Curious how much energy it costs to get oil. How much of that is due to economies of scale.

While the generation of energy is important, i think that getting it to places and the ability to store it for use later is just as important.

Where do people get this sort of BS?!? Do you have absolutely no understanding of the basic sciences, that you would accept as true and repeat such nonsense?

As I suggest to Snowman, get something into your head!

O.K. Professor enlighten me.:confused:

There is only one ready to go alternative energy source: Nuclear Fisson power generation.

Our Electric power consumtion is around 4 Trillion kWh per year. We need about 500,000 mW of Power Generation. Installed cost of a Nuclear Power plant is around $1,000,000 per mW, or it would cost about $500 Billion to replace the Electrical Generation with Nuclear.

We need a standardized design, which our government is already familiar - I suggest the same basic design as used on Aircraft Carriers. This may reduce the costs, since we can setup factories to build the components. We should build them as 600MW plants and build aproximately 1,000 of them, which will allow us growth in our electrical generation.

Next, we move from a gasoline based vehicle economy to a CNG based one. We can even produce some hydrogen and mix it with the CNG for the cars (max 5%). Oil can then be used for plastics and polymers industry. Coal can be left where it is, and used in the plastics and polymers industry if we run out of oil.

In addition to saving tremedous amounts of money on fuel, the fuel we use should be the stocks of enriched uranium we have left over from the Cold War. There is only one way to prevent it from ever being used in a bomb, and that is to 'burn' it in a nuclear cycle.

And as far as the waste goes, nuclear waste is _less_ radioactive than the fuel. Uranium exists all around us. Nuclear plants actually _clean_ the environment, turning hazardous naturally occuring elements into safer, less radioactive ones.

The final step is to research into 2 things:

#1: Find a _use_ for the nuclear by products. Gasoline used to be a by product from Kerosene production!

#2. Start looking now for the next power source

None of which can be accomplished by government.

Nor should it be.

Bravo Red-Beard. Its the truth. I find it interesting that people get upset about 5% Plutonium nuclear reactors sitting on huge concrete pads with safe guards, but no one bats and eye over 95% enriched Thorium reactors in nuclear subs cruising hundreds of feet below the ocean surface. Nuclear waste management isn't a technical problem, its a political problem. Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactors would have reduced the amount of nuclear waste from power plants even more. My biggest bone about nukes is that they didn't have a solid, permanent disposal solution nationally before they started commercial nuke power plants.

Perhaps the Nuclear Waste Isolation Pilot Project in Carlsbad, NM and the high level repository being built in Deaf Smith County, NV (can't remember the name of it right now) will help solve the waste problem.

No argument here, now lets do it.

competentone Please explain. Hope you are correct as we can use as many options as possible.

Red Beard Totally agree. Other countries have realized this years ago. Lets get going and eliminate gas and oil fired generation of power. Grab loads of ex-Navy people with nuke experience and put them to work generating power for the country.

As soon as federal government regulation of the industry is abandoned; I'm almost certain that the commercial power companies will build the reactors. They'll come on line in 5-10 years if we citizens establish the demand for the power.

Since government regulations such as the useless, for animals (but a godsend to fascists) Endangered Species Act would be abandoned along with many other roadblocks, perhaps the 1950's proposals of doing away with power meters for homes would become reality.

Nah, only kidding. But that was once thougt to be possible, they'd just send you a small bill each month, the same for everyone. Sort of like a fixed garbage collection fee.

OK sorting out all the BS to date. There is NO alternative energy source. Its oil and Nuclear.

NO one has even IDENTIFIED an alternate source of energy, let alone make it feasible. I understand Einstein’s theory’s, and can even derive many of them, but NO one has identified an alternate source of energy. I would give all my earthly possessions to ANYONE who can identify a single source of alternate energy that produces more than it consumes to produce. That’s a few Million bucks in short to anyone willing to try. I am sure the world is willing to offer unlimited bucks for such a source.

People who talk about alternate sources of energy and just plain NUTS, without any common sense or a single ounce of rational thinking. THERE ARE NO SOURCES OF ALERNATE ENERGY, PERIOD!!!!

Anyone who considers wind, geothermal or solar energy as an alternate source is just plain, STUPID. DO the calculations, an average 8th grade education is all that is required.. Is there a politically correct way to state this? Yes, Your just plain STUPID if you cannot do these calculations. In other words, God help us if we cannot add 2 plus 2 and get 4 for an answer.

