Humans and Energy: Crash Course World History 207
video description
Date: 2022-04-04
Related videos
Comments and reviews: 10
Catamount
Nuclear never caught on in the US? Nuclear power accounts for 20% of our electricity generation, and we do know what to do with the waste. It's tiny in volume, and has never hurt anyone, and it's quite recyclable into much more energy (which also largely-to-completely eliminates the longer-lived highly radioactive portion. And nuclear power isn't used -in a few countries- like some residual anachronism from the 20th century - it's used in 31 nations worldwide, and those nations include nearly all of the largest economies on Earth, from the US, to Europe, to Japan and South Korea, to the BRIC countries. It currently generates 11% of global electricity (saying it's -5%- of total energy is misleading - not being portable enough for a car is hardly a meaningful metric)
Your attitude towards this kind of option is precisely the reason growth and increased energy consumption hasn't been more sustainable. If the industrialized world had embraced nuclear power like France 40 years ago, our climate problem would be a bare fraction of its present self today. It's not like there wasn't a reason to. It's clean, stable, can be deployed at national scales quickly, it's statistically the safest form of energy on Earth (even including Chernobyl, which is unfair since no modern reactor can do that, the waste isn't actually a problem, and it's only expensive if regulators make it such - just look at how South Korea builds standardized plants everywhere, under time and under cost, to see how it can be done.
Now, here we are, in 2019, scrambling to figure out an energy source that provides all the benefits nuclear power has offered for decades. I hope we do, because the only downside to nuclear power is that it suffers a baselessly bad public image that will probably permanently limit its deployment.
reply
Nuclear never caught on in the US? Nuclear power accounts for 20% of our electricity generation, and we do know what to do with the waste. It's tiny in volume, and has never hurt anyone, and it's quite recyclable into much more energy (which also largely-to-completely eliminates the longer-lived highly radioactive portion. And nuclear power isn't used -in a few countries- like some residual anachronism from the 20th century - it's used in 31 nations worldwide, and those nations include nearly all of the largest economies on Earth, from the US, to Europe, to Japan and South Korea, to the BRIC countries. It currently generates 11% of global electricity (saying it's -5%- of total energy is misleading - not being portable enough for a car is hardly a meaningful metric)
Your attitude towards this kind of option is precisely the reason growth and increased energy consumption hasn't been more sustainable. If the industrialized world had embraced nuclear power like France 40 years ago, our climate problem would be a bare fraction of its present self today. It's not like there wasn't a reason to. It's clean, stable, can be deployed at national scales quickly, it's statistically the safest form of energy on Earth (even including Chernobyl, which is unfair since no modern reactor can do that, the waste isn't actually a problem, and it's only expensive if regulators make it such - just look at how South Korea builds standardized plants everywhere, under time and under cost, to see how it can be done.
Now, here we are, in 2019, scrambling to figure out an energy source that provides all the benefits nuclear power has offered for decades. I hope we do, because the only downside to nuclear power is that it suffers a baselessly bad public image that will probably permanently limit its deployment.
reply
Lu
People don't -believe- nuclear can be dangerous, they know it. That's called being educated. Ever heard of Tchernobyl or Fukushima? Or nuclear bomb? When a country develops nuclear power plants, it usually also develops nuclear weapons in the meantime given the closeness of the 2. It also produces radioactive trash which is scientifically proven very harmful for health (and we have no idea how to get rid of these trash, so we just burry/let them accumulate, hoping our descendant will find a magic wand to get rid of it for us.
reply
People don't -believe- nuclear can be dangerous, they know it. That's called being educated. Ever heard of Tchernobyl or Fukushima? Or nuclear bomb? When a country develops nuclear power plants, it usually also develops nuclear weapons in the meantime given the closeness of the 2. It also produces radioactive trash which is scientifically proven very harmful for health (and we have no idea how to get rid of these trash, so we just burry/let them accumulate, hoping our descendant will find a magic wand to get rid of it for us.
reply
VFatalis
It's kinda hopeless that 99% of people commenting here seem to totally underestimate the impeding energy crisis we'll have to deal with very soon.
