The November 2008 issue of Scientific American has two articles about
subjects dear to my heart:
M. Z. Jacobson and M. A. Delucchi, "A Path To Sustainable Energy
2030." This describes how the U.S. could transition to fully
sustainable energy, as follows:
Water (tidal, geothermal and hydroelectric) 1.1 TW
Wind 5.8 TW
Solar 4.6 TW
This is well written but the graph on pages 60 and 61 is confusing.
I think they put too much emphasis on rooftop PV and not enough on
solar thermal.
D. Despommier, "The Rise of Vertical Farms"
Fascinating. The author makes many of the points that I made in
chapter 16 of my book. (Clarke and other authors made these same
points in various books, that I should have cited but did not.)
I did not realize these things could be made to work primarily with
ambient sunlight, rather than artificial light. That changes the
energy balance completely. The Japanese approach described in chapter
16 is not needed. I shall have revise the book sometime. Still, I
expect cheap energy would improve the prospects for these indoor
vertical farms.
The lighting described in this article is not only direct ambient
sunlight but also artificial light with electricity from PV panels on
the roof of the building and from "incineration of plant waste."
- Jed
