I've just signed up and donated today and began reading many of the comments. I am very interested in Bio-fuels and have done fairly extensive research. I drive a VW-TDI Diesel, which I use 100% biodiesel fuel. If we are serious about Global Warming and alternative energy other than Big-Oil, we have no farther to look-we already have all the technology - we need politicians and the american public to demand it. This is why we have all signed on for Unity 08. Right?
The Electric Car - already produced and removed from the entire auto population by GM. This was the absolute perfect automobile. Watch the movie "who killed the electric car". We also have the technology to make every new home and building Solar, yet we choose not to. Vegtable oil as fuel for an automobile is clean, should be cheap. We do not need to subsidize farmers to grow corn to make Ethanol, which is not productive enough to cover the costs. Vegetable oil is 100% renewable, does not add pollution to the air and should be very inexpensive. Our US Government was so scared of the Bio-diesel movement, the FDA changed the auto manufacture guidelines on all diesel engines so that NO DIESEL POWERED AUTOMOBILES will be made in 2024 and 2024 models. The FDA is taking the stand that the diesel engine is not good enough and making the auto manufactures redesign the diesel engine. The 2024-2006 diesel engine is nearly perfect. This is a move from our big-oil government to stifle this movement.
Dean Kamen the inventor of the Segway and many other wonderful things, has taken the "Sterling" engine and developed a way to clean polluted water in India into clean purified water. This Sterling engine design he used was developed in the 1800's and uses nothing but heat and cold at the same time, and does not produce any polution. We already have the technology, and that to me is why I'm signed up on Unity 08
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Diesels are actually more efficient engines than gasoline.
And they'll run on just about any sort of hydrocarbon fuel (including vegitable oil!)
http://journals.aol.com/kweinschen/Veritas/
Diesel is the best thing to ever happen to automobiles.
Hi,
Its good to have someone else talking about diesel cars. (See my earlier posts in the 'forks on the road to energy independence" thread of 10 june, 16 June, 24 June, 25 June 29 June, 2024 under the name glen).
The focus on Space in the 1960's prompted a no holds barred approach to putting a man on the moon; it worked. In the 1950's a similar approach to Nuclear Submarines produced equal results.
Now is the time to do the same for an alternative energy focus. Everything should be on the table for consideration, with the a goal of becoming energy self-sufficient within 10 years.
Washington needs to get off their collective arses and do something NOW! tom.williams43@verizon.net
If we were energy independent, we wouldn't have more Americans dead than were killed by Bin Laden for OIL.
As with the space program, a focus on alternate energy, and alternate fuels will have spin-offs that will benefit our economy.
I feel there is no one "silver bullet" - diesels, bio-fuels, synfuel, solar, nuclear (I prefer fusion), wind, LED lighting,.....
A multi-pronged, long-range strategy is needed - conservation, improving efficiencies, developing alternate energy, alternate fuels - will help global warming, make us less dependent and position us for the future.
What we need is intelligent leadership to set the goals.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69
I'm all for it but what do you estimate will be the costs to do what you both describe. What shared (or not) sacrifices do you all anticipate to implement this. I'm all for such Manhattan effort but you must delineate the anticipated costs/sacrifices/means of implementation to get to this objective. Please fill in the ends-means blank for me.
http://milligansstew.blogspot.com
John,
I disagree somewhat. The citizenry are at about maximum taxation, we can't give much more. The disconnect comes when you compare our priorites with spending.
So if Energy Independence is priority #1, spend there first, priority #2 next, etc etc. See then if we can afford a war, and the answer is we can't unless it becomes top priority.
Why would a war become a top priority? Immenent threat of citizens on american soil. So the disconnect is that we are spending so much money to influence the rest of teh world and not enough to solve our own problems.
So Ends-Means can only be valid when the Means are being spent on the top priority things.
My feeling is that they are not.
So you would take the costs for the Energy programs from Defense right? How much do you anticipate would be needed and what part of Defense? Would there be any sacrifices asked of any parts of the citizenry??
http://milligansstew.blogspot.com
Of course there would be other changes, and I don't pretend to know what they are, but what I do know is that there is a disconnect between the spending of the public's money and the priorities of the public.
All I am suggesting is that these must be put back into sync before you can ask "do we have aenough money for x, y, or z?"
There does not need to be any manhaten project for energy independence!
