Unstoppable

Harnessing Science to Change the World

Bill Nye with Corey S. Powell 2016 Bvt Lib 363.7387 NYE

• p20 pg 64 April 28 1975 Newsweek Peter Gwynne reported "scientists" claiming global cooling

  • elsewhere 2014 correction https://www.insidescience.org/content/my-1975-cooling-world-story-doesnt-make-todays-climate-scientists-wrong/1640

  • in 1975, aerosol pollution caused a cooling effect
• p25 TV show 1992
• p27 John Stossel from ABC to Fox in 2009, ardent climate denier, demanded then ignored info from Nye
• p37 CO2 280 to 400 ppm by 2014 p43 Humans produce 100x more than volcanoes
• p50 thermodynamic efficiency, gasoline burns 1000C Theoretical Carnot efficiency 77%, real auto 28%

  • 2800F or 1570 C

• p53 Nye Laboratories West (California house)
• p55 why not pale pavement? (answer, tires would darken it)
• p56 hydrosol bubbles in ocean, lowering albedo? (answer, less light for photosynthesis)

• p62 wheaties and ... iron filings? true

• p76 fracking in "New York state where I live part time"
• p78 Methane 80x more "greenhouse" than CO2 after 20 years, 30x more after 100 years
• p86 typo Nils (not Niels) Bohr

• p88 Three Mile Island, p89 Chernobyl "uninhabitable", maybe for centuries but people chose to live there

• p92 breeder reactors, etc. Lots of hypothetical worries

• p106 Ivanpah solar power facility, only 40% of design capacity

• p113 space solar power
• p117 Likes wind power ... doesn't mention negatives
• p134 Electricity losses in the grid ... doesn't understand why, suggests more electronics
• p143 Superconducting power lines (HTS -140C, LN2
• p144 carbon nanotube power lines - BS, NOT superconductors

  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_nanotube#Electrical | ... resistive nanotube-to-nanotube junctions and impurities ... ]]

• p146 electric cars
• p153 home battery storage
• p168 sunlight to ethanol is 2% efficient (after subtracting energy inputs), ethanol is 19.9 MJ/kg, gasoline is 45.8 MJ/kg
• p171 Brazil sugarcane to ethanol is more efficient, but forests are destroyed to get it
• p183 Bicycles
• p187 Trains
• p189 hyperloop
• p192 mass transit
• p200 bike tunnels with fan-blon tailwinds (er, power cost?)
• p201 self-driving taxis

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