sun-earth-energy

Energy From Waste

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 12:08:00 +0000

In my last blog I called for more effort on energy from wastes. I showed some nice pictures of Anaerobic Digester Plant in the Czech Republic. Who listens? Not many, I was not bold enough in my delivery..

So lets show what wastes we are talking about:

This is where London sends at least 50% of their DOMESTIC wastes

London is a great example. It generated hundreds and thousands of tons per year of domestic waste plus a further 16 million tons of commercial wastes (including construction materials). No, that is a lot of stuff.

But most of it is transported out of London! The total bill each year for collecting and redistributing (I cannot use the word recycling as this does little which could truly be considered recycling) is £580m. At the same time they run 10,000 buses on diesel choking up the hard pressed residents. It's utter madness. It smacks of blinkered, too specialised, compartmentalised thinking. We need some generalists who can co-ordinate - to pull together all these strands; and to bang a few heads together.

A Mountain to "Recycle"

Luckily Boris Johnson has a plan. And its not too bad; so long as the plan is carried out and not just started as a publicity stunt (as if....). He has begun to listen to what a great deal of people in the UK already know. However all this is put into practice on the Continent already and has been for decades.

In Germany they reckon that they could replace all their natural gas needs from bio-gas, or bio-methane. This would be generated from 'digesters' which would process farming wastes, food industry wastes and sewage works to make gas. In fact they already do a huge amount.

And the best thing is that they generate gas, which they can easily store - unlike electricity. This is a great point worth making. All the detractors regarding renewables always complain about the [assumed] storage problems with all technologies. Well with bio-methane we can store the energy for plenty of things.

If properly designed sewage can be big exporters of bio methane

Like using the stored bio-methane to run Buses (as they do in Sweden), Lorries and Cars and even trains. The bio-methane can also be used to generate electricity on demand -just so long as we can find a usage for the heat that this process generates (something that is rarely done in the UK's conventional power thinking).

Food Wastes can make useful bio-methane

Lastly bio-methane can be injected into the gas grid, like our partners have done in Didcot, Oxfordshire with Thames Waters Sewage Works there. When it goes in we get 'Green Gas Certificates', and users can buy it out at their end, so we can effectively utilise the existing gas grid to distribute all the bio-methane generated from anywhwere in the UK within a sensible distance from a gas main (for which we have the UK's plans). Just like the renewable electricity schemes. But unlike electrcity, as I have said it can be stored and used when needed. In fact it has to be stored, because there are times when the gas grid is not ready to receive the bio-methane.

Our' love affair' with waste is institutionally inefficient. Very little of what happens today makes much economic sense. Sending stuff to landfill is not necessarily good. But not capping off the gas generated by this same landfill is [energy wise] criminal. The gas needs to be 'harvested', and ideally injected into the grid. Transporting wastes out of London is pretty stupid too, all that energy expended to move waste around - it's well ...wasteful.

All those crisp clean tanks from my last blog could be dotted all around the less attractive parts of London, to generate gas on the spot, from food wastes from all those eating places. In turn that gas could make electricity, heat or transport fuel.

It just needs vision and a generalist thinker. Like me.

Renewables from Wastes AD Benefits

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 11:12:00 +0000

Typical Anaerobic Digestion (AD) Plant

By 2015, biomass is to become the Czech Republic‘s primary source of renewable energy.

Waste to Energy is a major component in any renewable energy field, but efficient bio-mass plants need to be well specified and use 'clean' technologies - incineration in NOT the preferred solution. Anaerobic digestion and efficient gasification (without oxygen) are designed to produce bio-gas (a rich mixture of methane, hydrogen and C02). From the resultant gas several options are possible for energy production or transport fuels. The remaining solids can also be used as fertilizers or soil conditioning.

Accordingly, there is a high demand for biogas plants among investors and operators, especially from manufacturers who have international experience and an extensive service network. This summer, one such manufacturer established its fifth plant in the Czech Republic. The construction of the agricultural biogas (AD) plant in Příložany in the southern part of the country was completed in four months.

After casting the concrete floor slabs in March, the construction of the 2,500 cubic metres stainless steel fermenter, the combined heat and power generation plant (CHP), and the 35 cubic metres vertical dosing feeder started in the same month. The setup of the biogas plant equipment was finished in May. The gas started flowing through the pipes in early May, and the final approval of the test operation was granted in June.

AD can supply Heat, Power and CNG road fuel

The biogas plant has a biogas emergency flare and operates without a hygienisation unit and separation unit. In the CHP, a CHP-Unit with 366 kW output produces the electricity that is fed into the grid. The plant‘s energy efficiency is high, because the generated heat is used in the facilities and stables. The plant is fed with substrates and manure of the operator and farms in the vicinity: pig manure, grass silage, maize silage, crop silage, and grain waste.

The EU and the Czech government provide special incentives for biogas plant projects in the Czech Republic. One of the main reasons is that the carbon dioxide emissions per capita are rather high compared to other countries. Czech farmers receive financial support for the establishment of biogas plants from an EU environmental fund and an EU rural development fund.

Since 2005, the feed-in law for decentralised eco-power has resulted in an increase in the energy production from regenerative sources. In 2010, a share of about 10 percent of the energy was already produced from alternative sources, compared to only 4 percent in 2008.

Transport Fuels GAS vs Electricity?

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 15:42:00 +0000

Why bother with a 'beauty parade' when you can have CNG/LPG Electric Hybrids!

Electric power trains and systems are still in the development phase and will be for some time.

However that development could work hand-in-hand with the gaseous fuel advantages. With hybrid delivery system you get electic power to the wheels, but with a great range due to on-boad fuel. By utilising CNG for Trucks and Buses as a 'transition fuel' to wean us off diesel.

Additionally bio-methane can be cleaned and compressed to make transport CNG, but derived from our ever increasing 'mountains of food, human, farming and other wastes. So two issues resolved.

CNG Bus

The big advantage with CNG is that it is far cleaner in terms of Particulate Matter (PM) and Oxides of Nitrogen (Nox) than current diesels, even with the expensive to maintain particulate filters. But the CNG Electric Hybrid takes clean air and fuel economy to new levels compared to the best diesels around - even the diesel hybrids.

CNG is ideal for buses, Truck and even trams and trains, as seen in Europe.

Swedish CNG Train

Gaseous Vehicle Fuels: Alternative view

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 16:17:00 +0000

Commentators tend to lump together oil and gas and describe them as fossil fuels, complete with 'Peak Oil' crisis projections. BUT:

How long ago do you recall that during oil extraction or refining, that gases were flared off? Yeah, not too long ago, and in Russia and Nigeria it's still common practice.

Well I have to say that the Renaissance of CNG and LPG for transportation fuels is almost a' breath of fresh air'; why? Because these are practical uses for what was a waste product. By reducing flaring and marketing LPG, Propane, Butane CNG, LNG etc we are improving extraction efficiency. Thus making the fossil fuel business go 'further' for practically the same outlay.

This has to be a good thing. Whilst we wait around and twiddle our thumbs before hydrogen and electric vehicles have 'matured' to a point where they are available to the 'masses' at acceptable cost; in my [humble opinion] in about 15-20 years time.

So short term look at some commercialisation of gaseous fuels as an immediate alternative to petrol and diesel, with obvious environmental benefits.

http://autogas-network.blogspot.com/2011/06/autogas-alliance-published.html

Open Letter re Energy Strategy

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Sat, 21 May 2011 12:30:00 +0000

Open Letter to Angela Merkel, Federal Chancellor of Germany, the founder and to all members of the German Ethics Commission "Secure Energy Supply"

Starnberg, Germany, April 12th, 2011

Dear Frau Chancellor Merkel, dear Ms. Lübbe, dear Ms. Reisch, dear Ms. Schreurs, dear Mr. Toepfer, dear Mr. Beck, dear Mr. von Dohnanyi, dear Mr. Fischer, dear Mr. Glueck, dear Mr. Hacker , dear Mr. Hambrecht, dear Mr. Hauff, dear Mr. Hirsche, dear Mr. Huettl, dear Mr. Marx, dear Mr. Renn, dear Mr. Vassiliadis!

“In the light of the events in Japan, it is imperative that the risks of nuclear energy be re-evaluated. The task is, to establish a national energy strategy that will have to be accepted by the entire society as a guideline for the next decade…” This challenge has been handed over to you by the German Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel as members of the German Ethics Commission “Save Energy Supply”.

Please allow me to support your work a little by providing a few figures which may already be known but contain high potential for immediate improvements. Surprisingly, these facts and figures are neither questioned nor discussed by so-called expert groups. Also media representatives and other groups are quite disheartening in considering their immense significance.

This should not stay as it is, due to the fact of the importance of the topic.

A new energy strategy, which you are now being asked to create, is urgently needed. However, it can only be done based on a clean state analysis of the actual status of the existing energy infrastructure. According to the BDEW*, the German electricity grid as of March 22, 2010 is an incredible 1.783.209 Kilometers (more than 1.000.000 miles) long. This length corresponds to four times the distance from the Earth to the Moon.In addition, more than 550,000 transformers (substations) are needed to keep this grid-network running in order to transfer electricity from the source of production (still mostly coal-fired power plants) to the consumers in industrial, domestic and Small and Medium Enterprises (SME`s). Here, I would like to ask you for your judgment by “common sense”. This inefficient archaic system, which was set up in the 1890s, has only been even marginally improved since then, it should not further be supported by additional network expansion. Please ask yourself the question, who will benefit from any modifications to make this grid smart.

Additionally, according to the German Working Group on Energy Balances (Arbeitsgemeinschaft Energiebilanzen e.V.), the conversion losses (consumption and losses in the converting sector, flare and cable losses in the grid) in the German electricity generation in 2008 (newer figures not available) was 141.6 million tons of hard coal units (1million tons of Coal Equivalents (CE) = 29.308 Petajoules). That number alone does not offer much insight. The total energy use in all German households amounted to 87.3 million tons CE. In addition, in trade, commerce, services and other industries, additional 49.2 million tons of CE were used. The total energy consumption of all these consumer groups put together amounts to 136.5 million tons CE, which is far less energy than the losses in the German power generation and transmission process.

One of the major “flaws” of our current energy infrastructure among other things, is the fact that electricity from renewable energies in Germany (hydroelectric since 1891 and wind power since 1870s) in the electricity industry has always been treated like electricity from normal power plants by feeding it into the inefficient grid. This has always made little or no sense physically. Also, the so-called smart network doesn’t really help. We need many more intelligent solutions. And they are there.

What you now have, dear members of the Ethics Committee is the wonderful opportunity to put forth a truly genuine, decentralized, dedicated and small-scale energy system. With this, I mean that the energy is only to be converted where it is actually needed. Not even a single (old or new) nuclear, coal or gas power plant would be needed to supply the energy actually required in Germany. But all this is achievable only if the sources are used “by their nature”, depending on local existing renewable sources of energy. They have to be used locally within a maximum radius of 15 kilometers. Requiring only small storage capacity, these autonomous units can therefore also be utilized to cover all transportation services in Germany, too. The necessary facilities should in each case be used and operated locally and above all, they have be owned by the consumers. This changes the consumer behavior in households, SME`s industry and transport automatically in the right direction. The savings will be based on the close relationship of converting and using power independently.

This system will be the most efficient and also the most secure energy supply system. It can propel Germany to the forefront of the Renewable Energy race in the coming years, alleviating today`s fears of dependence on uncertain foreign and expensive supplies of imported fossil fuels. With “Out of the Box” thinking and new infrastructures like the one mentioned here, we can save more energy than our collective imagination may allow us to believe.

As a next step, we will need strong and responsible individuals who understand how to transfer these ideas to our population, bringing them to discussions on open and unbiased forums. The concepts can then be implemented quickly and locally. All the necessary components and processes for this transition phase are in part known for years and already exist. What is needed is to provide “only” the meaningful connections to create a new and much better picture.

