More on the renewability of oil as a power source

[oiuyt]

http://www.springfieldnews-leader.co...key120402.html

New plant to be operated by Con-Agra to convert organic wastes into petroleum products including oil and diesel fuel.

Enjoy.

-B :)

[Jason]

Is it really a good idea to have TWO threads about this?

You must be some kind of sadist.

[pkt]

Jason,

In order to take this thread away from oiuyt:

One thing good about sabreurs is that most of us have balanced personality:
both sadistic and masochistic



I don't know about epeeists...

Perhaps someone like epeemike can answer this Q.

PK

[edew]

I and oiuyt both posted information about this "renewability" of oil from waste animal products on April 1. So, I thought maybe it might be an April Fool's joke.

Hunting around, the article that we both referred to, from the Springfield News, was published on December 4, 2002. Hence, that is a first indication that it is probably not an April Fools' joke. Of course, one can spoof that information as well.

So, a google search for thermal depolymerization plant came up with changingworldtech.com.

Read up on them. Of course, they could be bogus as well, as there are plenty of snake-oil (haha) salesman websites touting free energy this or free energy that. Hydrinos, blacklightpower, and other flim-flam sites do abound.

[135711]

there have been many articles written about converting waste products into energy sources, so many engineers have sat down and written up stuff, you can't keep track of it all, it's all a gigantic waste of time, everytime one of those guys presented something to an oil company, they would 'naturally' turn it away. The oil corporates had no intentions of creating alternative sources - they didn't have the brains to introduce something even on an eventual basis, or slowly to the economy. They just wanted things the way they were; and repeatedly referring to the ties and friendships they had made over the years with Saudi Arabia. I couldn't have agreed more with the Saudi link, they've been our friends for so long it's impossible to unravel the whole thing, and who would want to? The problem is that they have 1st alligance to their 1st friends and they may be very sorry, but we're not on the top of their holiday list. If we had been less greedy, and were willing to haul it through a transitional stage we would not only have created new fuel sources, but a new industry that would have created other jobs. The whole concept has gone the way of organic farming, fish ponds, and hiking. But we can't blame each other for this, because unless i'm mistaken, there's no-one on this board who has corporate power.

[pkt]

hey, 135711, clear up your PMs....

Then there's the cheap way of generating methane to generate electricity in the poorest parts of India using, yup, BS, literally. Well, actually and cow **** too, we have to be PC here.

Remember this whenever you hear factory pig farms, etc. polluting the waterways...

The solutions are out there...

PK

[Sildar]

Personally, I favor Dave Barry's solution. We just need to use our newfound genetic engineering technology to clone some more dinosaurs, then when they die we let them decompose naturally, and there you go; renewable oil supplies!

It's about as feasible as the "renewable" old growth redwood forests here in California; wait 1000 years, and you won't even know it's ever been clearcut! Just ask the lumber companies.

[dreadfoil]

Someone actually designed a entire heating system for a house using human waste, I saw the specs, it was incredible! I've also been privy to the India cow-dung spec thing and it's a wonder unto itself. In the cold climates it's more urgent to develop fuel alternatives; India is considerably warmer than North America, with the exception of Kashmir. I would love to visit Kashmir one day, however, at the moment they're in the middle of a religious conflict. What do they use in Sweden? I would be interested in hearing about it? For a while, wood burning stoves were the thing, I still think it's a great idea for private homes, to have a wood burning stove in one room, with electric heat in some others, then employ the old fashioned methods of 'closing up several rooms' for the winter; while employing the solar panels for the southern states as well as other warmer climes.

Sometimes I think we fencers should run the world! hey! let's go!

[pkt]

Webmeister jsut censored me!!!
I didn't write cow ****. I wrote 'cow sh*t'. what's wrong with that?

That reminds me of watching movies on American channels vs watching the same movie on Cdn channels. The former bleep out some of the most common swear words. I guess LCD - lowest common denominator - is the yardstick they use. Who do they think that kind of language is going to offend? Not the kids. Perhaps the 80 y-o church-going little old ladies.

that's enough cow dung to keep an Indian village lit up for a long time.



