Alternative Energy

[nacktman]

With all the discussion about fossil fuels energy sources drying up - and they are so no hyperbolic rhetoric about them never running out - what would be the best forms of "new" energy to tap into?

[Qikdraw]

Trash (http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5i5FdowoXtaRhdYAEkdDg4uR8SiAAD8VBOTLO0)

Qikdraw

[luvnaturism]

Coal is one fossil fuel that is in no danger of drying up. We're likely good for two or three centuries there. But coal is a disaster in terms of CO2 production, so we really need to use as little of that as possible.

I've been seriously opposed to further development of nuclear energy because of the problem of waste storage. However, I just read a scholarly article (actually a college lecture) that is causing me to reconsider. Not sure where I'll eventually come out on this issue.

http://www.hillsdale.edu/news/imprimis/archive/issue.asp?year=2008&month=02

Making electricity from wind and sun always sounds good, but both methods use up enormous amounts of land and only work when conditions are right. Maybe sometime we'll be able to produce large amounts of electricity from wave and/or tidal action, but that's certainly a long way off.

I had hoped for years that the real solution for reducing pollution from cars and trucks would be hydrogen power, but now we learn that, in much of the country, producing the electricity to generate the hydrogen ends up releasing more CO2 than if we just burned gas to start with. Same with plug-in hybrids. That's because so much of the electricity in this country comes from burning coal.

So there aren't any easy answers. I've been telling people for 20 years that energy dependence is a national security issue, but—no matter which party is in power—our government is chronically unable to deal with long term planning.

[OZJames]

Copied from NEWS WEEKLY - I think it says it all. By the way I have about AUD$3,000 invested in this company.

"Despite the absence of active volcanoes, geysers or other forms of intense tectonic activity, scientists and engineers are confident geothermal heat will become a significant source for power generation in Australia.

A research paper presented in Turkey last year by scientists Prame Chopra and Fiona Holgate of the Australian National University highlighted these pioneering moves and pinpointed regions where such energy may eventually be tapped.

And a release from the Australian Earth Sciences Convention, held in Melbourne in July, identified some of Australia's sedimentary basins as prime sources of subterranean heat.

"One such basin is Queensland's Cooper Basin," a Convention spokesman said. "Where two wells have been drilled to more than 4350m into a granite where the rock temperature is 250C in an underground reservoir extending over an area of more than four square kilometres, believed to be the largest in the world.

"In September 2005 the first hot dry rock resource exploration was completed in South Australia.

"An evaluation confirmed the potential for a 1000MW electrical geothermal energy sources."

Similarly positive claims have been made in an assessment compiled by the Centre for International Economics (CIE) for Geodynamics Ltd of Brisbane, a pioneer in moves to tap below ground heat sources, also known as hot fractured rocks (HFR.)

The CIE report said that Australia already has 14 companies pursuing geothermal energy on 87 geothermal licences and work commitment of more than $500 million over the next five years.

Most of the activity centres on South Australia. "Geodymanics Ltd have established that there is a large scale HFR energy recourse located below the Cooper Basin, near Innamincka, on the SA side of the border with Queensland," the CIE report said.

"They have drilled the Habanero 1 and 2 wells into the hot granites and identified the resource as being the hottest outside of a volcanic region yet discovered - 287C at around five kilometres depth.

"What remains is to demonstrate the capacity of HFR to convert a natural resource into electrical energy on a competitive and commercial basis.

"Once that is achieved it could put Australia into a leading position in what could become a major global industry."

Geodynamics Ltd also has geothermal tenements in NSW and Queensland, including the NSW Hunter Valley. Other prospective areas include the Murray Basin; the Otway Basin (west of Melbourne); the Perth Basin; and McArthur Basin in the Northern Territory.

Unlike the hot wet geothermal energy tapped in New Zealand and Indonesia, in Australia water will need to be artificially infused into the systems.

Moreover, overseas projects have struggled to extract energy economically for a range of reasons including poor rock structure, low water flow rates and low rock temperatures.

Despite this Professor Sheik Rahman, head of a University of NSW research unit, believes Australia's hot rocks have the right temperatures and geological structure to be successfully exploited.