Dear members of the Ethics Commission “Secure Energy Supply”, please let make use of this unique historical chance to achieve a quantum leap in our energy economy. In the past, perhaps the officials lacked the courage to implement such drastic changes. The time has now come. However, I wish you to have the power to achieve these worthy results in the time available to you which will impact many subsequent generations to come. Many thanks for your personal efforts in this matter. Future generations will be thankful to you.

For further information, I am at your disposal.

Best Regards,

Arno A. Evers
Arno A. Evers FAIR-PR
Achheimstrasse 3, 82319 Starnberg
tel.: +49 (0) 8151 998923, fax: +49 (0) 3212 9989243
e-mail: arno@hydrogenambassadors.com
www.hydrogenambassadors.com

Founder of the Group Exhibit Hydrogen and Fuel Cells (in 1995)
at the annual Hannover Fair in Germany
More about Evers new book The Hydrogen Society...more than just a Vision?
here:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/order/order.php

Background information:

The Ethics Commission "Secure energy supply” is headed by former German Federal Environment Minister and current founding Director (since 2.2. 2009) of the Institute for Climate Change, Earth systems and sustainability, based in Potsdam, Klaus Toepfer and the President of the German Research Foundation, Matthias Kleiner. Chancellor Angela Merkel appointed as additional members:
Ulrich Beck, a former sociology professor at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich
Klaus von Dohnanyi (SPD), former Federal Education Minister
Ulrich Fischer, Bishop of the Evangelical Church in Baden
Alois Glück (CSU), President of the Central Committee of German Catholics
Jörg Hacker, president of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina
Jürgen Hambrecht, CEO of BASF
Volker Hauff (SPD), former Federal Minister for Research and Technology
Walter Hirche (FDP), President of the German Commission for UNESCO
Reinhard Huettl, Chairman of the German GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam and President of the German Academy of Science and Engineering
Weyma Lübbe, Philosopher, member of the German Ethics Council
Reinhard Marx, Archbishop of Munich and Freising
Lucia Reisch, Economist, Professor at the Copenhagen Business School, member of the Council for Sustainable Development
Ortwin Renn, Risk Research, Sociology Professor, Chairman of the Sustainability Advisory Board of Baden-Württemberg
Miranda Schreurs, American Political Scientist, head of the Research Centre for Environmental Policy at the Free University of Berlin
Michael Vassiliadis, Chairman of the Mining, Chemical and Energy

* The quoted Federal Association of Energy and Water Industries (BDEW) e.V., Berlin, is since October 2008 led by the Chairman of the Executive Board, Ms. Hildegard Mueller. Ms. Mueller is wired well with the Federal Chancellery; she was from 2005 to 2008 Minister of State in charge of the Federal Chancellor and the federal-state coordination of the federal government in Berlin, Germany.

The BDEW represents some 1,800 companies. The spectrum of members is ranging from local and municipal to regional to national companies. They represent about 90 percent of electricity sales, a good 60 percent of the local and district sales, 90 percent of natural gas sales and 80 percent of drinking water funding and about a third of the wastewater disposal in Germany.

Additional Links:
Dr. Klaus Toepfer at the Hannover Fair 2003:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/hm03/vips/toepfer.php
Interview with Dr. Klaus Toepfer at the Hannover Fair 2003:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/hm03/movies/vip5.mpg
Dr. Angela Merkel at the Hannover Fair 2006:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/hm06/vips/merkel.php
Video with Dr. Angela Merkel at the Hannover Fair 2006:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/hm06/images/movies/240406_Dr_Angela_Merkel.mpg
Information regarding the German electricity grid:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/background/german-high-voltage-network.php
Information regarding the energy balance in Germany 2003 in comparison with 2007:
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com/background/energy-balance-germany-2003.php

My sincere thanks for helping with the translation go to:
Srikanth Honavara-Prasad, MS in Mechanical Engineering, San Fransico, USA,
Robert (Robbie) Mackay, Managing Director at VeMarine Ltd Thurso, United Kingdom
Juan Martínez-Vázquez, Energy Ambassador, Paris, France and:
Peter Kindzierski, Managing Director at ISCEER, Malaga, Spain
Thanks also to:
Heinz Sturm, Europaen CompetenceCenter for Energy & Environmental Transfer, Bonn, Germany

Woeful Energy Efficiency Skews Electricity Supply Planning

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:50:00 +0000

Why not add some serious focus on ENERGY DEMAND and ENERGY EFFICIENCY.

We in the UK like most of the western world have some pretty miserable performance characteristics when considering turning fossil fuels into electricity. Around 25% fuel efficiency. The remaining 60% losses to 'low grade heat' dissipated to the cooling towers (erected as a testimony to waste), and 10-12% grid distribution losses etc.

Just as bad in the USA see graphic: Interestingly the figures for generation losses translate into 67.2% of the energy inputs, even after allowing for the Hydro and other renewable inputs. Poor efficiency indeed!

The nuclear cycle is similar with the cooling towers (designed to 'waste' heat energy) warming up the atmosphere rather than being usefully employed to heat buildings etc.

Pimlico District Heat Plant

BUT WAIT: we can't use the heat from cooling towers because all power stations (with the exception of Ferrybridge and Trent) are too far away from population centres to justify the district heating distribution network.

As a historical pointer Battersea Power Station, London had no cooling towers (land was too expensive) so they piped the heat energy to Pimlico and sold it to the residents in 1950! And its still there today.

So in effect our whole approach to centralized power (electricity but not heat energy) is flawed. THATS THE FIRST PROBLEM.

For the sake of brevity I will summarize:
THERE IS NO ENERGY POLICY: What we have is a series of lobby groups shouting at weak Governments. What goes for a 'policy' is to do with taxation on North Sea Oil and other taxes on transport fuels. The rest is to keep you quiet.

THERE ARE NO DRIVERS TO MAKE POWER GENERATION EFFICIENT: Otherwise we would see hundreds of 'mini' (unseen to the 'man/person in the street') power, heat and (optional chilled water) generation systems providing around 85+% fuel efficiency heating and powering our homes, offices and retail parks. What we do is just pay more and more per kWh, heck the Government even taxes us for the Carbon because of this inefficiency. On top of that they want us to stump up to artificially support renewable because you have been 'told' they are more expensive(?). Renewable can stand on their own. Which is more than can be said for Nuclear.

The factors that are determining our plans for electricity supply (not energy needs) are still based on the hopeless inefficiency I have merely touched on. Its also based of the economist's 'favourite mistake' of constant upward industrial growth and electricity needs expanding as they have done in the past. That will not happen.

In fact the power companies will never object to talk of brown-outs and demand outstripping supply. It's their business. They get bigger and more powerful on comments like that.

Football Stadium that Acts as a power station

The real alternatives are for efficient 'parish' or even 'estate' scale power and heat generation systems utilising all energy sources, gas, wind, geo-thermal, small scale hydro and solar thermal. (forget the vastly over sold solar PV for the next 10 years). Then we will have our own independent power supplies and then we might actually see real ENERGY COMPETITION.

So start forming your local energy co-operatives, forget Nuclear NIMBY'ism and lets create real energy security in our homes and offices. Because we certainly don't have it now if we continue with the energy propaganda that fills the press and the BBC.

Risks of shale gas seem to outweigh the advantages-Really??

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 12:49:00 +0000

Risks of shale gas seem to outweigh the advantages

This article in the Montreal Gazette, got me thinking about relative risk and bias. I will quote from the article [below in orange high-light] which has been written with a 'bit of an agenda', and to be fair makes some very good points regarding oil and gas industry attitudes towards leakge, waste and the [arrogance] of some of their exploration processes. But the bias is too anti natural gas (called so because it occurs naturally, but because it is primarily methane some think is OK to bash it because it's a "chemical"!)

"Quebec has sometimes been called a polluters’ paradise because of its tradition of slack environmental protection. Even an uncharacteristically keen corps of inspectors would have a hard time enforcing regulations at the 15,000 wells that the Quebec Oil and Gas Association estimates could be drilled in the province during the next 20 years. Many would be in remote areas."
"No matter what steps the Charest government takes to reduce the risks of shale gas, those risks appear great."

"As for the environmental upside, it’s far less than commonly touted. The natural-gas industry likes to say its product, when burned, gives off 31 per cent less carbon dioxide (the main greenhouse gas) than heating oil and 45 per cent less than coal. When you count for methane leaks, however, much of gas’s relative climate-change virtue literally vanishes into thin air."

However, just like the Carbon Cycle, there is a Methane Cycle that has been happening since way before man or woman was on this planet. Methane is to do with decomposition of organic materials. Its occurring on such vast scales that we need to understand the relative risks portrayed by articles such as this.

So to add some balance my research shows the following article from NASA circa 1977 [http://icp.giss.nasa.gov/education/methane/intro/cycle.html ] , and even this has under-estimated the volumes of Methane Hydrates on our ocean floors. For which I have included material from the Office of Naval Research (US Military Source 2002) concerning these: Then a recent Wikipedia article points out some un-accounted for reductions in Atmospheric Methane between 2000-2006

EDUCATION: GLOBAL METHANE INVENTORY

The Global Methane Cycle

By Harvey Augenbraun, Elaine Matthews, and David Sarma

(Note: This article was originally written in conjunction with the 1997 Global Methane Inventory.

1. Introduction to the Methane Cycle

Measurements of methane from Greenland and Antarctic ice cores indicate atmospheric concentrations of ~350 ppbv (parts per billion by volume) during the Last Glacial Maximum about 18,000 years ago, rising to 650 ppbv by about 200 years ago (Chappellaz et al., 1990).

Researchers have estimated that natural methane sources totaled about ~180-380 Tg (10¹² g) methane per year (Chappellaz et al., 1993). Wetlands were the dominant source with small contributions from wild fires, animals and oceans. [note 1 Tg (Terra-grams) equals 1 million tonnes]

Since methane is chemically as well as radiatively active, atmospheric concentrations can increase because the terrestrial sources are increasing and/or because the sinks are declining. An important atmospheric sink for methane is the OH (hydroxyl) radical. The reaction of methane with OH radicals is the first step in a series of reactions which eventually leads to compounds that are readily removed from the atmosphere by precipitation or uptake at the surface. OH radicals also act as a chemical sink for other trace gases. For this reason, OH radicals are known as "the detergent of the atmosphere" (Crutzen, 1995).

During the last two hundred years, atmospheric methane concentrations have more than doubled to ~1800 ppbv and are still increasing. During the same period, the total annual emission of methane has increased to ~450-500 Tg, about two times what it was during the pre-industrial period when natural sources dominated. Most of this increase in sources is due to the anthropogenic perturbation to the methane cycle, though climate variations may also contribute to changes in emission from wetlands and from wildfires.

The following sections provide a brief overview of the major methane sources -- background on what we know about them, the processes that produce methane, and what we still do not know (based on Matthews, 1993, 1994).

2. Natural Sources

Figure 2-1 below shows current estimates for individual sources. Although some uncertainties remain, the largest sources are natural wetlands, irrigated rice paddies, and domestic animals.

Figure 2-1: Global sources of methane
Also See table from Wikipedia

2.1 Wetlands

What we know:

Wetlands are most likely the largest natural source of methane to the atmosphere; their emissions are estimated to be about 100 Tg annually.
About 50% of the wetlands are peat-rich, temperature regulated northern wetlands and the remainder are low latitude systems dominated by precipitation and flood cycles.
Both flux measurements and large-scale modeling studies confirm the dominance of low-latitude wetlands and the smaller role of northern ecosystems in methane emissions under current climate conditions. Only about 30% of emissions are from peat-rich northern wetlands.

Processes that produce methane:

Methanogenic bacteria produce methane by anaerobic decomposition of organic materials.
Methane produced in the sediments is transported to the surface either through the water column (diffusion), through gas bubbles that rise from the sediments (ebullition) or via transport through the plants themselves.
Highly local controls such as temperature, topography, water table, and organic content as well as episodic events such as ebullition, degassing, hydrostatic pressure changes and wind have a large effect on methane fluxes.
Methane that is produced in water-logged soil sometimes moves upward through a drier surface soil and is oxidized, resulting in no methane emission.

