No Coal, No Nukes, No Problem?
Coal remains the largest source of U.S. power generation by a wide margin. Approximately 45 percent of the nation's electricity was fueled by coal last year, and while that is down from 51 percent in 2001, net generation from coal is still almost twice as much as from any other source. At the current rate of consumption, each percentage point of coal that is reduced from the fuel mix equates to more than 40 million megawatt hours of generation that has to come from another source. Given the general trend higher in U.S. demand for electricity -- retail sales were up more than 10 percent from 2001 to 2010 -- the impact of reduced coal-fired generation on other fuel sources is likely to be magnified even further in the coming years.
In the quest to reduce CO2 emissions, a potential rebirth in nuclear generation had until recently been gaining momentum. During his January 25, 2011 State of the Union address, President Barack Obama included nuclear among the non-renewable but low-carbon energy sources that would allow for compliance with a proposed federal clean energy standard by 2035. However, following the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan in March, much of the social goodwill and acceptance of nuclear power that developed in the U.S. over the last 10 years was lost. The central Virginia earthquake in August further highlighted the issue of U.S. nuclear safety, as tremors forced the temporarily shutdown of reactors at the North Anna power station. Instead of growing nuclear generation from its current 20 percent of the grid, it is more likely now that the retirement of a portion of the existing nuclear fleet will be escalated.
If reliance on coal and nuclear generation is to be reduced, the most realistic replacement option is natural gas. It has a proven track record for growth and market dynamics are currently very attractive, in that prices are relatively inexpensive and supplies are plentiful. Both of those factors are owed largely to a renaissance in domestic natural gas production in recent years. Improved technology that allows for the extraction of gas from shale formations has been a game changer for the U.S. natural gas market, leading to successive annual records for domestic production in 2008, 2009, and 2010. In the wake of this supply-advantaged environment, natural gas prices in recent years have declined considerably from the levels of 2004 through 2008. Still, those looking for an alternative to coal and nuclear should be careful in labeling gas a panacea for the country's generation needs.
Against the backdrop of record production and a sub-$4.00 market, it is easy to forget that natural gas has historically been among the most volatile commodity prices. Just three years ago, prompt-month gas futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange traded to almost $14 per MMBtu. Not too long before that, conventional wisdom ahead of the shale boom was that natural gas supplies were drying up. If a measurable portion of the combined 65 percent contribution that coal and nuclear make to the generation mix is shifted to natural gas, it is not that difficult to imagine a return to higher pricing, in conjunction with a potential supply squeeze.
Consideration should also be given to the increased scrutiny of the use of hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") in natural gas production. Concerns over the safety of fracking operations and the environmental impact of the practice could lead to further regulation of the drilling industry. A change to production economics and/or restrictions on the use of hydraulic fracturing in the future would impact the availability of natural gas supply to the U.S. market, limiting the potential of gas as a replacement generation source for electricity.
Reduced dependence on coal and nuclear facilities in the U.S. is likely to remain a topic of political and social conversation in the foreseeable future. In considering alternative sources for power generation -- renewable or otherwise -- potential cost and reliability concerns should be explored as well, and should be just as hotly debated.
Comments
You raised some good points, especially by mentioning natural gas.
With regard to burning natural gas, it can also be burned more efficiently in heaters and stoves inside homes and buildings than in power stations. Natural gas is certainly very compatible with grid-scale compressed air energy storage technology, which would be one of the more productive ways to generate electric power using natural gas.
Natural-gas fuelled Solid Oxide Fuel Cells inside private buildings may be another efficient and productive means by which to generate electric power, produce heat (or heat-driven absorption cooling) at competitive cost.
Renewable energy technologies such as wind and solar have a long way to go in terms of lowering the cost/kW to competitive levels that allow for subsidy-free installation of such technologies.
Actually, no. CCGT is about 60% efficient. Modern heat pumps have a COP of 3+
Burn 1 kW of gas in a CCGT and about 500W gets to a home and generates about 1.5 kW. Burn 1 kW of gas at home and about 80% appears as heat.
http://www.prosefights.org/nmgco/nmgco.htm#homan2
Hello Ms Homan,
PNM October 2011 electric bill contains ...
Line 'Add new natural gas-fired generation in 2015' prompts me to ask why you have not acknowledged receipt of my Monday October 10, 2011 08:58 email.
...
suggests that adding new customers may increase natural gas consumption too?
PNM load forecaster Steve Martin identified 'Growing number of customers - Increased construction as the primary cause of Peak Demand for electricity
This topic should be on the agenda for the 2011 Integrated Resources Planning report if it is to be competent.
