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A comment on Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running Out of Electricity. Parent comment

Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by cladopa on Sunday October 06, 2024 @04:22PM (#41759990)
The population density of Taiwan is 649 people per square kilometre. In the US it is 38.

So that means in the US you can use renovables and the same space needs to satisfy the demand of 17 times less people than in Taiwan. In other words: it doesn't make any sense in Taiwan.

Also It doesn't make any sense to close your nuclear plants, specially when China could invade you any day of the week and destroy anything you have offshore in hours.

if the US abandons Ukraine support after two years, it would mean that it will abandon Taiwan too. Nuclear deterrent is real.

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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by kiba on Sunday October 06, 2024 @04:48PM (#41760187)
Population density is unevenly concentrated.
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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by numpad0 on Sunday October 06, 2024 @06:35PM (#41760935)
Yes. That means cities that aren't going to go solar are skewing the statistics, and the real density disparity is more than 17 times.
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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by JumpCrisscross on Sunday October 06, 2024 @05:29PM (#41760486)
> Population density is unevenly concentrated

So are PLAN landing sites. (They’re all in the south.)

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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by churchill on Sunday October 06, 2024 @04:29PM (#41760036)
Unless Taiwan is crammed so full that people can't move, they can easily source 200 KM² to increase their electricity capacity by 10% (i.e., roughly 20TWh). if they realise it's a national security/economic competitiveness issue, they will solve it.

Otherwise, what do you suggest they do? Nothing? Or keep hand-wringing with articles like this?

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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by JumpCrisscross on Sunday October 06, 2024 @05:27PM (#41760471)
> they can easily source 200 KM² to increase their electricity capacity by 10%

Solar panels are by definition easy to see and thus knock out remotely.

> what do you suggest they do

Nukes. We’ve seen from Ukraine that they’re given special status even in war.

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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by Panzer04 on Sunday October 06, 2024 @06:19PM (#41760825)
What's that even supposed to mean? Renewable generation would be much more secure than comparable centralised generation because you'd need so many more resources to knock it out.

If i were an adversary I'd much rather my enemy source everything from a single NPP than hundreds of square km of solar.

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Re:Taiwan Makes the World's Computer Chips. Now It's Running... by JumpCrisscross on Monday October 07, 2024 @02:07PM (#41769019)
> you'd need so many more resources to knock it out

If you're America, yes. If you're an island nation defending against China one hundred and ten miles away, you don't have the air defence resources to protect your entire island. (And they do have the resources to knock hout hundreds of square kilometres of solar.)

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