Uncertainties:

There is general agreement concerning the global area and distribution of wetlands although uncertainties remain as to seasonal variations of wetland environments and dynamics of methane production periods.
The response particularly of high-latitude wetlands under a changing climate is highly uncertain; they may become larger or smaller methane sources or methane sinks.
Methane characteristics of most major wetland environments have been studied; measurements are still scarce for the wetlands of Russia which occupy about 25% of the global total, and for non-riverine tropical grasslands such as the Pantanal in Brazil.

2.2 Termites

What we know:

The source strength of termites has been estimated with a very large range, but recent estimates suggest emissions of 15-20 Tg/year.
The habitat distribution of the termite source is similar among several studies; termites are concentrated in tropical grasslands and forests.

Processes that produce methane:

Methane is produced by the activity of methane-oxidizing bacteria on the organic material consumed by the termites.

Uncertainties:

The source strength has been estimated with a very large range of 0-200 Tg methane per year.

2.3 Oceans

What we know:

The ocean source is very poorly known but considered minor. The emissions estimate is 10 Tg.
Coastal ocean regions exhibit higher and more variable concentrations.

Processes that produce methane:

Methane is produced at seepage areas in the seabed with organic-rich sediments (Judd, 2000).

Uncertainties:

Seabed flux rate estimates vary widely.
Losses to solution as bubbles rise to the sea surface are not known well.

2.4 Methane Hydrates

What we know:

Methane hydrates are rigid water cages surrounding methane molecules.
Hydrates are known or inferred to be found on the continental shelf at all latitudes.
Stability of hydrates requires high pressure and cold temperatures, meaning that most occur at depths and in regions insulated from climate change.
Methane source from hydrates is considered minor at present [See article by Office of Naval Research to show this is a huge under-estimate].

Processes that produce methane:

Hydrates are subject to destabilization from climate warming. Destabilization would lead to the release of the methane molecules.

Uncertainties:

The dispersed nature of this source makes it especially difficult to evaluate.
The large pool of methane in gas hydrates implies that a small perturbation under a changing climate could produce a considerable source of methane.

ADD to this the Work done in 2002 by the US Navy in Studying these Methane Hydrates

3. Anthropogenic Sources

3.1 Rice Cultivation

What we know:

Rice Fields Emit Methane

Rice production may account for 10% (~30-60 Tg) of the total annual methane emission.
Since 1980, rice production has risen by over 40% through the combined effects of increased harvest areas and higher yields.
Over 90% of the harvested area is confined to Asia.

Processes that produce methane:

Methanogenic bacteria produce methane by anaerobic decomposition of organic materials.
A large number of factors affect the production, transport, and efflux of methane in the flooded rice fields, among them temperature, water status, fertilizer application, soil properties, and plant phenology.
Methane that is produced in water-logged soil sometimes moves upward through a drier surface soil and is oxidized, resulting in no methane emission.
As much as 90% of methane produced in sediments may oxidize during transport to the water surface.

Uncertainties:

Information on local soil temperatures, type and application rate of fertilizers (especially non-commercial organics), seasonal and annual variations in water status, and soil chemistry is not readily available.
Even with sufficient data on the factors mentioned above, considerable uncertainties remain in quantitative relationships between methane flux and these factors, though they have been significantly reduced recently.

3.2 Domestic Animals

What we know:

Animals contribute about 80 Tg methane per year.
About half of the global emission come from India, China, the former USSR, USA, and Brazil.
Non-dairy cattle and dairy cows together contribute about 75% of the total methane source from animals; the remainder is from water buffalo, sheep, goats, pigs, camels, and horses.
Emissions from animals may be one of the better known sources in the methane budget because statistics on animal populations in developed countries are reasonably reliable.

Processes that produce methane:

Methane production from animals results from fermentation of carbohydrates in the rumen (stomach containing microbes capable of breaking down cellulose).
Production is affected by factors such as quantity and quality of feed, body weight, age, and activity level; therefore, it varies among animal species as well as among individuals of the same species.

Uncertainties:

Significant uncertainties exist with respect to population statistics for less developed countries.

3.3 Fossil Fuel

What we know:

Methane is the major component of coal gas and natural gas.
Methane emissions associated with fossil fuel sources range from ~16 to 24% of the total source strength equal to about 80-120 Tg.

Processes that produce methane:

Natural gas and coal gas both consist almost entirely of methane.
Fossil fuel sources of methane include coal mining and processing, as well as gas exploration, production, transmission, and distribution.
Methane released to the atmosphere during mining and processing of coal is associated directly with coal removed from mines as well as with releases from coal left in the mine in overlying and underlying seams.
Methane emissions associated with natural gas production and consumption include losses during extraction, venting and flaring at oil and gas wells, and losses during processing, transmission and distribution.

Uncertainties:

Most of the variation among estimates of methane released to the atmosphere during mining and processing of coal results from inclusion and/or exclusion of processes or particular coal products, and from differences in the emission factors used.
Natural gas transmission losses are the difference between gas purchased for delivery and gas sold, differences which may be due to theft and metering errors as well as to actual leaks.
The geographically- and sectorially-dispersed nature of the sources of methane emission from natural gas transmission makes direct estimates difficult.
Time series estimates using constant emission factors do not take into account changes in technology which would affect the amount of methane emitted.
Lack of data on venting and flaring of natural gas (collected by oil and gas companies but not available publicly) is a major source of uncertainty.

3.4 Biomass Burning

What we know:

Recent estimates indicate annual methane releases of ~10-50 Tg from biomass burning.

Processes that produce methane:

Methane is released when vegetation is burned. The amount is a function of burning technique and temperature, moisture and carbon content of the vegetation, amount and type of vegetation burned etc.

Uncertainties:

The contribution of biomass burning to the global emission of methane is highly uncertain due to the innate variability of the process itself as well as to severe data limitations.
A considerable portion of burning takes place in association with poorly documented agricultural activities in the tropics.

3.5 Landfills

What we know:

Open Landfills Contribute to Methane Emissions

One early global estimate of methane emission from landfills gave a range of 30-70 Tg/year, although recent estimates suggest that the landfill methane source may be more in the range of ~25 Tg.

Processes that produce methane:

Decomposition of biodegradable organic material in landfills produces both carbon dioxide and methane.

Uncertainties:

Uncertainties remain with respect to the magnitude and composition of waste production and the fraction of waste placed in landfills.
There is very high variability in local factors such as climate, age of refuse, and landfill design, construction, and management which affect the amount of methane produced, consumed and emitted in these sites.

4. Summary

Methane sources under anthropogenic control currently account for approximately 70% of the total annual emission. Several of these (e.g., animals, rice cultivation, energy-related sources) may be prone to future increases due to demands of increasing human populations. The magnitude of the remaining natural sources, dominated by wetlands, is relatively well known. Currently, northern wetlands contribute about one-third of the world's total wetland emissions while the tropics account for most of the remainder. However, wetland response to climate change predicted for the next century is highly uncertain. Depending on local interactions among temperature, water status, nutrients etc., wetland ecosystems may become larger or smaller methane sources, or even methane sinks. A varied collection of additional sources such as volcanoes, oceans, seabed seepage, gas hydrates, and peat mining are highly uncertain but considered minor, probably totaling of ~20 Tg.

Currently, we understand a great deal about the processes that produce methane from various sources as well as the distribution of many of the sources such as wetlands or animals. In addition, we now have a 15 year record of measurements of atmospheric methane from a growing network of ground stations. However, the atmospheric record shows large and variable patterns in annual increases in atmospheric concentrations and uncertainties remain with respect to year-to-year variations in methane emissions from various sources. For example, short-term variations in temperature and precipitation can affect emissions from biological sources such as rice paddies and wetlands; political and economic changes can affect levels of industrial activity and consumption of fossil fuels; management practices can affect emissions from domestic animals and rice paddies; and development and recycling trends can affect methane emissions from landfills and from wastewater.

The challenge is to improve the collection of tools we have to understand the methane cycle and its variations over time. These include:

atmospheric chemistry models that simulate chemical reactions and transport in the atmosphere,
measurements of the atmospheric concentrations of methane and related gases,
field measurements that quantify the influence of various factors on emission from sources (for example, how do methane emission from a northern wetland change when the summer is hotter than usual? wetter than usual?)
inventories of the sources of methane and associated emissions at intervals of about 5 years beginning in the early 1980s and continuing in the future.

The methane inventory project described in the following section is a contribution to the last goal listed above. These global inventories are developed in part using field measurements (2 above) and used in the atmospheric chemistry models (1 above). Results from the models are evaluated by comparing them to the measurements of atmospheric methane (2 above).

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Concentrating Solar Power

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 14:48:00 +0000

Poised for gigawatt-scale adoption in 2011, concentrated solar power’s star is only beginning to rise, says Lux Research.

Stirling Dishes win on Price and Modularity

Boston, MA

Despite competitive photovoltaic prices and lingering environmental and financing concerns, concentrating solar power (CSP) technologies are poised for gigawatt-scale adoption in 2011; and future growth will remain healthy as the generation stack increasingly incorporates CSP plants in excess of 100 MW. However, in order to land their share of this emerging market, utilities and developers alike will need a clear grasp of the economic and performance factors driving adoption of CSP’s four main technology contenders, according to a new report from Lux Research.

The report, titled “Solar Thermal Update: The Renaissance of Concentrating Solar Power,” compares the economics and performance of three key CSP technologies – parabolic trough, power tower, and Stirling thermal systems – as well as CSP’s arch-competitor, photovoltaic systems. To do so, it examines the application of each technology in a hypothetical 100 MW plant, and compares their levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), capital costs and internal rate of return, among other factors driving adoption.

“After a few fits and starts, solar thermal projects have begun to make a big impact on the generation mix in both Spain and the Southwest U.S,” said Ted Sullivan, a Lux Research Senior Analyst and the report’s lead author. “Though trough technologies have been dominant to date, we expect power tower solutions to gain increasing prominence as the technology is proven, because their integration with thermal storage technologies smashes through the fundamental constraint that has held solar back to date: intermittency.”

Among the report’s key findings:
• Dish Stirling offers the lowest capital expenditures. A more modular technology, dish Stirling leads the pack in terms of cost, due to its cheap Stirling engines. Meanwhile, the costly mirror fields of parabolic trough plants make them the priciest of CSP options, while power-tower systems are relatively cost competitive. Driven by high module costs, PV systems fall somewhere in the middle.

Solar Tower

• Conventional trough and tower CSP technologies lead in performance. Parabolic trough plants have the highest peak efficiency but come second in yield and capacity factor, while power tower is the top performer on system yield and capacity factor due to a highly efficient turbine cycle and dual-axis tracking. Dish Stirling and PV, in contrast, both underperform, with lower capacity factors and lower energy yield, in kilowatt-hours output per kilowatt of peak power (kWh/kWp).

Solar Trough

• Dish Stirling also leads in LCOE. LCOE (measured as $/kWh) neatly synthesizes the total operating costs of a power plant, and is key to determining the internal rate of return (IRR) to the project investor. Here again, dish Stirling leads due to its low cost and decent performance – making it a good substitute for PV. But power-tower technology is hard on its heels, and will remain a viable contender for years to come. Parabolic trough systems, by comparison, have the highest LCOE of any CSP plants due to their expensive capex, and high operation and maintenance costs. PV systems currently trail the pack on LCOE due to relatively high capex and mediocre performance.

Aviation Fuel from Algae

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 00:47:00 +0000

Although they still have to overcome some problems to be feasible, researchers have implement new production study

Liquid biofuels seem to be a good alternative to conventional aviation fuel. In fact, testing conducted by Airbus, British Airways, Rolls Royce, etc. suggest that biofuels from microalgae are the future. However it is necessary to improve the production system to lower (52.3 € / gigajoule), improve technological and scientific level (metabolic diagnostic techniques) and make it competitive. By John R. Coca

At present, the constant change in environmental conditions in climate change, makes it imperative that all sectors of industry (and the air navigation sector is not going to be less) to take action on the matter and reduce their environmental impact.