Failure to include relevant data on which to base the natural gas integrated resource planning report conclusions might mean that the 2012 natural gas irp report could be headed the way of the unfortunate 2008 official PNM electric irp report?
SWEEP pie chart identifies where natural gas was used in 2007, Chart needs to be updated and forecasts added for inclusion in the irp report, imo.
Please ack if you receive this mail and received my Monday October 10, 2011 08:58 email.
Regards,
william h payne
Science provides the solution through the relationship between mass and energy. Mass or matter may be converted to energy and energy may be converted to mass. The relationship between mass and energy was set forth by Albert Einstein as E=MC² in the Special Theory of Relativity. This means that energy (E) is equal to mass (M) times the velocity of light (C) squared. Since the velocity of light is 299,792,458 meters per second, C² becomes 8.98 X 1016 which is a very big number. A scientific and technological process known as Pulsed Jet Magneto Inertial Fusion, or PJMIF can be developed within the decade to convert a very small amount of matter, say two ½ grams of special forms of Hydrogen, into over 94,300 Kilowatt hours of electricity or the equivalent energy of 5,825 gallons of fuel oil. Synthetic liquid and gaseous fuels can be produced by fusion for the aviation business and the like.
A similar process to do this is well known and has been successfully implemented in weapons development. It is known as thermonuclear nuclear fusion. Although it is an atomic process, it has none of the major drawbacks of the current fission based nuclear power generating reactors.
The United States Government along with other scientifically advanced countries have known for over 40 years that fusion is the only realistic long term solution to the world’s energy requirements. The United States has invested over $10 billion dollars in fusion high energy plasma physics research. However, the United States government has not managed a focused fusion power plant development program for a number of reasons.
I propose that private enterprise develop this state-of-the-art fusion reactor technology utilizing the most advanced fusion techniques of Plasma Jet Magneto Inertial Fusion or PJMIF. It is projected that a commercial PJMIF power reactor will be less costly than the cost of a comparably sized nuclear fission based power reactor. The cost of its fuel is so low it is hard to quantify.
I challenge private industry to build a demonstration of PJMIF producing the world’s first net positive gain fusion reaction within this decade and a demonstrable commercial power plant five years thereafter.
The fuel cycle will be derived from sea water and small amounts of a common element called Lithium to produce all the energy the world will need in future millennia to support agriculture, potable water, transportation, commercial industry, and residential needs. There is enough of these “raw energy materials” on our planet to last for eternity.
Although some will point to the ITER project in the South of France as the vehicle to bring us fusion energy, the United States is only a 9% partner in ITER. ITER’s first Deuterium-Tritium “burn” in ITER is not scheduled for 2028. Furthermore ITER is not a demo reactor project. ITER is a high energy plasma physics projects which will provide engineering and scientific data to help build the first DEMO reactor which will take another 20 years. We do not have that much time. We must get the job done in the United States and we must begin now.
Tom D. Tamarkin, President & CEO USCL-EnergyCite, tomer@usclcorp.com
However a gas engine driven heat pump (GEDHP) would provide better performance for heating as a house hold unit. 33% engine efficiency and COP of 3 would give a 100% return on heat in to heat out and still allow recovery of 80% low grade heat from the exhaust gas for a COP of 1.8 on natural gas compared to 1.5 in the example above. I do not have a clue as to the availability or price of a GEDHP unit but it would be hard to beat for heating, for cooling the grid would still be more efficient
Huh only solution? Let’s see what ever happened to the old orbital solar platform that would recover energy from the only operating known operating fusion reactor in our solar system? Is that now a technical impossibility? Fusion remains pie in the sky sure we can blow up cities with fusion reactions initiated by a fission reaction but otherwise it has little value and billions spent. One of the big problems is its big advantage small nuclear fuel input whether it is deuterium or tritium just a drop too much and kabomb there is crater where the plant once was. I am missing how that is safer or as safe as current fission plants. Some of the newer technology like the thorium breeders would by my very limited understanding have much less potential of a serious excursion and have fuel supplies measured in thousands of years.
I agree renewables are limited as is Nat Gas, oil and coal supplies. We will eventually burn through our reserves of fossil fuels the question is in how long. To bet the farm on a technology break through seems risky. We know fusion is possible but whether it will ever be practical remains an unknown and is a huge risk to swallow blindly so a bunch of PHD’s can spend blindly on their pet projects at the expense of the populous.
I am thinking there may possibly be another solution or two out there.
