Comments enki09 has made

Pickens appoints republicans

I see that T. Boone Pickens has added a bunch of republican ops as "colonels" in his online action army. I thought his effort was non-partisan. I am embarrassed...

MJOn An interview with Bob Barr about his presidential platform on energy and the environment posted 1 year, 2 months ago 3 Responses

Maintaining The Status Quo

Big Nuclear is more or less like Big Oil. A very few major players have a monopoly on energy now and because of this they are able to virtually circumvent normal capitalist circumstances in the marketplace. Prices are essentially fixed without competition determining price.

That may be one of the biggest fears that the major players have with the advent of new fuel sources. Their monopoly will be broken by small producers who can produce fuels and energy locally.

So they spend millions to convince people that they must support big oil/nuclear/coal. After all, the economy of the world is based on oil and having new fuels emerge which can challenge oil also challenges the entire world economy as it stands today.On McCain tours nuke plant, renews call for nuclear power expansion in U.S. posted 1 year, 3 months ago 19 Responses

future gen is not coal energy

If you look at the diagram of the future gen power plant you will see that it is a large scale hydrogen plant. Hydrogen is combusted with oxygen to create superheated steam. This steam turns two turbines which produce electricity. The hydrogen comes from water. Diagram: http://www.futuregenalliance.org/technology.stm

What is the coal for? The coal is used in the very old water shift reaction to release the hydrogen from water by combining the carbon in the coal with the oxygen in water.

If you find another way to produce hydrogen from water as cheaply as by using coal then we would already have large scale hydrogen power plants in place...

Interestingly, the energy produced by burning a pound of hydrogen with oxygen is around 62,000 btu's. The energy produced by burning the 5 pounds of coal needed to release a pound of hydrogen from water is only around 5500 btu's.

A pound of hydrogen is about the amount in either a gallon of water or a gallon of gasoline.

This process is also about as efficient as a steam plant can be because it eliminates the need for a boiler as with normal power plants. The product of the combustion of the fuel (hydrogen) is superheated steam which can be used directly to turn a turbine. I designed such a boiler in the mid 90's: http://www.geocities.com/mj_17870/Boiler1.htm
Just fyi...

http://www.myspace.com/enki09

Terraforming and Climate Change

I think that we are all getting too wrapped up in the weather. Trying to predict the short term effects of changing the composition of our atmosphere with 100% accuracy is nearly impossible. But being able to do that isn't even the real issue. The fact is that we are changing the composition of gases that make up our atmosphere and watching the effects of that change is fascinating. It reminds me a great deal of the science of Terraforming which is the deliberate manipulation of the atmosphere of a planet to make it habitable for humans. We have never actually done this on another world but there has been a lot of serious discussion of doing it on Mars. Perhaps the current situation on Earth could be viewed as our species first experiment in Terraforming?

Terraforming links:

http://www.astrobiology.com/terraforming.html

http://www.howstuffworks.com/terraforming.htm

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/070623_mars_terrafo ...

Finally, this simple description of what it would take to Terraform a world like Mars sounds almost exactly like what we are doing on the Earth today: http://quest.nasa.gov/mars/background/terra2.html

In other words, if we established a colony on Mars that used Chlorofluorocarbon aerosols and burned fossil fuels, the expected effect would be that the composition of the atmosphere there would be altered and the planet would become warm and livable. But the skeptics argue that duplicating the same process on Earth will have absolutely no effect here. It just doesn't make sense either scientifically or logically.

http://www.myspace.com/enki09

Avoidance

Seems to me that those who are attempting to obscure rational discussion on the potential effects (present and future) of changing the composition of our atmosphere are simply diverting the discussion into meaningless areas in order to avoid really dealing with the issues.

The Climate Deniers making Al Gore into their favorite whipping boy  simply deflects public attention away from real evidence and places the whole question of the reality of the issue on Al Gore's back. In other words, if they can convince people that Al Gore doesn't have all the answers then there are no answers to be had... Not logical but unfortunately effective.

http://www.myspace.com/enki09

and worse yet...

The weather and or the overall climate are the result of the interaction of many natural forces and factors. The energy produced by the sun, the distance of the earth from the sun and the composition of the atmosphere are just a few of these.

The data that we have shows us that at least one major factor in this system is changing. The composition of our atmosphere has shown a rise in the percentage of CO2 in its' mix of gases and a decrease of O2. There has also been an increase in the overall amount of water vapor in the atmosphere.

This being the given it is interesting to consider all of the possible effects that this changing atmosphere might produce. For example, the earth is a giant capacitor in both literal and figurative terms. There is a difference in electrical potential between the surface of the earth and the ionosphere. The earth's surface charge is fairly constant but electrons are descending to and rising from its' surface constantly. Charged particles from the solar wind are adding to the sheath of electrically charged particles that surrounds the earth (the ionosphere).

Between the two charged "plates" of the ionosphere and the surface of the planet there is a mix of dielectric gases. In a capacitor the dielectric between the plates determines the amount of potential difference that can be created between the plates. The earth has a potential difference between the ionosphere and the surface of the planet of around 360,000 volts.

If the charge between the plates of a capacitor gets too large dielectric breakdown occurs and current can pass between the plates. Lightning is an example of this in our earth capacitor.What the dielectric is composed of determines how much energy can be stored between the plates. In the case of the earth we are changing the composition of our atmospheric dielectric. It will be interesting to see what effect this has on the system overall. :)

http://www.myspace.com/enki09

Pointless Argument

I have been reading the Heartland Institutes's material for a while now. I have also been following the science behind climate change research.

It seems that we have an argument which is un-winnable as it is framed. Both sides are making predictions of different futures based on the same set of data. But the future will be what it will be regardless of which side wins the argument. That is the reality.

Our energy future can be determined based on what works best and what meets the needs of the consumer best at the lowest cost. The need to replace fossil fuels for reasons of the economy, security and the environment are and have been well known since before the climate change issue became a factor.

While it is true that the potential for dire consequences related to human induced climate change are a great incentive to move rapidly on the energy issue that is all that it really is; an incentive to do what we have to do either way. This argument is just a replay of the creation vs evolution debate in different clothes. On Climate skeptics hold conference in New York City posted 1 year, 8 months ago 3 Responses

Is Climate Change Even Meaningful?

There is much time being wasted today on debate over the Climate Change question in the sense that, with or without Climate Change, we are still going to have to turn to new energy sources to meet the growing world demand. We should therefore make choices which are going to be the best for society and the planet for the long term. Whether or not Climate Change exists is then just an added incentive to choose wisely and quickly. As for me I feel it is better to err on the side of caution in regard to Climate Change than to forge ahead with typical reckless abandon.

http://www.myspace.com/enki09

Coal to Liquids

I appreciate the way you are looking at this issue. But before you make up your mind please consider the alternatives which could be developed within this paradigm.

The coal (carbon) to liquids concept is the first step that needs to be taken on the path to making hydrocarbons a totally clean, endlessly renewable fuel.

An intermediate step would be the implementation of on board reformers. This alone could cut the fuel used by vehicles by as much as 50%.

The goal however would be to create a system in which hydrogen fuel cells are the power plant of choice. These cells will use the hydrogen from hydrocarbons as the fuel and leave behind the carbon to be recycled into liquid fuel again. The hydrogen will come from water and so these hydrocarbons will be totally renewable. Since the only exhaust would be water vapor they are also non polluting. I think this is the only viable pathway to a clean, renewable future.

http://www.myspace.com/enki09