Dr Chopra has backed this claim. "We are the only country in the world we know of that has rocks at very high temperatures within easy drilling depths and where there is no volcanic activity," he says.

But there is a long way to go, warns Richard Dumbrell, a technical advisor with the School of Petroleum Engineering at the University of NSW.

"It's an enormous challenge and it shouldn't be misunderstood as being a fait accompli or simple in terms of developing it," Dumbrell said.

"But Australia can itself can take a major leading role."

The outlook, then, is guardedly optimistic. And if current expectations are met, CIE sets out a three-phase program to tap this subterranean energy source.

Phase one, CIE says, would see construction of a 40MW demonstration plan followed by the commercial development of the HFR sector with total generation capacity of 420MW by 2016.

The second phase would see industry expansions, including base-load generating capability providing an extra 1320MW by 2012.

Under phase three there another 2760MW of generating capacity would come on stream by 2030.

For such huge outputs transmission lines from the Cooper Basin region would be required thereby linking this new energy to Australia's national grid and thus the national electricity market.

Australia's so-called "dead heart" may yet become one of its greatest energy sources."

[EricNY]

Actually anthracite coal is one of the cleanest burning fuels currently available. It burns hot and blue and has and is almost smokeless. It is so clean you never have to clean your chimney.

There is a large supply and much comes from Northeastern PA.

As a side note......Centralia PA. year 1962 a vein of coal caught fire underground and is STILL burning right now.

[Qikdraw]

As a side note......Centralia PA. year 1962 a vein of coal caught fire underground and is STILL burning right now.

Jeez. Never buy a home in Centralia PA, their fire dept sucks...

Qikdraw

[EricNY]

Jeez. Never buy a home in Centralia PA, their fire dept sucks...

Qikdraw

RIGHT...I guess there is nothing that can be done and it keeps burning until there is nothing left. Centralia is basically a ghost town now, but there still are some residents that call it home.

Additionally, Centralia was the inspiration for the Movie "Silent Hill"

[Qikdraw]

RIGHT...I guess there is nothing that can be done and it keeps burning until there is nothing left. Centralia is basically a ghost town now, but there still are some residents that call it home.

I know. I was making a joke. :p


Additionally, Centralia was the inspiration for the Movie "Silent Hill"

Meh. Twas an ok movie. They gotta stop making movies from video games though. Pretty soon they are gonna make a Q-bert movie...

Qikdraw

[BinCo]

Solar on new homes and buildings. Nuclear otherwise. Thereby we have a local concentrated waste issue, not air that can't be breathed and water that can't be drunk.

I also would like to point out the too many parking lots have lights on all damn night!:mad: This is a waste of electricity and creates light polution. It won't be long before my little home in the country has no view of the stars for all the street lights. Isn't that why we have headlights?:eek:

[luvnaturism]

Actually anthracite coal is one of the cleanest burning fuels currently available. It burns hot and blue and has and is almost smokeless. It is so clean you never have to clean your chimney.

Visible pollution (smoke vs smokeless) and CO2 emissions are two different things. Anthracite produces the MOST CO2 per btu of heat. It may make it more pleasant to live where it's being burned, but it is worse for the global warming problem.

[Naturist Mark]

Actually anthracite coal is one of the cleanest burning fuels currently available. It burns hot and blue and has and is almost smokeless. It is so clean you never have to clean your chimney..

Low sulfur anthracite does burn fairly cleanly - except for mercury emissions, CO2 and the large quantities of ash which must be disposed of - nearly every coal burning power plant is also in the mountain building business. The mercury can be scrubbed out, unfortunately the Bush administration has bent the rules to allow the industry to easily evade that responsibility.

Power plants may be the best place to burn coal if we can develop an effective system of carbon sequestration. Coal gas and 'liquid' coal are not really good environmental strategies, unless the 'gas' produced is hydrogen and the carbon is captured.

But even with advanced anti-pollution devices, carbon capture, and creative ways to reuse fly ash, energy from coal should only be seen as a stop gap bridging technology until we can replace it with renewable and carbon neutral sources.

