelligent people ( you no doubt are ) that beliefs and making a living formed on other people opinions of a theory is shaky ground.