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by theteapot 996 days ago
Wind turbines have a higher potential power density. Wind is sun energy concentrate.
3 comments

That's even more true for oil and coal, but doesn't necessarily make them great choices.

Plus "concentrate" doesn't quite capture how there are inefficiencies in conversion: A lot of that sunlight gets wasted. A concentration of a portion of a portion.

Even more true of Nuclear but I wasn't making an argument about oil and gas versus solar.

> Plus "concentrate" doesn't quite capture how there are inefficiencies in conversion.

Jeez.

> I wasn't making an argument about oil and gas versus solar.

I know, I'm mentioned them to demonstrate how "it's indirectly from sun energy" isn't automatically positive.

> Even more true of Nuclear

That seems like a stretch from "steady irradiance like with solar power" over to "stars death-sploding." It's a good thing the stuff we use in nuclear power wasn't formed from our sun, we aren't done with it yet.

Potential and realized are different things. I could potentially run at light speed…
Where can I find the math for this?
Vaclav Smil's book Power Density is quite good