Algae 'Incubators'

In the latter regard, during 2010 there have been a series of tests to verify the feasibility aircraft biofuels derived from algae oil. In fact, the company EADS announced in mid-year test flight of a plane loaded with biodiesel derived solely from microalgae oil.

Towards the end of the year has created a consortium of aerospace companies and research centers to implement, among other things, the use of fuels derived from microalgae, according to EIT . Airbus, British Airways, Rolls-Royce, British Airways, Gatwick Airport, IATA and Cranfield University have formed a consortium whose main purpose is research, improvement and implementation of biofuels such as obtained from microalgae.

As stated in Renewable Energy Focus, Cranfield University has a pilot plant cultivation and processing of microalgae for the production of biofuels for aviation. However, the main objective is the establishment of a marine center for sustainable production of commercial quantities of algae biomass.

Although these tests are very encouraging feasibility can not forget that the production system still has deficiencies which must be corrected for the viability of these fuels in the sector of aviation.

With the aim of improving the production system have recently published a series of articles in magazines such as Bioresource Technology, Trends in Plant Science yBiotechnology Advances. They all give us an idea of the importance of researchers and companies give to the potential use of microalgae for biofuel obtaining a viable and profitable.

New techno-scientific research

In one Campbell and colleagues analyzed the environmental impact and economic viability of microalgal biodiesel.These authors found that emissions from microalgae, compared with those from rapeseed oil and diesel ULS (ultra low sulfur content). They saw that the emissions of greenhouse gases algae varied in the range of -27.6 to 18.2 (g of CO2) compared to 35.9 for rapeseed and 81.2 for diesel. Despite these positive data, production costs are not as favorable as the algae range from 2.2 ¢ ($ / liter) to 4.8, compared with rapeseed oil (4.2) and ULS diesel ( 3.8).These data show, according to the authors, the necessity of having a high rate production of biofuels to be economically attractive results.

Another relevant text they have written mutans and colleagues which examines the possibilities for developing a bioprospecting of microalgae to detect lipids of these organisms in different media. This will facilitate the development of optimal laboratory conditions that allow these organisms to grow the best possible way, thus keeping a large amount of lipids that will be used in the production of biodiesel.

In addition, Norsk and colleagues have published in the journal Biotechnology Advances an article analyzing the patterns of production of microalgae more employees today: open ponds, horizontal tubular photobioreactors and type flat panel photobioreactor. For the three sets of results were 4.95, 4.15 and € 5.96 / kg respectively.Suggesting that the production model is the cheapest of horizontal tubular photobioreactors.

Skepticism and doubts

Stacey Feldman writes an article which states that Mary Rosenthal, the representative of the 170 members of the Algal Biomass Organization (ABO) states that within 7 years the fuel obtained from biomass microalgal compete with the price of oil. In fact, Rosenthal said that between 2017 and 2018 will reach price parity.

This opinion is skeptical about the increase in the production of this biofuel when compared with other more optimistic positions. For example, Dan Simon, president and CEO of Heliae, microalgal technology company based in Arizona, believes the industry could offer a competitive product in about 3 years.

Also, Kaloustian the director of a company focused on Argentina culture of these microorganisms: Oil Fox, also defends its production and viability. In fact, as we saw him speaking on a visit to Spain, Kaloustian advocated immediate and effective production of these biofuels. Indeed, the company opened in August this year its first production plant of biodiesel made from algae oil.

This more or less optimistic stance contrasts with the great skepticism of techno-scientific research. In fact, as reported by Feldman, a report from the University of California, Berkeley 's Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI) states that it would take a decade of tests to determine if companies could produce a massive microalgal biofuels may well be used in air transport.

This seems to be the big question, will there be sufficient capacity to produce biofuels for aviation, given the amount of fuel it uses?. In this sense, David Biello wrote that this is the big challenge is to develop a biofuel production that is sufficient to supply even a fraction of the more than 60 million gallons of fuel used in aircraft annually.

However to achieve this objective, the main difficulty that point in the report of the University of California is focused on finding the right strain of algae that allows a high yield production. This problem is taken by scientists from the Spanish universities with whom we have contact (and not allowed us to give his name) working on algae research.These people have great doubts about the short-term viability of biofuels or because still, they say, do not have adequate strain and problems in the production system.

Real possibilities and challenges

The cultivation of microalgae seems to become one of the new international bunker fuels. In this sense Biofuels International magazine reported that the Alternative Energy Resources Company (ANR) plans to start building a biodiesel plant microalgal production in February.

In Spain there are various companies that are already producing this type of biofuel, with one of them and Aurantia Bio Fuel Systems. All of them are extremely optimistic about the possibilities of these new fuels.

The reluctance comes mainly processes and production costs. In this sense, one of which believes that business can not be permanently subsidiaries of government subsidies for these fuel prices do not rise excessively. In this regard, the Website Wageningen UR (University & Research Centre), published an editorial in which it was stated that the cost of biodiesel production from microalgae is, at present, from 52.3 € per gigajoule of energy, compared with 36 € for the rape and only 15.8 € for oil.

Microalgae

The algae are microorganisms photoautotrophs (thanks to the light obtained their metabolic products) and single cell of variable size and can live in various habitats. Most of them are aquatic but also live on land, and their number is extremely high because it was considered that 90% of the planet's photosynthesis is carried out by these microorganisms.

Although microalgae have many years with people, because in Mexico have for years been feeding products made from biomass deu na microalga Spirulina call. On the other hand, other algae such as Chlorella, Dunaliella and Haematococcus are useful in cosmetics, food, pharmaceutical, etc.

Not long ago the idea of making fuel from oil obtained from them and found that it was possible. In this sense, there are (among others) a number of candidates who seem to be the best: Scenedesmus obliquus, Scenedesmus dimorphus, rheinhardii Chlamydomonas, Chlorella vulgaris, Dunaliella tertiolecta, Nannochloropsis sp., Schizochytrium sp., Etc. However, the development of microalgae biofuels has several difficulties because of the industrial production system. Hence, as we see, today this is one of the great techno-scientific research efforts in the sector.

Basic ideas of cultivation of microalgae

Microalgae photosynthetic organisms need to be light, CO2 and water. Through photosynthesis, convert the energy captured from light (sunlight or tanning lamps) into chemical energy (CO2 + H2O + light → Carbohydrates + O2). This physiological process is conducted in the chloroplasts, organelles of great importance and that in species such as Dunaliella salina may require as much as 50% of cell volume. Thus we see that the light is one of the key factors in the cultivation of microalgae, together with the agitation of these organisms and nutrients. For this reason, scientists are testing various systems of microalgal growth in order to improve production, but as we saw the horizontal tubular photobioreactors are most suitable.

As we have seen, for the production of biodiesel is important for the species chosen have within them the greatest possible amount of usable oil. Therefore it is essential to choosing a species or a variety capable of providing high rates of this product. The problem is that species to generate a higher fat content are not precisely those that reproduce faster.

However, when selecting the best possible candidate we have to take into account the growth rate (μ) and productivity (P = μ • Cb), tolerance to radiation and temperature extremes, the selective advantages (tolerance high or low pH, salinity, high irradiance, N2-fixing capacity of the atmosphere, etc.), the high content of certain proteins, carbohydrates, lipids or selective accumulation (or excretion) of a specific compound of high value, and the ease of harvesting. All this makes the production system becomes a highly complex process and very difficult.

For this reason, an interdisciplinary team of Cornell University, has developed some techniques, based on the use of mass spectrometry, to diagnose the situation of the crop. This makes it easier to change the culture conditions of the increasing productivity.

Source: http://www.tendencias21.net/Los-biocombustibles-microalgales-se-consolidan-como-alternativa-para-la-aviacion_a5321.html

Solar Trough Air Con/Pool Heating System

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 13:23:00 +0000

System Flow Chart: Solar Assisted Air Con via Domestic Heat Network

Hitachi Plant Technologies has combined solar heating (not Photo Voltaic -PV - electricity) with with its plentiful expertise in air conditioning, accumulated over many years, in the development of the Solar Activated Air Conditioning System.

This system is designed to drive a refrigerator directly with thermal energy (Heat) generated from the solar energy collector to obtain chilled water for air conditioning.

high-efficiency parabola trough-type solar energy collector

As the key to this system, Hitachi Plant Technologies developed its own original designed high-efficiency parabola trough-type solar energy collector* (see picture). The collector is improved through design features such as its simple and easily-handled structure, and the use of computer simulations to develop a design for control of displacement of the focal point in the presence of wind and other factors.

Hitachi Plant Technologies supplies a total system incorporating the solar energy collector, as well as presenting proposals for combinations of energy-efficient technologies for air conditioning systems, and water treatment technologies.

This system also has application beyond air conditioning systems, and future development is expected to involve wider application in a variety of heat sources.

Press Release:

Tokyo, January 5, 2011 --- Hitachi Plant Technologies, Ltd. (President and Representative Director: Toshiaki Higashihara) has recently developed an environmentally-friendly Solar Activated Air Conditioning System employing its own developed solar energy collector. The system reduces consumption of fossil fuels and carbon dioxide emissions remarkably.
Hitachi Plant Technologies is actively expanding its marketing activities, targeting at local-air conditioning in buildings or district cooling facilities for the regions of the Mediterranean, the interior of North America, Western Asia, and Australia, “Sun Shine Belts” which are sufficiently exposed to huge amount of sunlight. The company expects to break in its sales up to 5 billions yen in FY2015.

Solar (concentrated thermal) power is increasingly in focus as a source of renewable, sustainable and efficient energy, thus significantly displacing the use of fossil fuels. Hitachi Plant Technologies has considerable experience in a wide range of plants employing solar energy for power and heating. Typical electricity saving with such as system could be as high as 50% dependent of design.

Whilst other companies have used solar thermal tubes, or even thermal flat plate type collectors, the use of a "mini-parabolic Trough" is a nice twist. This allows higher operating temperatures to improve energy distribution efficiencies.

The system displaces electrical energy required to do the same 'work' in terms of air conditioning. Ideally suited to hot sunny climates where air con electricity loads can be large and cause major grid problems. So in effect the utilities ought to be promoting this too to balance their power demands in the day. Also interesting is the apparent modular design of the 'Troughs' so that multiple collectors can be used for larger installations or to balance the energy input needs of a designed air con system with the square 'meterage/footage/acreage' of collectors.

All the more strange is that these types of systems are not more common. So what have the air con installers been doing over the years? I guess they thought that air con units were just an 'electrical device'.

Is the Hydrogen Fuel Cell a Practical Solution

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 19:17:00 +0000

Open Access Article Originally Published: September 23, 2009 And Available from EV World

The hydrogen initiative is stalled. The hydrogen fuel cell cars work fine but no good solutions have been found to the problems of where to get the hydrogen, how to deliver it and how to store it. 95% of our hydrogen is made from natural gas, which is abundant on earth and already distributed at 1/3rd of the price of gasoline.

Three recent breakthroughs have made natural gas a very interesting fuel:

Ceramic fuel cells that can make electricity from natural gas at 60% efficiency.
ANG: Adsorption stores natural gas at low (500 psi) pressure in compact tanks.
A glut of cheap natural gas caused by new shale drilling/extraction techniques.

The fuel cell breakthrough is particularly important because it means a car can generate its own electricity more efficiently than a massive power plant! Big plants typically average 30% efficiency, so a 60% NG fuel cell hybrid is twice as efficient as an electric vehicle charged from the grid.

Fuel Cell in the Engine Bay

That means half as much fuel is consumed. Twice as efficient as an electric car is saying a lot because electric cars are already three times more efficient than conventional cars. This is because internal combustion engines are less than 30% efficient verses 90% for electric motors.

Natural gas fuel cell cars are thus about six times more efficient than today’s cars. Using 1/6th as much fuel means pollution is also 1/6th . But NG is inherently very clean. and has 30% lower carbon content and virtually no sulfur, mercury, volatiles, and Nox so pollution is way less than 1/6th.

Since NG fuel cells have a warm up time, the hybrid batteries must have enough capacity for all-electric operation until warm up is complete. After warm up, the fuel cell keeps the batteries charged and the batteries provide power for peak loads and acceleration and recapture energy on braking.