PK

[edew]

It's interesting that cow 5H1t was censored by the auto-censor. Well, probably not interesting. The censoring was probably done with little consideration for the context.

In the case of PK's original post with the term, it was used not as some expletive or invective. It was really used to describe the fuel used: cow manure.

[135711]

how did i miss that. sorry guys.

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!

Originally posted by dreadfoil
Someone actually designed a entire heating system for a house using human waste, I saw the specs, it was incredible! I've also been privy to the India cow-dung spec thing and it's a wonder unto itself. In the cold climates it's more urgent to develop fuel alternatives; India is considerably warmer than North America, with the exception of Kashmir. I would love to visit Kashmir one day, however, at the moment they're in the middle of a religious conflict. What do they use in Sweden? I would be interested in hearing about it?

Well, since I am an engineer in Sweden, I can shed some light on this. Of the electricity produced in Sweden, nuclear and hydroelectric each provide somewhat less than 50%. Fossil fuels make up most of the remainder, while other renewables account for a bit more than token amounts. The latest 30 years there has been a lot of political pressure against nuclear power and for the alternative renewables, this has lead to a lot of political stuff but has not changed the energy mix, so far. There are no fossil fuel deposits in Sweden, and therefore there is no lobbying by oil/coal/gas companies. The energy consumption not used for electricity production (except vehicle fuels) - mainly domestic or industrial heating consists of fossil fuels, and a large proportion of the thrash is also used as fuel. Also important are various wood byproducts, burnt in industries, this is due to the facts that 57% of the country is forested, and wood industry is a huge industry in Sweden. So much for energy production.

The Swedish building code is shaped by the fact that most of the country lies north of Anchorage - while the Golf stream helps us, it is still a cold country. (Close to where I grew up, there are large areas where they have on average 220 days/year of snowcover. Where I grew up, I could expect snow to stay until at least the end of april, and have at least one week each winter with temperatues lower than -30 Celsius.) Windows (actually, that word in English comes from Viking language!) are by law required to be 3-glazed in new buildings, and there are tax deductions for insulating your house - most houses have up to 40 cm of rockwool/glassfibre mat insulation. In order to keep the gasoline consumption down (and thus protect the trade balance) gasoline is heavily taxed - it costs about 1 $/liter - and big cars are also heavily taxed. This would not have been feasible is there were strong oil-producing local companies. There are lots of political carrots (tax breaks, subsidized university research, etc) for companies that want to reduce energy consumption, and sticks for the lazy ones.

On balance, Swedes consume less energy/capita than Americans, and when the cold climate and low population density anre taken into consideration, our consumption is low even by Western European standards.

Have a nice time!

Peter Gustafsson

[pkt]

Peter,

Thank you for your insights.

"On balance, Swedes consume less energy/capita than Americans, and when the cold climate and low population density anre taken into consideration, our consumption is low even by Western European standards."

Alas, Cdns are energy hogs too.

Here in BC, on the wet coast of Cda, we do not have any nuclear -or as Dubya said it in his 2003 State of the Union speech, 'nu-cu-lar', not once but 3 times. daeceg, is that how Texans say that word? - power plants. It is mainly hydro - hence BC Hydro, our electricty utility - natrual gas and thermal. BC do have our own natural gas and fossil fileds but, alas, not to the same extent of the blue-eyed sheiks of Alberta.

As a result of the sucking from south of the border, the nat. gas price is everincreasing: a 16% price increase just started April 1.

Ther eis one - yup ONE building in Vancouver that uses geothermal water heating so beloved of the Icelanders. But lately I've heard more condominium - read apartment - owners are exploring this source of renewable energy.

Our gasoline price - more than 50% of it is taxes of one sort or another - has been in the CAD 0.90 range. Today it is 0.799 per litre.