I wish there were an alternate source, I would be racing to identify it, to make it work, it would make me incredibly rich, but alas, I have not discovered it, and no one else has either.

And if I, as an engineer and physicist cannot discover IT who can?

NO one responded. Thats quite approiate.

Jack,

Well, considering that estimates are that our fossil fuel will last only 20-40 more years, should we just shoot ourselves now and end it while life is good?

Jack,
In some ways, your position reminds me of the livery stable owner of the late 1800s who might have asked, "Why would anybody want to travel on a powered buggy? They're slow, smelly, noisy, too expensive and you have to have a smooth road to travel on. And where are you ever going to get gasoline in these parts? Anyone who considers powered buggies is just plain STUPID!"
The current cost-benefit ratio of wind, solar, hydro, tidal and wave action energy generation is unfavorable because we are undervaluing the fossil fuels currently in use. Sure carbon fuels are cheap, being basically chemically stored solar energy, we are only paying to get them out of the ground, do a bit of refining and transport. But they are finite. The laws of supply and demand are in effect. There will come a day when either the supply diminishes to the point where the price makes it a poor choice, or some other factor, such as politics, dictates a change to a more sustainable energy.
Please note 'politics' can cover a broad range of circumstances. Much of Germany's work with bio-fuels in the early 1940s was a response to the Allied blockade which restricted the supply of fossil fuel stocks. What happens if the cost of Gulf crude doubles because of 'political' considerations?
Stupid or not, if the 'alternate energy sources' become the only game in town, that's where we'll be playing.
Les

Actually, the answer is methanol - the same stuff used to power Indy cars. I recall a thread where Pelican member Grady Clay said he used to run a 911 on methanol. If the stuff were more common and less toxic, I'd be running my 911 on it now. But sadly, it is pretty nasty stuff.

They don't respond because you ignore them when they do. One member says much of his state runs on hydro. Another says he currently uses geothermal in his home. And you keep saying it is impossible. And then you get insulting about it. Frankly, you just made it to my ignore list.There is no point in discussing anything with you if you dismiss the first hand experiences of the others on the forum. If you are going to ignore everything we say, then why post in the first place? You are the weakest link. Goodbye.

Now as for alternative energy, there is a TON of money to be made by the individuals who manage to solve our oil dependency. IIRC, Iceland uses geothermal almost exclusively and I just heard last night on the radio that Spain gets 1/4 of its electricity from wind. And as a person who lives near the ocean, I am amazed we don't build wind farms off the coast the same way we build drilling rigs. There is a big debate right now in MA over an offshore wind farm where a bunch of so-called "environmentalists" are complaining the windmills will mess up the pretty view of the ocean. Frankly, I have been a hard core tree hugger my whole life and I think they are nuts. These same environuts are willing to pour tons of fertilizers and pesticides into the Earth to grow ethanol but won't erect a bunch of windmills out at sea. Seems like a no-brainer to me.

Duh Buddy, the Sun's perty powerfull, and although the energy we receive from it in relationship to its total consumption is mind boggling, still, its not coming from us. :)

Wind, Tide, etc, all get their energy from the sun. Even our oil's energy came from the sun. Plants used the energy to make hydrocarbons, which where rapidly buried and turned into petroleum or coal. Its quite simple realy.

I think this is an over-simplification of the reality of nuclear waste. Nuclear plants do not use "naturally occuring elements" per se - they use enriched uranium. Nuclear fuel is essentially a non-issue until it is bombarded with neutrons. You can hold the pellets in your hand without risk. Once the fuel is irradiated, the story changes. The fuel is "used up" to a point where it is economically not beneficial to leave it in the reactor any longer, but it is still incredibly nasty. As in "acute lethal dose in a matter of minutes" nasty. So nasty they don't really know what to do with it. That's why it's currently piling up in nuclear plants.

I am a big fan of nuclear power, but just like everything else, if we were able to build enough plants to really make a dent in the energy situation, then uranium reserves become an issue.

Time for fusion!!

Mike

Fusion is the only wild card out there at this point. The theory isn't fully developed so its not known for certain if it is even possible to produce energy this way. It does look, at least at this point, possible, in theory.

All other "sources" of energy, solar, wind , geothermal, ethanol are not even worth discussing as they consume as much energy as they produce or will never be capable of producing a significant amount of energy. Even Hydro, which is by far the best source, cannot produce enough energy to take care of over 2 to3 percent of the total demand.