A Prius uses 16.8 kW for continuous 70 mph driving on a level road. The fuel cell must be able to supply this much power for steady driving. Natural gas is already distributed by pipeline to homes all over the US and UK, so home refueling is possible. Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) is already used to run five million vehicles worldwide. Pump prices for CNG are about one third of the price of gasoline in spite of the expensive ($350k), 3600 psi pumps and fittings currently used for delivery.

The pipeline cost of natural gas is only 1/4th of the cost of crude oil with the same energy content. If much simpler, 500 psi Adsorbed Natural Gas refueling is adopted, prices could be reduced even further.
Cost per mile for a NG fuel cell hybrid would currently be only 1/18th of present cars but could be reduced even further with low pressure ANG refueling! ANG fuel tanks contain activated carbon “sponges” that adsorb 160 times their own volume of natural gas. They can be made from Corn cobs , which have a network of nanoscale passageways that remain after carbonization. One gram of this material has as much adsorbing surface area as a football field.

When natural gas is adsorbed on a carbon surface it ceases to act like a gas. Dense storage at low pressure makes it possible to hide the much smaller tank inside the car's frame. Even if we kept the existing CNG high pressure storage, the tripled efficiency would allow fuel cylinders only 1/3rd as large as present CNG tanks.
So an NG fuel cell hybrid is a lot like a Chevy Volt with a fuel cell replacing the range extender (engine/generator) and a much smaller battery. Its battery only needs to be large enough to run the car during warm-up of the fuel cell, currently about 15 miles. The Chevy Volt's 40-mile battery is rumored to cost $5000, so the NG car's 15-mile battery would cost $3125 less. Incidentally, at these battery prices a 400-mile range pure electric car would need $50,000 worth of batteries!

Clearly, small batteries with range extenders are the way to go until we have a significant battery breakthrough. Pure electrics have other problems too: A 110v, 20A household plug can only supply 2.2 kW which means that, unless you add 220v service, 10 hours of home charging will only take you 10 x 2.2 x 4 mi/kW = 88 miles. Natural gas today is primarily a non-renewable, fossil fuel.

But people have already begun selling renewable gas into the pipeline. Landfills, manure piles and sewage plants that used to release significant amounts of methane into the atmosphere are now selling it as green gas. Biomass and garbage can also be gasified to add to the supply.

The energy balance of grass bio methane production is 50% better than annual crops now used. Though the US power grid uses significant hydro power and other renewables, CO2 emissions are still almost twice as much per kilowatt-hour as a 60% efficient NG fuel cell. In 2007 the US power grid emitted 605 grams/kWh.
A NG fuel cell emits only 327 grams. At 4mi/kWh that translates to about 151 grams per mile for a grid charged car verses 82 for the NG fuel cell car.

Someday the grid could be cleaned up so that electric cars charged from it are cleaner than NG fuel cell hybrids. EIA data makes it easy to track our progress towards this goal: In 1996 we emitted 627 grams of CO2 per kWh and by 2007 this was reduced to 605 grams.

That’s a 2-gram per year decrease. If we continue at that rate, it will take 139 years to equal what we can do now with a NG fuel cell. Recent years show even less progress. There was no improvement between 2006 and 2007. Plugging into the grid is, unfortunately, a bit like plugging into a lump of coal.

Infrastructure expansion also favors natural gas. Gas pipelines cost half as much to build as ugly overhead electric transmission lines of the same power capacity. Gas also has one fourth the transmission loss of electricity and much cheaper energy storage.

Depleted gas fields and salt caverns are already storing 4.1 Tcf of gas in the US. At 60% efficiency this could produce 1,970 gigawatt-hours of electricity. A very cheap battery! Fuel cell developers are in a race to commercialize suitable fuel cells. The first products using NG fuel cells are home CHP electricity generators that use their waste heat to make hot water. The fuel cells in these units produce only 2 kW but they can start up from an idle state in 5 or 6 minutes.

Scaling up to 15 kW and adapting to the tough environment of a car could take years. Another company is developing a fuel cell range extender that is fueled by methanol. Methanol has only half the energy density of gasoline but, because of the high efficiency, fuel tanks would still be smaller than current gasoline tanks. “Price at the pump” is the one thing that seems to get voters excited. Reducing fuel cost/mile by a factor of 18 with a fuel that is 97% from North America while using corncobs should generate some excitement. The hydrogen initiative should be immediately redirected to focus instead on a fuel that is plentifully available, transportable and storable.

Finally if the Governments of the US, UK Europe and the rest of the world wish to allow some kind of demarcation as its a transport fuel (and thus subject to some form of road pricing tax) then LPG is already available as both a transport fuel. It is also subject to the tax as well. LPG whilst a more complex molecule could still be developed as the fuel cell of choice by the motor industry.

AD and CHP - What?

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 18:11:00 +0000

Yes AD combined with CHP or even CHCP. What is all this acronym stuff eh?

AD Plant in UK The 'tanks' are where all that rotting organic stuff goes to

AD is Anaerobic Digestion, its the sort of process that happens in a sewage works where all that nasty stuff is broken down by 'good' bacteria. What is left is largely safe but has given off lots of methane gas and CO2, along with some other trace stuff. Anaerobic means 'without Oxygen'.

Now that Methane is what we need. Its almost the same as Natural Gas that you buy at home. So it can be 'cleaned up' and sent down pipes to the gas mains or it can run a gas fired electricity generator.

But rather than just generate electricity, we also need to look at how effective the burning of gas in an engine really is. When gas is burned in say a modified car engine to drive a shaft to turn a generator to produce electricity, there are loses. These loses affect the efficiency of turning the energy value of gas into electricity. It is disappointing to discover that only around 20-25% of the gas burnt produces the electricity. The rest is 'low grade' waste heat.

The Chinese have over 2 million of these AD-CHP Units

However, this so called 'low grade' heat to you and me living in a house is more than enough to give us central heating and hot water. It's also enough to run through a device called an 'absorbtion chiller' so we get chilled water to run an air conditioning system.

By now you could be thinking about the CHP and CHCP bits. They mean

CHP = Combined Heat and Power (Electricity and Central Heating/Hot Water)
CHCP = Combined Heat, Cooling and Power. (Electricity Central heating/Hot Water and Air Conditioning)

The good thing about using the 'waste' heat in this way is that we get a lot more use out of the energy (from the methane) gas. So 20-25% of the energy from the gas gives you the electrical power generation, but we can also get around 50-60% use from the Heating and Cooling. This jacks the efficiency of a CHCP system up to the 80-85% energy efficiency range. As you will agree its a lot better than 20-25%. So energy efficiency is a major benefit.

This is what a CHP unit looks like nothing to be scared of here?

If a CHP unit was to replace simple power generation then we can practically quadruple the benefits or useful energy. This is the basis of what is called 'Distributed Energy', rather than just focusing on electrical generation as our Utilities have done for a long time in the UK and US and the other nations they have 'sold' this daft idea to.

Now back to AD. As a 'consumer' (as we all are) we waste an awful lot of stuff in our everyday lives. As do the factories that produce 'processed foods' and our agricultural practices. Food we discard, grass cuttings, stuff we don't eat in a restaurant, unused oils and fats in cooking, effluents etc, in fact anything that will 'rot' down. Now imagine if the waste collection authority/company was to have an AD system to throw all this organic waste into.

Well they could then be in the power, heating and cooling business! Trouble is most of these organisations don't actually 'think outside of the box' like they all claim. If they did, rubbish collection would be really very profitable!

Furthermore "Waste to Energy" is an important concept. It's not the same as Waste to Electricity, that's only using 25% of the ENERGY potential (for electricity). The heat and cooling energy has to be utilised. It needs somewhere to go and someone to buy it as well. The distribution of heat and cooling energy is the 'hard bit'.

AD CHCP Flow Chart Concept

But that is the concept behind a coherent "waste to energy policy" that EVERY public authority or waste collection agency MUST adopt if their green credentials are to be believed. Otherwise its all just HOT AIR. (which is another story!!).

Hydrogen Fuel Cell Buses in London

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 02:33:00 +0000

Whilst certainly not the first its good to see London starting the long long route to phase out diesel buses. With plenty of good results in China, Australia and Germany these vehicles are a step in the right direction. However to replace all of London's buses is a multi-billion £ project likely to take 20 years or more. However their press release below is encouraging. Though as a practical interim step LPG should be considered

Zero-polluting hydrogen buses that emit only water were unveiled today in London, providing a boost to the Mayor's plans to improve the capital's air quality.

Trialled H Bus 2003-2007

The first of the buses, of a planned fleet of eight, will start operating on 18 December using the latest hydrogen fuel cell technology, emitting nothing but water vapour. The buses will form the only hydrogen bus fleet in the UK and the largest currently in Europe. These state-of-the-art vehicles were specifically designed for Transport for London using pioneering technology developed by ISE, Wrightbus and Ballard. All eight buses are expected to be phased into operation next year creating the UK's first zero-emission bus route.

The buses will join one of the cleanest, lowest polluting bus fleets in Europe which also includes 100 hybrid buses set to expand to 300 and from 2012 will be joined by the Mayor's New Bus for London, which will be 40% less polluting than a traditional diesel bus.

Boris Johnson, Mayor of London, said: "These buses are a marvel of hydrogen technology, emitting only water rather than belching out harmful pollutants. They will run through the most polluted part of the city, through two air pollution hotspots, helping to improve London's air quality. This is just another way that our city is harnessing pioneering low emission public transport to improve quality of life, whether the New Bus for London, electric vehicles or my public bike hire scheme."

David Brown, Managing Director for Surface Transport at TfL, said: "London faces many environmental challenges but we believe alternative fuels, such as hydrogen, will bring genuine long term benefits in tackling CO2 emissions. The arrival of these hydrogen hybrid fuel cell buses marks an exciting new chapter for London Buses as we embrace new technologies to further build on the excellent work we are doing to improve air quality for Londoners."

London has always been at the forefront in using and developing new technology, initially pioneering hydrogen buses in the UK when it took part in the Cleaner Urban Transport for Europe (CUTE) trial from December 2003 to January 2007. TfL operated three trial hydrogen buses on the route RV1, using findings from these trials and that of European partners to seek out these suppliers who have developed these next generation hydrogen fuel cell buses to operate in central London.

This next generation technology will be phased into service on route RV1 from Saturday 18 December whilst driver training takes place, with all the buses fully entering service in 2011.

The buses are jointly funded by TfL, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and the European Union via the Clean Hydrogen in Cities (CHIC) project.

Fleet of London Buses

The London Hydrogen Partnership (LHP) launched an action plan earlier this year setting out ambitions to create a 'Hydrogen network' by 2012, to help accelerate the wider use of this zero-polluting, zero-carbon energy.

The LHP is working with London boroughs and private landowners on plans to deliver six refuelling sites to run hydrogen-powered vehicles in the capital over the next two years. It also aims to encourage a minimum of 150 hydrogen-powered vehicles on the road in London by 2012 including 15 hydrogen powered taxis

Electric Cars and Fuel Cells are the Future, BUT......

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 16:45:00 +0000

Recharging Electric Vehicle

There is no argument about the direction of the future of motor vehicles. All electric, Hybrid, Hydrogen Fuel cells etc. They are all being developed. But.

What are we going to do with the 806,000,000 petrol and diesel vehicles already out there? I mean firstly not everybody can go and buy an alternative vehicle right now or even in the medium term. In addition manufacturers and the raw materials markets could not cope either. So whats the compromise?

In practice the transition to alternative powered vehicles might take between 30-50 years. This is based on how a 'new' concept can become accepted as the 'conventional wisdom'. This occurs in all sorts of industries, from transport to construction. Reinforced concrete took 40 years to gain a place along side steel and brick. The diesel car took over 30 years in the UK to become 'accepted'. In addition technological advances along the way are also required.

And let's not forget that the fight will be for dominance in the alternative energy cars, will it be Hydrogen Fuel Cell, All Electric, Hybrids or what? Remember VHS and BetaMax, then Blu Ray and HD. Which technology will win this race and what is the attrition rate to be? Who out there will be left owning some of the 'losers' technology without the means to use it?

