Alternative sources of energy

The so called biofuel. They do it round here.

 

Biodiesel obtained from chemically treated used cooking oil has been out there for quite a while, although it is said to be more expensive to produce than normal diesel, which limits its acceptance by governments that would have to subsidize it.

Here's a link from the Irish Agriculture and Food Development Authority with some hard figures:
http://www.teagasc.ie/research/reports/crops/4355/eopr-4355.htm

[rant]
Checking other documents on the matter, I find it hard to believe that "cost-effectiveness" is really what it's holding the governments back. I mean, emissions from a vehicle running on treated cooking oil are between 50 and 80% less harmful to the atmosphere than those from a normal car. The raw materials for this fuel can be harvested or produced in the lab, rather than drilled, so there's no risk of running out of fuel eventually.

And yet it's not accepted. Then again, governments are surely getting a nice profit from fuel sales (it's quite heavily taxed in some countries, after all), and if your everyday Tom, Dick and Harry start running their engines on cooking oil...
[/rant]

[ February 16, 2006, 14:19: Message edited by: Colthrun ]

 

The North of Ireland relies on rapeseed oil for farm machinery, and Brazil were probably the first to use sugarbeet for public transport.

 

There are a lot of things you can do with this. With just a little fermentation, you can turn it into ethanol and use it to cut or replace gasoline. The problem, as far as I know, is that neither of these are nearly as energy efficient as petrolium products. This is a viable solution to the gas problem, and there are several others out there. The problem is that none of them are great. They all just work. I expect petrolium will have to become much more scarce before any of these are implemented on a large scale as-is. The rush now is to make them more efficient so they can compete with petrolium today.
Of course, the other problem with biofuels is that they still release CO2, one of the bigger concerns in the 'greenhouse effect'. The electric alternatives don't, so they're looking better for the long term, but it really comes down to who can make theirs more efficient and cheaper, faster.

 

There's probably a whole bunch of perfect substitutes for petrol(gas), but companies like shell, bp, and our governments, don't want it, for obvious reasons. So, these cheaper environment friendly fuels will probably never see the light of day.

 

I believe you can use vegetable oil in standard diesel engines. I think there was a "joke" study run that showed that oil previously used for cooking fish and chips gave the best performance!
The veg oil in diesel engines was trialed on Top Gear and seemed to work, but legally you're not allowed to do it unless you pay the extra fuel tax.

Time to bore people stupid. (I'll try and keep things brief)

As stated in the other thread, Hydogen is really a storage mechanism, not a fuel. You create it from water and turn it back into water - conservation of energy etc. However if you can create it using an eco-friendly method then it makes sense for transport purposes. The most interesting idea I've seen to create hydrogen is giant space lazers which "zap" the ocean. No idea how they were supposed to work though!

Photovoltaics
Actual efficiencies of between 5 and 17% depending on material, direction facing, elevation and temperature (lower is better). I think crystal silicon technology has a max theoretical efficiency of around 30%. Photovoltaics are very expensive to produce and without grants (and inflated electricity "buy-back" prices from the grid, as seen in Germany) the costs can not generally be recouped from normal electricty production within the lifetime of the product. HOWEVER (with a grant), they became financially viable on the Beddington Zed project in London when used to power electric cars (given the price of petrol). The high initial price can also be offset if it can be used to replace another expensive item - typically highly expensive facade glazing.

Solar Heating
Probably more useful in domestic situations, it's generally used to pre-heat water before it goes through the main water heating system. They can be financially viable if installed in new-build.
I believe there is also a project in Australia for a one mile high glass solar heater which would be used to create steam to run turbines.

CHP
Combined Heat & Power. Not really an "alternative" source as they tend to run on normal gas, however wood chip, biogas and rubbish incineration versions are available - the security of fuel supply tends to be the most crucial design factor. I beleive the woodchip one at BedZed ran for about a month only.

Wind Turbines:
Again high cost, but with acceptable pay-back periods. Need to be sited in a spot with regular wind patterns - not too high as they have safety shut downs, and without eddies. Main concerns I've seen raised is the death rate of birds, visual impact (though we got used to power lines didn't we) and the MOD have raised concerns about interference with radar patterns. Off-shore systems have additional losses due to cables distances and siting transformers. It's also not as easy to earth them from lightning strikes.