-Mark

[Naturist Mark]

A repost from a Global Warming Solutions thread over a year ago:

<UL TYPE=SQUARE> <LI>A return to nuclear power.

If I were designing an National Energy Plan, accelerated development of new nuclear power plants would be a key strategy - starting with expanding existing plants (where all the environmental impact studies and community safety plans are already in place) with the best new technologies.

Frankly I don't think nuclear waste is quite the problem it is made out to be.

Yes it takes thousands, even hundreds of thousands of years to decay to safe levels. But it only takes a few years for the MOST dangerous levels to decline.

We have 50 years of experience in storing nuclear waste on site at nuclear power plants, and it has yet to become a problem - the problems we hear about are at very old research reactors and at closed weapon plants.

You really don't want to bury nuclear waste and forget it. You want to safely contain it and guard it so that bad people don't use it for bad purposes. You also want to be able to get at it in a few years because there are a lot of useful isotopes in it that we may want for medicine, scientific instruments and spacecraft.

There are new nuclear power technologies that are inherently much safer than even today's safe plants - such as the pebble bed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_modular_reactor) reactor.

Other measures of such a plan would be<LI> General conservation measures (reduce waste, more insulation, etc.) This has the highest potential for reduction of energy use. <LI>A national net metering (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_metering) law, along with tax credits or even subsidies for small scale renewable energy production. <LI> A requirement that all new internal combustion engine vehicles be flex fuel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flex_Fuel) compatible - so they can run on ethanol and gasoline ethanol blends. In fact, every car sold in the US since 1989 can be easily converted to flex fuel use - Brazil has been doing so for years. <LI>Tax incentives and/or subsidies for electric or plug-in hybrid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-in_hybrid) vehicles. <LI>Rapid industrialization of cellulosic ethanol (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulosic_ethanol) production <LI>Massive research into carbon sequestration (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_sequestration#Artificial_sequestration) and coal gasification in order to create technologies to replace current coal burning plants with power stations that do not increase atmospheric carbon dioxide. <LI>A fully implemented carbon emissions trading (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_trading) system. <LI>Large scale renewable energy production - primarily funded via the carbon trading system. <LI>Continued development of fusion energy production systems. <LI>A massive increase in basic research in new and unusual energy systems - including long shots like cold-fusion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_fusion) , zero point energy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_point_energy) , and sonoluminescence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonoluminescence). <LI>and more recycling. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recycling)

-Mark

[silverhalide1]

Replacing any Fuel with our current fuel will probably not happen.

Example, starting in the year 2010, if the United States plans on replacing coal with nuclear we will need to build %10 more nuclear power plants every year for the next 50 years if we plan on replacing coal

If we ever plan on replacing fossil fuels it'll either take beyond serious market demand , which if preferable, or replacing our congressional/parliament leaders soon.

[silverhalide1]

Once were able to get cars that will get 120 mpg , which shouldnt be that hard but is because of the cost, i dont believe we'll need to replace oil for a while.

Of the 20 million barrels the U.S. uses daily, 8.5 million are domestic. So by getting most vehicles to reach atleast 120 mpg would be cutting our current consumption im guessing by 3-4 fold per non industrial vehicle.


Atop of that ive heard Canada has one of the largest oil reserves on earth. Recently it was discovered how to easily extract oil from the shale. from what ive read oil may go down to $70 a barrel by 2015 because of this.

[KNude]

It's not the effecient use of fossile fuels but the non use of carbon dioxide producing fuels that needs to be developed quickly. The only thing that burns without CO2 is hydrogen. It takes a lot of energy to produce H2 that must come from a non CO2 producing sourse, solar or nuclear. Without considering the CO2 end product we are quickly adding to the green house gases and the troubles they portend.

[silverhalide1]

#1, global warming isint real because it doesnt explain why the ice caps on mars are also melting along with some of the ice planets on saturn

#2 Hydrogen is facing a lot of the same problems that oil faced when it first started. what we would deem alt. energy vehicles were plentiful then, just as they are starting to become plentiful again.

