Alternative fuels

[JagFarlane]

So, I think overall on this board we're all in agreement that sooner or later we will have to transfer over from burning coal/natural gas/oil to alternative fuels. Each one has its benefits and drawbacks, for example solar power requires large amounts of land that receives heavy amounts of sunlight every day, which while it may be great for Sydney, Australia...it may not be so practical for Anchorage, Alaska, USA.

From what I've read here on the boards, as well as a few other places, the frontrunners seem to be:

1) Solar power
2) Wind power
3) Tidal power
4) nuclear fission

Some up and coming technology that is expected to start making an impact in the next couple decades include:
1) Nuclear fission/fusion hybrid reactors, which will also help with the nuclear waste issue
2) Nuclear fusion via plasma, see the ITER project for further information [actually very interesting, and huge collaboration between the US, EU, India, China, and South Korea]

Side note: Honeywell will be distributing a new wind turbine for the average home this fall, kind of interesting: Windtronics turbine

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Changing development patterns couldl significantly reduce our demands for energy and almost end our dependence on cars for transportation.

But what I expect to happen is billions wasted on public transportation that isnt efficient or convenient.

 

[JagFarlane]

Hey...it actually posted LOL. For the longest time after I posted this...it didn't show

 

[neonlyte]

So, I think overall on this board we're all in agreement that sooner or later we will have to transfer over from burning coal/natural gas/oil to alternative fuels. Each one has its benefits and drawbacks, for example solar power requires large amounts of land that receives heavy amounts of sunlight every day, which while it may be great for Sydney, Australia...it may not be so practical for Anchorage, Alaska, USA.

From what I've read here on the boards, as well as a few other places, the frontrunners seem to be:

1) Solar power
2) Wind power
3) Tidal power
4) nuclear fission

Some up and coming technology that is expected to start making an impact in the next couple decades include:
1) Nuclear fission/fusion hybrid reactors, which will also help with the nuclear waste issue
2) Nuclear fusion via plasma, see the ITER project for further information [actually very interesting, and huge collaboration between the US, EU, India, China, and South Korea]

Side note: Honeywell will be distributing a new wind turbine for the average home this fall, kind of interesting: Windtronics turbine

None is feasible without changing consumption & utilisation strategies - except possibly fusion, and that is probably decades away. Changing utilisation strategy isn't the end of the world, but it does require a shift in thinking and habit.

 

[JagFarlane]

None is feasible without changing consumption & utilisation strategies - except possibly fusion, and that is probably decades away. Changing utilisation strategy isn't the end of the world, but it does require a shift in thinking and habit.

Well, currently approx 75% of France is nuclear powered. About 20% of US electrical power comes from nuclear plants.

As far as fusion goes, current estimates put it coming online in my lifetime [about 2050] as long as things go as planned with ITER [10 years to build, 10 years of testing, 20 years before the first commercial plant]

 

[neonlyte]

Well, currently approx 75% of France is nuclear powered. About 20% of US electrical power comes from nuclear plants.

As far as fusion goes, current estimates put it coming online in my lifetime [about 2050] as long as things go as planned with ITER [10 years to build, 10 years of testing, 20 years before the first commercial plant]

Yeh... nuke plants, first target in the oil war. Sorry, pessimism rules if you're suffering UK politiks.

France is an example to Europe, possibly the world, but the world worries about anyone non-nuclear getting nuclear. Portugal aims to be 60% alternative by 2020 and judging from the number of wind systems being installed, they are not far off. Portugal has the added advantage of most of the population remembering how to survive of three hours of electicity per day (outside the major cities). Cold showers, from a bucket no less, with holes in the base, hand pumped from the well to a storgae tank at roof level. A simple life... for simpletons.

Fusion is the great 'white hope'. It's been the same for the last seventy (70) years... maybe we are closer, but the energy inputs currently exceed the energy output... and whilst that will change, no researcher actually knows how to control the burn. Current fusion research uses 'pellets' with a finite burn, i.e. they burn themselves out in less than a second releasing vast amounts of energy. Too much to cope with, there is no way of storing the release of energy, or distributing it, and there is no way of controlling the burn, currently.

