Quotes by David J. C. MacKay

About David J. C. MacKay:

David John Cameron MacKay is the Regius Professor of Engineering in the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge and from 2009 to 2014 was Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC). Before being appointed to the DECC, MacKay was most well known as author of the book Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air. He has an Erdos Number of 2.
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The only thing that really scales up apart from nuclear is solar power from other people's deserts.

David J. C. MacKay

The United States consumes power per land-area at a rate three times the average. Even though they are more energy efficient, densely populated industrial countries like Germany, Britain and Japan have even bigger power consumption per area.

David J. C. MacKay

Fridges can be modified to nudge their internal thermostats up and down just a little in response to the main's frequency in such a way that, without ever jeopardising the temperature of your butter, they tend to take power at times that help the gri...

David J. C. MacKay

We must not let ourselves be swept off our feet in horror at the danger of nuclear power. Nuclear power is not infinitely dangerous. It's just dangerous, much as coal mines, petrol repositories, fossil-fuel burning and wind turbines are dangerous.

David J. C. MacKay

Fusion power is speculative and experimental. I think it is reckless to assume that the fusion problem will be cracked, but I'm happy to estimate how much power fusion could deliver, if the problems are cracked.

David J. C. MacKay

I was distressed by the poor quality of the debate surrounding energy. I was also noticing so much green wash from politicians and big business. I was tired of the debate - the extremism, the nimbyism, the hair shirt. We need a constructive conversat...

David J. C. MacKay

Electric cars are really very cool. Air-source heat pumps are great.

David J. C. MacKay

Solving climate change is a complex topic, but in a single crude brush-stroke, here is the solution: the price of carbon dioxide must be such that people stop burning coal without capture.

David J. C. MacKay

I was writing a book about sustainable energy, and a friend asked me, 'Well, how much energy do you use at home?' And I was embarrassed. I didn't actually know.

David J. C. MacKay

The amount of energy saved by switching off the phone charger is exactly the same as the energy used by driving an average car for one second.

David J. C. MacKay

When the Industrial Revolution started, the amount of carbon sitting underneath Britain in the form of coal was as big as the amount of carbon sitting under Saudi Arabia in the form of oil, and this carbon powered the Industrial Revolution, it put th...

David J. C. MacKay

I would like to help people have honest and constructive conversations about energy. We need to understand how much energy our modern lifestyles use, decide how much energy we would like to use in the future, and choose where we will get that energy ...

David J. C. MacKay

All renewables, much as I love them, are diffuse. They all have a small power per unit area, and we have to live with that fact.

David J. C. MacKay

The discussion about energy options tends to be an intensely emotional, polarised, mistrustful, and destructive one. Every option is strongly opposed: the public seem to be anti-wind, anti-coal, anti-waste-to-energy, anti-tidal-barrages, anti-carbon-...

David J. C. MacKay

We can't be anti-everything - we need an energy plan that adds up. But there's a lack of numeracy in the public discussion of energy. Where people do use numbers, they select them to sound big and score points in arguments, rather than to aid thought...

David J. C. MacKay

Most of physics is about energy, and physicists understand inefficiencies. I wanted to write a book about our energy options in a neutral, human-accessible form.

David J. C. MacKay

To have constructive conversations about the world's energy options, one needs to take a calm look at the numbers.

David J. C. MacKay

Author Bio

  • NameDavid J. C. MacKay
  • DescriptionBritish academic engineer
  • BornMay 22, 1967
  • CountryUnited Kingdom
  • ProfessionPhysicist; Computer Scientist
  • AwardsFellow Of The Royal Society