OT Hydrogen economy, not?

[Eeyore]

So you think it's easier to go install a pollution containment system all
ALL the engines out there

What pollution ? Have you any idea how clean burning modern engines are ?

If CO2 IS a problem and there's a hell of a lot of doubt about it, despite the
alleged 'consensus', it makes more sense to capture it in large plants located
all over the country for deep burial or whatever.

Graham

 

[James Arthur]

Nah, the "ate" ending means some of the hydrogen is already bound up
with oxygen, so you wouldn't get as many calories per gram - you need
a digestive system for that. ;-)

Cheers!
Rich

Oh fine, I've gotten nothing but abuse for this post,
completely undeserved.

How 'bout YOU draft a pithy, ironic gibe at the hydrogen
economy, fuzzy thinking, biofuels, carbon-phobia,
and gluttony in ten words or less, eh?

Please include carbon and hydrogen in your answer.

And no smiley-faces either--that's uncouth.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[Balanced View]

What makes you think they mean well?

John

Environmentalists have always said corn was a shitty choice for ethanol,
it was the government and the
corn lobby that pushed for corn ethanol. Waste products, wood chips etc.
and non food high sugar
crops such as Jerusalem artichokes and sugar beets were always listed as
the best choice for ethanol.
There is no reason ethanol could not be made from waste cellulose
currently going to land fill every year.

 

[James Arthur]

Balanced View wrote:

Environmentalists have always said corn was a shitty choice for ethanol,
it was the government and the
corn lobby that pushed for corn ethanol.

Do you have a source for that view?

Waste products, wood chips etc.
and non food high sugar
crops such as Jerusalem artichokes and sugar beets were always listed as
the best choice for ethanol.
There is no reason ethanol could not be made from waste cellulose
currently going to land fill every year.

Economically? How?

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[Eeyore]

I was bonking

Have you any idea what that means in the UK ?

Graham

 

[James Arthur]

The furthest back I can find an article with online free access is at
New Scientist 2007,

Thanks Martin.

Since
o Gore said he was proud to have *saved* ethanol in 1998
(in the speech I linked on the Clinton Administration website
archive),
o that he cast the tie-breaking vote to do this,
o then went on to praise the stuff as helpful to the environment,
o and since the ethanol of the day was corn-based,

I wondered where Balanced View got his/her idea environmentalists
had always opposed ethanol from corn. Al supported it.

Looking back, it's worse than I thought, really. It looks like
Mr. Gore knew full well that ethanol was marginal:

http://clinton6.nara.gov/2000/09/20...ident-at-michigan-victory-2000-reception.html
"Let me just say, you know this whole business about ethanol
and farm-based fuel products, right now the reason we don't
have more of it is it takes about seven gallons of gasoline
to produce about eight gallons of ethanol. But we are funding
research, which is very close to making a breakthrough that
is the equivalent of what happened when crude oil was broken
down so that it could be refined into gasoline. And when that
happens -- when that happens, you'll be able to make eight
gallons of ethanol for about one gallon of gasoline, and the
whole world will change. That is what Al Gore has been doing
the last eight years. (Applause.)"
--President Bill Clinton, Sept. 21, 2000


The ethanol was corn-based, with hopes for cellulosic:

http://clinton3.nara.gov/WH/EOP/OSTP/html/0022_5.html
"And the big thing that's coming up in this area is,
before you know it, I believe we will crack the chemical
barriers to truly efficient production of biomass fuels.
One of the reasons you see this whole debate -- in the
presidential campaign, if you're following it, you know
the big argument is, is it a waste of money to push ethanol
or not, if it takes seven gallons of gasoline to make eight
gallons of ethanol. But they're on the verge of a chemical
breakthrough that is analogous to what was done when crude
oil could be transferred efficiently into gasoline. And
when that happens, you'll be able to make eight gallons of
biomass -- not just from corn, but from weeds, from rice
hulls, from anything -- for about one gallon of fuel. That
will be the equivalent therefore, in environmental terms, of
cars that get hundreds of miles a gallon. And the world, the
environmental world, will be changed forever. And that's --
one-third of our greenhouse gas emissions are in transportation."
--President Bill Clinton, Jan. 21, 2000

Such lofty promises, such fabulous technology "just around
the corner, solutions to all our problems, almost ready,"
....and still not. Fuel cells, electric cars, hydrogen,
free clean power...what we all want, promised by leaders
who can't deliver. Politics.

I'm not trying to rain on Al, just dispel the wacky, wrong,
farm-lobby conspiracy thing. It's just one of the green
myths, another being that "fabulous technology is out there,
but 'the bad people' won't let you have it."