I was once a energy trader, there is a fix for gas volatility. Utilities can hedge with long term gas contracts while gas is cheap and the strip is in the dirt. Of course that means paying more now. But it will not happen, the US has a pattern. Utilities hedge with pricey gas during a run up out of fear. Then they get spanked by falling prices, then swear to never hedge again. A few years from now in the next run up they will get scared and finally hedge again. They could get lucky and eventually be right but it appears they normally remain 180 degrees out buying the highs. What sellers there are during a run up will normally be demanding a premium price that the sellers are confident is to there benefit.
Listen to Dr Leo Mascheroni's opinion on this.
http://www.prosefights.org/nmlegal/theinvestigation/mascheroni.mp3
No one seems to mention that every time we build a new gas fired plant we increase CO2 emissions. It ain’t the percentages; it’s the pounds of carbon in the fuel. (In the US we have high cancer death rates because we don’t have high malaria death rates.)
Today, billions of people have little or no electric service. Unless they are sitting on natural gas they are not going to get their electricity from gas. On the other hand if they are sitting on coal they will get their electricity from coal – or is there an energy god that tells them they must not do that on pain of eternal damnation? To make the situation even worse it is where there is little electricity that the population is growing, where there is malnutrition/starvation/egregious health problems, and frequently rampant crime – and besides they don’t have money else they would have had electric serve long ago.
It is fatuous to expect to solve any of our problems outside of the population dilemma. Only forty years ago there were only half as many of us - twice the resources (including water) per capita, no critical CO2 problem. Then might have been out last chance.
Here are the Statistics:
Coal Statistics
Coal provides 29.6% of global primary energy needs and generates 42% of the world's electricity
Total Global Coal Production (including hard coal and lignite)
• 7229Mt (2010e)
• 6823Mt (2009)
• 4677 (1990)
Total Global Hard Coal Production
• 6185Mt (2010e): 891Mt coking coal, 5294Mt steam coal
• 5789Mt (2009): 782Mt coking coal, 5007Mt steam coal
• 3493Mt (1990): 598Mt coking coal, 2894Mt steam coal
Top Ten Hard Coal Producers (2010e)
PR China 3162Mt Russia 248Mt
USA 932Mt Indonesia 173Mt
India 538Mt Kazakhstan 105Mt
Australia 353Mt Poland 77Mt
South Africa 255Mt Colombia 74Mt
In 2010, world hard coal production increased by 6.8%, compared to 1.8% in 2009. It continued to be driven by growth in production from the non-OECD countries with 8.4%
Total Global Brown Coal/Lignite Production
• 1042Mt (2010e)
• 1033Mt (2009)
• 1184Mt (1990)
Top Ten Brown Coal Producers (2010e)
Germany 169Mt USA 65Mt
Indonesia 163Mt Greece 56Mt
Russia 76Mt Poland 56Mt
Turkey 69Mt Czech Republic 44Mt
Australia 67Mt Serbia 37Mt
Brown coal production in the OECD countries continued to decline while non-OECD brown coal production rose to a record level, led by Indonesia which accounted for over 75% of global incremental growth.
Top Ten Coal Consumers (2010e)
PR China 2516Mtce South Africa 141Mtce
USA 733Mtce Germany 105Mtce
India 434Mtce Korea 103Mtce
Russia 177Mtce Poland 87Mtce
Japan 165Mtce Chinese Taipei 60Mtce
Reserves
At current production levels, proven coal reserves are estimated to last 118 years, with recoverable reserves in around 70 countries. In contrast, proven oil and gas reserves are equivalent to around 46 and 59 years at current production levels respectively and over 62% of oil and 64% of gas reserves are concentrated in the Middle East and Russia.
Coal in Electricity Generation
Coal is the major fuel used for generating electricity worldwide - countries heavily dependent on coal for electricity include (2008, 2009):
South Africa 93% Kazakhstan 70% Morocco 55%
Poland 90% India 69% Greece 55%
PR China 79% Israel 63% USA 45%
Australia 76% Czech Rep 56% Germany 44%
(Source: World Coal Association)
At best Renewables can play a supplement to Conventional Sources like Coal,gas and petroleum but cannot replace the latter.
Dr.A.Jagadeesh Nellore(AP),India
Wind Energy Expert
E-mail: anumakonda.jagadeesh@gmail.com
Bryan, Not sure what crappy furnace you have that operates at only 80%. The condensing gas furnace I have at my place operates at 96% efficiency which is a lot better than CCGT. Also while you are correct that heat pumps can deliver positive returns the ground type require large land areas or numerous vertical holes drilled into the earth to extract the heat. Not suitable for most urban dwellings but OK for rural areas. Unfortunately most people live in the urban areas.