All things are possible. I'm for cold showers until someone shows me otherwise.

 

[JagFarlane]

Yeh... nuke plants, first target in the oil war. Sorry, pessimism rules if you're suffering UK politiks.

France is an example to Europe, possibly the world, but the world worries about anyone non-nuclear getting nuclear. Portugal aims to be 60% alternative by 2020 and judging from the number of wind systems being installed, they are not far off. Portugal has the added advantage of most of the population remembering how to survive of three hours of electicity per day (outside the major cities). Cold showers, from a bucket no less, with holes in the base, hand pumped from the well to a storgae tank at roof level. A simple life... for simpletons.

Fusion is the great 'white hope'. It's been the same for the last seventy (70) years... maybe we are closer, but the energy inputs currently exceed the energy output... and whilst that will change, no researcher actually knows how to control the burn. Current fusion research uses 'pellets' with a finite burn, i.e. they burn themselves out in less than a second releasing vast amounts of energy. Too much to cope with, there is no way of storing the release of energy, or distributing it, and there is no way of controlling the burn, currently.

All things are possible. I'm for cold showers until someone shows me otherwise.

It varies, mostly they worry about the breeder plants that produce materials that can be used for weapons. However, the proliferation of plants is spreading. I know that they're used in Brazil [who is building another one], Thailand is also getting into the act.

And you don't need to deal with cold showers. There is a product on the market that uses a bag designed to catch solar rays and warm the water. Campers in the US have been using them for years.

But I do find it exciting to see the amount of research that's been put into fusion the last two decades, which is culminating in this new project, of which countries that represent half the worlds population have joined together to work on.

 

[Weird Harold]

So, I think overall on this board we're all in agreement that sooner or later we will have to transfer over from burning coal/natural gas/oil to alternative fuels. ...

From what I've read here on the boards, as well as a few other places, the frontrunners seem to be:

1) Solar power
2) Wind power
3) Tidal power
4) nuclear fission

Those are the leaders for powering the Grid, but you should add Hydroelectric to the "Tidal" class. There's a lot of new technology that doesn't require huge reservoirs on the horizon in that field and Tidal and Wave generators are only part of the water based power systems.

The big problem isn't going to be powering the Grid, though. The Grid can be powered by a wide variety of alternative generating systems so there doesn't have to be a single definitive alternative there. Most people won't even notice the changeover there unless their lights go out.

The Big problem will be replacing Gasoline, Diesel, and Jet Fuel for the Transportation sector. The transportation sector simply can't go 100% electric and fusion plants small enough to power an airliner simply aren't even on the theoretical drawing boards yet.

What is going to be necessary is an energy storage/transport medium and power delivery system that can replace -- or at least clean up -- Internal Compustion and Jet Engines.

 

[Pure]

i think biofuels should be mentioned, esp. those from plant/crops not supplanting food crops, e.g. ethanol from switch grass.

http://eap.mcgill.ca/MagRack/SF/Fall 91 L.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080109110629.htm

biodiesel from algae is another interesting avenue:

http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html


a jet has been flown on 50% biofuel.

==

a problem with the fusion dream: what exactly is the energy demand to get a split second of fusion to occur; i have only a vague recollection, but isn't it enough electricity to power a small country for a while?

 

[neonlyte]

Those are the leaders for powering the Grid, but you should add Hydroelectric to the "Tidal" class. There's a lot of new technology that doesn't require huge reservoirs on the horizon in that field and Tidal and Wave generators are only part of the water based power systems.

The big problem isn't going to be powering the Grid, though. The Grid can be powered by a wide variety of alternative generating systems so there doesn't have to be a single definitive alternative there. Most people won't even notice the changeover there unless their lights go out.

The Big problem will be replacing Gasoline, Diesel, and Jet Fuel for the Transportation sector. The transportation sector simply can't go 100% electric and fusion plants small enough to power an airliner simply aren't even on the theoretical drawing boards yet.

