Renewable Energy has many parts, and some of them can do jobs that others cannot do. It is important to work together to bring the best renewable Energy to the world that we can hope to achieve.
This diagram represents a short overview over different elements of a renewable energy network, and what the different parts can do, and what not.
For example, Hydropower can be both an energy source (flowing water through a turbine) but also a means of energy storage (by keeping the water behind the dam). Renewable Biomass can be stored well, but can also be turned into a renewable source of energy. Batteries can store energy well, but cannot produce energy.
Thoughts, comments, likes :-)
Is biomass renewable, though? I mean it takes a lot of time for a tree to grow. A lot.
There are other types of biomass though. Using waste product from food production or gas from sewage plants is somewhat reasonable.
It is renewable in the sense that given infinite time, you can use it to grow infinite energy (for the nitpickers: assuming an eternal sun).
It is not infinite though and the amount of power you can extract from it is limited but that’s true for every renewable sources: you have a limited amount of places where you can put dams, where you can put windmills or even solar panels.
What is important is that it is not power generation that consumes a scarce good (as fossil power does) but that it is increases in power generation that consumes it, in a reversible way.
If you look at it like that, fossil is renewable as well. Just a tiny bit slower, but still, given enough time … :)
Not really IIRC. Modern bacteria are more efficient at breaking down organic materials and forests buried today won’t make oil anymore.
That’s interesting. You have an url handy for now details? Even if this wasn’t the case, fossil generation isn’t real feasible for us anyway.
Sorry I don’t have it handy, just read it, probably on /r/askscience a while ago. A quick search indicate that maybe this is not as true as I thought. That seems to be the case mostly for coal and for some forms of oil, but not all of it.
Hey, no worries. It’s interesting how nature changes.
Poplars and willows are fairly fast growing. Plus there are perennial grass feedstocks
That certainly helps, but still, at scale is hardly sustainable.
@Mihies @gandalf_der_12te Yes it is. The waste from biomass can be used as fertiliser for new plants, so a circle is formed. One tree is not quite the right model, you could think instead about managed forests where older growth is harvested and new growth is always in various stages, from saplings to ‘ready next year’. Carbon from the biomass process is used by the new growth.
Yes, and, once established, a grove of trees can continue providing biomass for literally centuries. Look up coppicing.
TIL. But I’m not convinced that this would solve the problem for good. But it certainly helps with growth.
The deforestation of the Amazon is largely driven by a desire for more land to grow biofuels (sugarcane) on.
The byproducts of sugar production (the leaves and stalks) are used to produce ethanol from a biological, renewable source, as opposed to fossil fuels.
Oh, and in the Amazon, said sugarcane farming is often done by slaves.
You either need more farmland to grow what will become biofuels on it, or you have to stop growing food on existing farmland, which means food gets more expensive.