Don, You make a lot of sense in this post. As has been widely reported we now number 7 billion people and we are fast developing the technology to live much longer. We cannot even agree on how to bail out Greece from a few financial problems let alone solve the big one - how to feed and clothe all those people. Mind boggling stupidity isn't it.
Malcolm
So to paraphrase Mark Twain the reports about the death of nuclear are greatly exagerrated.
Malcolm
http://www.mathisconsulting.com/white-papers-archive/2010/8/17/the-power-of-energy-efficiency-treatise-1-plug-the-holes-in.html
We can make biomethane, cheaply and easily from any type of biomass at all. Including sewage and landfills---it is being done now.
We can generate thermal and electrical power directly from catalytic converters using methane at over twice the efficiency of the most advanced coal powered plants. And, unlike coal electrical plants, this can be done with almost no transmission losses----making CHP(combined heat and power) practical, thereby improving effiiency greatly. The city of Lunen, Germany produces all of their electrical and thermal power needs with biomethane produced from sewage collected from livestock farms in the vicinity. They use a zone distributed diesel engine electrical generation system that also uses the waste heat for heating and cooling. This gives CHP efficiency of over 90%.
Solar thermal heat is low tech, easy to manufacture, install, maintain and use. It is 100% efficient, and low cost and easy to store. Your furnace or water heater works just as it always has, coming on and going off in response to thermostat settings----the difference is, they will come on far less often, and run far less time when they do. Solar thermal heat can also provide cooling.
Providing an equal amount of energy from methane as compared with coal only produces 44% of the CO2 that coal does. Switching to methane from coal would reduce CO2 production 56% to produce the same amount of energy-----even before any reductions in efficiency. Producing power with methane compared to petroleum produces only 65% of the CO2 to produce the same amount of energy. If all of our vehicles were running on methane, the effect on CO2 production would be the same as taking one out of every three vehicles off the road. This isn't even mentioning that methane is far cleaner to use than both coal and petroleum. The air would be a lot cleaner. And the comparative octane rating of methane is 120, it can be used in high compression, high efficiency engines(diesel or otto cycle) that could easily double the thermal efficiency of present engines.
Browns Ferry and Watts Bar 1 are fully functional plants and Watts Bar 2 is in progress.
Other than that I cant say I agree with much you say. Air source heat pumps easily beat direct gas burning in the lower half of the US, as one moves northward the benefit decreases. Even a 100% efficient furnace will produce less heat per therm of gas burned compared to converting it to Electricity in a combine cycle plant and using a electric heat pump in the south. That has nothing to do with which is cheaper.
As for fusion, I am not a physicist or an engineer but I have seen the hype about how safe fusion power will be. Sounds a lot like the previous hype about how safe fission plants were before three mile island. I doubt either of us live long enough for it to be proven. But even with my limited understanding I am pretty sure the largest human made release of energy and associated explosion in the history of our species has been hydrogen bomb tests using this benign non chain reaction fusion process. I guess someone needs to call the H bomb testers and tell them it did not happen since it is impossible.
These are test stand efficiencies and are obtained on a dynamometer while running at wide open throttle and variable load to cover a wide range of rpm. The maximum thermal efficiency would obtain at only one or a small range of rpm and load. If the engine were used to turn a generator this would be the important rpm and load. But the normal case is where the engine is driving a vehicle over a large range of loads and rpm and one would never know what efficiency was being attained. Idling they all have the same efficiency: zero.
Wartsila(Finland) builds the largest diesel in the world----and also the most efficient.
------"The RTA96C-14 can achieve a maximum power output of 108,920 hp at 102 rpm and astonishingly, at maximum economy the engine exceeds 50% thermal efficiency. That means, more than 50% of the energy in the fuel is converted to motion. Its Brake Specific Fuel Consumption (BSFC) at maximum power is 0.278 lbs/hp/hr."-------
http://www.gizmag.com/go/3263/
Indy race cars running ethanol also exceed 50% efficiency. Although they are highly blueprinted engines---not straight production models. Indy cars run 16:1 compression ratio with turbo boost---giving a total compression of 20-24:1----although boost is limited to give a safety margin of 18-20:1 total compression I think.
The comparative octane rating of 120 for methane would allow methane use in either engine.
Don-----" We have the efficiencies we have today because the engine designers couldn’t raise compression ratios until tetraethyl lead and improved refinery processes were invented."-----------
Don, you are right----you can't achieve the efficiency numbers discussed here with gasoline engines-----not anywhere even near it. Gasoline does not have anywhere near enough octane to resist the preignition the necessary compression ratios require. Ethanol and methane do however.
