Comparing Power Generation Technologies - Highlighted Article

From: edmhdotme

By: Ed Hoskins

Date: October 15, 2024

Comparing Power Generation Technologies

Introduction
The Industrial Revolution and the exploitation of fossil fuels has provided and can continue to provide an ample supply of abundant energy for Mankind.  Fossil fuels have advanced the quality of life and prosperity particularly of the Western world over the past 2 centuries.  There remains a very large proportion of the Global population who are yet to see similar benefits and the same advances to their wellbeing.

Nonetheless, in spite of the rapid growth in the Global population there has still been a progressive advance of the well-being of Man-kind with the reduction of poverty levels and climate related losses worldwide.

Green Thinking is now a major obstruction to the availability of abundant energy.  At the same time Western Nations in tackling their idea that there is a Climate emergency and by promoting the concept of  “Net Zero“,  try to demonstrate their “Virtue” by demonising Carbon Dioxide as pollutant.  

This has to be nonsensical as atmospheric CO2 is the essential Gas upon which all life-on-Earth depends.

This posts collates, summarises and illustrates the performance characteristics of the different power generation technologies in a unified visual format.

Considerations in this post
This post considers the following power generation technologies:

• Onshore Wind
• Offshore Wind
• Solar PV on grid
• Gas-fired CCGT
• Advanced Nuclear
• Biomass
• Coal / Lignite
• Hydro + Pumped.

This post provides illustrated comparisons between these power generation technologies from the following points of view:

• Energy Return on Energy Investment, ERoEI ratio
• Achieved productivity / capacity percentages
  • Mass of installations required for a comparable power output: tonnes / GW
  • Non-fuel CO2 emissions embedded in various generation technologies:  tonnes / GW
  • CO2 emissions from Fossil fuels
  • Land Usage for comparable power output:  sqkm / GW
  • Estimated construction times for power generators
  • Approximate service life of generation installations
• Cost effectiveness comparisons between generation technologies:  $bn / GW
• Excess expenditures on Weather-Dependent Renewables in Europe:  $bn / GW

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Comparing Power Generation Technologies