Not your grandfathers World Energy Outlook: Tesla Master Plan 3!

[woodgeek]

Tesla has posted it's third 'Master Plan' document: MP3

It is not about EVs so much as how we as a society can go about decarbonizing the global economy. It deals more with the costs, benefits and resources required rather than trying to project timelines (like the EIA), and declares that the switch will be cheap, using available tech, and requiring minimal land use and less than currently available resources. In 38 pages with cartoons and references.

Basically, the same idea as Exxon's World Energy Outlook they used to put out every year, but now produced by Tesla! This just makes me chuckle. Remember that Tesla now is a much bigger company than Exxon, and is listed in the S&P, while Exxon was delisted (from Dow IIRC). Wah wah.

How times change.

 

[begreen]

From the source of another area of climate disruption concern.

Scientists Warn of 'Significant' Climate Effects of Frequent Space Launches

Increased rocket exhaust "may start having significant adverse effects on the atmosphere or the climate, and in turn, on human health," researchers warn.

www.vice.com

 

[EbS-P]

From the source of another area of climate disruption concern.

Scientists Warn of 'Significant' Climate Effects of Frequent Space Launches

Increased rocket exhaust "may start having significant adverse effects on the atmosphere or the climate, and in turn, on human health," researchers warn.

www.vice.com

I have nothing other than a gut feeling that says rocket exhaust is not an issue now nor will it be for the the next decade. But I get the point being made.

To educate oneself as to the qualities of fuel needed watch this video and pay attention to the power requirements needed for one pump on one motor.

 

[ABMax24]

I think the concern should be more related to the particulate released from the rockets than the CO2 or CO or NOx. While of course these gases pose their own hazards, CO in particular can react with Ozone (O3) to produce CO2 and O2, depleting the ozone layer.

SpaceX in particular uses Liquid Oxygen and RP1 (kerosene) to fuel their Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy Rockets. The nature of the Merlin rocket engines means the fuel mixture is deliberately burnt fuel rich to avoid an oxidating environment that would burn the engine metals at high temperatures. As we all know from Diesel engines, when hydrocarbons are burnt in a fuel rich environment a lot of soot is produced. This can be seen as dark smoke in the exhaust trail of a Falcon 9 or Heavy launch. This soot has the potential to hang in the upper atmosphere for decades changing climate patterns.

All of which is part of the reason Starship Raptor engines will use Methane in place of RP1, to produce less soot.

 

[SpaceBus]

I wonder what the effects of all the rocket launches needed to install three separate satellite internet constellations

 

[woodgeek]

IIRC, the thermal output of the new SpaceX rocket (super heavy) is 200 GW. But it only fires for a couple minutes. So one launch would be the same CO2 emissions as ~100 MWe nat gas plant in one day if completely combusted. As noted, burn is fuel rich, exhausting a lot of methane that burns up in the lower atmosphere. The emissions from these engines are blue (mixed with pure onboard O2), but further back turn yellow (poorly mixed combustion with air and N2). Whether combustion completes in the upper atmosphere I do not know.

Black carbon particulates should be a lot lower on 'methalox' rockets, which many companies are switching to.

Those solid rockets make alumina particles in the upper atmosphere that are not great and linger. I think SpaceX eschews solids for a lot of reasons, including this one.

Also, re-entry plasma is hot enough to react N2 and O2 into NO. Large objects re-entering as a 'rule of thumb' create their own mass in NO in the upper atmosphere. Each shuttle re-entry made a huge (~100 tonnes) and easily imaged NO plume that lasted for days. This photoconverts back later on a reasonably short timescale but can also deplete ozone. If Starship does start launching regularly (i.e. daily) it will create a steady state NO layer in the upper atmosphere! When I looked at it, it seems that for Starship most NO production would be above the ozone layer, so hopefully it will not have a major effect.

 

[EbS-P]

I have nothing other than a gut feeling that says rocket exhaust is not an issue now nor will it be for the the next decade. But I get the point being made.

To educate oneself as to the qualities of fuel needed watch this video and pay attention to the power requirements needed for one pump on one motor.

Each engine burns 1 ton of kerosene and two tons of liquid O2 every SECOND!!

Main stage then burns 15 tons of propellant every second!

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, in our heart of hearts, we all know the real cause of global warming is cow flatulence.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

 

[woodgeek]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, in our heart of hearts, we all know the real cause of global warming is cow flatulence.

Couldn't have said it better myself!

 

[begreen]

I wonder what the effects of all the rocket launches needed to install three separate satellite internet constellations

That was my concern as well. It has not been the most brilliant plan and shows no regard for atmospheric or astronomic effects. In Feb. they completely disregarded space weather forecasts and lost a whole bunch of freshly launched satellites due to a solar flare.

 

[woodgeek]

That was my concern as well. It has not been the most brilliant plan and shows no regard for atmospheric or astronomic effects. In Feb. they completely disregarded space weather forecasts and lost a whole bunch of freshly launched satellites due to a solar flare.

The news from Starlink this week is that their v2 mini sats have gotten their brightness down to visual magnitude 7, when deployed. And that is only during the brief period when they are in sunlight near dawn and dawn and dusk.

This was the target set by professional astronomers for them not to flood their cameras during ling exposures. They can adapt to such an object passing quickly through their FOV.

Also, they are now invisible to the naked eye even from the darkest sites.

You can still see them during deployment, when they are brighter, and form a dramatic 'train' in the sky.