Even Sunoco racing gasoline---with an octane rating of 110 only barely makes the grade. However, at $18 to $22/gal, I doubt if it will ever be much of a popular item for a shopping trip to WalMart.
My Tomarkin, WE do not need your solution for the world energy troubles. Yours and a few others. The Gen 3 fission reactors they will construct in France will do the job after they are broken in. Malcolm, makes me wonder why we waste our breath, now that Madison Avenue has slipped into the discussion, but don't worry, things will go our way. Angela Merkel is selling out her country for another term in office, but after that term it is not certain that she will be invited to take the place of Marlene Dietrich and Romy Schneider in Hollywood.
Yes, eventually there will be a problem with motor fuels, but i dont want to think about that until someone pays me to do so, and then I would ask for so much money that they would lose their interest.
I am looking at actual test results for an 80 HP 1930’s automobile engine. As tested with an r of 6.7 max e was 23%. It had a carburetor, primitive distributor advance and retard, no electronics, mousey valves and manifolds. High e was not an important consideration in the design. If we only adjust the r to 10:1 (mill the head) even this engine would have an e of 26.
I did not tackle running a diesel engine on methane as I had never heard of such a thing up ‘til now so had nothing to offer. I suppose they would dissolve methane in the oil?
An engine with a high max e does not mean low fuel consumption. That old diesel semi you encounter is almost surely realizing better e than your super duper high HP car. High e on the test stand has little to do with fuel economy. A car with a 450 HP high e engine on the highway getting 25 mpg at 75mph is only using about 45 HP, 1/10th of its rating and will be getting less than its high test stand e. Replace the engine with a 150 HP lower e engine and likely get > 30 mpg, and the smaller engine would be only 30% loaded and run forever..
Suzanne Hammelman asked that I respond to your question.
Natural gas prices will increase because coal-powered generation plants would be retired prematurely and companies would move to natural gas (so demand would increase). The four regulations that we refer to -- and that are used in the attached analysis by National Economic Research Associates (NERA) -- are predicted to increase natural gas-fired generation by 19.7 percent on average over the period of 2012 to 2020. The increases in natural gas prices would lead to an estimated average increase in costs of about $8 billion per year for residential, commercial and industrial natural gas consumers, which translates into an increase of $52 billion over the 2012-2020 period (present value in 2010$ as of 2011 discounted at 7 percent).
It is important to note that NERA used natural gas price information from the U.S. Department of Energy.
Thank you for your interest.
Regards,
Scott
Thursday November 3, 2011 15:37
http://www.prosefights.org/deaton/deaton.htm#think
e = 1 – 1/r^(k-1)
Where r is compression ratio and k is the ratio cp/cv for a diatomic gas, ( ratio of specific heat at constant pressure over specific heat at constant volume.} Engineers use k=1.4 called “cold air standard”, or k=1.3 called the “hot air standard.
Notice the only number you can plug in the expression is the compression ratio. The Otto Cycle cares nothing about the energy source or the age or hat size of the engineer.
An IDEAL engine does not have to suck or pump in air, nor push out exhaust. It does not run cooling fans,pump cooling water, pump oil or fuel, or power a generator. It does not operate a valve system, or turn a distributor or fire ignition, nor run any belts or chains. It supplies no energy for friction either rubbing or flowing. Real engines care a great deal about all these thing and maybe some I missed.
As to Indy cars having an e of 50%, I don’t believe it. Compression ratios over 20 don’t do much good as the curve gets asymptotic.
A word on Octane ratings. During WWII we made mil.av gasoline called 115/145 with 4.6 ml tetraethyl lead. (Motor fuel was limited to 3.0 ml.) It was made in HF catalyzed alkylation plants. It allowed the US to have superior performing piston planes even carrying pilot protecting armor plate. Jets made them obsolete. After the war premium gasoline got up to 100 RON and regular to about 96 RON with 3 cc lead blending such as the av alkyl ate. When laws required the eventual banning of lead refiners could not keep these high octane ratings. Car manufactures had to make engines less prone to knock. Now we see RO+MO/2 on the pumps. Research Octane + Motor method Octane /2
It so happens though that I have a considerable knowledge about the energy thinking in that country. I'd say at least ten times as much as you...at least.
Japan will be the LAST country on the face of the earth to give up on nuclear. Nuclear is essential for them, as the people who own that country are fully aware. Giving up nuclear means giving up a prosperous future, or maybe just a good but not particularly rich future. It is out of the question.
