From: steinly@topaz.ucsc.edu (Steinn Sigurdsson)
Newsgroups: sci.energy
Subject: Re: Richard has a gripe (was Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change)
Date: 12 Jan 93 21:33:48 GMT
	<STEINLY.93Jan11152710@topaz.ucsc.edu>
	<1993Jan12.202703.8227@vexcel.com>
Organization: Lick Observatory/UCO
NNTP-Posting-Host: topaz.ucsc.edu
In-reply-to: dean@vexcel.com's message of 12 Jan 93 20:27:03 GMT

In article <1993Jan12.202703.8227@vexcel.com> dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:

   In article <STEINLY.93Jan11152710@topaz.ucsc.edu> steinly@topaz.ucsc.edu (Steinn Sigurdsson) writes:
   >In article <1993Jan11.221055.12931@michael.apple.com> ems@michael.apple.com (E. Michael Smith) writes:
   >
   >   I can say it is by definition since I see it as a question of looking
   >   at a large sample space (ALL the economy) and looking for the (mean/
   >   modal point).  You see it as being some issue of pre-defining 'mean'
   >   as 'profitably and easily converted'.  That is your problem, not mine.
   >   When you ask me to clarify MY position, please do not pre-suppose 
   >   that I must do so in the context of YOUR pre-conceptions of it.
   >
   >Not adequate: consider this postulated distribution of costs vs
   >frequency for energy sources in the community.
   >
   >
   >     f
   >	|
   >	|
   >	| 				*
   >	|			       *
   >	|*			      *
   >	| *			     *
   >	|  *			    *
   >	|   *			   *
   >	|    *			  *
   >	|	*		*
   >	|	  *	      *
   >	|	    * *	    *
   >	|		***
   >	|
   >	|____________________________________ $$$
   >
   >Neither the mean nor the mode have the properties you desire,
   >and I contend this is a not unreasonable model of reality...

   There is a lot of speculation going around here about financing these
   improvements, but not many actual numbers.  I assume that Steinn's
   frequency axis above means contribution to consumption for the
   technology whose cost for replacement is on the horizontal axis.

This is meant to be a differential distribution, with cost per kWh
saved on the horizontal axis and energy consumption weighed frequency
on the vertical axis. Basically the curve says you can make some rapid
gain cheaply, that somewhat more expensive efficiency gains are
available for moderate costs and the remaining efficiency gains
increasingly hit diminishing returns and that there are a lot of
efficiencies attainable in principle (_more_ than the "easy"
efficiency gains) which are expensive. The graph was very deliberately
scale free!

   The cheapest replacements are for residential and commercial
   lighting, and their "frequency" is modest, though not trivial.
   The single component with the highest frequency has a moderate
   cost.  

   What I fail to see is why Steinn thinks the relationship
   of these two figures would produce a curve that fits any continuous
   model, be it exponential or a polynomial.  There is no coherence
   between different technologies and their related costs and uses.

 ??? Any distribution is going to have a differential curve
that is continuous with even moderate graining (note finite resolution
of x-axis) - unless there is a jump discontinuity in the integrated
efficiency attainable. And of course with finite data I can _always_
give you a polynomial fit. The curve I presented is a conjectured
coarse grained curve - it may have lots of small bumps, I may have got the
intermediate behaviour badly wrong but I contend I got the endpoints 
qualitatively right, discarding the tail out to infinite costs :-)

   I will examine the EPRI report, which provides these very numbers,
   and report back.

|  Steinn Sigurdsson	|Strong and warm and wild and free  		|
|  Lick Observatory	|Your laws do not apply to me                  	|
| steinly@lick.ucsc.edu |Come eat and drink and sleep with me   	|
| "standard disclaimer"	|We can be what we want to be      - B.B. 1991	|
Newsgroups: sci.energy