Production of hydrogen now is very costly, just as it was with oil. once science/technology over come it then when an established market exists, im sure the alt. fuel vehicles will cease to exist

[Naturist Mark]

It's not the effecient use of fossile fuels but the non use of carbon dioxide producing fuels that needs to be developed quickly. The only thing that burns without CO2 is hydrogen. It takes a lot of energy to produce H2 that must come from a non CO2 producing sourse, solar or nuclear. Without considering the CO2 end product we are quickly adding to the green house gases and the troubles they portend.

Yes.

Hydrogen can have a larger carbon footprint than petroleum, because Hydrogen must be produced from some other energy source - for instance coal generated electricity. Only if the hydrogen is produced by nuclear, geothermal or a renewable energy source like solar, wind, or biofuels is it carbon neutral.

Biofuels, such a ethanol or firewood do not produce a net increase in atmospheric carbon when burned, even though they do produce CO2. That is because the carbon they release was bound up in the first place from atmospheric CO2 as their plant sources grew - all biofuels are the equivalent of using solar power. It should be noted that inefficient production of some biofuels may use excessive amounts of carbon increasing energy sources like petroleum or coal generated electricity in their production and processing - this is a common criticism of ethanol, but based on obsolete information. Modern ethanol production is far more efficient than the critics claim.

The so called 'hydrogen economy' is a bit of a pipe dream. Hydrogen is an energy storage medium, not an energy source - it in no way offers a way out of the energy and CO2 crisis - we still need to develop non carbon increasing energy sources to produce the hydrogen.

Particularly insidious is the promotion of the 'hydrogen fuel cell car' as the answer to petroleum dependence and the need for clean transportation. I suspect it is little more than a delaying game to prevent adoption of clean technologies that are achievable now - like e -vehicles and plug-in hybrids. There is still no way to store meaningful quantities of hydrogen fuel in passenger cars. But fuel cells can also be designed to run on fossil fuels, or ethanol.

-Mark

[usmc1]

My impression is that virtually all of us in the United States would like to continue on without any change. We don't really care where the energy comes from; fossil fuel, wind, solar, wave-power, hydrogen, ethanol, thermal, nuclear, methane, or fusion in a bottle. Anything, just so we can keep on as we have.

At some point, even the most hard-headed among us will have to realize that we are going to have to undergo some major changes. There is no white knight in shining armor coming to save us. No technological break through that will be revealed in the final reel. There is really nothing on the immediate horizon, other than more of the same, except more intensely so.

We are going to have to change the way we live, whether we want to or not. As a part of this, the gaps between the haves and the have-nots is going to widen.

We are right now in the Arab curse of "living during interesting times", we are fast approaching very damned interesting times.

[nakedjohn]

Energy from wind, it is everywhere on earth and it is free. Here in Belgium, we have already different mill parks.

[KirkOntario]

Energy from wind, it is everywhere on earth and it is free. Here in Belgium, we have already different mill parks.

But don't put any windfarms near where Teddy Kennedy sails. He'll kill the project. Liberals want everyone else to pay for change. They want their own perks and privileges to remain intact. Al Gore when are you going to sell that big energy guzzling house?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1890797/posts


"Proposed the month before Sept. 11, 2001, Cape Wind remains in limbo. It's been frustrated at every turn by a handful of yachtsmen, Kennedy included, who don't want to see windmills from their verandas. Many millions have been spent spreading disinformation and smearing the wind farm's supporters.

The towers would be at least five miles out and barely visible from shore on the clearest day, but the summer plutocrats resent any intrusion on their waterfront vistas -- and, equally, any challenge to the notion that they control everything.

"But don't you realize -- that's where I sail!" may stand as Kennedy's most self-incriminating quote."

[EricNY]

Liberals want everyone else to pay for change.

Why is it that everything is related to politics? Why do people stereotype people. People are people and there is good and bad everywhere, but that has nothing to do with affiliation with a political party.

[KirkOntario]

Sadly these projects get wound up in politics because they require government approvals and sometimes government gets involved in these alternative energy programs (they shouldn't) and turns into a matter of political pork or NIMBY vote buying.

[nacktman]

Why is it that everything is related to politics?