Somebody who was at the brilliant lecture I gave on nuclear in Singapore said that people in Japan are ill at ease after the Fukushima incident. I don't see anything wrong with that. Every questionable nuclear facility should be trashed, and augmented Gen 3 reactors should take their place. Moreover, the nuclear sector should be a public or quasi public good: why should the financing of energy production of a country be left to ignorant graduates of the better universities working in the larger financial institutions.
One other thing Mr Linn. During the brilliant talk on oil that I gave at Singapore National University, some gentleman actually had the nerve to question some of the things I said. He kept his mouth shut after he got my reply however. You can remember that in case you find yourself at one of my 'gigs'.
Coal is King, but is declining due to economic and environmental regulatory constraints. Hydro is as hydro was. Oil is still an also-ran and will be so until it expires. Natural gas is the heir apparent, as long as it doesn't become the environmental heir abberant. The now traditional renewables have had multiple launch pad failures and are better for third world micro-genration. The too cheap to measure to confusingly regulated to over-reacted to long-term rehab to over-reacted to requiring a living will to ready for a candle-lit wake nuclear needs a mirror to its nose and bells on its toes, but don't embalm it yet.
Now, my crystal ball. Everthing above is actually renewable, but the time of renewal is the inconvenient truth. Coal, they ain't making much of that. Oil, they ain't making much of that, either. Gas, they ain't making it, but we're sure finding what they did make...for a while. These three require you and me to do absolutely nothing in order to renew them. We simply die and turn into them. For hydro, maybe global warming will melt enough ice and evaporate enough sea to cause a sigificant upswing. On the other hand how well did that work out coming out of the previous ice age? Reneable nuclear will prevail in the second to next longer run. I just hope it doesn't breed fear once again.
Lower compression ratios. Less power, less efficiency. The higher the octane, the greater the fuel resistance to preignition(knock).
I'm sure you are aware of the difference in otto cycle and diesel cycle engines---but for people who aren't: An otto cycle engine uses an electrical spark to ignite the fuel in the cylinder. The fuel must be highly volatile(easily vaporized and explosive) for this to happen. When air is compressed, it gets hot. That is why the compression ratio is limited using otto cycle engines. Using ethanol allows the use of higher compression ratios making the engines more efficient.
Diesel engines use the heat of compression to vaporize and ignite the fuel. They can achieve much higher compression ratios. Therefore, diesels produce more power per size/weight than otto cycle at higher efficiency. Diesels are rugged and very long lasting because they typically achieve their maximum power output at around 1/2 the rpms of gasoline engines. Maximum outputs of around 3000 rpms vs, 6000 rpms.
-------" As to Indy cars having an e of 50%, I don’t believe it. Compression ratios over 20 don’t do much good as the curve gets asymptotic."-------
As I said----turbo boost is limited to 18-20 over all compression equivalent as a safety buffer----to protect the engine components, not because of fuel preignition problems.
-----" It allowed the US to have superior performing piston planes even carrying pilot protecting armor plate. Jets made them obsolete."------
The Messerschmidt Me 262 Swallow. The world's first operational jet fighter. Made possible because the Germans were working with synthetic fuels, made from coal and wood using the Fischer-Tropsch process. Germany powered everything from submarines, to panzers to the Me 262 with synthetic diesel fuel. Wood was the preferred feedstock----coal was needed for steel production, and there was an abundance of scrap wood due to Allied bombing. Also, wood does not contain sulphur as is found in coal. Sulphur contaminates the reforming catalyst beds causing the process to shut down.
You are welcome. Here is another piece of information for you. 80,000 people were evacuated from their homes with less than an hour's notice in a 20 km radius of the plant. Almost 8 months later----and those people are still homeless, and the 20 km exclusion zone remains in effect. And there was a news item this week indicating the presence of Xenon 135. Xenon 135 is produced during a nuclear reaction by neutron reaction and is a relatively short lived unstable isotope with a half live of around 6-9 hours. Xenon is also a gas that can escape into the atmosphere. The presence of Xenon would indicate that the decomposed fuel rods are still at critical mass and the nuclear fission reaction is still taking place in spite of the fact that it was reported months ago that the reactors were shut down and no nuclear fission is taking place.
Skip Ross---------" Now, my crystal ball.....................................Gas, they ain't making it, but we're sure finding what they did make...for a while."----------
Germany is. Big time. And the Germans are rapidly converting their transportation fuel mix to natural gas. Germany has about 5500 natural gas filling stations now(for a country about the size of Missouri and Iowa)---compared to 650 for the entire US.
Natural gas is methane, CH4. Methane is both a fossil fuel(natural gas) AND a biofuel(biogas, biomethane) Exactly the same stuff, CH4. The only difference is the source----the two can be mixed in any proportion with no loss of performance in any application. Methane can be made easily and cheaply from any type of biomass at all, including sewage and landfills. It is being done now, and we have been able to do it for over 160 years.
