fordmantpw Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 It's definitely not water vapor when combustion occurs...not at that pressure and temperature.. Water is everywhere and Humidity is much easier for the earth to control than added CO2. When the air gets too much water it rains...but then I guess clouds can be dangerous at times... Well, there is a lot of drought down south, so the rain would be good. We can solve the drought issues by burning more natural gas. We're geniuses! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theoldwizard Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 Unquestionably, NG is our best alternative fuel for the next 10-20 years. It is plentiful, has good cost/BTU and it is "made in the USA" ! Ethanol and biodiesel are just not cost effective in large volume (They may have their niches, especially if you can get large quantities of used cooking oil for free ! ) LNG is extremely expensive to install and still requires some diesel to light the NG. The "over the road" trucks using it actually have longer chassis to accommodate the large tank. If the price of NG stays stable and diesel continues to increase, it might catch on. Several companies have committed to providing LNG fueling along the major East-West Interstates. CNG Is a good alternative, but not for all vehicles. The conversion is expensive (> $10k) although if the volume was much higher, that would decrease. Range and storage energy density (how much fuel can you cram into a tank) are the next "challenge". CNG is not a good small vehicle fuel, unless the owner can refuel his vehicle every day (i.e. home fueling) so that a short range (smaller, cheaper tanks) is not an issue. The sweet spot for CNG could be medium duty trucks (Class 6 and 7) and delivery vehicle (think Transit and Transit Connect). Many (most ?) of these vehicles are fleet owned and return to "the yard" every evening and can then be refueled. Yes, CNG has less power than diesel or gasoline. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 When the air gets too much water it rains Not exactly.... 100% humidity just means 100% humidity, the air cannot hold any more water vapor. I don't trust any scientist that says he can model what would happen if we quadrupled water vapor exhaust while reducing CO2 exhaust by 90% or so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edstock Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 Ethanol and biodiesel are just not cost effective in large volume — with current technology. If you have been following the science sites, you may be aware that this will not be the case in another 10 years, probably sooner. DNA research has been most encouraging. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpd80 Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 Not exactly.... 100% humidity just means 100% humidity, the air cannot hold any more water vapor. I don't trust any scientist that says he can model what would happen if we quadrupled water vapor exhaust while reducing CO2 exhaust by 90% or so. I have serious doubts about all weather models, there are so many variables that act together that really, i think a smart person could make the science say anything they wanted... And really reducing carbon from coal fired plants is way more important than zoning in on carbon produced from transport. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blacksheep Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 (edited) Not exactly.... 100% humidity just means 100% humidity, the air cannot hold any more water vapor. I don't trust any scientist that says he can model what would happen if we quadrupled water vapor exhaust while reducing CO2 exhaust by 90% or so. I would be more inclined to believe their global warming models if someone could consistantly and accurately tell me what the weather is going to be 5 days from now... Edited February 13, 2012 by Blacksheep Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theoldwizard Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 — with current technology. If you have been following the science sites, you may be aware that this will not be the case in another 10 years, probably sooner. DNA research has been most encouraging. I will grant you that ! But NG is likely the best solution today, especially if you factor in that there are huge quantities available in the US and Canada so we aren't dependent on "energy" from countries that are less than our best friend. NG is probably not the best long tern (25+ years) solution either. I don't know what is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edstock Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 Yes indeed. LNG/Propane is ideal. In Southern Ontario, it's quite common at gas stations. However, DARPA and others are making surprising progress, so another 10 years may have commercial-size efforts. At $5 a gallon, bio-fuels become easily doable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark B. Morrow Posted February 14, 2012 Share Posted February 14, 2012 Yeah, but just think of all the stuff you can do on a smart phone. I just a commercial for a new Sears Craftsman garage door opener that uses a smartphone app instead of(or maybe in addition to) a traditional remote. So if your kid is locked out, or if you're not sure you closed it... Verizon is advertising a whole house system for lights and door locks with video that operates from your phone. I'm not sure I want HAL in charge of my house. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twintornados Posted February 14, 2012 Share Posted February 14, 2012 The first cell phone I ever used could go days without needing a charge...I can barely make it through a work day with my iPhone 4S LOL :P But then again, you never played "Angry Birds" for hours on your first cell phone either.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted February 14, 2012 Share Posted February 14, 2012 Verizon is advertising a whole house system for lights and door locks with video that operates from your phone. I'm not sure I want HAL in charge of my house. Yeah, especially since they advertise those Droid phones with a bright red dot in the middle of the screen while talking up how powerful they are. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twintornados Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 Yeah, especially since they advertise those Droid phones with a bright red dot in the middle of the screen while talking up how powerful they are. "Open the garage bay door, Hal......" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 "Open the garage bay door, Hal......" I'm afraid I can't do that, Dave. I know you're planning to replace me with an Overhead Door Company unit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theoldwizard Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 Ethanol and biodiesel are just not cost effective in large volume — with current technology. If you have been following the science sites, you may be aware that this will not be the case in another 10 years, probably sooner. DNA research has been most encouraging. Research is one thing. The government collecting penalties for an unobtainable goal is another ! Ethanol mandate fails economically and environmentally Corn ethanol, produced in any quantity to make a difference in oil imports, will take massive amounts of land, destroy habitat and forests, and threaten our food supply. It takes 1,700 gallons of water to produce one gallon of ethanol according to a Wall Street Journal report of a Cornell study. Cellulosic ethanol has been touted as an alternative to corn- or sugar cane based ethanol production. But that too seem economically non-viable. Recently we learned that a cellulosic ethanol plant in Georgia has failed. The project raised $320 million, largely in the form of federal, state, and local subsidies, but the plant never produced a drop of ethanol. Nor did the factory ever hire the 50 to 70 permanent employees its promoters had promised. This shows, again, that the government is incompetent at picking economic winners. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lfeg Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 For liquid transportation fuels, it is easier to convert natural gas to liquid fuels (not LNG, but other hydrocarbons) than it is to convert corn or cellulose to ethanol. And I still have problems with converting food to fuel In the ethanol from cellulose realm, out in my area there was a big effort by a company to get landowners and farmers to sign on to raising a crop (right now, the name escapes me) that they would use as feedstock in a cellulostic ethanol plant. When those who were interested looked into it deeper, the prices offered for the harvested crop could not cover the cost of planting, cultivation, fertilizer, herbacides, amortized harverting equipment and the labor to operate it. And this was with a heavy federal subsidy to the plant, and price supports for the ethanol. We will see more ethanol plants being mothballed since the ethanol blenders credit went away on 01 Jan. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edstock Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 We will see more ethanol plants being mothballed since the ethanol blenders credit went away on 01 Jan. Precisely. The technology is not here — yet. IMHO, it will be, sooner than you may think, almost certainly by the end of this decade as prices rise. For example, 2 months ago, DARPA announced an unusually efficient microbe had been engineered, and was investigating how to scale the process up. The point is, there are many bio-fuel projects happening at present, with more in the future. One or more of them will probably be successful. Of course rising oil prices helps this happen. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twintornados Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 Precisely. The technology is not here — yet. IMHO, it will be, sooner than you may think, almost certainly by the end of this decade as prices rise. For example, 2 months ago, DARPA announced an unusually efficient microbe had been engineered, and was investigating how to scale the process up. The point is, there are many bio-fuel projects happening at present, with more in the future. One or more of them will probably be successful. Of course rising oil prices helps this happen. Lets hope they don't begin calling it "Soylent Green".... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 We will see more ethanol plants being mothballed since the ethanol blenders credit went away on 01 Jan. Production consolidation always happens as industries mature. And the blender credit is unlikely to reduce demand for ethanol. As long as the EPA requires oxygenated fuel and refuses to indemnify against MTBE groundwater pollution, there will be steady demand for ethanol as a percentage of overall fuel demand. In fact, it arguably provides an advantage to biofuel ethanol, as the blender credit was source neutral, while many states continue to subsidize biofuel ethanol. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBirdStangSkyliner Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 DARPA seems to me to be somewhat of the bureaucratic equivalent of Don Quixote. I have been so interested in some of their projects and contractors who have responded for the Requests for Proposals (RFP's). Several have seemed so good and years go by without production-level breakthroughs. OPOC is one which comes to mind. Maybe with NASA's budget seeing so many cuts DARPA is now the leading edge for technological breakthroughs from the Federal Government, but the output seems to so often fall short of the hype. Getting back to the subject....Natural gas does seem to be the best alternative to the crude oil option for the next century. The technology is already available to use this fuel for transportation and electrical generation needs. Estimates from MIT and the federal government are that there is a 100 year domestic supply for both of these uses in just the Marcellus shales geo-region. Fracking with current methods is controversial as far as ground-water pollution. I make a living performing environmental analyses and I can't honestly figure out the truth of this issue. This is after reading a lot of popular-media and scientific journal articles. Even if the current methods do pollute ground-water, I believe that the process lends itself to much safer alternatives. There are many ways to induce concenetrated, underground pressure. The greenhouse gas emission of natural gas use is about half of crude oil based fuels. This seems to be a win-win for CO2, energy stability, foreign policy, available technology and any other related issues. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 The internet started off as ARPANET. (D)ARPA also developed the first GPS network (but not the one we're using today). Their projects seem Quixotic because, by definition, they invest in things that have minimal chance of success and long-term time frames. http://reason.com/blog/2008/05/16/50-years-of-darpa-gps-telepath Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lfeg Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Precisely. The technology is not here — yet. IMHO, it will be, sooner than you may think, almost certainly by the end of this decade as prices rise. For example, 2 months ago, DARPA announced an unusually efficient microbe had been engineered, and was investigating how to scale the process up. The point is, there are many bio-fuel projects happening at present, with more in the future. One or more of them will probably be successful. Of course rising oil prices helps this happen. I still have reservations about that. I was involved in a like effort back in the 70s. Oil shale was supposed to be the next big energy source. I was deep in the design of the facilities for processing the oil shale. There were constant projections on at what price level petroleum would have to get to in order for the oil shale industry to get off the ground. Pilot plants were built, new and more efficient processes were developed and designed based on pilot plant operations. The technology was advancing very fast, and we were constantly making the proces more efficient. Oil went above $15, and the threshhold was put at $20. Oil want above $25, and the threshold was put at $28. We pulled the plug on all development in the early 80s as the threshold always seemed to be $3 to $5 above the current price of oil, no matter what it was. I see the same for cellulostic ethanol. It is an interesting technology, but when you look into all the aspects of production (harvesting the feedstock and logistic issues of efficiently getting it from the field to the facility is just one sticking point) I see many parallels to my previous experience. But still, we should continue development, just in case. (and I know where the plans are for a complete modular oil shale processing facility just in case that ever becomes viable.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theoldwizard Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 ... Fracking with current methods is controversial as far as ground-water pollution. I make a living performing environmental analyses and I can't honestly figure out the truth of this issue. This is after reading a lot of popular-media and scientific journal articles. Even if the current methods do pollute ground-water, I believe that the process lends itself to much safer alternatives. There are many ways to induce concenetrated, underground pressure. The greenhouse gas emission of natural gas use is about half of crude oil based fuels. This seems to be a win-win for CO2, energy stability, foreign policy, available technology and any other related issues. Thank you for an honest summary from someone who is close to the situation ! Fracking will continue. Hopefully improvement of fracking techniques will continue and stay ahead of any government mandates ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
92merc Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I think what will pan out is that fracking is safe, and it isn't. It'll all depend on the depths you are talking. Here in ND, fracking is huge. Our oil boom wouldn't be happening without it. But all of our fracking is well into the 10,000 ft depth or lower. There are many "hard" layers between the Bakken shale and the water tables. So the drinking water is safe, as long as the oil pipe isn't leaking. Funny part is that after fracking, a lot of water is coming out. And it isn't just from the fracking injection. Some wells have been releasing considerable amounts of salt water along with the oil. Water is becoming hard to find and expensive to truck in for fracking. So some oil companies are starting to work on ways to recycle that water and re-use it. From what testing has gone on, they can get 60-70% of the water back. If they can clean it well enough to be re-used, that's what they'll do. Just pipe it over to the next well site. The Bakken shale, and the Three Forks shale formations in ND are producing top quality oil, and natural gas. IIRC, three new natural gas processing plants have come online this year. And another 3 or 4 additional are being planned. ND is going to become a natural gas power house shortly. Along with our oil, plus wind power, ND will shortly be the countries number one "energy" state. Oh, and on the CO2 front, we already have the ND Coal Gasification plant. This is a plant that is making natural gas out of our ND lignite. One of the byproducts is CO2. Right now, they pipe a lot of it to the Canadians. I'm not sure what they're using it for. But some companies have started working with the gas plant, and will be trying CO2 injection for fracking, trying to see if this will crack the Bakken shale. If it does work, it'll be used both for fracking, and "disposal" of excess CO2. Shoot, if our coal electric plants can figure out how to extract the CO2 from the stacks, they can ship it out for injection. That'll help CO2 levels coming from our state. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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