We already have the technology to do everything we need to become independent. Electric cars might be the sole exception. In their case they are almost there. A really good all electric SUV is slated to come out in 2024. It will be able to go 400 miles on 1 charge, and recharge in 10 minutes on special high voltage lines. Its acceleration will be the same as a normal car. But for everything else (nuclear, solar, bio-diesel, etc...) we have the technology. We just need to make it profitable for corporations to produce this kind of equipment. This means a gradual increase in taxation for transportation gasoline and tax breaks for companies willing to build nuclear power plants and renewable energy power plants. But it needs federal oversight. This means having congress mandate that every new car is 100% bio-diesel or electric by 2024 (giving us enough time to build the infrastructure for delivering the bio-diesel and building the nuclear power plants).
Maybe not, but the "free market", dominated as it is by oil interests, and profit only, isn't heading toward energy independence - that requires government direction/emphasis/incentives.
I would like to see nuclear fusion be our long-term nuclear option, and that isn't ready yet.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69
As usual the discussion isn't about The Methanol Economy.
Methanol can be made for about fifty cents a gallon,and is
a better fuel than ethanol. The Integrated Gassification
Combined Cycle is a clean coal process for making electricity
and fuel (MEOH,DME,etc.) Air Products and Eastman Chemical
demonstrated by making 80,000 gal.in 2024. Methanol is also
used in some fuel cells. Also,if Honda and Ford got together,
they could put unused plant capacity to good use.
Except that Methanol still uses natural gas to be produced, and doesn't burn as well which causes more problems. And using coal Gasification still has CO2 emmissions and the captured carbon must still be stored somewhere. And coal Liquefaction releases even more carbon. Ethanol uses corn, not a carbon object. And unlike Nuclear which uses neither.
But there is a problem with both Methanol and Ethanol - they still give off carbon dioxide (the main culprit in Global Warming)! They also do not have any energy gain, meaning it uses as much energy to produce as it puts out. And the US can not produce enough corn to power all of our cars. Electric cars have amuch higher energy ratio and does not give off any carbon. So by using Solar Power, Wind Power, Nuclear Power, etc... we can have no carbon output, as well as cheap energy that we can get entirly from within our nation rather than importing natural gas or corn (I thought WE were the food producers for the world,why would we import food!), and while still being able to have reasonable priced corn. And we can't forget about the machines which can convert trash into energy! Garbage dumps are a thing of the past!
Lets not use the NAZI rocket fuel, instead lets use the energy from the last days of WWII which led Democracy to Victory!
Please also see the thread I started about energy independence, renewable energy, and nuclear energy.
From what I've read, methanol has 38% less energy than ethanol per liter, so why do you say it's a better fuel?
I am not for corn ethanol, unless it was made from fermenting the stalks (which are currently blown back into the field as waste), because it wastes food, and is not energy efficient to produce.
Methanol could be made from natural gas produce by landfills or similar organic decomposition.
I don't think we can look for a single answer - ethanol and methanol, and bio-diesel, and synfuels - all have pluses and minuses, but overall are better than petroleum.
We need to do this - for global warming, for pollution, because someday we'll run out of oil, and right now oil we buy is often from people who hate us.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69
While I agree that we should put everything possible into becomming energy efficient, I would suggest that this will require an increase in the defense budget. If you think the middle east hates us now, while their leaders are rich with American oil dollars, how do you think they will react to us trying to take all of that money out of their economies. I think we will see a full on asault on anything perceived as a threat to their incomes. We will need super-security around all alternative energy plants and facilities to make these biodiesel and electric cars. Even when we have succeeded, we will then need to remain diligent against the attacks that will come as a result of what they will see as the American destruction of their way of life.
Yes, but they will have less money to attack us. They have wasted so much money they will feel the loss quickly. Domestic issues, I would think, would quickly rise to the serface as the leaders try to keep people in line without the money from us.
The threat of Radical Islam comes from their access to unlimited funds. Energy independence is the strongest step we can take in combatting them.
At some point we have to trust the voters.
China and India are consuming oil at an increasing rate - they'll buy all the oil - and then maybe the Islamic wackos will hate them instead of us.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69
I think both those countries china and india are on the Infidel Top 10 hatred list. But those countries don't fool around with teh wackos and know how to use the locals to contain/wither them better than we do at this point. I think the Islamic extremist hirabist wackos you speak of are equal opportunity infidel hatred types Quick. What we need is to get the top 10 on that list working in concert againts the writers of that list. Then maybe we'll have something!
http://milligansstew.blogspot.com
Maybe - but India and China aren't faced with massive illegal immigration, either...