And methane can be used for anything we need done. Including producing heat or electricity directly by the use of catalytic converters. Catalytic converters are over 90% efficient-----well over 2X the efficiency of even the most advanced coal burning plants. And catalytic converters can be used at the point of generation---no long distance electrical grid connections necessary. And they are small enough to be easily portable and ready to begin operation in a few hours. And catalytic converters have no moving parts to wear out.
You seem to think pre-ignition and compression ratio and octane numbers is are simple relation ships. They are not. Indeed, engine designers use many ways to thwart knock and ping. They did use these methods as the amount of TEL/gal was reduced from 3 ml to zero. TEL was a far better way to get octane boost than other methods – except that although there was never any proof that people were getting lead poisoning the toxicity of lead is not in question, so banning it without a proven case was a prudent move. Other additives were not satisfactory for various reasons.
Unless your engine pings under your driving habits using a fuel of higher octane rating will not make it more efficient or more powerful. It will only make it more costly to drive. (I don’t think I have ever encountered an auto mechanic who knew anything about gasoline.)
There are two “octane ratings” the Research Method and the Motor Method, RO and MO. They are both calibrated to give a rating of 100 to 2,2,4 trimethyl octane, sometimes called "isooctane." For other compounds and other mixtures the RO and MO are usually substantially different. Straight chain hydrocarbons and those with a double bond in the chain usually test lower, in fact n-heptane, where all seven carbon atoms are in a single row has a rating of zero. Ring compounds such as benzene, toluene and xylene have good octane numbers.
I think I made it clear that the edge ultra high octane fuels allowing for higher compression for combat planes referred only to those with piston engines. The Germans had really an impossible task supplying their planes with both quality and quantity. We would bomb a refinery one day and they would start trying to get it back in production before getting all the fires out.
As to using Fischer Tropsch to make liquid fuels it is not a process one would chose if there were alternatives.
“Fischer and Tropsch filed a number of patents, e.g., US patent no. 1,746,464, applied 1926, published 1930.[8] It was commercialized in Germany in 1936. Being petroleum-poor but coal-rich, Germany used the FT-process during World War II to produce ersatz (German: substitute) fuels. F-T production accounted for an estimated 9% of German war production of fuels and 25% of the automobile fuel.” Wikepedia
Note: “an estimated 9% of German war production”above. There were few private cars in Germany during WW II, and FT feed stock is and was overwhelmingly coal, not wood.
That is why the only fuel used by the Indy League Racing Circuit cars is 100% ethanol.
All Indy League races are run without using a single drop of gasoline.
Let’s do the kind of arithmetic I did as a Freshman Ch E candidate in 1945.
Burn ethanol. C2 H5 OH + 6 O2 GOES to 2CO2 + 3 H2O. and
Burn gasoline (as a saturated octane molecule) C8 H8 +3 O2 goes to 8 CO2 + 9 H2 O.
A pound of ethanol yields 12,780 BTU HHV.
A pound of typical gasoline yields 20,569 BTU HHV.
If you grind through the numbers you will discover that 6691 BTU of ethanol and 6657 BTU of gasoline both emit 1 pound of CO2. These are identical numbers for a Chemical engineer and well within the accuracy of my calculation.
Unless I have made an arithmetic error (quite possible, I don’t see well) this calculation is as valid today as in the Garden of Eden.
On an mpg basis ethanol gives about 70% of that of gasoline. If you have been getting 30 mpg, expect 21mpg with 100% ethanol, and at higher cost.
Why should we care what fuel they use at Indy? I am more concerned that they only expect a hundred miles or so from very expensive tires. (I kinda expect 500 times as many miles.) The Indy rules have become bizarre and have almost nothing to do with automobiles. Why not limit the amount of energy to go 500 miles?} Why not require Indy cars to use consumer gasoline and consumer tires? Indy has become more about personalities than cars. Do you know even one person who knows the rules?
As for the situation in Japan, I want to repeat: the average length of life in Japan is the longest in the industrial world, and the Japanese will NEVER give up nuclear. You can believe what you want, and find fools interested in your opinions on this topic, but count me out. The same applies to Germany. Angela Merkel is selling her country out because she believes that it will get her another term in office, but giving up nuclear for natural gas is sheer stupidity.
The biggest advantage to ethanol use in my opinion----we don't have to fight wars to get it. We don't have to support dictators or monopolistic oligarchies The last three wars the US has become involved in have oil as an underlying root cause. They have cost us something in the neighborhood of $10 trillion and 6,000 lives. Reason enough to get rid of oil in my estimation. And that isn't even counting environmental destruction and pollution in the Gulf of Mexico, all of out major rivers, and coastal waters.