Therefore an intermediate step towards 'cleaner' technologies and fuels is needed. Now that diesel vehicles have become almost 'standard' we have to look at the disadvantages of diesel as a fuel. Irrespective of the relatively low CO2 emission, diesel has many other unpleasant problems, such as soots or 'black carbon'.

These products of incomplete combustion are rather bad, in fact some are considered carcinogenic. They also explain why your engine oil gets so dirty so quickly. Diesel is a 'heavy fuel' with a very complex structure. During combustion many differing compounds are created. This is why diesels are less suited in urban environments such as city centres. Its also why the diesel taxi is now falling out of favour.

In Hong Kong for example there are no diesel taxis at all. Being a very densely populated area, diesel exhaust emissions are becoming problematic. Not just human health either. The Sulphur compounds can accelerate the erosion of buildings when combined with rain.

Therefore Autogas Network has decided that this transition fuel system should be built around LPG - Liquefied Petroleum Gas. LPG or Autogas is a mixture of Butane and Propane gases that have been lightly compressed to be stored in a compact fuel tank as a liquid. LPG has the added advantage that it is extremely clean burning with so little deposits from combustion that your engine oil will remain clean much longer (up to 70,000 miles is not unknown).

Autogas Network LPG Converted 2010 Vauxhall

Not only is it much cleaner than diesel and so ideal for high mileage taxis in urban locations, it emits less than 99.9% less soot than a diesel cab. Furthermore the infrastructure is already in place. In Europe there are over 8 million LPG dual fuel cars with over 32,000 filling stations. In the UK alone there are 1,440 filling stations. So its not like the future or cars; where we need additional filling points and infrastructure.

LPG or Autogas is the ideal intermediate fuel, the ideal compromise for cleaner cheaper motoring for all those existing petrol vehicles out there or still to be built. Let's not forget that the current motor manufacturers are still making brand new cars and have spent a huge amount of money in setting up production lines. These cannot just be switched off and electric cars produced - it will take years.

2.8 Mega Watt Fuel Cell in USA

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 00:59:00 +0000

Construction of a fuel cell with enough capacity to power 2,800 homes has begun on the UC San Diego campus as part of a renewable energy project with the city of San Diego and BioFuels Energy to turn waste methane gas from the Point Loma Wastewater Treatment Plant directly into electricity without combustion.

UC San Diego's 2.8-megawatt fuel cell

When completed in late 2011, the 2.8-megawatt fuel cell will be the largest on any college campus, providing about 8 percent of UC San Diego’s total energy needs. The $19 million project requires no university funding: The project is eligible for $7.65 million in California Self Generation Program incentives; BioFuels Energy will provide the remaining $11.35 million in private investment, loans and investment tax credits.

“Our campus currently generates 85 percent of its own power. With this new fuel cell and the near-doubling of our photovoltaic solar capacity in 2011, our campus will be able to meet as much as 95 percent of our annual electricity needs,” said Gary C. Matthews, vice chancellor of resource management and planning. “The fact that we’ve been able to significantly increase our renewable-energy capacity in very challenging economic times with an innovative public-private partnership is as much a financial feat as it is an engineering accomplishment.”

As part of a 10-year agreement, UC San Diego will buy the electricity produced by the fuel cell from BioFuels Energy at competitive rates. The university’s fuel cell also offers the potential benefits of cogeneration, or combined heat and power, in which waste heat can be tapped as a secondary power source, raising the overall net efficiency of the fuel cell to about 60 percent, compared with about 33 percent for coal- and oil-fired power plants.

About 85 percent of the university’s energy needs are provided by its low-emission 30-megawatt natural-gas-fired cogeneration plant, which operates at 66 percent overall net efficiency. It is also called a combined heat and power plant because it generates electricity to run lights and equipment and also captures the plant’s waste heat to produce steam for heating, ventilation and air conditioning for much of the 12.5 million gross square feet of campus buildings. Waste heat from the plant also is used as a power source for a water chiller that fills a 3.8-million-gallon storage tank at night with cold water, which allows the university to reduce its peak daytime energy requirements by about 14 percent.

The fuel cell and its ancillary equipment will occupy a space about the size of a tennis court. It will form the centerpiece of UC San Diego’s Energy Innovation Park on the east side of the main campus, which includes:

• High efficiency, 5.75-kilowatt sun-tracking concentrating photovoltaic array made by Concentrix Solar.
• A compressed natural gas (CNG) fueling station for 13 CNG service vehicles, including two delivery trucks and two street sweepers, three sedans, three pick-up trucks and three buses. Vehicle emissions are lower with natural gas fuel than with gasoline because CNG-fueled vehicles emit 10 percent less carbon dioxide compared to diesel and 30-40 percent less than equivalent gasoline-fueled vehicles.
• A chiller plant that efficiently produces the cold water required to cool the nearby Moores UCSD Cancer Center and Shiley Eye Center.
In the future the energy park will have an array of additional technologies:
• An electric-vehicle charging station.
• A second chiller plant with 300 kilowatts of cooling capacity that will be powered by the fuel cell’s waste heat to cool the Cancer Center, Shiley Eye Center and other UC San Diego medical treatment, research and office buildings nearby.
• An energy-storage system that will stockpile four hours’ output of electricity from the fuel cell every night during off-peak hours and release the electricity to the campus energy grid during peak-demand hours in the afternoon.

The planned energy-storage system is eligible for an additional $3.4 million in Self Generation Program incentives and could reduce UC San Diego’s peak energy demand by 6 percent.

“The university’s increasingly sophisticated microgrid will integrate all the campus’

production, consumption and stored power and cooling water into one of the most sophisticated energy-management systems anywhere,” said John Dilliott, energy and utilities manager for the campus. “We will soon be able to factor in the variable cost of imported electricity and optimize the production and consumption of electricity in our entire system with a high degree of cost and energy efficiency.”

The city of San Diego will make money by selling the Point Loma Wastewater Treatment Plant’s biogas, which is purified on site and injected into an existing gas pipeline that will supply three fuel cells being constructed, one at UC San Diego and two at city of San Diego sites. “This project and the uniqueness of the concept is anticipated to pave the way for similar future applications,” said Frank Mazanec, managing director of Encinitas, Calif.-based BioFuels Energy.

The three fuel cells are made by Danbury, Conn.-based FuelCell Energy, Inc. and use an electrochemical process to combine the methane fuel with oxygen in ambient air to produce electricity directly. Carbon dioxide and water vapor are also produced, but no nitrate or particulate pollutants are produced because there is no combustion.

The so-called directed biogas project is the first time that a FuelCell Energy power plant will be fueled by renewable biogas generated at a distant location.

The fuel cell being built at UC San Diego is one of the largest fuel cells in the nation to use directed biogas from a wastewater treatment plant,” said Kenneth J. Frisbie, also managing director at BioFuels Energy. "No university has a fuel cell this big."

Solar Power, Silicon Production and Reforestation of the Sahara

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 15:26:00 +0000

(Source PhysOrg.com and DigInfo TV) -- A joint project by universities in Algeria and Japan is planning to turn the Sahara desert, the largest desert in the world, into a breeding ground for solar power plants that could supply half the world’s electrical energy requirements by 2050

The Sahara Solar Breeder Project aims to begin by building a silicon manufacturing plant in the desert to transform silica in the sand into silicon of sufficiently high quality for use in solar panels. Solar power plants will be constructed using the solar panels, and some of the electricity generated will supply the energy needed to build more silicon plants to produce more solar panels, to produce more electricity...

Koinuma's concept. Solar Power, Water, and Forests plus Silicon Production for more PV panels

Leader of the Japanese team, Hideomi Koinuma from the University of Tokyo, said while no one has tried to use desert sand as a source of high-quality silicon before, it is the obvious choice and will be of high enough quality.

The energy generated by the solar power plants will be distributed as direct current via high-temperature superconductors, a process that Koinuma said will be more efficient than using alternating current. He envisages a large network of supercooled high-voltage direct current grids capable of transporting the expected 100 GW of electricity at least 500 kilometers. Even if the grid needs to be cooled with liquid nitrogen, Koinuma said it could still be cost-competitive. (High-temperature superconductors operate at about -240°C.)

The Sahara Solar Breeder Project (dubbed the Super Apollo Project by Koinuma) is being developed as part of the International Research Project on Global Issues by the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). The team expects to have to overcome many problems, including frequent sandstorms, the need to use liquid nitrogen to cool cables and to bury them in the sand to minimize fluctuations in temperature, and so on.
The initial aims of the research will be focused on tackling the expected challenges and demonstrating the project’s viability. Training engineers and scientists from Africa in the entire research and development process is also a goal of the project.

Another project aiming to harness solar power in the Sahara was launched last year. The Desertec Foundation aims to supply 15 percent of Europe’s electricity requirements by 2050 using high-voltage direct current transmission lines without superconductors The Destertec Project will also use mainly Solar Thermal Technology and little Solar Photo-Voltaic. This is in addition to providing desalinization plants and domestic electricity to all the North African nations.

Solar Thermal Concept using Parabolic Mirrors to focus light (and heat) onto Heat Transfer Tubes

Desertec Concept and Grid Coverage

China Breaks 300 mph to Take Rail Speed Record

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 13:08:00 +0000

China' transport strategy gains an important boost with this achievement. Now as long as the electrical power is generated with clean technology then this is a great step forward.

The Xinhua News Agency said it was the fastest speed recorded by an unmodified conventional commercial train. Other types of trains in other countries have traveled faster.

This sleek conventional train powered by electricity hit over 302 mph

A specially modified French TGV train reached 357.2 mph (574.8 kph) during a 2007 test, while a Japanese magnetically levitated train sped to 361 mph (581 kph) in 2003.

State television footage showed the sleek white train whipping past green farm fields in eastern China. It reached the top speed on a segment of the 824-mile (1,318-kilometer) -long line between Zaozhuang city in Shandong province and Bengbu city in Anhui province, Xinhua said.

The line is due to open in 2012 and will halve the current travel time between the capital Beijing and Shanghai to five hours.

The project costs $32.5 billion and is part of a massive government effort to link many of China's cities by high-speed rail and reduce overcrowding on heavily used lines.

China already has the world's longest high-speed rail network, and it plans to cover 8,125 miles (13,000 kilometers) by 2012 and 10,000 miles (16,000 kilometers) by 2020.

The drive to develop high-speed rail technology rivals China's space program in terms of national pride and importance. Railway officials say they want to reach speeds over 500 kph (312 mph).

USA, China and UK team Up for Bio Fuel Technology

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 21:24:00 +0000

The process, using a unique integrated catalytic process, could open the door to a chemical industry based on renewable biomass feedstock.

Dwindling petroleum resources combined with economic, environmental and political concerns about the petroleum-based economy in which we live makes it imperative to develop new processes for the production of renewable fuel and chemicals.

The research, led by the University of Massachusetts-Amherst (UMASS) in collaboration with experts at Southeast University, Nanjing in China and Nottingham, and published in the journal Science, demonstrates how cheap renewable pyrolysis oil, bio-oils produced from biomass, can be upgraded into high commodity chemicals such as mono-alcohols, diols, light olefins and aromatic hydrocarbons — which are used in the production of plastics.

Because of their oxygen content these bio-oils have not been of high enough quality to use in the production of synthetic fuels so far. Now the team of scientists have converted the bio-oils into 11 different biomass-derived feedstocks using a de-oxygenation process which makes them more compatible with current fuels and chemical crude oil refinery settings.

Aimaro Sanna, from the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, said:

“Overall, this is a very promising and flexible catalytic process that would sensibly decrease the economical disadvantage of biomass compared with fossil fuels and would make possible the conversion of biomass on an industrial scale.”

This new catalytic process is flexible enough to produce different targeted distribution of organics to suit different existing petrochemical products in function of the different market conditions — for instance gasoline additive or feedstock for the chemicals industries.