Damned good question!:lightingzapA:

This discussion has been about types of alternative energy and nothing about any type of politics with posts from members across the political spectrum who recognize the non-political discussion and have remained on topic.

That is until one of the thread perverters slimed in with their first off topic post at 9:08AM this morning.
This pattern is really getting annoying!:mad:

*****

The topic is Alternative Energy and what types would be the best to use in lieu of fossil fuels.

Thank all of you who have maintained the discussion on topic with various types of energy put forth and the willingness (or lack thereof) to use them and the ways to implement their use.

[Boreas]

The NIMBY crowd comes in all stripes.

There is a plan to put a wind farm near here. It is a sensible spot on one hand. On the other hand, there have been some good points made about the effect this would have on a local caribou herd. They will need to assess that an make sure it won't adversely harm then.

At the same time, there is a plan to put a third large dam in this area. The second one did create huge consequences and of course does provide a lot of electricity to the province and the US. So, the powers that be see the need for the third dam......most of that electricity will get sold to the US. Profit over sense reigns again. All the province/hydro company needs to do is tweak its exsisting dams to get the same amount of additional power. It does not need to build a new dam.

[Qikdraw]

The NIMBY crowd comes in all stripes.

There is a plan to put a wind farm near here. It is a sensible spot on one hand. On the other hand, there have been some good points made about the effect this would have on a local caribou herd. They will need to assess that an make sure it won't adversely harm then.

At the same time, there is a plan to put a third large dam in this area. The second one did create huge consequences and of course does provide a lot of electricity to the province and the US. So, the powers that be see the need for the third dam......most of that electricity will get sold to the US. Profit over sense reigns again. All the province/hydro company needs to do is tweak its exsisting dams to get the same amount of additional power. It does not need to build a new dam.

Yeah I am not for that. If Canada doesn't need the electricity, then there is no need to build it. I heard that the US is trying to go after Canada's fresh water as well. I am completely against that too.

Qikdraw

[silverhalide1]

Theres already been reports of that happening. Such as polluting and over consuming the water in the Great Lakes

[usmc1]

Why is it that everything is related to politics? Why do people stereotype people. People are people and there is good and bad everywhere, but that has nothing to do with affiliation with a political party.

Because it is through politics that policy is formed, law are written, and spending is determined. And, we are all affected in many ways, some large, some small by those policies. When the politicians of a party or ideology make bad policy, the people who put and keep them in office are culpable for the bad effects of those politicians and their policies.

Of course, people are people and some are good and some are bad. I have no doubt that many conservatives are kind to their aged mothers, try to be good parents, and don't kick their dogs. But, when the people they elect and support enact policies, pass laws and spend in way that is detrimental to We The People they lose that good person protection. Good people do not support torture, invade other nations and occupy them, or attempt the systematic dismantlement of social security and Medicare.
Those are not the policies of good people, regardless how many strays they might rescue.

No liberals are not without fault. I've named them here several times. But, the faults of liberals are generally tied to trying to do something right for people.

[nunne]

Naturist Mark, in his post of 3-15-08, outlining his proposal for an energy policy, has hit a number of extremely relevant points. However, the major emphasis upon nuclear energy is not well advised. While it certainly is pollution-free, it has far too many drawbacks in this country to be a relevant alternative to fossil fuels.

Unlike France, where nuclear is a major factor in the production of elelctricity, when we(the USA) began developing nuclear power, we designed every plant to be completely different from all others. Thus, not one of our 105 nuclear plants can share parts or labor seamlessly with any of the others. This has added huge costs to both the construction and the operations and maintenance of nuclear plants. In other words, the industry has priced itself out of existence. This is the reason no plants have been built in this country since the 1970's.

Unfortunately, this country has also lost all its engineering and skilled labor resources which are necessary for the building of new plants. And the cost of new construction for a new plant is still skyrocketing. Estimates are that a new plant will run around $5000 per mW to contruct (compared with about $3500 for new coal and $2100 for wind).

There are no silver bullets to the problems of carbon pollution, but many of the items Naturist Mark listed are real steps toward an ultimate solution.