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Transparent solar cells that could power skyscrapers

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Or (Score: 1, Interesting)

by Anonymous Coward on 2015-12-08 03:35 (#WZYE)

Build fibre out to remote cities, stop the current waste of petrol and other resources used for people to all commute to a central location, build cities outwards and remove the need for more ckyscrapers. We have high speed net now. Do we all need to work in the city?

Re: Or (Score: 2, Interesting)

by fishybell@pipedot.org on 2015-12-08 14:55 (#X1J7)

Building cities outwards necessarily either requires removing farmland or destroying ecosystems, which is far and wide the largest contributor to extinctions. Since a significant goal of lower emissions is to save the environment and all its inhabitants, urban sprawl goes directly against this.

Building out fiber to remote areas doesn't help either as jobs continue to demand the worker be there during work hours. Look at what Yahoo did for an example.

I'm not saying building up is the answer either, as skyscrapers aren't exactly environmentally friendly either. If the answer were to be to retrofit existing buildings, and the process to build the transparent solar cells was sustainable and economical, then I'm all for it. Unfortunately, we've all heard the spiel before, and yet years have gone by and no one is building buildings with integrated solar windows. I'm not holding my breath that it starts now.

Re: Or (Score: 1)

by evilviper@pipedot.org on 2015-12-09 13:05 (#X4Y1)

Building cities outwards necessarily either requires removing farmland or destroying ecosystems, which is far and wide the largest contributor to extinctions. Since a significant goal of lower emissions is to save the environment and all its inhabitants, urban sprawl goes directly against this.
The US population keeps moving south and west... The Southwestern US is not farms or forests (except in small spots), but mostly-empty desert. While there are some endangered species there, it's a very small number. Maybe it's just me, but I can't get myself worked-up that development of thousands of square miles of desert land might eventually endanger a couple bird sub-species. Particularly in the light of so much more damage being caused if that land development was done outside the sparsely populated desert. Several (certainly not all) desert animals do much better in suburbs, anyhow.

Besides, whatever may be theoretically best, the economics show sprawl, even with commuting, is still massively more affordable than high-demand city living. People will continue to want to live without neighbors above and below them, and will want decent-sized yards that they don't have to share. Cutting-out the energy wasted by daily commuting is a net-positive result, regardless.
Building out fiber to remote areas doesn't help either as jobs continue to demand the worker be there during work hours. Look at what Yahoo did for an example.
The fact that Yahoo discontinued telecommuting, is not evidence that telecommuting doesn't work... Your link turns up opinion pieces on both sides, some saying it was a good idea, others saying it was a mistake, and most saying the number of companies who allow telecommuting keeps increasing. For Yahoo, I think it was just a tool to cut employees without as much downside as firings or layoffs.

Re: Or (Score: 0)

by Anonymous Coward on 2016-08-31 20:57 (#1S8ZJ)

A problem: there is no extra water to be had here and humans are thirsty beasts. Having lived in Arizona and being keenly aware of the water situation here, I can tell you that the current population is already draining the water table as fast as they can. In Tucson AZ, for example, the aquifer has already fallen several hundred feet since the 1980s. A single human lifetime ago the Rillito and Santa Cruz rivers flowed year round, whereas now they only flow when flash flooding occurs in the summer months. The city of Phoenix has drained local water sources so rapaciously that it is forced to steal water from the Colorado river and the White Mountains to the north.

The massive amount of development that has occurred in the southwest in just the past fifteen years is affecting changes in the seasonal rains, increasing temperatures in the cities by as much as 5 degrees from the temperatures in surrounding areas, and is disturbing the natural hydrology of the southwest and causing destructive flooding and massive sandstorms. Humans are poisoning the very delicate ecosystems with foreign and invasive plant species and salty water drawn from relatively saline rivers that accumulate in the soil because of the hard clay layer just below the ground.

The southwest cannot support the cities on the scale you're suggesting unless people are willing to live in enclosed arcologies built below ground to limit the damage that this bunch of hairless apes do everywhere we go. We're already swinging toward a tipping point in our local environment. This doesn't even account for the energy consumption that running AC all day does (which is necessary, I assure you). Please don't move here.

Re: Or (Score: 1)

by evilviper@pipedot.org on 2016-09-01 01:04 (#1S9HE)

Arizona is a sad case because libertarian fools run the state, and they refuse on principle to regulate and manage their natural resources sustainably, like adults.

California is a better model. Aquifers are recharged, usage restrictions are enacted, tiers are lowered, grey water is required for commercial landscaping, etc. Desalination is used to some extent as the technology gets cheaper, and tertiary treated sewage goes back into the water supply, creating a loop. Those last two offer a practically endless supply of water that can scale up to any population size.

Arizona could do all of this and would have ample water, but it's politically unpopular to talk about such things there, and they may need a harsh wake up call before the necessary reforms can be implemented.

But more importantly, even with that mismanagement, they're still doing infinitely less damage to infinitely fewer species than if people were developing old growth forests into cities and suburbs, or building just about anywhere else in the country, for that matter.

You have to keep in mind that there's almost NOWHERE with enough water. Forty out of fifty US states expect water shortages: http://pipedot.org/C373 . It's best to just accept that we can't stick a hose in the ground and pump enough water for everyone. Then we can move forward to practical management efforts, and it's doable everywhere, even the deserts. With California's jump-start on water management decades before anybody else was interested, I'm sure there are much wetter locales which will be hit much harder by droughts. Atlanta is one such example.

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2016-09-01 01:04
Arizona is a sad case because libertarian fools run the state, and they refuse on principle to regulate and manage their natural resources sustainably, like adults.

California is a better model. Aquifers are recharged, usage restrictions are enacted, tiers are lowered, grey water is required for commercial landscaping, etc. Desalination is used to some extent as the technology gets cheaper, and tertiary treated sewage goes back into the water supply, creating a loop. Those last two offer a practically endless supply of water that can scale up to any population size.

Arizona could do all of this and would have ample water, but it's politically unpopular to talk about such things there, and they may need a harsh wake up call before the necessary reforms can be implemented.

But more importantly, even with that mismanagement, they're still doing infinitely less damage to infinitely fewer species than if people were developing old growth forests into cities and suburbs, or building just about anywhere else in the country, for that matter.

You have to keep in mind that there's almost NOWHERE with enough water. Forty out of fifty US states expect water shortages: http://pipedot.org/C373 . It's best to just accept that we can't stick a hose in the ground and pump enough water for everyone. Then we can move forward to practical management efforts, and it's doable everywhere, even the deserts. With California's jump-start on water management decades before anybody else was interested, I'm sure there are much wetter locales which will be hit much harder by droughts. Atlanta is one such example.

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