GreekIslandGirl wrote:cyprusgrump wrote:GreekIslandGirl wrote:As for replacing fossil fuels with solar and other greener forms of energy; it's those stuck in the carboniferous age like you that slow down progress.
By the way...
You should realise that the wheels are coming off the 'global warming' bandwagon...
More and more people understand (unlike you) that CO2 isn't the deadly gas that they have been led to believe and that AGW is just a scam to tax us all more...
... you need to be careful that it is not you stuck in an age of AGW belief when everybody else has moved on....
It's not simply about CO2 levels. Fossil fuels are destructive to the environment for pollution (tanker spills, pipeline leaks, transport, etc), and also they are not limitless.
The greener move is
more than just CO2 levels but your ability to appreciate that is simply because you fear change.
Without your sort of thinking, technology would have advanced faster and photovoltaic cells would have been far cheaper by now as well as alternative forms of storage of solar energy. Nevertheless, these have made a lot of headway and even in the UK an array of 10 or so cells is sufficient for a house, plus selling back excess to the grid. Cypriot homes would need fewer than this number and I know of one British person in Cyprus who has made this work in his home.
In your fantasy world this may be true...
But in reality it is not...
Show me an example of 10 cells in the UK providing a house with electricity
and selling excess back to the grid....
More likely, they sell direct to the grid and because the electricity they produce is subsidised (by ordinary taxpayers) at such a ridiculous level the revenue they receive exceeds the cost of the electricity they consume off the grid...
Take away the subsidy and it doesn't work at all...
I also know of a house in Cyprus which makes money out of selling the electricity to the grid from solar panels - but again, it is only because of the ridiculously high rate they are paid for it (several times the generating cost of traditional plants)...
In fact, so high are the subsidies that there have been examples of people using petrol generators to sell electricity back to the grid which they claim comes from solar!
The fact is that this only works when small numbers of people are receiving a subsidy provided by large numbers of taxpayers. If the roles were reversed we simply couldn't afford it...
And as I mentioned earlier, in a real-world situation with no grid connection it is difficult to produce (and store) enough electricity to keep you going 24/7 - even in Cyprus. the reality is that most houses in Cyprus don't have enough outside space to even begin to cover their electricity requirements by installing PV.
The reality is that it is subsidies that distort the market and prevent research into alternative energy forms. Why spend millions developing new solar panel;s for instance when the government (via the taxpayer) will pay you three times the value of the electricity you produce with the old ones...?
And why invest in new, efficient generating capacity when the government (via the taxpayer) will give you vast amounts of money for erecting useless windfarms and paying you for the electricity even when they don't produce any...?