Friday, April 4, 2003
1 Canadian Dollar = 5.81136 Swedish Krona
1 Swedish Krona (SEK) = 0.17208 Canadian Dollar (CAD)

To our American, non-Alaskan friends, the temperature Peet is talking about is not bad for the prairies. In Sweden at least they have the Gulf Stream, in the prairies, nada. Then there is Calgary with the shinook coming in from the south. Winnipeg , Manitoba is reputedly the coldest city in Cda. The intersection of Portage & Main has clocked the highest wind velocity...

What is rockwool. I hope that's not asbestos.

Most of the windows in Cda is double-glazed. The have yet to mandate 3-glaze.

One unfortunate result of the Fed's mandate to make houses more het-tight was that here on the wet coast - in both Cda & the US - we have leaky condos. The wind drive rain goes under the metal cap on the flat-roofed building, go in behind the walls. As a result of sealing the buildings for conserving heat, the water has nowhere to go but through the gyproc into the inside...

I unfortunately live in one such leaky condo. Our share of the repairs is CAD 45,000, enough to buy a brand new M-B or Bimmer.


Now they have a new tech called 'rain-screen' which allow he rain to leave the wall cavity... too late for us.

PK

[135711]

Yes, and speaking of insulations, construction in the us has taken a bit of a dive, they build stuff, with less insulation and then it ups the need for fuel, which puts more demand on fossil fuels etc etc, if on the other hand, we had placed a little more importance on following specifications as an architect would have originally wanted we wouldn't be in this mess,

Mango

p,s,: peat moss, i can't believe it I haven't thought of that in a million years!

[pkt]

135711,

Some of the reasons we have leaky condos here on the wet coast was because:
1. developers cater to the market whims rather than the physical realitiies of living in a rain forest.
2. architects stuck to the building codes meant for the dry, cold climates east of the Rockies.
3. the Fed gov't catering to the biggest mass of where the electors live.
4. Greed. Tradesmen not doing their jobs properly.

ad nauseum.

PK

[135711]

the architects spend a lot of time designing beautiful structures, they have them blueprinted and engineering go over them for correctness, plumbers go over them, they all look over the specs then someone comes along and says: 'beautiful, really nice, but, that will cost me X amount of dollars. I have to hire 50 carpenters, who are union and their salaries are X amount of dollars, and so on, until someone comes along and says: "well, we need our money, so, buy copper plated instead of all copper" and then it slowly goes - now before you freak out and change majors, realize that most of the public buildings are built better than private homes. It's sort of ridiculose, but the places where we live, eat and sleep are less comfortable than our offices. So, if you just do your best then you won't have to worry about it. It's like that in every industry.

[thyme_daniels]

this is so cool! i just read about this in the latest issue of discover magazine last week. they even had pictures and diagrams. it is definitely such an awesome thing. imagine that! turning organic waste into useful resources! if you are interested in this, i highly recommend picking up that magazine. very cool.

[pkt]

Originally posted by thyme_daniels
this is so cool! i just read about this in the latest issue of discover magazine last week. they even had pictures and diagrams. it is definitely such an awesome thing. imagine that! turning organic waste into useful resources! if you are interested in this, i highly recommend picking up that magazine. very cool.

thyme,

YOu got me going there. Not till the 2nd last word of the 2nd line did you mention what you were talking about.

I thought you were writng about leaky condos... I was thinking to meslf, who is this person...

Yes, you should see the diagrammes for rain screen. that;s pretty nifty too.

----------------(---

135711,

I agree with you. That unfortunately is the sad fact. Add on top of that the fact that a lot of developer, in order to maximise the profit margin do not hire qualified workers and gov't, wanting to be pro=business, do not want to enact laws that force developers / builders to hire qualifies people to build the most costly asset most of us will own in our life.

BTW, did you have a chance to clear out your PMs?

My reply to your request is this:
the Power Point file is too big to be attahced here. so, as I mentioned before, you or anyone who want to read that University of Milan's PowerPoint presentation/explanation of 'Why the US go to war' send me you email address... I don't have any commercial use for them and I promise I won't 'spam' you myself.

PK