You're right, John. England, Spain, Turkey, others have had terrorist attacks. Our days of Wyatt Earp diplomacy need to be over. We need to join the civilized nations against the uncivilized.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69
They hate our way of life! They hate our freedoms! They hate that we "allow" our women to be productive members of society that are protected by the same laws that protect men! We are the infidels! They will continue to find reasons why it is our fault that they hate. Do you think that we would become "secretly" energy independant? Do you think we wouldn't sell/share this technology with the entire world under the heading of "AMERICA STOPS GLOBAL WARMING, SAVES THE WORLD"! They will hate us as long as we allow personal freedoms and do not convert to Islam and/or obey Sharia Law.
We could maintain a smaller military (and make better choices about using it) if we had a less expensive - more stable energy supply.
If the effort is planned, directed, implemented, and comes to fruition within the US economy, there should be a cost-benefit gain when every aspect is considered relative to the current energy/defense spending matrix.
Jeff C leikec@yahoo.com
This is what we need to spell out in these policy questions and this is What we then need to ask our prospective candidates to delineate! (I do not think a poll can capture that) We need to have our candidate spellout those tradeoffs and his big vision thing and how they will take the country from Point A to Point B and figure in as best they can the anticipated cost, sacrifices, benefits, and tradeoffs.
That is what I want in a leader - someone who has some grasp of the implementation complexities and is willing to make the case and stand by his priciples when things may go off the anticipated track in getting from Point A to Point B (often happens due to unanticipated circumstances and then what). That is the test of character, leadership and true political courage. And I do not think that a poll can quantify those types of intangibles in a leader.
http://milligansstew.blogspot.com
Well, if the uncounted billions wasted in Iraq were redirected, we could accomplish a tremendous amount.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69
The uncounted billions don't exist. They are borrowed. We would never go into debt like that for domestic issues. I don't think we should for this war, but that's beside the point. But if the war ended tomorrow, the feds would not have more money, they would just borrow less.
At some point we have to trust the voters.
Every single jack one of you is either incapable or unwilling to do the simplest d*** thing in the world; OBEY THE SPEED LIMITS!!
It takes 10% more gas to go 70 m.p.h. than it does to go 60 m.p.h.
How much gas do you think we would save as a nation if you stupid f***s would simply obey the law? (a reasonable estimate is that if everyone drove the speed limit our national gas consumption would decrease by 16% OVERNIGHT!!!)
In addition to using more gas (unnecessarily) speeding also:
1) increases the risk of collision/accident.
2) increases the amount of air pollution your vehicle produces.
3) increases the wear and tear on your vehicle, necessitating its replacement sooner rather than later.
Oh, but that's right; time is money!!! Believe me, you're NOT that important. But no, you continually intentionally break the law in order to do all the wonderful things listed above; after all, you wouldn't want your kids or grandkids to have any of that gas, would you?
Let's start with a couple of truths.
First, we can never totally eliminate artificial greenhouse gas emissions unless we develop totally new energy technologies. Second, the United States has absolutely no long-term comprehensive energy policy.
For that reason, I am proposing the following Energy Plan for the United States (and the world) in the following 3 steps.
Short Term - Conservation and Alternative Power
Five to Thirty Years - A Strong Nuclear Program
Long Term - We Need New Technologies
First - Immediate Efforts - Conservation and Alternative Power
Conservation is a good initial step to take to help reduce greenhouse gases and lessen our dependence on foreign energy sources: driving a Prius, if practical, is great, turning off lights, lowering the thermostat, all those things are great; but in the grand scheme of things do very little to help us in the long run. As the population of the world keeps growing and becoming more "middle class", more people want the same things we already have and the demand for power and energy worldwide will continue to grow. Conservation slows the growth (slightly), but the growth of greenhouse gases worldwide will continue regardless of what we as a nation try and do. Every little bit helps, but in the mid-run it will not help enough and in the long-run it will be an absolute disaster.
Solar, wind and other environmentally "safe" technologies do exist and should be used as much as practical, but the current state of their technologies cannot produce enough energy to fully solve the long-term problems that we are facing as a nation and a world.
