272: Shopify vs Amazon Logistics, Microsoft Cloud, Young Druckenmiller, Jeff Bezos 2017 Letter, Adyen Hitting the Brakes?, Nuclear Fusion, and Bilingualism
272: Shopify vs Amazon Logistics, Microsoft Cloud, Young Druckenmiller, Jeff Bezos 2017 Letter, Adyen Hitting the Brakes?, Nuclear Fusion, and Bilingualism
Re: Energy Usage: There's a great discussion around Japan planning on replacing 20-50% of coal usage with *green* ammonia to reduce 20-50% of CO2 emissions from 30-years-old plants.
Detractors argue that it's inefficient since producing green ammonia consumes 3x the power you get by burning it to generate the same energy (and is 20% more expensive.)
The mindset here is what I believe to be out of date. The math could be correct, but if we can produce green ammonia in the Atacama desert or Magallanes region, where the cost of renewable energy is extremely low and then ship it to japan for them to burn it to generate power and reduce CO2 emissions without replacing supply or distribution chains, do you really care about the efficiency equation?
Available technology is on pace to reduce the cost difference to match the coal price ( even without carbon taxes.) For reference, burning ammonia does release nitrous oxide which is a heavy green house gas. Capturing it, in contrast to capturing CO2, is done with super efficient catalysts that are not only proven but also orders of magnitude cheaper than capturing CO2.
Re: Energy Usage: There's a great discussion around Japan planning on replacing 20-50% of coal usage with *green* ammonia to reduce 20-50% of CO2 emissions from 30-years-old plants.
Detractors argue that it's inefficient since producing green ammonia consumes 3x the power you get by burning it to generate the same energy (and is 20% more expensive.)
The mindset here is what I believe to be out of date. The math could be correct, but if we can produce green ammonia in the Atacama desert or Magallanes region, where the cost of renewable energy is extremely low and then ship it to japan for them to burn it to generate power and reduce CO2 emissions without replacing supply or distribution chains, do you really care about the efficiency equation?
Available technology is on pace to reduce the cost difference to match the coal price ( even without carbon taxes.) For reference, burning ammonia does release nitrous oxide which is a heavy green house gas. Capturing it, in contrast to capturing CO2, is done with super efficient catalysts that are not only proven but also orders of magnitude cheaper than capturing CO2.