Pinex

I've booked a flight from Frankfurt to Cincinnati with a layover in Detroit and back I have a layover in Washington DC. Do you know if it is possible to skip the flight from Cincinnati to DC if I want to visit the city a day or two before the departure?

I booked the flight for 500€ 3 month ago. I think it is way cheaper in winter. The last time I was in Cinci it was summer and I payed around 1200€. Someone told me that CVG is one of the more expensive airports in the US.

And if you have time: I am in Cincinnati the whole February. Any suggestions which US city I could fly to on a low budget for a short trip?

Interesting! The German goverment subsidizes windmills. This results in a lot of companies willing to build them although they are ineffiecient and there is almost no way to store the energy that is produced. Our villages tries to fight it but it is really exhausting, not only physically but also money-wise. In many discussions you will get the "nuclear"-slap. If I talk about my opinion I will often run into "green"-people who will just say "Oh you are against windmills, so you support nuclear energy, gtfo!". I would say talking about nuclear energy will earn you the same looks as if you would talk about the nazis.

Is there anyway to approach those people in a way, that my opinion gets through their wall of ignorance?

I mean which is safer for the economy right now?

• Windfarms, where they cut down whole forests and put 50 tons of concrete into the ground each while also burning more coal than ever and producing shit tons of CO2 when you can't even be sure the wind blows the whole time

or

• a few nuclear plants that produce energy at any given time without producing any CO2?

Sadly the media used incidents like Fukushima to create fear among the people which then resulted in the early shutdown of our last plants.

Do you really expect from me to write an essay about that topic in a foreign language?

I may be a little biased because of the misery our town is in but my general conclusion is true and not simplistic at all.

Nuclear energy obviously brings its own risks. But given the facts we have about them I would highly prefer them.

Simple math example. Average windmill ~5MW(peak and only if wind blows), average nuclear plant ~1500MW

To replace a nuclear plant you will need 300 windmills at peak time. What happens if the wind is not the same at every mill? So you will need at least twice or three times that much to be sure you have electricity. Sounds manageble. But what happens if no wind blows at all (which is possible)? Right. No electricity at all. You will need peaking power plants like gas plants to ensure that everyone gets electricity. That does not sound efficient. Windmills don't even cover the base power. So we need coal plants for that. Right now we are burning more coal than ever in Germany. Tendency going up. I have no clue how they want to surpass the CO2 cap the government wants to reach until 2020.

This is just another reason. I haven't even gotten to safety problems regarding humans and animals.

I would gladly hear your opinion about the topic. This is as far as it gets with most people but proof me wrong.

(And by the way: I am not a nuclear only supporter but windmills are no alternative right now. Maybe in a couple years when we have more possibilities to storage electricity (e.g. power-to-gas on a industrial level))

What does non-contribution mean?

That is pretty ridiculous. It seems like that's poor planning/engineering though too.

It is. The problem is the general mindset. Get off nuclear energy as fast as possible without really discussing risks and problems of the alternatives. Building them without any boundaries where ever some space is. The only reason they are built are the high subsidies and mostly from really big companies which are only looking on the money.

What are your thoughts on solar energy?

I really like the idea of solar energy and windmills but in my opinion they are just not feasible right now. But I would prefer solar when it is built on houses and do not take any other space. It is ridiculous that farmers give away their land which is normally used for crops or corn just for the purpose of building solar plants on it like in this picture.

Our climate is generally not ideal for solar. We do not have many sun days. A lot of people built them because of the high ROI (also through subsidies) not because they believe in energy revolution.

I like the idea of huge plants in deserts where there is plenty of space and sun. Looks kinda alien-like. Although it would produce tons of energy there would most likely be a distribution problem.

By the way. That is another problem in Germany. Wind blows much more in the north and off-shore but right now there is no infrastructure to get the electricity to the south when there is demand. They plan to build huge power grids as big as a German Autobahn from the north to the south which is just incredibly stupid. These are some of the routes.