Too many greenies are meanies: blaming, angry, accusing others,
and wrongly. That doesn't help.

Ethanol is a disaster wrought by environmentalists. Passion's
great. Let's make the world better, but let's make sure the
numbers work first. Much harm can be done if they don't.
Like starving off the world's poor, and mowing the rainforest
to grow biofuels.

No more 'ethanols.'


Best regards,
James Arthur

 

[danny burstein]

had always opposed ethanol from corn. Al supported it.

Looking back, it's worse than I thought, really. It looks like
Mr. Gore knew full well that ethanol was marginal:

http://clinton6.nara.gov/2000/09/20...ident-at-michigan-victory-2000-reception.html
"Let me just say, you know this whole business about ethanol
and farm-based fuel products, right now the reason we don't
have more of it is it takes about seven gallons of gasoline
to produce about eight gallons of ethanol. But we are funding
research, which is very close to making a breakthrough that
is the equivalent of what happened when crude oil was broken
down so that it could be refined into gasoline. And when that
happens -- when that happens, you'll be able to make eight
gallons of ethanol for about one gallon of gasoline, and the
whole world will change. That is what Al Gore has been doing
the last eight years. (Applause.)"
--President Bill Clinton, Sept. 21, 2000

- Thanks for finding those quotes (which mesh with my
fading memory cells...).

Well, while things have improved incrementally in
the production efficiency, we've yet to see any
dort of "breakthrough".

- So a small number of plants, and lots more
research... would make sense. But sure as hell
not what we've been doing.

 

[James Arthur]

- Thanks for finding those quotes (which mesh with my
fading memory cells...).

Well, while things have improved incrementally in
the production efficiency, we've yet to see any
dort of "breakthrough".

- So a small number of plants, and lots more
research... would make sense. But sure as hell
not what we've been doing.

I was actually horrified at Martin's first link--
the US, currently making about 9e6 gallons of
ethanol for fuel--triple that of a few years back--
presently intends to quadruple that yet again,
to 35e6 gallons a year.

With corn the only contender, that's going to
come from corn.

That's an amazing way to burn gasoline, topsoil and
food plus increase emissions all in one fell swoop.

Yikes.


Regards,
James Arthur

 

[Trygve Lillefosse]

GOOD LORD.

Is that what they teach you at school now ? How do you plan to 'contain' all
this pollution at the electric plant ? Never mind an electric plant is only ~30%
efficient including transmission losses.

30% sounds awfully low.

That has to be a pretty unefficient plant that are placed a very long
distance from where the power is used.

 

[daestrom]

Thanks Martin.

Since
o Gore said he was proud to have *saved* ethanol in 1998
(in the speech I linked on the Clinton Administration website
archive),
o that he cast the tie-breaking vote to do this,
o then went on to praise the stuff as helpful to the environment,
o and since the ethanol of the day was corn-based,

I wondered where Balanced View got his/her idea environmentalists
had always opposed ethanol from corn. Al supported it.

Looking back, it's worse than I thought, really. It looks like
Mr. Gore knew full well that ethanol was marginal:

http://clinton6.nara.gov/2000/09/20...ident-at-michigan-victory-2000-reception.html
"Let me just say, you know this whole business about ethanol
and farm-based fuel products, right now the reason we don't
have more of it is it takes about seven gallons of gasoline
to produce about eight gallons of ethanol. But we are funding
research, which is very close to making a breakthrough that
is the equivalent of what happened when crude oil was broken
down so that it could be refined into gasoline. And when that
happens -- when that happens, you'll be able to make eight
gallons of ethanol for about one gallon of gasoline, and the
whole world will change. That is what Al Gore has been doing
the last eight years. (Applause.)"
--President Bill Clinton, Sept. 21, 2000

Excellent research and citations.

One thing that needs to be challenged is the whole idea that technology can
somehow increase the energy available from that ethanol.

IMHO, when he compared the possible technological improvements in production
of ethanol with those of gasoline from crude, that was a grave distortion.
Taking a barrel of crude and removing the gasoline and then converting some
of the remaining hydrocarbons to gasoline ('catalytic-cracking' for example)
is one thing. Technology improvements have meant you can get a larger
fraction of a barrel of gasoline from a barrel of crude (you still don't get
42 gallons of gasoline from a barrel of crude however).

But take all the ethanol out of a 'barrel of ethanol' and you don't have
anything left to 'convert'. No technology can put more than a barrel worth
of ethanol in a 'barrel of ethanol'.