As to hydrocarbon sources running out in 30 or 40 years, I don't think so. As of now there is over 500 years of hydrocarbon left to consume, just in Canada, and this assumes that no more sources will be identified, which at this point, is a bad assumption. The price of hydrocarbon energy reflects its abundance, still very very cheep.

Red-beard has presented the current thinking on the subject. This is good policy at this point as it makes sense and was made by people that know what they are talking about. Hopefully it will be adopted and the government will get out the way, enough, to allow it to happen. I would say get on the bandwagon, but they usually muck up more than they help, so they should stay as far out of it as possible. Pat is far to optimistic on the chances of government going away completely. What will work is to somehow channel donations to politicians as part of the program. Simply pay the government tithing and all will go well.

ANYONE who proposes alternate energy and does not take the time to at least read articles by reasonable people, from a reasonable source, eg the Wall St Journal, OR take the time to research and do the calculatins, again only an 8th grade or less is required, will find the answer is not out there. It is not identified, even in theory. Its pretty hard to search for something thats not even there, and even harder to develop.

I'm sorry, but you are don't really have a sense of how nuclear power works. I didn't either, until I studied Nuclear Engineering. Unfortunately, there wasn't much work in that field when I graduated and I ended up in Gas Turbine Combined Cycle field.

Nuclear fuel is not bombarded with neutrons. The are inherently produced. Typically they are too fast to interact with other nuclei. Moderators are required to slow down neutrons so they will interact. Water and graphite are good moderators. Water is especially good since if it get to hot and boils away, it stops moderating and the reaction slows down.

In the process of fission, many different elements are produced. Some short-lived, some long lived. Some useful, some not. Many of the short-lived elements produced are what make nuclear power possible. They allow the reaction to be controlled. These isotopes are the source of delayed neutrons, which allow operation above critical, but not fast super critical. Chernobyl is the only commercial nuclear power reactor to go fast super critical.

The good news, the spent fuel can be reprocessed and the good stuff removed. This has not been happening because of the anti-nuclear scaremongers. Instead it sits in pools of water, unprotected, next to power plants.

The 'solution' to the waste issue is reprocessing and long term storage. However, we will be digging the 'waste' up at some point, when we find a use for the 'waste' like we did gasoline.

As far as reserves, we could convert the world fully to nuclear fission and we have hundreds of years of proven reserves. There is a lot more out there and when we run out, we have the moon.

And as far as fuel goes, the US has enough bomb grade enriched Uranium and Plutonium around to produce 40,000 bombs. Russia has enough to produce 100,000 weapons. This is more highly enriched than is needed for a nuclear power plant. We can use these materials to make Mixed Oxide fuel (MOX). We have enough material, when mixed with a lot of unenriched uranium, to fuel the 1000 reactors the US should have.

Fusion is probably a pipe dream at least in the relative short term. One of my professors asked us what was the size of a critical mass of Uranium. He would then say something larger than a grapefruit, smaller than a melon.

He would then ask what a critical mass for fusion would be? Everyone would shrug and then he would point out the window, at the sun.

In the 1800's, the Southern production model was based on pretty cheap labor - adjustments made in the 1900's for unions and so forth so operating costs increased. Crude is cheap from Africa and the middle beast (to them) because of the low over head. Te same can be said for products made in Asia. If all products had the same cost models the imaginary prices would fall away and stability occur. This can be said for oil or energy.

Pursue any technology you want. If it becomes reasonable then the mfg folks and bean counters will figuer a way to squeeze out all imaginary costs, cut the overruns, increase the gross margins to gross levels and pay the workers as little as they can get by with .

And by the way, it costs 10 times more in energy to produce a florescent light bulb that an incandescent one yet they are only about 3 fold more energy ecomonical? (That was from some application engineers at GE Lighting - I never ran the numbers but who would ever think someone from GE would not know anything?)

LubeMaster77

What the F is this kind of jubberish??? Means NOTHING unless you expound on it, and then likely NOTHING.

Energy out of nothing is entirely differen't than some slave type of thing. NO correlation, whatsoever. Basic science, and I mean BASIC science shows that there is NOTHING there. Its not like something is yet to be invented as even in 1800 the theory was there for what is todays science. There is NO science, even the most outrageous science, that even suggests a solution to todays problems. THis has never been true in the past, but it is true now. There is NO alternative energy. Only Nuclear energy is the likely savior, and even then its an IF....

In any case we have at least 500 plus years to fix it.