Hydro/Wave.
Don't know a lot about these, but I believe over 50% of New Zealands power comes from Hydro, and a significant portion from Geo-thermal. Main issue on river hydro is the effect on the river eco-system. The latest one in China (Which is massive) has effectively killed off the entire fish population, in turn destroying the unique river dolphins and porpoises.

Heat Pumps
Not too sure how they work. Basically they take heat out of the ground/water source (which is normally warmer than the surrounding air) and use it to heat a building.

EDIT

Interestingly, "vegetable" products are seen as CO2 neutral as far as the UK compliance with Kyoto is concerned. So you can burn as much wood as you like! Sorry, just come off a three day training course to be a SAP assessor. (You don't want to know)

EDIT 2
Sarevok:
BP Solar is a big company now. It's just still not a financially viable product until manufacturing costs come down, but the petrol companies recognise it WILL happen.

 

Most of those couldn't be directly used to power vehicles, though.
The beautiful thing about fuel cells is that they let you use things like those, and the more conventional and fun ones (nuclear anyone?) to indirectly power your vehicles without any intermediate pollutants.

 

Hydrogen and oxygen? Fuel cells? Wouldn't you be like, driving a bomb, in effect? So if you are in an accident, boom?

 

Not really. One, they're seperated. Two, it takes heat to initiate a combustion reaction and these wouldn't be exposed. Three, the second these were exposed to the atmosphere, they would evaporate and be gone (they're kept condensed to liquid state).

 

Just got a mental image of what Sarevok was suggesting... can anybody say 'chain-reaction'? Nuclear explosions traveling down motorways via exploding cars. Nasty

 

Someone should tell that to Michael Bay or Jerry Bruckheimmer; I'm sure one of 'em would include it in their next film.

 

NOG,

I understood the topic to be about alternative energy in general, not just running cars.
Besides which you get electric (Battery) cars anyway, so the important bit could just be about the creation of electricity.

As it happens, you also get solar powered cars as well. The World Solar Challenge has been running in Australia since the 1987. The last three events (every two years) have been won by a dutch team.
In 2005, The Nuna 3's average speed in a 3000km race was over 100kmh. It's top speed is in the order of 160kmh. Not bad considering it's only running on sunlight.

http://optics.org/articles/news/11/9/23/1
http://www.nuonsolarteam.nl/nuna3/engels/home_eng.php

 

Good points Carcaroth, on all of them, but solar power doesn't seem to be efficient enough to be a reliable power source on almost any scale, yet. There are a few 'solar farms' around that direct all the light from a massive area into photovoltaic cells, but they aren't that common.
The things I'd really like to see more of are nuclear and geothermal energy. As I understand it, Iceland gets most of its electricity from geothermal power plants.
This may have been what you were thinking of when you said heat pumps. Geothermal power plants use the heat from geothermal vents, volcanic vents, hot springs, any natural heat source, and use it to boil water. After that, its just a regular turbine generator. These are usually stable, reliable, and safe plants that produce no pollution at all, but you need a stable, reliable geothermal source.

 

I just saw this a couple of days ago: there apparently is a process called thermal depolymerization which allows you to get oil out of pretty much any kind of organic refuse. It works a bit like the natural processes through which oil is formed, only that is much faster.

So, oil form pig s**t. (actually, the plant already operating use turkey waste - and produces about 400 barrels of oil per day). You'd think this is a win-win situation; take something nobody needs and get out useful stuff. However, apparently the plant is not quite profitable, since it has to pay for the waste they take in, which otherwise would have been used as fertilizer or animal feed (for chickens or cows, I imagine). You've got to love these modern farming practices.

 

What I am going to say will not be nice. Many will be angry. A human needs energy and produces waste. we are now at 6 billion+. Just a few years ago I learned that it reached 5 billion. Figure out which part of the formule also needs work. China gets it. Sad but unavoidable in the long term. If our population grows at this rate nothing will work. biofuel. energy cells you name it, it will not be enough.

 

We're quickly moving to a situation where survival of the fittest may again become a major factor for the human race. I won't say I'm happy about it, but I won't say I'm sad, either.

 

These are good energy conservation methods, but there aren't really any new sources in there. I would be impressed if Ford had found a way to run a car on, say, sawdust or something.

 

I heard geothermic energy was expensive to maintain due to the sulphuric nature of the natural vents eroding machinery. Don't know if thats true. Still think splitting water into it's basic elements would be a cheap efficient power source for vehicles. Lot of wind farms near me but some people think they mar the natural beauty of the countryside. Personally I quite like them.