A Star on Earth?

BBC's Horizon recently screened an interesting programme about the prospect of nuclear fusion power called "Can we make a star on Earth?". The conclusion of the programme, presented by the entertaining Professor Brian Cox, was that nuclear fusion power is a real prospect that given proper funding might produce real results in 20 - 40 years.

However the programme contained a very informative interview with Saul Griffith of wind energy firm Mankani Power where the alternatives were examined. Cox sets Griffith a challenge to show what would be required to give every person on the planet 5kW of energy within 25 years without recourse to fossil fuels (given that today's average US energy consumption is 11.4kW).

To accumulate the necessary 30TW they assume 5TW from conventional nuclear, 5TW from Wind, 10TW from Solar, 2TW from Biomass, etc. But creating 5TW of wind power in 25 years would mean building a full size, 3MW, turbine every 3 minutes, the same impossible problems face solar and even conventional nuclear would require 5,000 new reactors to meet it's quota.

Essentially there are three factors in this equation that we can effect;

1. The population of the world - this assumed a population of 6 billion so we can reduce our target if we find ways to control our population.
2. The average energy target of 5kW is a reasonable one but even a tiny reduction would have a massive effect.
3. Let's pray the engineers working on nuclear fusion are successful sooner than they predict!

Ultimately, if we don't balance this equation then nature will take a grip and force us into balance by reducing our population as predicted recently by James Lovelock.

For those of us that are not world renowned nuclear scientists we can best have a positive impact by reducing consumption and this is where Transition Initiatives can be so powerful.