Interesting concept.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Northfield Mountain in MA is pumped storage. Been in use since about 1970ish. They pump the Connecticut river up to a man made lake at night and let if flow back down to generate power during the day.

My late cousin worked on that project for an engineering firm.

Leonard

No account , can't log in. But assume it's almost nothing after all the USA farmers and citys take water from it.

Problem with current power plant nuclear cycle is it's a carry over from cold war days when it was designed to allow gov to recovered plutonium from civilian waste for nuke weapons. Then process remainder for reuse in reactors. But Hanford labs has been shut doewn

Leonard

No account , can't log in. But assume it's almost nothing after all the USA farmers and citys take water from it.

Problem with current power plant nuclear cycle is it's a carry over from cold war days when it was designed to allow gov to recovered plutonium from civilian waste for nuke weapons. Then process remainder for reuse in reactors. But USA doesn't currently reprocess anymore, France does in Lehauve . Ocean and beaches there are contaminated with >> 10X "safe" plutonium levels, they discharge waste directly to ocean thru ~1 mile pipeline and to air thru chimneys. Cancer rate in that area is at least doubled, higher than that leukemia rate for children

Saw on web , In the Chernoble incident, by Russian LAW doctors can NOT say a death or problem was related to radiation. Or doctor's license to practice is REVOKED, they don';t want anyone to learn the true extent of the problem and the deaths. Can only say it's strange so many kids have leukemia. In past if even 1 kid had it then it was unusual.

nibs

Have walked along the banks of the river where it crosses the border, there is not much river left.
The obvious energy sources of the future are Photo Voltaic, (my fave) and wind.
Buckminster Fuller pointed out in the '70's that nowhere in the US is a good wind site more than 50 miles away.
He also pointed out that if we put in massive conductors across the Bering Straight, there would be solar energy available every hour of the day.

Gordy

My point is about what they want to do at the Hoover dam. Recirculating a portion of the discharge isn’t going to fly. Not until something happens with Mother Nature replenishing the Colorado river. Don’t blame global warming. If we went back to inception of the Hoover dam after filling Lake Mead everything would be fine. It’s all of the population expansion, and agriculture taking the water since then.


The existing projects of such a battery design were that way from inception.

Solid_Fuel_Man

Its always global warming.... well their logic is already flawed as they state there is less melting and less snow to make the Colorado river. Global climate change would produce more rain therefore making more river (even if it were not from snow melting).

It is real, just not to the extent it's made out to be. Man-made or otherwise. Just my opinions.

nibs

When the glaciers are smaller or gone, and the snow pack is smaller or gone, rivers that once ran year around, are either in flood from rain, or dry as dust.
This is impacting millions of people world around, in Asia, South America, Europe and here.

Harold

The above described logic of snow pack is faulty. What nibs says is correct.

A bit longer explanation. The major effect of the snow pack (and glaciers) are water storage mechanisms. They store water in the form of winter snow and release it slowly over the rest of the year as the snow melts. That is why rivers fed by mountainous regions work. Without the snow storage and slow melt there will be floods in the winter and dry rivers in the other months.

Nor will there be even distribution of areas where climate change will cause more/or less rain in any specific area at any specific time. Seasonal atmospheric (wind) patterns will be changed. They control where water will go in the atmosphere. You favorite river may or may not be in the rain patch when you need it. And it may not rain on your farm.

Gordy

So Harold. Would you say that climate change has more, or less to do with an ever increasing population pulling off of natural resources that do not contribute to global warming?

In other words water usage. Since water is a renewable resource so long as it is not contaminated. It just takes much longer to end up back where it started.