What is going to be necessary is an energy storage/transport medium and power delivery system that can replace -- or at least clean up -- Internal Compustion and Jet Engines.

Good post, WH

The nub of the problem, unless familiar with the USA, European's have no idea of the distances involved in transportation. Sure, Europeans visitthe USA, but mostly for 'one city' stop-overs, travelling between centres of population is an entirely different matter. The distances are colossal, we have no equivalent in Europe, except Spain where it is possible to travel 100 km between cities. Coping to meet the transportation energy needs of the USA is the nub of the problem if the energy equation is to be balanced. There are other ways, but not ways that a Republican Roxanne (late lamented) would consider viable. It is not appropriate to consider diminishing the norms of USA culture to achieve energy harmonization, in the end, the rest of humanity, like it or not, aspires to USA 'transportation culture even if they are prepared to dispense with the accessories. Find an alternative way to transport Americans, and find a way to solve the energy crisis, failure will be a disaster since might remains a USA realm in the foreseeable horizon of 'oil based' energy supplies.

 

[JagFarlane]

What is going to be necessary is an energy storage/transport medium and power delivery system that can replace -- or at least clean up -- Internal Compustion and Jet Engines.

Particularly when you consider the internal combustion engine is only about 35% efficient.

i think biofuels should be mentioned, esp. those from plant/crops not supplanting food crops, e.g. ethanol from switch grass.

http://eap.mcgill.ca/MagRack/SF/Fall 91 L.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080109110629.htm

biodiesel from algae is another interesting avenue:

http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html


a jet has been flown on 50% biofuel.

==

a problem with the fusion dream: what exactly is the energy demand to get a split second of fusion to occur; i have only a vague recollection, but isn't it enough electricity to power a small country for a while?

1) Biofuels are most definitely interesting. Just didn't happen to recall them when I started the post.

2) Fusion has advanced quite a bit from there. The bonus also being that it runs on much much less fuel over a longer period of time. Considering the split moment it takes to start the reaction compared to running for decades, on one surge, it would seem rather well worth it. Hell, even consider the fact that a modern fission reactor uses its fuel for several decades.

 

[TE999]

All the catchy alternative fuels (eg: biofuels, wind, solar) consume vast amounts of land for a low yield of energy...growing untold acres of corn for propulsion rather than consumption is not sensible considering the fertilizer, water and machinery needed to harvest and process it...IMO nuclear power is the way to go...all that energy in one spot generating electricity for industry, homes, hybrid or electric cars makes sense...disposal of spent fuel rods can be dealt with more easily than covering the Mojave Desert with sunscreens.

Unfortunately the environmental lobby is anti-nuke...and for some reason has Congress by the shorties...so no nukes yet. How they reconcile the flocks of migrating birds being sliced and diced by those giant windmill blades I haven't determined.

For good or ill, petroleum and coal are our pedominant power sources for the foreseeable future...learning how to utilize them more efficiently makes more sense than endless experimentation with alternative power sources with lower yields that, in some cases, consume more energy than they produce.

 

[neonlyte]

i think biofuels should be mentioned, esp. those from plant/crops not supplanting food crops, e.g. ethanol from switch grass.

http://eap.mcgill.ca/MagRack/SF/Fall 91 L.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080109110629.htm

biodiesel from algae is another interesting avenue:

http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html


a jet has been flown on 50% biofuel.

==

a problem with the fusion dream: what exactly is the energy demand to get a split second of fusion to occur; i have only a vague recollection, but isn't it enough electricity to power a small country for a while?

J,
Used fried fat is cheaper and more efficient than bio-fuels... the problem is 'NO TAX'.

Most vehicles (diesel) will run on used fried fat... but it can't be efficiently 'harvested' and thus taxed. Bio-fuels, an EU conception, deal with protected payment subsidies to Farmers, and produce a waste product thatb can be turned into a fuel... that attracts government TAX.