Currently, Aimaro Sanna is a research associate at the National Centre for Carbon Capture and Storage (NCCCS) based in the University of Nottingham’s Division of Energy and Sustainability. The Centre addresses issues of global importance in the area of sustainable and affordable energy technologies.
He said: “My contribution to this work came out of an intense six month research collaboration at the Catalysis Bioenergy Centre at UMASS led by Professor George Huber working on the bio-oil hydrotreating. The goal of the project was to add hydrogen to the biomass derived molecules by reducing thermally unstable functionalities to more stable alcohols and by controlled cleavage of C-C and C-O bonds without consume high amount of hydrogen required in a typical full hydrotreating process.”

Future advances in the field of metal and zeolite catalysts, combined with reaction engineering, will lead to the design of even more efficient and economical processes to convert biomass resources to renewable chemical industry feedstocks.

The Nottingham research group lead by Dr. John Andresen is also proposing an innovative multi-steps catalytic process able to convert biomass into bio-oil by catalytic pyrolysis.

Despite the fact that the original biomass contains undesirable high oxygen contents, the catalytic pyrolysis under investigation is able to sensibly decrease its oxygen content. This would be beneficial to the further upgrading of the bio-oil by the novel process developed at UMASS due to a low amount of hydrogen that would be required in presence of low oxygen level in the starting bio-oil.

The University of Nottingham has a broad research portfolio but has also identified and badged 13 research priority groups, in which a concentration of expertise, collaboration and resources create significant critical mass. Key research areas at Nottingham include energy, drug discovery, global food security, biomedical imaging, advanced manufacturing, integrating global society, operations in a digital world, and science, technology & society.

Through these groups, Nottingham researchers will continue to make a major impact on global challenges.

Co Generation gets Thumbs Up from Germany

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 20:57:00 +0000

Supplying Electricity (or more accurately supplying ENERGY) is in the process of metamorphosis because people want to know what is the most sensible and efficient way to utilize all types of energy sources and needs. German researchers at Fraunhofer put the most common ideas for heating under the microscope and come up with findings that may not please the larger utility companies.

6 Cooling Towers shown 3 either side of the main generation building allow the rejection of around 60% of the energy released by this coal fired station to be sent into the atmosphere. The steam rising from this wasteful practice is often confused as smoke from the burning of coal.

This work from the respected Fraunhofer Institute in Germany is starting to ask some radical questions about the conventional thinking in centralized power generation. Looking at decentralization and combining power with heat and cooling loads can make fuel burning efficiencies as high as 80% and compares much better than the wasteful cooling tower designs which let 60% of the fuel energy be 'wasted' to the atmosphere. John Burke SEE, 1st December 2010.

Supplying energy is in the process of metamorphosis because people want to know what is the most intelligent and efficient way to utilize all types of energy carriers. German researchers at Fraunhofer put the most common ideas for heating under the microscope and come up with major potential.

Carsten Beier from the Fraunhofer Institute for Environmental, Safety and Energy Technology UMSICHT in Oberhausen, Germany does not believe that “anyone would burn a 50-dollar bill just to keep warm. It’s obvious that it simply is too valuable for that.” But, in contrast to dollar bills, most energy carriers are all too frequently burned for less than they are worth. Take wood, for example. Beier and his colleagues have analyzed the efficiency of heat supply systems and he explains that “wood is a high-quality fuel that can be compared to natural gas. With adequate technologies we could utilize it for power generation. As a fuel, there‘s a lot more in wood that we are taking advantage of at the moment.”

Beyond this, the researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Environmental, Safety and Energy Technology have come up with a model for comparing various systems and technologies in heat supply ranging from heating boilers for single-family dwellings right down to district heating networks for whole cities. They apply exergy as a criterion of analysis which is a thermodynamic parameter defined by the quantity and quality of an energy. In contrast to the CO2 balance sheet and primary energy consumption, the exergy analysis indicates whether we are sufficiently taking advantage of the potential lying dormant in the energies we use. Carsten Beier has come to the conclusion that “if we used fuels such as natural gas or wood for power generation and only use the waste heat for heating, we would be able to save large quantities of primary energy and avoid generating CO2 emissions.”

Cogeneration plants are taking advantage of these potentials. While large-scale power plants lose an average of 60 percent of the energy as waste heat through the cooling tower, cogeneration plants use this flow of heat for heating purposes, which means that they achieve overall efficiency of more than 80 percent.

The researchers distinguished four categories of heat generation in their analyses: burning, cogeneration and using heat pumps or waste heat from industrial processes.

Comparing these categories, using waste heat was particularly good in connection with heat networks. That said, it also became apparent that the way drinking/washing water was heated was a key factor in exergy efficiency. Beier reveals that ”even heating a room with waste heat has a poor overall exergy balance sheet if the service water for the household is electrically heated.”

Researchers derived one basic recommendation from their comparison of systems and technologies. Beier demands

”we should take advantage of all sources of heat whose temperature level corresponds to our heating requirements.”

And we could take advantage of the fact that there are a whole series of applications where heat is needed at different temperature levels.

Beier explains how.

”Any type of cascade is very efficient. For instance, if you use fuel for power generation first, then the waste heat for water heating and finally the remaining heat for space heating.”

CHP utilises the differing forms of energy from the generation of elctricity

He confesses that there might be discussions on the economic efficiency of these scenarios, especially because the initial investments are rather high. “But, on the other hand, it is essential to restructure our energy system quickly and an exergy analysis is an excellent tool for identifying how power supply should be designed in future.“

Stadium with Self Generation

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 12:45:00 +0000

Stadium to Generate it's Own Clean Electricity and Save $60 Million in Energy Costs
$30 million Investment in Wind Turbines, Solar Panels and Dual-Fuel Co-gen Plant To be Installed. The implication here is that the 7.6 megawatt on site CHP will underpin all energy needs on site and provide a surplus to the local area via selling back this energy to the power grid company.

SEE COMMENT: This is a great example of a project that should be replicated on all large scale construction projects around the globe. With large scale embedded energy production, comes the realization that decentralized power systems offer better power security. They also obviate the need for large scale generally inefficient remotely located power stations. Lets see what the UK's 2012 Olympic development has to offer in these realms of energy generation on this scale. The World Games stadium in Taiwan which opened last year was self powered albeit with solar panels.

Artists impression of finished stadium with VAWT around 'rim'

The Philadelphia Eagles today announced a plan to power Lincoln Financial Field with a combination of onsite wind, solar and dual-fuel generated electricity, making it the world’s first major sports stadium to convert to self-generated renewable energy.

The Eagles have contracted with an Orlando FL, renewable energy and energy conservation company, to install approximately 80, 20-foot spiral-shaped vertical axis wind turbines [VAWT] on the top rim of the stadium, affix 2,500 solar panels on the stadium’s façade, build a 7.6 megawatt onsite dual-fuel co-generation [CHP] plant and implement sophisticated monitoring and switching technology to operate the system.

Over the next year, they will invest in excess of $30 million to build out the system, with a completion goal of September 2011. A private provider will maintain and operate the stadium’s power system for the next 20 years at a fixed percent annual price increase in electricity, saving the Eagles an estimated $60 million in energy costs.

The Eagles estimate that over the 20-year horizon, the on-site energy sources at Lincoln Financial Field will provide 1.039 billion kilowatt hours of electricity — more than enough to supply the stadium’s power needs — enabling an estimated four megawatts of excess energy off-peak to be sold back to the local electric grid.

“The Philadelphia Eagles are proud to take this vital step towards energy independence from fossil fuels by powering Lincoln Financial Field with wind, solar and dual-fuel energy sources,” said team owner and chief executive officer, Jeffrey Lurie. “This commitment builds upon our comprehensive environmental sustainability program, which includes energy and water conservation, waste reduction, recycling, composting, toxic chemical avoidance and reforestation. It underscores our strong belief that environmentally sensitive policies are consistent with sound business practices.”

Added Eagles owner Christina Lurie, “We believe the iconic stature and universal appeal of professional sports can become a powerful, visible, motivating example of how renewable energy sources can replace fossil fuels and create a cleaner, sustainable environment for people everywhere.”

Against a backdrop of trees symbolizing the Eagles’ commitment to reforestation, the Luries invited special guests to join them in signing the Go Green! Team’s Declaration of Energy Independence, which “seeks to create a better living environment by reducing the world’s dependence on fossil fuels.”

The greening of Lincoln Financial Field is a significant step by a major sports franchise to achieve that goal. The energy to be generated by on-site renewable sources is comparable to the annual electricity usage of 26,000 homes. Engineers estimate that converting the stadium to renewable energy will eliminate CO2 emissions equivalent to 500,000 barrels of oil or 24 million gallons of gasoline consumed annually. That equates to removing the carbon emissions of 41,000 cars each year.

“The Eagles’ plan for Lincoln Financial Field represents one of the most extensive renewable energy commitments by any major facility”. “The energy plan will utilize the most technologically advanced wind turbines and solar panels. With this installation, we anticipate that many businesses will see the benefits of renewable energy and be inspired to emulate the Eagles’ bold leadership.”

Beyond the substantial environmental advantages, the Eagles’ renewable energy plan will create hundreds of jobs for the Philadelphia area. They anticipate directly employing 200 local people during the year-long design and installation phase. One-quarter of these jobs will be permanently maintained over the 20-year operational horizon. In addition, the project will generate approximately 600 indirect jobs in the surrounding region as a result of their commitment to utilize local contractors, vendors and suppliers, as available.

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter stated, “The Philadelphia Eagles have been great corporate citizens for many years, most specifically working with disadvantaged youth throughout the City. But we also know the Eagles to be green; they don’t just wear green, they sincerely believe in the concept of responsible environmental stewardship. We appreciate their commitment to an issue that is at the core of the City’s Greenworks Philadelphia Plan, to become the Greenest City in America. Today’s announcement will help reduce the City’s carbon footprint, create hundreds of much needed green jobs and put our City on the world stage. This type of forward thinking will serve as an excellent example to every organization that wants to play a role in strengthening our local economy while helping the environment.”

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell stated, “With this ground-breaking initiative, the Eagles are taking another significant step forward in their commitment to environmental responsibility and to their community. The work of the Eagles’ Go Green! initiative in raising environmental awareness and implementing green programs is a tribute to the leadership of the organization. The NFL is proud to support the Eagles and Christina and Jeffrey Lurie as they set the right example for all of sports.”

About The Philadelphia Eagles

The Philadelphia Eagles are members of the NFC East division of the National Football League (NFL). Under its current leadership, the team has become known as one of the most aggressive as well as progressive organizations in professional sports. Off the field the Eagles are recognized as a leader in community outreach having founded the Eagles Youth Partnership, one of professional sports’ most innovative charitable foundations, and Go Green, the team’s comprehensive environmental initiative. For more information visit the Eagles website at www.PhiladelphiaEagles.com.

Solar Up Draft Tower

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 11:15:00 +0000

First postulated in 1931 by Isidoro Cabanyes who discussed it in the magazine 'La energía eléctrica', this concept uses several key effects to work; the chimney effect, greenhouse warming and low velocity wind turbines.

The sun's radiation is used to heat a large body of air under an expansive collector zone (green houses in this case),

Solar Up Draught Tower Principles

which is then forced by the laws of physics (hot air rises) to move as a hot wind through large turbines to generate electricity. A Solar Tower power station will create the conditions to cause hot wind to flow continuously through 32 x 6.25MW pressure staged turbines to generate electricity.

One of the major advantages of a Solar Tower over other renewable and traditional coal & nuclear energy producers is a Solar Tower does not use any water in the energy production process.
A US Department of Energy report 'Reducing water consumption of concentrated solar power electrictity generation', states coal, nuclear and heliostat CSP technology (power tower) utilize approximatley 500 gallons of water per MWh of power produced.
The Solar Tower project earmarked for Arizona will abate the approximate usage of 528 million gallons of potable water (drinking water) per annum.'

Solar Up Draught Tower with Thermal Storage

Artists Impression of the Finished 'Power Station'

When using green houses crops can be grown and/or some heat energy can be retained overnight using water filled tubes as can be seen in this schematic below. This allow for the generation of power over a 24 hour period.