The only 'improvement' technology could make would be to be able to grow
more corn with each gallon of oil (most farm machinery doesn't use
'gasoline' but rather diesel fuel). But such improvements in farm tech
would be a general boon to farmers, not just ethanol. Improvements in
distillation efficiency seem unlikely.

daestrom

 

[daestrom]

30% sounds awfully low.

That has to be a pretty unefficient plant that are placed a very long
distance from where the power is used.

It's not too far though. It is true that new state-of-the-art plants
running natural gas are much higher (GE's H-series approach 60%). The
simple heat-rate of coal plants can be higher than 30% (often in the mid
40's), but the fuel handling energy to move the coal around the yard and
process it typically doesn't show up in the stated heat-rates.

Distribution losses of course can vary but are in the range of 5 to 7%.

daestrom

 

[daestrom]

It has to do with a little-known science called "thermodynamics". Look
it up some time.


That's done occasionally here, but in the US power plants tend not to
be located in urban centers. Low-grade (ie, lots of calories at low
temperature) heat is hard to use. And an efficient power plant dumps
only low-grade heat. I suspect that, if power plant cooling water is
hot enough to be used to heat a city, the plant efficiency suffers.

Sure it suffers, but if you look at the whole setup, overall fuel usage is
better. The 'trick' is to pay the plant for that low-grade heat in such a
way that it's economical to run with lower plant efficiency (even when
district heating is not needed in summer).

Netherlands has found it benefits society overall to use the 'hi-grade'
energy in power production and the 'low-grade' energy in domestic heating.
I believe the plant and district heating are operated by the same agency so
they aren't focused on just power plant efficiency.

Or you can heat your home and hot-water with natural gas that has a flame
temperature of 1950C (~3500F) and 'waste' all that entropy heating air or
water to 140F. While a modern, condensing, gas furnace may have an
efficiency of >93% (of LHV), it is terribly 'wasteful' of entropy. The high
differential temperatures across the heat exchanger means entropy is being
created at a very high rate. Think about it.

daestrom

 

[daestrom]

Because fission produces both very hard and penetrating gamma
radiation and neutrons. Both require rather massive shielding.

High level waste produces either only low energy gammas or none at
all, depending on what isotopes are left in the mix. A Sr90 heat
source produces no external radiation. Pu-238 only a little.

Even if the shielding question could be dealt with, achieving the
kind of "throttle response" necessary for ordinary driving would be
difficult to impossible in a nuclear reactor.

Actually, a couple of research projects were done in the 80's about
servo-controlled control rod systems for small reactors. The control
algorithm could raise power up to a couple of MW for a prescribed time and
then lower power back down to the sub kW range in about 10 seconds.

Needless to say this was *not* a typical, low enrichment LWR design ;-).
But it was considered for certain, ahem... 'mobile' applications and money
was not much of a concern.

daestrom

 

[daestrom]

Melis... Melis... why does that name ring a bell...?

Oh yeah...Google Melis: UC Berkeley professor: hydrogen from algae

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2002/08/54456

"In the fall of 2001, the company built a bioreactor containing 500
liters of water and algae that can produce up to 1 liter of hydrogen
per hour."

Nice.

==> 500 L reactor : 24 L/day hydrogen
==> 0.048 vol H2 produced per day / vol reactor (higher is better)

Compare Melis' above, secret, patent-pending project with a common
off- the-shelf cow manure to methane project:
http://www.mnproject.org/pdf/Haubyrptupdated.pdf

352,000 gallon total reactor volume;
11,500 gal slurry produced per day;
58,900 cu ft per day of gas (440,600 gallons gas per day)

==> 440,600 : 352,000 gal
==> 1.25 vol gas produced per day / vol reactor (higher is better)

Granted, cow poo gas is about 1/2 carbon dioxide, and methane is not
the same as hydrogen (I'm lazy, someone else can derive the enthalpy
of combustion)... but an order of magnitude difference... now come
on...

But Melis' system doesn't require cows, pastures, etc. All it requires is
sunlight and water. See the difference??

daestrom

 

[Vaughn Simon]

You just need a moderator that changes density inversely with temperature,
and then virtually no rod movement is necessary to change power. As you draw
heat from the reactor, the moderator cools a bit, increases density,
automatically raising the core power level. If you stop drawing power, the
moderator heats up a bit, gets less dense, and the power level decreases. The
naval PWRs that I am familar with have throttle response that is plenty good
enough for ship manuvering.

The real problem (besides that minor radiation & safety thing) with a small
reactor is they don't yet make nuclear reactors with handy crankshaft couplings
sticking out of them. Nuclear reactors are really just a heat source, so you
still need a heat engine to do much useful with them.