Second - Intermediate Effort - What we can do next
As stated in my previous document, nuclear power is strong in Europe with about forty-two percent of their energy produced by nuclear fission. Nuclear generation provides about 17% of world electricity, avoiding the emission of up to 2.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide annually. France produces 76% and Lithuania produces 85.6% of its energy by nuclear fission. (http://infoweb.magi.com/~dwalsh/wfsesr.html)
In the United States, a lot of people and almost all environmentalists are antinuclear because of 3 Mile Island in 1979 and Chernobyl in 1986. However, many experts say that it is a safe, clean, and reliable source of energy. Nuclear Fission produces no greenhouse gases, but does produce highly toxic radioactive wastes. (http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/society/greenhouse.htm)
As President I would immediately call for the United States to embark on a strong nuclear power building program. We have the land upon which to build the power plants (here in California we could throw a half dozen plants in Eastern San Bernardino County alone and no one would ever see them and taxing the energy might solve California's budget deficit), we have technology that is extremely safe and we have an extremely safe depository for the waste in the Yucca Mountain facility that could be opened very soon if the politicians would quit being politicians and become statesmen and do what is right for the United States and the World.
If we converted almost all of our electrical power generation from oil and coal to nuclear we would go a very long ways towards lowering our greenhouse gas footprint and show the rest of the world that we mean to do what we can to contribute to the reduction of greenhouse gas production. Such a step would also go a long ways towards lowering our dependence on foreign sources of oil and help bring stability to unstable portions of the globe. We could also use the nuclear power plants to help convert sea water to fresh water which addresses another threat looming just over the horizon - the shortage of potable water.
This, however, is an intermediate step and we can't as a country and a world just continue to sit on our hands and hope for the next step in energy production - we have to go out and make it happen.
Third - The Future - New Technologies
Everything I have talked about in this email so far concerns what we can do with old and existing technologies. NO MATTER WHAT WE DO, NO MATTER HOW MUCH WE CONSERVE, OUR CURRENT TECHNOLOGIES WILL ONLY TAKE US SO FAR AND IT ISN'T FAR ENOUGH. WE NEED SOMETHING NEW.
As I have stated before, as President I would call on the country to immediately start a "Manhattan Project" for energy independence. We put a man on the moon back in the "dark ages" of technology and I firmly believe that we have the brain power to come up with solutions to the world's energy problems if only we apply ourselves and our resources to the task. We are quickly on our way towards spending $1,000,000,000,000 (that a trillion) of your tax dollars on the war in Iraq. If that money had instead been pointed towards new research and development into fuel cells, hydrogen power, solar power, fusion and other technologies, I believe we would already be well on our way towards major break-throughs in renewable and alternative energy solutions. The world and the United States will be much better off if we weren't all relying on a small region of the world for the lifeblood of our economies and we had a new technology to take us into the future.
That is my proposal for the long-term energy policy of the United States and, quite honestly, the world. Why don't we have a long-term energy policy in United States now? Because it doesn't make for interesting sound-bites and it requires politicians to be statesmen rather than politicians. Politicians aren't interested in something that may be a success after they leave office, but statesmen are because they understand that their job is to do what is best for the nation they lead, not for their political career.
Sincerely,
Frank McEnulty
frank@frankforpresident.org
www.frankforpresident.org
This is how I believe we can achieve 100% energy indepencence within the next 10-20 years. Solar power is a great way to do it, but there are limitations to solar power:
1)needs large open areas to generate lots of power
2)can only gather sunlight during the daylight hours
3)rendered useless in cloudy weather
Here is how to overcome all the problems in one solution: Orbital Solar Power(OSP). The idea is, you launch a huge satelite into orbit with the most advanced solar pannels made, and it will gather sunlight 24 hours a day, 7 days a week-forever. Now, your going to ask, "well how do we get the energy down here?" You send it from the satelite in low-frequency energy beams to an energy collector on the ground. It will be a low enough frequency not to harm or damage anything on its way down, and will get to the surface very efficiantly. The downside is that to develope the technologies required and to get one up and running would take 10-20 years, and hundreds of billions of dollars(which we are already spending on the Iraq War). The up side of this is it would pay itself off in a matter of 5-10 years, and not only would we be 100% energy independent, we would be a major supplier of energy for the rest of the world as well.
