Originally Posted by Geof  Couple of comments:
First the energy is not free no matter how it is collected. The device doing the collecting cost money and incurs maintenance costs.
Second you seem to be switching track here. Now you are talking about something becoming cost effective 'eventually' as the cost of crude climbs. I thought your original focus was on replacing fossil fuels in the short term to reduce CO2 emissions.
So what really are you after? |
Hi Geof,
Valid point, I seem to be floundering around don't I. My only excuse is I purchased a new Blackberry and was spending too much time learning how to use the stupid thing. I finally took it back and told the salesman I had read the whole manual and couldn't find where it said how to turn the thing on or off. He gave me that look but I swapped out for a simpler device.
Now, where were we. I've been doing a little more research and I'll spend a little more time looking stuff up. Check this out:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/...ectID=10381404
They have a commercial plant in New Zealand that has biodiesel from algae in production. They are taking waste sewage for the growing medium. Mariss was wondering where the water would come from, there it is. This is early development so I don't think it would be so easy to get the numbers to do an analysis but there you have it, someone thinks it's viable. Algae gives a much higher energy yield per acre than soybeans, corn etc. And that dark green color is going to be about as close as you can get to Mariss' matte black with a living organism.
My focus is to replace fossil fuels to reduce emissions and develop cost effective synthetic fuels. Checking Wikipedia I find that Europe is the largest producer of biodiesel, I quote: "100% Biodiesel is now available at many normal service stations across Europe." As economies of scale accrue, I think this technology will prove cost effective as a short term solution until hydrogen can be perfected.
I'm not an engineer so I can't argue your contention that thermal dissociation of water isn't valid due to the inefficiencies. I can only point out that research is being done. Maybe you are right, perhaps it would be more efficient to use CSP to generate electricity for electrolysis of the water. Perhaps we'll never have cars that run on hydrogen, the problems may well prove insurmountable. I think hydrogen could, however, replace natural gas in the home for clean and relatively efficient heating. Think about it, no heat exchanger required. Just have a fan blowing across the flame and ducting the combustion products into the home. It would provide the benefit of adding humidity to the home since the product of combustion would be water vapor.
As you pointed out, there is a cost associated with all this. My thinking is the cost thing will be worked out and energy will be produced that is clean and cost effective with oil. We just have to avoid the obvious problem of political interference with the science of it. If all the mid-western farmers put pressure on Washington to go with corn ethanol then we'll have problems. I don't think the energy density will be there. The production of energy per acre will be much less than what is needed and it will drive food prices up. Nope, pond scum algae is probably the way to go.
Donna