In the UK, until last month, we had a law that prevented local councils from setting traffic lights to green to allow through flow of traffic, at a regulated speed. The purpose was to restrict traffic flow and increase fuel use by stopping and starting. OK... the UK takes 70%+ in tax on fuel, but there high bench mark sets a European 'price' for fuel. The rest of Europe (except Portugal - the UK's oldest ally) has slightly cheaper fuel, and where does the profit go???? To the oil companies... who continue to exploit ever more expensive oil resources, backed by their current profits, instead of seeking rational alternatives,



There is a new battery - Litium/something - that has sbeen overlooked for years simply because Lithium/Graphite has been cheaper to produce. Lithium/something is more expensive to produce but is virtually instantly re-chargeable... it may be the solution to transportation batteries!

 

[Weird Harold]

All the catchy alternative fuels (eg: biofuels, wind, solar) consume vast amounts of land for a low yield of energy...growing untold acres of corn for propulsion rather than consumption is not sensible considering the fertilizer, water and machinery needed to harvest and process it...
...
For good or ill, petroleum and coal are our pedominant power sources for the foreseeable future...learning how to utilize them more efficiently makes more sense than endless experimentation with alternative power sources with lower yields that, in some cases, consume more energy than they produce.

Most of your post sounds like a cut & paste from the American Petroleum Institute's website.

Wind Turbines only kill the stupid birds and Hydro turbines in the Hudson river don't even kill stupid fish Wind Turbines can coexist with crops and pastureland and work just fine on land that is good for nothing else.

Solar Power is more than solar cells like the one on your calculator. Solar Concentration systems like Nevada Solar One take up a lot less space than solar cell arrays and produce orders of magnitude more power -- AND the best land for Solar Power Installations of either type is land that isn't much good for anything else.

Pure mentioned Algae based Biofuels; they don't take up a lot of land because modern algae farms are three dimensional and expand UP instead of out -- they take up about as much room as the smoke stacks of the power plants the test installations are scrubbing the CO2 from or a transformer farm and switching station.

Pure also mentioned Switchgrass as a source of Ethanol for fuel -- swithgrass is a weed that grows where anything else will grow and a lot of place next to nothing else will grow.

Using Corn for ethanol only makes good sense to politicians, corn farmers, and oil corporations.

The main problem with Solar and Wind on a grid-power scale is that the acceptable places for the equipment are too far from where the power is needed. The Honeywell turbine JF linked in the first post is a good start to a more rational application of Wind energy -- and it doesn't even chop up stupid birds because it has a guard on it like the one on your desk fan.

And finally, the Transportation is reliant on a huge installed base of internal combustion and jet engines. It is NOT however locked into petroleum as the fuel for those engines.

Every car sold since the mid-nineties in the US that runs on gasoline or diesel has an EPA approved conversion kit for Propane/LPG/CNG; while those fuels are still fossil fuels, they are NOT exlcusively crude oil products and the same conversion is suitable and approved for use with Methane, which is a completely renewable fuel that can be scaled up to nearly the quantity required to replace gasoline usage all by its lonesome. City Sewage will become the new lightsweet crude.

It would probably very quickly overload the existing bottle exchange propane business, but unless you are verging on bankruptcy and have no crdit at all you could go down to you auto dealer and have your current vehicle converted to run on Propane and start buyin your fuel at K-Mart or Smith's Grocery, or anyplace else that has a Blue Rhino rack out front or one of Blue Rhino's competitiors.

You could also get a Natural Gas meter added to your house for the "to be compressed as Motor Fuel rate" -- depending on local regulations about compressing Natural Gas at home.

Unless you have a farm or sourceof lots of manure and compost, I don't think you can generate enough Methane at home to convert to Methane, but if you know of a source for methane, you -- as in YOU, the person reading this post -- could be free of the oil companies for good.

Alternative energy source have a long way to go before they replace petroleum, but if we don't start NOW in developing alternative fuels for internal combustion engines, there won't be any fuel or alternatives when petroleum eventually does run out.

 

[R. Richard]

A lot of dune buggies now run on propane. The technology is simple and reliable. Propane burns clean and is very high octane. If you have an engine designed to use propane, you can get a lot of performance and mileage out of a propane burning vehicle. The only exisiting problem is that there are few places along the highway to refuel a propane powered vehicle.