The satelite would have to be in geosynch orbit over the collector. So it would only get light 12 hours a day.
Browncoats Unite!
Excellent post and welcome aboard! I myself drive a newly rebuilt 1986 Isuzu Diesel P'UP that gets 51 mpg. They are building a filling station that will feature BIOWILLIE biodiesel in the area and I will definitely get my fuel there. Biodiesel is just part of the big picture of energy independence.
Once again, welcome aboard and keep up the good work!
Population control and conservation are the only two real long-term solutions. Before you write this off, think about it for a moment, please. Let's take the example of "non-polluting" wind power. First of all, you don't get something for nothing. How many wind turbines can we set up before we start changing the weather by ELIMINATING THE WIND!!!??? Sounds insane, I know. But that's only because there seems to be so much wind, just as there at one time seemed to be so much oil) When you intercept the wind you are using that portion of the wind that would otherwise have continued to blow on downwind.
Now then, that wind is used to run a turbine of some type with it's attendant inefficiencies and waste heat. (friction) That rotary motion that IS captured is then used to generate and distribute electricity, which is NOT 100% efficient. It also generates waste energy. (If you don't believe that try standing under a high-voltage power line during a nice humid day sometime and tell me how the fillings in your teeth feel about it) Then that energy finally arrives at your home where it is re-converted back into kinetic motion to drive compressors (LOTS of waste heat) and electric motors in blenders, fans, electric lawn mowers, etc. (again, inefficient, with an enormous amounts of waste heat generated) When it's not re-converted to motion it is converted to (you guessed it) ACTUAL HEAT for heaters, stoves, blow dryers, etc.
The capture, conversion and use of energy in and of itself generates a lot of (waste) heat. Yes, I'd love to see more wind power, solar power (the best idea, since it actually generates it's power by using existing heat) and alternative fuels, but don't kid yourselves. We need conservation at least as much, if not more, than all these other ideas put together. Try thinking of your great, great grandkids instead of how you "need" to drive your car to the store for that pack of cigarettes...
Or we could use nuclear. Much simpler. Or better yet, a combination. I doubt we could "eliminate the wind". That is the stupidest thing I have heard today; maybe all week.
A gentleman from Erie named John Kanzius made a somewhat "shocking" discovery while he was working on a radio-wave generator he had developed for the treatment of cancer. While attempting to desalinate sea water using radio frequencies, he noticed flashes, and within a few days, had saltwater burning in a test-tube as if it were a candle. The discovery spawned interest from the scientific community, mostly concerned with whether or not the water could be used as a fuel, and of course, healthy doses of disbelief. Last week, a Penn State University chemist named Rustum Roy held a demonstration proving that the science is sound, noting that the water doesn't burn, though the radio frequencies weaken the bonds holding together the salt, releasing hydrogen which is ignited when exposed to the RF field. Mr. Kanzius and Dr. Roy say the question now is the efficiency of the energy, and are presenting the technology to the US Department of Defense and Department of Energy to investigate how useful the technology will be. Of the plentiful maybe-fuel (which apparently burns so hot it can melt test-tubes) Dr. Roy says, "This is the most abundant element in the world. It is everywhere," and (without recognition of the poetic irony, as far as we can tell), "Seeing it burn gives me chills." Check the TV report after the break to see the water in action.
http://www.engadget.com/2007/09/11/can-saltwater-be-burned-as-fuel/#comments
Go to the link a you can see a video of it burning.
In the manfacturing process of clorine. Using electrolysis on salt, you get clorine, hydrogen and sodium hydroxide. In the case of using radio waves to do it, he's just using a high power source. Either way uses a lot of energy to get small amounts. I had an instructor in school who lit up florescent tube using a radar. Gave the janitor who was carrying a dozen of them quite a startle.
Browncoats Unite!
Just as NASA led the way into space and helped research and develope many advances in, for example, healthcare, why not create a National Energy Security Agency?
NESA would coordinate various government agencies such as Defense, Energy, Agriculture, etc. with the sole purpose of securing our total Energy Self-Reliance by the year 2024. It could be funded by a 5 cent a gallon tax on fuels used for transportation. The tax would also encourage conservation. The tax would be waived in time of emergency for "First Responders" such as Police, Fire and Medical personnel and have a ten gallon limit.
What do you think?