Solar/Wind Energy merely swaps oil dependency for rare earths dependency?

D107

<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/11/08/can-the-us-compete-on-rare-earths/america-should-not-panic-about-rare-earths">http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/11/08/can-the-us-compete-on-rare-earths/america-should-not-panic-about-rare-earths</a>



NY Times article by Kenneth P Green of the American Enterprise Institute. Claims "Our fetish for wind and solar development could only make us more dependent on rare earths." He clearly has a bias against solar/wind energy, but would the detriment of rare earths dependency approach the deleterious effects of continued reliance on oil? I never thought of this nor have seen this discussed here.

hot_rod

nothing rare in solar thermal

collectors:) Although copper prices make it feel that way sometimes.



Better recycling of electronics would be a good start. Seems like we send most electronic waste off shore for recycling. Or in the landfills.



Other options for the rare earth components? I've heard one of the pump manufacturers has found a work around for the rare earth component in their ECM pump technology.



We do have a bit of rare earth mining here that was shuttered when China dumped the price on these minerals.



I hope the folks in power don't resort to the all fall back of waging war to get resources, tea, silk, oil, water, etc.

NRT_Rob

wow

heck of a shill there. I wonder why it is part and parcel for conservative thinkers to have to champion using oil? It's like it's some kind of litmus test for being a conservative. You'd think they'd be all about domestic energy production that might actually be viable and stick around for awhile.



he's got it exactly backwards. Solar, wind, and electric infrastructure are far more critical to our national defense and economy than fighter jets are. fighter jets fight enemies we don't fight much anymore, plus we already have tons of 'em. but getting off oil gets us out of the middle east, which reduces our threat exposure massively, once we leave oil behind. Never mind climate change issues.



if there were a rare earth problem, pretty much our entire civilization crashes unless they find a workaround. Everything we depend on today uses them. Solar panels or wind turbines would be the least of our worries. Pretty narrow minded point of view to point fingers at clean energy when they use a miniscule fraction of the rare earths our society uses every day.



That would be like saying our fetish for weed wackers is putting us at risk for an oil embargo. sure, they use oil, but... not really the main concern.



consider if oil is embargoed, we're done in about a month or two. if rare earth are embargoed... we're fine for quite awhile if necessary. consumer goods would plummet but we could maintain our current military infrastructure much more easily.



I think HR is dead on with recycling as well. we should keep that here at home. problem is, costs money to do it safely, while in china they don't mind poisoning their workforce picking over electronic waste. yet. and heaven forbid we pay a few extra bucks up front for our electronics to cover the costs of domestic recycling!

rlaggren

Sounds like

One of those guys that make a career (quite literally) of bashing anything that changes the status quo and threatens to change the course of the big dollar flows. Wonder who pays him?



There is always cost. So what else is new? In all likelyhood some of what he says could be right, but that doesn't mean staying on this high carbon diet until we all (not him) starve is the way to go. There's always going to be a cost and lots of times it's hard to calculate exactly ahead of time. You pays your money and you takes your chances. But I wouldn't want my grandchildren totally dependent on oil like we are now.



Rufus

pipe4zen

I think I see his position

and the mention of solar and wind in the authors mind is justifying the fact the the very small share that solar pv and wind have now of 1%-2% is not worth the effort nor is a necessity , but other more important and necessary technologies really do need rare earths for national security, economic reasons.

Truth is , in order for solar pv and wind to really put a dent in our co2 reductions, we need to be looking at a 50% share . And that won't ever happen in anyones life time who can read this. Even if we can approach those numbers, we most likely would be even more dependent on oil, for oil is the engine that drives and manufactures those panels. Ironically, BP , yep those guys, are big, big players in the alternative energy field. "Beyond Petroleum". It's just a way for the oil guys to get a share of the electrical utility generation, and take away from coal and NG. It's foolish to think oil co's would be impacted in anyway by solar or wind power.

Let's not mention the mining of silica, and processing into silcon wafers, then the doping of those wafers with Boron, Phosphourous chlorides and other substances necessary to make turn those wafers into electrical conductors. Then after all that, only capable of capturing 1/5 of the sun's energy and convert it into eletricity.

Yes, I think I know where he's coming from.

NRT_Rob

there is no need

for oil to drive the manufacture of renewables.



at least one solar plant in america was largely powered with its own panels. they called it a "solar breeder".



solar and wind will continue to grow, as their price continues to fall, and fossil fuels continue to rise. and if we ever wise up and actually make fossil fuels pay their true costs (i.e. stop giving them free military aid, tax to clean up their pollution) instead of using your tax dollars and mine to make fossil fuels LOOK cheap, it'll happen even faster.



instead of a general tax I just want it on the energy itself that causes the issues. seems pretty simple.

pipe4zen

surely you can't be serious

All that plant really did is offset it's electrical usage. And most likely they only assembled the panels there, not manufacture all components. There is absolutly no way to manufacture the metal cases, smelt the glass, usage of excavation equipment for mining of silica, and ship the panels across the globe without oil.



Keep dreaming.

NRT_Rob

dead serious

there is thousands of times more solar and wind energy resource than total current energy usage worldwide, including smelting and mining and everything else humans do on this planet. and I would very conservatively estimate that half the energy we currently use is wasted.



Obviously it would take a very large, concerted, and sustained effort to go ALL renewable... that may not be feasible given political realities to deal with, unfortunately... but we could get pretty darned close. and last time I checked, the price per KWH for industrial PV was about 0.23/kwh, solar thermal electric was below 0.20 and onshore wind was almost at parity with many fossil fuel sources already at something like 0.14 to 0.16/kwh.



with ANY significant concession for the military costs, pollution health costs, extraction/spillage environmental costs, or greenhouse effects of fossil fuels showing up in their costs, as they should, rather than being invisibly subsidized with our tax dollars, and all of a sudden those development projects make a lot more sense. and they *almost* make sense without it now. Never mind any actual upward price drift in fossil fuels... renewable prices are coming down, not going up. amazing.



I will keep "dreaming", thanks. If you think oil is going to continue to be a viable option for much longer, I would say you are the one who is dreaming. Let me know when coal gets clean, ok?

pipe4zen

surely you can't be serious, again!

I never said that oil is a viable option, it's not. Nor is solar or wind power, in any stretch of the imagination.



Like I said before BP, Exxon are jumping into the game, not because they see it as a threat, rather another source of income in their already well padded bank accounts. Those alternative avenues will only enable and futher entrench our environmental woes.



My opinion is technology and industry got us into this mess, and technology and industry can not and will never get us out of it.



For the record , I advocate conservation, conservation and more conservation. Now I'm the one who's dreaming........sigh.

pipe4zen

double post

NRT_Rob

my apologies

I must have misunderstood your "seeing the point" of the original article as being supportive of our current fossil fuel regime. mea culpa. I do think we can do a lot better with technology and industry though. We used to have rivers catching fire as well, and we fixed that. Improvement though innovation is definitely possible. The will to do it is the only question in my mind.