 

[oggbashan]

Chinese electric car

A Chinese company has a prototype of a small SUV that has a maximum range of 250 miles before needing a recharge.

While that is much better than previous electric cars, it won't be enough for the distances necessary in the rural US.

Og

 

[Weird Harold]

If you have an engine designed to use propane, you can get a lot of performance and mileage out of a propane burning vehicle. The only exisiting problem is that there are few places along the highway to refuel a propane powered vehicle.

That's just the point I was trying to make: If you own a gasoline fuled vehicle sold in the US in the last fifteen years or so, you DO have a "flex fuel engine" -- that is an engine designed to run on propane, methane, alchohol, biogas, and combinations of alternatives, like E85. I don't recall exactly when Flex fuel capability became fully mandated but it is sometime after my 1986 Blazer was built. The EPA website has a complete listing of alternate fuel conversion certificates to check whether you vehicle complies withthe Flex fuel mandate or not.

The conversion to Propane/Methane is primarily in the fuel storage and delivery system and can include a reduced size gasoline tank for emrgency refueling if Propane can't be found (that latter is a slightly mor complicated and expensive conversion.)

There are Blue Rhino propane bottle exchange racks at just about every other exit on the freeway system and at every K-mart, Wal-mart, and grocery store in the country. A Blue Rhino sized Propane bottle and Auxiliary fuel connection to fit added to the basic Propane conversion (maybe an additional fifty bucks) would insure that you could always find some fuel and provide a reserve tank for when you don't pay attention to the fuel guage.)

There is an extensive network of bulk propane dispensers that service the RV Community -- like the U-Haul dealer on the corner about a thousand yards from my apartment -- so driving a Propane powered car wouldn't be much more difficult that it was finding Unleaded gasoline when the first catalytic converters hit the roads.

People cry about there not being any viable alternatives to gasoline, without knowing that the the government has required their car to be capable of using alternatives since the mid-nineties.

Propane isn't the ideal solution to gas prices and polution because it is still a fossil fuel, but it is a step in the right direction and it is somthing that can be done right NOW as fast as the conversion kit makers can provide fuel tanks and regulators and mechanics can install them.

 

[Weird Harold]

A Chinese company has a prototype of a small SUV that has a maximum range of 250 miles before needing a recharge.

While that is much better than previous electric cars, it won't be enough for the distances necessary in the rural US.

Og

250 miles is probably adequate for US distances -- that's about the distance between refuling stops most people on long trips plan for -- but it's the refueling time for recharging for another 250 miles that would the killer for cross-country travel.

That range for an SUV sounds like a good solution for just about anything other than cross-country travel and would even be adequate for a family vaction that isn't planned aorund spending more than 5 hours a day on the road.

I've suggested in the past that U-haul or Avis could get into the business of renting Auxiliary power units to tow behind all-electric cars going outside of their normal usage patterns; mount a Honda generator on a light trailer and plug in your extension cord to recharge as you drive, or mount Hydrogen fuel cells or supplemental batteries on the trailer to extend the range -- perhaps even mounting Solar Cells over the auxilary power unit to grab a few cheap watts to supplement the supplemental power?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

WH

If the batteries were standardized recharged ones could be installed in about the time it takes to gas a car.

 

[Weird Harold]

WH

If the batteries were standardized recharged ones could be installed in about the time it takes to gas a car.

Actually, standard palletized battery packs could be changed faster than pumping 15 gallong of gasoline -- about comparable, time-wise, to changing the batteries in a flashlight.

The problem with that concept is storing and charging the battery packs. Fifteen thousand gallons of gasoline to service one thousand cars requires about 57 cubic meters of undeground storage space (if I got the decimal place right.)

A standardized battery pack would probably be something in the range of 1m square and 20cm deep or about 1/5 of a cubic meter -- or about 200 cubic meters (plus storage racks and charging equipment) for 1,000 packs of above ground storage. That's without considering that a service station capable of dealing with a thousand battery changes each day would need at least a megawatt level substation off the Grid to charge the battery packs.

