Hellish Energy

I've been looking at solar power and other such like things, from a consumer point of view. Not with anything major in mind, more just looking to see what gadgets are available and how useful they'd be.

If the lights do go out this winter it'd be handy to have at least some alternative to the grid, even if it's just to charge a phone. The solar power banks you can buy don't look too impressive though from a solar point of view. I think they'd be next to useless in the UK.

Looking at these things it really becomes apparent just how much energy we use. Boiling a kettle is a seemingly minor thing and doesn't take long, but you're literally boiling water, it takes a fair bit of energy. Some little solar panel ain't gonna get close.

It makes you appreciate fire. Combustion.

GO nuclear.

As an aside I've also came to appreciate and understand nuclear power a lot more over the last year or so. Things finally clicked when I was reading about how radioactivity beneath the Earth's surface drives volcanoes. Nuclear power is often presented in popular culture as this scary, complicated - almost magical - thing; and magical in a malign way. It's a real world voodoo that humans shouldn't play with.

However, using uranium isn't really that different to using coal. Fire - combustion - itself is a chain reaction, only using oxygen. We start things with a spark then the fire self-perpetuates. Like a house burning down. It's similar with nuclear, it's just a different type of chain reaction. Instead of a spark we start things by firing protons or whatever. Then once it gets going the fire burns itself. Only it's not fire, it's fission releasing the heat - the breaking down of the uranium fuel. (So a meltdown is not unlike a fire that's raging out of control.)

This isn't a very technical explanation, but my lack of technical knowledge aside it does bring things down to earth a bit. Nuclear power isn't magic, it's just chemistry and nature. The nature that's under our feet. (And I say chemistry instead of physics purposely, in an attempt to remove it from the abstract in the minds of people reading.)

Of course, it's still dangerous. In many ways we're bringing the hell that's below the Earth's surface to the surface 😈. Again though, it's not entirely dissimilar to digging for coal. We dig down to get coal and oil - to release that energy that's been pressurised under the weight of the Earth. With nuclear we're just going for even denser things. Really heavy metals.

So seeing things like this I'm now much more open to using nuclear. It doesn't seem as unnatural anymore.

Returning to my plans..

That detour aside, and going from one extreme to another, as far as my own plans go I think the first thing I'll do is buy some candles. It's old technology, but it's dependable. If the lights go out it's a sure fire way of getting some illumination.

Then secondary to that I might get one of those little wind up radios. The claim is that they can be used to charge a phone, so that's the main appeal. They also have a little solar panel, so it'll be interesting to see if that makes a blind bit of difference.

I'm more optimistic that the wind up hand crank will work than the panel - at least it's something to do in the cold anyway ..the devil makes works for idle hands. I'm not overly optimistic either will be much use in any real sense. It's a relatively cheap way to experiment however, so it'll be a fun little purchase. I'll give an update if and when I get one.