No. There has always been green energy, windmills and hydro were used in the 18 and 19 century's, but it was not until coal did the industrial revolution take off.
If we went to all green energy we would be going back to the dark ages, you may argue that we have better green technology now, agreed, but we also have a hell of a lot more people.
Dave H who lives in th southern hemisphere and cuts firewood (lucky you) how would a city with a million people all find enough firewood for winter?
Can 'green energy' get you through a cold winter? It sure can.
We keep warm and cosy using entirely renewable energy. Our sole winter heating is firewood. I already have my winter supply stacked and drying. (I live in the Southern Hemisphere, it's the end of summer here).
Wind and solar are fickle. I can rely on my stack of wood.
Ian. Re "Most alarmist probably wouldn't like you polluting the atmosphere with so much deadly CO2 though." I'm only putting it back where it came from. I call it 'atmospheric sequestration'.
The big disadvantage of both solar power and wind power is that they are not available all of the time. They can not meet all of our needs without a backup, such as hydro or natural gas. Of course, if we are relying on hydro or natural gas, then obviously solar and wind power will not be supplying all of our needs. Power could be stored with batteries of in the form of hydrogen, but we need technology which is more advanced than what is currently available for such solutions to be economic.
Many people who do not consider AGW to be a threat think that we should not develop wind or solar power until they can compete with oil, gas and coal. But if we wait for that day, rather than invest in R & D and build up economies of scale, solar and wind will be able to compete with oil, gas and coal because of oil gas and coal becoming more expensive, rather than because of the cost of solar and wind going down.
And certainly, if someone does not like burning hydrocarbons, solar and wind power will not replace nuclear power for decades. Perhaps sometime this century, renewable power can provide half of our energy needs. The other half could be provided by nuclear power or by hydrocarbons.
21st century insulation including double paned windows is the only real answer...that and getting used to wearing appropriate clothing indoors. ALL energy is going to keep going up and up, up beyond the point where anyone who works for hourly wages will be able to pay for it. As a second choice you could consider migrating south for the winter, not really a practical idea for many people, but not unheard of either. My town here in south western Arizona is currently jammed with 'snowbirds' from as far away as northern Canada. We even have snowbirds from Arizona's higher elevations who drive down from the mountains around Flagstaff so they can avoid paying high prices for winter fuel.
Back in the day when power was cheap homes were built without much in the line of insulation, or double paned windows or efficient heaters. 'Back in the day' being not much more than the late 1990's. 'Green energy' can be defined as better use of the energy available. Part of the 'Stimulus' so despised by the GOP/Tea/Fox/Jesus freak party was a program to better insulate several hundred thousand of homes. The people who availed themselves of this program are now paying a fraction of what their former winter heating bills were. In the north eastern US where the majority of these upgrades were made the use of oil for heating has declined. Oddly the price of heating oil has gone up as the oil mafia has reduced the amount of heating oil produced to keep the profit margin up.
Conclusion: There's a lot more to 'Green Energy' than you're likely to hear from the right wing radio dummies who stooge for their corporate masters. Way more!
Just take Murdo Bay, for instance, if they could use green energy, don't you think they would?
Look at the UK. They are rationing fossil fuels to keep warm. And all this after spending all that money on green energy.
There has been no substantive success with green energy, except that it has made a lot of greenies rich.
I believe that is invcorrect. you would need a lot more then just green energy to go through a whole winter. Although if it would work it would need a lot of it! Hope it helped
I don't know anyone who claims that sustainable energy sources will not need backup, at least until enough is available to ensure our needs. I think England should be getting busy developing sustainable energy resources and reducing their carbon emissions and encouraging the rest of the world to. England is much warmer than it would be, given its latitude, because of the Gulf Stream which carries warm water to its shores. The melting ice in the Arctic may cause the Gulf Stream to shut down, which will cause England's winters to have frigid temperatures.
If you live in the UK you better hope so because they're about to run out of gas: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...
I'm not sure if those wind farms would do much good.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/379845/Blackout-Britain-EU-environmental-directive-puts-millions-at-risk-of-power-cuts
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2297296/British-gas-reserves-run-dry-36-HOURS-freezing-householders-turn-heating-up.html