That's going to eliminate convenience stores and corner service stations almost completely which means that each battery exchange center has to pick up the thousand refulings a day load of more than one gasoline station with the attendant multipliecation of space and power requirements.

It's a concept that might work well for Truck Stops and long-haul trucking, but you run into the amortization of the existing fleet as a stumbling block.

It's also a concept that might be a distant future solution when there has been time and demand to build th enecessary infrastructure.

The Aux Power unit concept is something that could be put into use today on an individual electric car owner basis -- just rent U-Haul's smallest trailer (like one of the two-wheeled car haulers,) tie your Honda or Coleman generator on it and, if necessary, disable the "nanny-switch" that keeps you from driving off witht he extension cord still plugged in.

It could be put into commercial application as quickly as U-Haul and other trailer rental companies could convert two-wheeled car haulers into Aux Power Units.

 

[oggbashan]

250 miles is probably adequate for US distances -- that's about the distance between refueling stops most people on long trips plan for -- but it's the refueling time for recharging for another 250 miles that would the killer for cross-country travel.

...

The Chinese developer has fitted a fast-charge option that would recharge the vehicle in about an hour. Time for a diner break?

However the 250 miles is the maximum under ideal conditions - a constant 50mph or less on level roads. The usable maximum is about 180 and drops significantly with higher speeds.

Og

 

[R. Richard]

That's just the point I was trying to make: If you own a gasoline fuled vehicle sold in the US in the last fifteen years or so, you DO have a "flex fuel engine" -- that is an engine designed to run on propane, methane, alchohol, biogas, and combinations of alternatives, like E85. I don't recall exactly when Flex fuel capability became fully mandated but it is sometime after my 1986 Blazer was built. The EPA website has a complete listing of alternate fuel conversion certificates to check whether you vehicle complies withthe Flex fuel mandate or not.

The conversion to Propane/Methane is primarily in the fuel storage and delivery system and can include a reduced size gasoline tank for emrgency refueling if Propane can't be found (that latter is a slightly mor complicated and expensive conversion.)

Propane is a very high octane fuel. In order to really use the potential of propane, an engine needs to be set up with very high compression. Thus, an engine set up to run 91 octane is not going to really use the potential of propane fuel.

The dune buggies that do use propane and are set up for that use are very fast.

 

[Pure]

note to neon

hi, hope you are well,

the wiki article has a survey of new lithium batteries, in the last part of the article, e.g. nickel-manganese; iron phosphate, etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery

based on these articles, it's apparently a revised 'iron phosphate' type you might have been thinking of.

http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/22280/

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2342982,00.asp




===
There is a new battery - Litium/something - that has sbeen overlooked for years simply because Lithium/Graphite has been cheaper to produce. Lithium/something is more expensive to produce but is virtually instantly re-chargeable... it may be the solution to transportation batteries!

 

[Weird Harold]

The Chinese developer has fitted a fast-charge option that would recharge the vehicle in about an hour. Time for a diner break?

Perhaps a rennaisance of Roadside Attractions and a slower more laid back travel style?

 

[Weird Harold]

Propane is a very high octane fuel. In order to really use the potential of propane, an engine needs to be set up with very high compression. Thus, an engine set up to run 91 octane is not going to really use the potential of propane fuel.

Octane isn't a rating of energy content, but I see your point. Any engine can be optimized to get the most out of any specific fuel but does so at the expense of air quality and flexibility.

The majority of cars sold in the US are designed to run on 87 Octane, not because 87 Octane is a better or more efficient fuel, but because higher compression Engines that need higher octanes produce more NOx compounds that turn into Smog and Acid Rain.

Propane is a cleaner burning fuel than gasoline under equivalent conditions, but when you put nitrogen and oxygen together under high pressure and high heat, you NOx-ious compounds whatever you're burning to generate the Heat.

FWIW, Diesel engines can also be converted to Propane/Compressed Natureal Gas/Methane (but the conversion is more expensive and extensive than for gasoline) and they already have the high compression to use the potential.