Oil is depleting fast and we still rely heavily on it for transports. With oil becoming more and more expensive and difficult to get our economy will suffer a lot in the next few years.
Read J. Tainter's 'Collapse of Complex Societies' and you'll have a grasp of the problem we have.
reply
It's kinda hopeless that 99% of people commenting here seem to totally underestimate the impeding energy crisis we'll have to deal with very soon.
Oil is depleting fast and we still rely heavily on it for transports. With oil becoming more and more expensive and difficult to get our economy will suffer a lot in the next few years.
Read J. Tainter's 'Collapse of Complex Societies' and you'll have a grasp of the problem we have.
reply
John
Au Contraire, the continued increase in the consumption of energy into the future should be viewed as a tragic historical step backwards. A historical step forwards would be increasing our power output while reducing our consumption, i. e, increasing the efficiency or Q of the system. Inefficient use of all resources is maladaptive for the long term viability of humanity as a whole.
reply
Au Contraire, the continued increase in the consumption of energy into the future should be viewed as a tragic historical step backwards. A historical step forwards would be increasing our power output while reducing our consumption, i. e, increasing the efficiency or Q of the system. Inefficient use of all resources is maladaptive for the long term viability of humanity as a whole.
reply
Psiberzerker
Water-power is solar-thermal, too. The way that water gets up in the mountains, to flow down in rivers is precipitation, which is caused by evaporation, and convection. The only energies we use, that aren't Solar are Nuclear, and Geo-thermal. Also, during the early part of Industrialization Whale Oil was used as a fuel, until we discovered Petroleum Distillation.
reply
Water-power is solar-thermal, too. The way that water gets up in the mountains, to flow down in rivers is precipitation, which is caused by evaporation, and convection. The only energies we use, that aren't Solar are Nuclear, and Geo-thermal. Also, during the early part of Industrialization Whale Oil was used as a fuel, until we discovered Petroleum Distillation.
reply
Raffaele
I know its 4 years too late but one note on solar power: If you consider wind as solar, then you also have to consider any river as solar-powered as well. The cycle of water is what gives energy to the system, and the energy comes from the sun evaporating water and moving it o higher altitudes converting sun power in gravitational potential energy
reply
I know its 4 years too late but one note on solar power: If you consider wind as solar, then you also have to consider any river as solar-powered as well. The cycle of water is what gives energy to the system, and the energy comes from the sun evaporating water and moving it o higher altitudes converting sun power in gravitational potential energy
reply
Peacefinder
Yeah I don't think muscle power was enough to build some of the pyramids when many stones weigh to much for the best modern machinery. I am not saying aliens, I am saying that we don't know nearly enough about how the pyramids were built to state anything as fact.
reply
Yeah I don't think muscle power was enough to build some of the pyramids when many stones weigh to much for the best modern machinery. I am not saying aliens, I am saying that we don't know nearly enough about how the pyramids were built to state anything as fact.
reply
Brandon
00: 04: 30 what do you mean Nuclear hasn-t been successful? We have done great things with the energy from nuclear plants and have found a safer way, now, to handle it in reactors. You get a substitute one time.
reply
00: 04: 30 what do you mean Nuclear hasn-t been successful? We have done great things with the energy from nuclear plants and have found a safer way, now, to handle it in reactors. You get a substitute one time.
reply
C3H5N3O9
1: 54Doesn't water power also comes from the sun by heating and evaporating water which created rainfall which created rivers?
I may be wrong on this. If I am, please correct me
reply
1: 54Doesn't water power also comes from the sun by heating and evaporating water which created rainfall which created rivers?
I may be wrong on this. If I am, please correct me
reply
Nexus
Finding renewable energy sources shouldn't be looked at as a step backward but forward, making humans take more responsibility for the planet, environment, and energy usage.
reply
Finding renewable energy sources shouldn't be looked at as a step backward but forward, making humans take more responsibility for the planet, environment, and energy usage.
reply
Add a review, comment
Other channel videos