BTW: There have been several fission nuclear reactors launched into space, so
they don't need to be all that big.

Vaughn

 

[danny burstein]

BTW: There have been several fission nuclear reactors launched into space, so
they don't need to be all that big.

And then there's the one we left on that Russkie
underwater telephone cable when we tapped it over
in (or under) the Sea of Okhotsk...

`:wq

 

[Calab]

|
|
| Calab wrote:
|
| > So you think it's easier to go install a pollution containment system
all
| > ALL the engines out there
|
| What pollution ? Have you any idea how clean burning modern engines are ?
|
| If CO2 IS a problem and there's a hell of a lot of doubt about it, despite
the
| alleged 'consensus', it makes more sense to capture it in large plants
located
| all over the country for deep burial or whatever.

Finally... a reply that DOESN'T sound totally condescending.

True, new cars are MUCH better these days. How good will they be after five
years of service though?

....and a couple questions related to this thread.

If gasoline is such a great way to store portable energy, why can't a fuel
cell be developed to get at that energy instead of burning it?

Also, has anyone considered the "heat" pollution from our modern world? I
know that it's relatively small compared to the heat that hits us from the
sun, but doesn't all those engines, and nuclear plants, and coal plants, and
air conditioning, etc. all affect our environment?

 

[Vaughn Simon]

In <[email protected]> "Vaughn Simon"


And then there's the one we left on that Russkie
underwater telephone cable when we tapped it over
in (or under) the Sea of Okhotsk...

No personal knowledge, but that was more likely an RTG, (radioisotope
thermoelectric generators) not an actual fission nuclear reactor.

Vaughn

 

[Tim Williams]

Some diesels can take dimethyl ether (DME) as a substitute fuel, but I
wonder about the safety of that, since ethers form explosive peroxides
over time (especially diETHYL ether). Not sure if DME is exempt from
this phenomenon - that's a question for the folks at sci.chem...

I recall ether is often used to start diesels. It ignites easily, so sure,
why not. Diethyl ether is just barely a liquid at room temperature (BP 42°C
or something like that), and dimethyl ether is a gas: it has to be stored
under pressure, so it has little or no advantage over propane or, God
forbid, butane (which, like DME, liquifies relatively easily in the winter).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dimethyl_ether

Peroxidation is only a concern around light and oxygen (not necessarily both
needed), so I don't think it's a concern for ethers in metal cylinders.
Stabilizers are almost always added which essentially eliminate this risk
(except for high-purity ether, only used in the lab -- preferrably used all
at once, with the leftovers disposed of immediately so it doesn't sit on the
shelf and go nasty!).

Tim

 

[James Arthur]

James Arthur wrote:
Balanced View wrote:


Environmentalists have always said corn was a shitty choice for
ethanol, it was the government and the
corn lobby that pushed for corn ethanol.
Do you have a source for that view?
The furthest back I can find an article with online free access is at
New Scientist 2007,

Thanks Martin.

Since
o Gore said [blah blah blah]

Since when is Al Gore "environemntalists"?? He is *one person*.

Balanced View said environmentalists had always opposed
corn-based ethanol.

That contradicted my memory, so I dug a bit for the history.
Al Gore popped up on the radar.

I assume Al Gore is/was in tune with environmental-types,
and would've heard their objections to corn, if such
objections were being made. I heard none.

And it might be that Mr. Gore heard and ignored those
cries--I don't know--but it seems more likely that
he was going with the flow.

Anyway, that was my effort to reconstruct the environmental
vibe vis-a-vis ethanol when it started.

If you remember differently, feel free to post some
links to articles. I'd be happy to read them.

And he has nothing whatsoever to do with *my* views about the
environment,
[snip]

Too many greenies are meanies: blaming, angry, accusing others,
and wrongly. That doesn't help.

Too many *PEOPLE* are meanies.

[rambling snipped]

Sorry, none of that's relevant. Yelling at people,
or blaming people--especially the wrong people--these
aren't helpful. That other people do it doesn't make
it more effective. It's not effective.

Doing or promoting things that don't make sense doesn't
help either. Facts must be checked. Numbers have to add
up.

If we're to make things better we have to do our
homework first. And proceed calmly, rationally,
politely, with the facts on our side.

Ethanol was ONE proposal offered in an attempt, albeit a vain one, to try
to implement a gradual adjustment to new world conditions.

It should never have become an excuse for refusing to change bad habits.


More like, no more of making excuses for not changing bad habits, and no
more finding half-assed ways to avoid implementing real changes.

I made no excuses; I simply posted some facts.
Ethanol is an example to learn from. That's all.
Let's not repeat it.


Best regards,
James Arthur