300,000 homes to get solar electricity after federal approval granted

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 00:14:00 +0000

Working on the Parabolic Reflectors for the SOLAR THERMAL PLANT

Good news from California and for Solar Thermal Plant (as opposed to solar PV panels). These reflectors concentrate light onto tubes filled with a heat transfer medium. This in turn is stored in insulated tanks and used over a 24hour period to power turbines to generate electricity - thus power at night!. Big in Spain and perfected by the Germans, this is an international project. See below from their press release.

Solar Trust of America, LLC today announced that its project development subsidiary, Solar Millennium, LLC, has secured a Record of Decision (ROD) from the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) approving the Blythe Solar Power Plant’s Right of Way Grant. The ROD is the final regulatory milestone in the federal permitting process and it paves the way for Solar Millennium, LLC to build and operate its Blythe Solar Power Project, which will be the largest solar power facility in the world.

Located in Riverside County, California, the Blythe solar power facility, will be the first parabolic trough solar facility approved on U.S. public land. It will consist of four 250 MW plants that together will deliver 1,000 MW of nominal generating capacity, or enough electricity to annually power more than 300,000 single-family homes. Upon completion the Blythe facility will increase the solar electricity production capacity of the U.S. by more than double, according to statistics from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Tidal Power: More Efficient Design Claim

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 11:21:00 +0000

A new company, Kepler Energy Limited, has been formed to develop a tidal turbine which has the potential to harness tidal energy more efficiently and cheaply, using a device which is simpler, more robust and more scaleable than current designs.

The new design of tidal turbine. Image courtesy of University of Oxford

The turbine is the result of research in Oxford University's Department of Engineering Science by Professor Guy Houlsby, Professor of Civil Engineering, Dr. Malcolm McCulloch, head of the electrical power group, and Professor Martin Oldfield, Emeritus Professor of the thermofluids laboratory.

Kepler Energy Limited will design, test and develop a horizontal axis water turbine intended to intersect the largest possible area of current. The rota is cylindrical and rolls around its axis, thereby catching the current. The researchers received £50,000 in funding from the Oxford University Challenge Seed fund, managed by Isis Innovation, to build a 0.5 metre diameter prototype demonstrating the benefits of the design. A full-scale device would measure up to 10 metres in diameter, and a series of turbines can be chained together across a tidal channel.

UK waters are estimated to offer 10 per cent of the global extractable tidal resource. Tidal currents are sub-surface, so tidal turbines have minimum visual impact, unlike wind farms or estuary barrage schemes.
Tom Hockaday, managing director at Isis Innovation said: 'This is the latest in a number of spin-outs from the Department of Engineering Science. Isis is fortunate to work with such an entrepreneurial department, particularly on technologies which have the potential to make a big impact on our energy supply.'

Provided by Oxford University

Small is Beautiful - HYDRO-ELECTRIC

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 12:13:00 +0000

Small is beautiful in hydroelectric power plant design, and good for the environment

In the shaft power plant design developed at the Oskar von Miller Institute of the Technische Universitaet Muenchen, water drops vertically into a concrete housing dug into the river bed, turns the turbine of a submersible generator, and returns to the river below the dam. This photo shows an experimental model of a shaft power plant -- without the water. Credit: TU Muenchen

Hydroelectric power is the oldest and the "greenest" source of renewable energy. In Germany, the potential would appear to be completely exploited, while large-scale projects in developing countries are eliciting strong criticism due to their major impact on the environment. Researchers at Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM) have developed a small-scale hydroelectric power plant that solves a number of problems at the same time: The construction is so simple, and thereby cost-efficient, that the power generation system is capable of operating profitably in connection with even modest dam heights. Moreover, the system is concealed in a shaft, minimizing the impact on the landscape and waterways. There are thousands of locations in Europe where such power plants would be viable, in addition to regions throughout the world where hydroelectric power remains an untapped resource.

In Germany, hydroelectric power accounts for some three percent of the electricity consumed – a long-standing figure that was not expected to change in any significant way. After all, the good locations for hydroelectricpower plants have long since been developed. In a number of newly industrialized nations, huge dams are being discussed that would flood settled landscapes and destroy ecosystems. In many underdeveloped countries, the funds and engineering know-how that would be necessary to bring hydroelectric power on line are not available.

Smaller power stations entail considerable financial input and are also not without negative environmental impact. Until now, the use of hydroelectric power in connection with a relatively low dam height meant that part of the water had to be guided past the dam by way of a so-called bay-type power plant – a design with inherent disadvantages:

The large size of the plant, which includes concrete construction for the diversion of water and a power house, involves high construction costs and destruction of natural riverside landscapes.
Each plant is a custom-designed, one-off project. In order to achieve the optimal flow conditions at the power plant, the construction must be planned individually according to the dam height and the surrounding topography. How can an even flow of water to the turbines be achieved? How will the water be guided away from the turbines in its further course?
Fish-passage facilities need to be provided to help fish bypass the power station. In many instances, their downstream passage does not succeed as the current forces them in the direction of the power plant. Larger fish are pressed against the rakes protecting the intake of the power plant, while smaller fish can be injured by the turbine.

A solution to all of these problems has now been demonstrated, in the small-scale hydroelectric power plant developed as a model by a team headed by Prof. Peter Rutschmann and Dipl.-Ing. Albert Sepp at the Oskar von Miller-Institut, the TUM research institution for hydraulic and water resources engineering. Their approach incurs very little impact on the landscape. Only a small transformer station is visible on the banks of the river. In place of a large power station building on the riverside, a shaft dug into the riverbed in front of the dam conceals most of the power generation system. The water flows into a box-shaped construction, drives the turbine, and is guided back into the river underneath the dam. This solution has become practical due to the fact that several manufacturers have developed generators that are capable of underwater operation – thereby dispensing with the need for a riverbank power house.

TU Muenchen civil engineer Albert Sepp (left) and Professor Peter Rutschmann are co-developers of the shaft power plant design. The power plant, most of which lies concealed below the riverbed, is designed to let fish pass along with the water. Credit: TU Muenchen

The TUM researchers still had additional problems to solve: how to prevent undesirable vortex formation where water suddenly flows downward; and how to best protect the fish. Rutschmann and Sepp solved two problems with a single solution – by providing a gate in the dam above the power plant shaft. In this way, enough water flows through to enable fish to pass. At the same time, the flow inhibits vortex formation that would reduce the plant's efficiency and increase wear and tear on the turbine.

The core of the concept is not optimizing efficiency, however, but optimizing cost: Standardized pre-fabricated modules should make it possible to order a "power plant kit" just like ordering from a catalog. "We assume that the costs are between 30 and 50 percent lower by comparison with a bay-type hydropower plant," Peter Rutschmann says. The shaft power plant is capable of operating economically given a low "head" of water of only one to two meters, while a bay-type power plant requires at least twice this head of water. Series production could offer an additional advantage: In the case of wider bodies of water, several shafts could be dug next to each other – also at different points in time, as determined by demand and available financing.

Investors can now consider locations for the utilization of hydropower that had hardly been interesting before. This potential has gained special significance in light of the EU Water Framework Directive. The directive stipulates that fish obstacles are to be removed even in smaller rivers. In Bavaria alone, there are several thousand existing transverse structures, such as weirs, that will have to be converted, many of which also meet the prerequisites for shaft power plants. Construction of thousands of fish ladders would not only cost billions but would also load the atmosphere with tons of climate-altering greenhouse gas emissions. If in the process shaft power plants with fish gates and additional upstream fish ladders were installed, investors could shoulder the costs and ensure the generation of climate-friendly energy over the long term – providing enough power for smaller communities from small, neighborhood hydroelectric plants.

Shaft power plants could also play a significant role in developing countries. "Major portions of the world's population have no access to electricity at all," Rutschmann notes. "Distributed, local power generation by lower-cost, easy-to-operate, low-maintenance power plants is the only solution. For cases in which turbines are not financially feasible, Rutschmann has already come up with an alternative: "It would be possible to use a cheap submersible pump and run it in reverse – something that also works in our power plant."

Provided by Technische Universitaet Muenchen

Electricity from Heat; with no moving parts

noreply@blogger.com (John Burke) — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 14:32:00 +0000

From Arizona University comes a very promising break-through in utilising heat energy. The heat wasted in electrical generation is monstrous, typically 2kW of heat produced from every 1kW of electricity generated. Traditionally this is just dissipated in the cooling towers to the atmosphere.

Benzene Rings in Theoretical Device

But if this waste energy can be harnessed and turned into more electricity then this 'wasted' energy can be properly harvested. Report below.

With rapid industrialization, the world has seen the development of a number of items or units, which generate heat. Until now this heat has often been treated as a waste, making people wonder if this enormous heat being generated can be transformed into a source of electric power. Now, with the physicists at the University of Arizona finding new ways to harvest energy through heat, this dream is actually going to become a reality.

University of Arizona Research Team: The research team is headed by Charles Staffor. He is the associate professor of physics, and he along with his team worked on harvesting energy from waste. The team’s findings were published in the September 2010 issue of the scientific journal, ACS Nano.

Justin Bergfield who is an author and a doctoral candidate in the UA College of Optical Sciences shares his opinion, “Thermoelectricity can convert heat directly into electric energy in a device with no moving parts. Our colleagues in the field tell us that they are confident that the device we have designed on the computer can be built with the characteristics that we see in our simulations.”

Advantages: Elimination of Ozone Depleting materials: Using the waste heat as a form of electric power has multiple advantages. Whereas on one hand, using the theoretical model of molecular thermoelectric helps in increasing the efficiency of cars, power plants factories and solar panels, on the other hand efficient thermoelectric materials make ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, outdated.

More Efficient Design: The head of the research team Charles Stafford is hopeful about positive results because he expects that the thermoelectric voltage using their design will be 100 times more than what others have achieved. If the design of the team, which they have made on a computer does work, it will be a dream come true for all those engineers, who wanted to catch and make use of energy lost through waste but do not have the required efficient and economical devices to do so.

No need for Mechanics: The heat-conversion device invented by Bergfield and Stafford do not require any kind of machines or ozone-depleting chemicals, as was the case with refrigerators and steam turbines, which were earlier used to convert waste into electric energy. Now, the same work is done by sandwiching a rubber-like polymer between two metals, which acts like an electrode. The thermoelectric devices are self-contained, need no moving parts and are easy to manufacture and maintain.

Utilisation Of Waste Energy: Energy is harvested in many ways using the car and factory waste. Car and factory waste can be used for generating electricity by coating exhaust pipes with a thin material, which is a millionth time of an inch. Physicists also take advantage of the law of quantum physics, which though not used often enough, gives great results when it comes to generating power from the waste.

Advantage Over Solar Energy: Molecular thermoelectric devices may help in harvesting energy from the sun and reduce the dependence on photovoltic (PV) cells, whose efficiency in harvesting solar energy is going down. SEE COMMENT: Thus solar thermal collectors, which are far cheaper than PV could eventually be utilised for direct electrical generation in the home or commercially.

How It Works

Though having worked on the molecule and thinking about using them for a thermoelectric device, Bergfield and Stafford had not found anything special till an undergraduate discovered that these molecules had special features. A large number of molecules were then sandwiched between electrodes and exposed to a stimulated heat source. The flow of electrons along the molecule was split in two once it encounters a benzene ring, with one flow of electrons following along each arm of the ring.

The benzene ring circuit was designed in such a way that the electron travels longer distance round the rings in one path, which causes the two electrons to be out of phase when they reach the other side of the benzene ring. The waves cancel out each-other on meeting. The interruption caused in the flow of electric charge due to varied temperature builds up voltage between electrodes.

The effects seen on molecules are not unique because any quantum scale device having cancellation of electric charge will show a similar effect if there is a temperature difference. With the increase in temperature difference, energy generated also increases.

Thermoelectric devices designed by Bergfield and Stafford can generate power that can light a 100 Watt bulb or increase car’s efficiency by 25%.

SEE COMMENT: Lets hope that the practical application of this effect can be brought to the development stage as soon as possible