billvon 3,116 #26 March 13, 2002 >Nah, no need to get fusion to get off fossils. Seriously, if we can get our cars off gas then we can >pretty much get electric from a lot of sources and crack hydrogen. There's lot of sources of energy. Like what? Coal kills about 30,000 people a year in the US, so that's not a great source. Nuclear might be an option but it's expensive. Natural gas is relatively clean, but hard to transport. (OTOH it makes a good motor fuel.)-bill von Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rhino 0 #27 March 13, 2002 Here we go..Blue Skies and Smooth Rides!! http://www.aahit.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ChromeBoy 0 #28 March 13, 2002 How about solar energy?Avoid Kachinks If Possible Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rhino 0 #29 March 13, 2002 This is gas..Let me look...Blue Skies and Smooth Rides!! http://www.aahit.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rhino 0 #30 March 13, 2002 I have Oil, Natural gas, Nuclear, Hydro, and primary energy...Blue Skies and Smooth Rides!! http://www.aahit.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rhino 0 #31 March 13, 2002 Best I could do guys. Maybe it answers some questions..Blue Skies and Smooth Rides!! http://www.aahit.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
billvon 3,116 #32 March 13, 2002 >How about solar energy?It's already taking off in a big way, but the problem is that night thing. Someday I think solar will supply something like 40% of our daytime power, and wind may supply a lot of our interruptible power, but we will always need nighttime baseline power - the kind that is best supplied by larger centralized plants. In my ideal world those plants would be nuclear, natural gas, hydro and geothermal.-bill von Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rhino 0 #33 March 13, 2002 No solar.. It's not industrialized yet.. Not sure about wind mills either..Blue Skies and Smooth Rides!! http://www.aahit.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Iflyme 0 #34 March 14, 2002 Perhaps we should continue to work on harnessing the power of the tides... "Men weren't meant to rideWith clouds between their knees"Five For Fighting Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rhino 0 #35 March 14, 2002 Maybe we should invent something that turns friction from sex into energy?? Could you imaging the POWER!!!PUMPERPOWER!!!Blue Skies and Smooth Rides!! http://www.aahit.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
freeflir29 0 #36 March 14, 2002 Quoteby "friendly" countries (i.e. Venezuela)How much do you REALLY know about Venezuela? They aren't really all that friendly to us...or their neighbors...."I only have a C license, so I don't know shit..right?"-Clay Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
billvon 3,116 #37 March 14, 2002 >How much do you REALLY know about Venezuela? That's why I put "friendly" in quotes. In this case, friendly just means more willing to ignore OPEC quotas. I still wouldn't want to depend on them, especially with Chavez at the helm.-bill von Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MarkM 0 #38 March 14, 2002 QuoteLike what? Coal kills about 30,000 people a year in the US, so that's not a great source. Nuclear might be an option but it's expensive. Natural gas is relatively clean, but hard to transport. (OTOH it makes a good motor fuel.)If we use fuel cells they run off of, what, hydrogen? You still have to use energy to get hydro, but at least you have more options than just fossils.Natural gas may be hard to transport, but you wouldn't need to. You covert the energy from it into hydrogen anywhere and transport that. Don't like natural gas? Use tidal, wind, solar, whatever. We'd at least be able to explore other energy options, because the end result can be used to make hydrogen.How about grain alcohol? Methanol?Hell, if you don't need a large kit to crack hydrogen I might even be able to build a totally self sufficient sailboat if fuel cells became common motors: wind generators and solar cells for electric, crack the hydro and store into a fuel cell. Depends on how much electricity you need to crack hydrogen and how big/practical the system would be. Give me a watermaker and a decent fishing kit and I could avoid civilization for months with a setup like that. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ramon 0 #39 March 14, 2002 OPEC hasn't had the balls to raise prices or cut production since the 70s embargo.they do whatever they can to support our auto-mania. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
billvon 3,116 #40 March 14, 2002 >No solar.. It's not industrialized yet.. Not sure about wind mills either..Solar will never be used to make large centralized power plants. However, it's great for powering houses - that's how I power my house. Put solar panels on just 10% of the houses in the US and you could supply 40% of our daytime residential power needs. The technology exists right now to do that. Wind is currently supplying about 3% of California's peak electricity needs, and is growing at something like 50% a year.-bill von Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
freeflir29 0 #41 March 14, 2002 Quoteespecially with Chavez at the helm.Exactly what I was getting at...."I only have a C license, so I don't know shit..right?"-Clay Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
billvon 3,116 #42 March 14, 2002 >If we use fuel cells they run off of, what, hydrogen? You still have to use energy to get hydro, but at least you have more options than just fossils.The problem there is that you have to generate the power, convert it to hydrogen, transport it, and then convert it to power at the other end. That's a lot of conversion steps and a lot of loss of energy. If you're going to do that, plain old electric cars are going to be a lot more efficient. If you really want a fuel, use the same energy to make methane. We already have cars that will burn it, they're very, very clean, and the transport/fueling systems already exist.>Natural gas may be hard to transport, but you wouldn't need to. You covert the energy from it into hydrogen anywhere and transport that.Hydrogen molecules are much smaller than methane (natural gas) molecules. They leak through everything, and it takes much, much higher pressures to send the same amount of energy. It's a lot easier to transport natural gas. (still not as easy as oil though.)>Don't like natural gas? Use tidal, wind, solar, whatever. We'd at least be able to explore other energy options, >because the end result can be used to make hydrogen.I think we will eventually bypass the hydrogen step and just use electric power directly. Easier to transport.>How about grain alcohol? Methanol?It takes more energy to make methanol (fertilizer for crops, harvesting, fermenting, filtering etc) than you get out of the fuel. Since natural gas is used heavily in fertilizer production I don't know if that gains you anything.Biodiesel, on the other hand, doesn't require intensive cultivation, the extraction is easy (just squeeze the seeds) and the reaction from vegetable oil to biodiesel is mildly exothermic. Still not perfect but not too bad - you can get 100 gallons per acre per year.>Hell, if you don't need a large kit to crack hydrogen I might even be able to build a totally self sufficient sailboat >if fuel cells became common motors: wind generators and solar cells for electric, crack the hydro and store into >a fuel cell. Depends on how much electricity you need to crack hydrogen and how big/practical the system >would be. Give me a watermaker and a decent fishing kit and I could avoid civilization for months with a setup like that.Heck, use batteries and do the same thing. Lithium-ion if you want to be fancy, valve regulated starved lead acids if you don't.-bill von Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
nacmacfeegle 0 #43 March 14, 2002 Geothermal is gonna get bigger IMHO, drill a deep hole, pump water down, get steam back up.Again IMHO the only way the US is gonna cut its hydrocarbon consumption is to tax the hell out of gasoline, not popular, but prevalent in Europe where gas (we call it petrol) is about 4 times as expensive as it is in the US.But hey, you guys keep on driving your gas guzzlers, you are keeping me in a job (I design production platforms mainly), and I for one appreciate that! OPEC, again IMHO will be less and less influential in world oil pricing. As Ramon rightly stated they are becoming a little short of balls. The areas to watch are the Caspian (search for 'Kashagan' on your favourite search engine, its massive), and the north side of North America. Both these areas have environmental, and political challenges to overcome.Deep water prospects that Richard was talking about are difficult and therefore expensive to effectively exploit also.But don't forget the power of lobbyists........Tuppence worth....D Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MarkM 0 #44 March 14, 2002 Heh, well, yeah, I guess I could just use electric directly but it wouldn't satisfy my need for gadgets nearly as much Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