As for you Mr. Banks-----I hope you will continue your boisterous and obnoxious self aggrandizement and support of petroleum and nuclear industries I can't think of a better way to sink both battleships at once with such a minimum of effort on my part.
As for placing a bet on the results of the outcome of German engineering or your shrill and pompous blathering-----I think I'll bet on the German engineering. It seems to me that German engineers now and historically have a MUCH better record of having a pretty good grasp of what they are talking about than you do.
Thank you but I am well aware of Rudollf’s engine. It ran on vegetable oil if memory serves and there was not much use for them in1893. Wasn’t the oil industry all American then? And moot since there was no gasoline available - gasoline was then a drug on the market. Refiners such as there were wanted to make and sell kerosene for lamps. We were running out of whales.
Anyway I keep having difficulty getting through to you that that gasoline makes lousy diesel fuel NOT because it does not have enough ON but because it has low CN (CETANE number). Diesles want easily compression-ignited fast- burning fuel. Otto cycle engines want fuels that do not easily auto-ignite during compress but burn slowly when spark ignited. In general the molecules that make good gasoline make lousy diesel and the molecules that make good diesel make lousy gasoline.
Otto Cycle engines worked amazingly quite well with carburetors, and considerable skill. They work even better with fuel injection and electronic sensors and computers – so do diesels. (Don’t those Indy engines you were touting still use carburetors? And when there was some diesel Indy entrees they were allowed larger displacements than the spark guys. (How do the rules read today?)
A diesel needs more compression ratio than an Otto Cycle engine to attain the same efficiency. Hence it needs to be heavier and more expensive, not an issue for trucks and ships, locomotives.
Len said,” The biggest advantage to ethanol use in my opinion----we don't have to fight wars to get it.”
Nearly all the ethanol we use for fuel comes from food. Have you noticed there is rampant starvation in eastern Africa, that tortilla prices in Mexico have gone through the roof, that increased corn production in the US has hastened the lowering of water tables and fertilizer and pesticide use has gone up as well as the run-off pollutants from fields? Noticed the huge price increases of produce at the market? Unfortunately those who pooh- pooh these problems are also those who promoted ethanol from corn, authorize subsidies and issue ever more food stamps. Ethanol from cellulose is not a viable process – and might never be signifificant.
Every day for decades we’ve heard about reducing CO2 from fossil fuels. Yet the story telling that far more CO2 was emitted in 2010 vs 2009 is ignored (try to find it), and that we welcomed 100 million new people to the table this year.
We've been able to make ethanol from wood for over 120 years.
F.Banks-------" It will be what I have been saying. Note that I didn't say wait and see, because obviously your ignorant claims about energy resources have something to do with money, which means that you are short on patience."--------
Well, I'm not having to wait very long. I noticed an article just today in yesterday's paper-----Mexico[the second largest economy in Latin America] has cancelled orders for 10 nuclear reactors. They are going to use natural gas instead. Appearantly they have discovered some very large NG deposits.
The fuel value of methanol is 9760 BTU/# (lower than many coals) compared to petroleum diesel and gasoline at about 20,000 BTU/#. “About”, because they are not defined mixtures and can vary a little depending on the crude oil and the refinery.
If you burn hard woods in kilns with insufficient air (distructive distillation) you get charcoal and pyroligneous liquor containing methanol. It used to be a way of getting rid of scrap hardwood for charcoal briquettes. I’d bet the EPA has shut them all down as air polluters.
I gave a talk in Singapore last week at the Singapore Energy Week. A few days ago I got a mail from a busybody named Kjell Aleklett in which he informed me that an environmentalist named Jeremy Leggett said that I had disgraced my university by opposing his beliefs about renewables taking the place of nuclear. Disgraced my university he said. When I signed on to teach at Uppsala University, I did NOT sign on to be an academic fool. I'm sorry.
A dozen new cal burners! And the last I’ve seen, Germany was making 44% of its electricity with coal. Where do those folks get all that green coal?
And the lies that are being told in Germany today match those that Goebbels told X years ago.
However, Don, the cost of that abomination in Germany over the next five years will be much more than 137 billion. To that must be added the influence of the increase in energy costs on such things as wages and salaries and so on. No my friends, please be glad that the Merkel initiative has no future.
At the same rate of growth---renewable energy will be the only source of energy in less than twenty years.
http://www.volker-quaschning.de/datserv/ren-Strom-D/index_e.php