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5 dollar gas...are we ready?

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Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

bigblue_dl said:
Propane has quite a bit of energy in it, almost 3 times that of nat gas, but usually engines must be derated due to its tendancy to auto-ignite (knock).
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What about in comparison today's gasoline that cars typically run on? Don't count E85.
 
Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

FlagDUDE08 said:
What about in comparison today's gasoline that cars typically run on? Don't count E85.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density

Had to look it up, since I don't work with liquid fuels. This compares them in mass-specific units as opposed to the gaseous volumetric-specific units that I am used to using.

edit: being that gasoline is similar to propane in energy content, a gasoline engine may not need much of a derate due to auto-ignition, depends on compression ratio, and a few other factors
 
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Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

bigblue_dl said:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density

Had to look it up, since I don't work with liquid fuels. This compares them in mass-specific units as opposed to the gaseous volumetric-specific units that I am used to using.

edit: being that gasoline is similar to propane in energy content, a gasoline engine may not need much of a derate due to auto-ignition, depends on compression ratio, and a few other factors
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Fairly comparable. Not sure you'd get much savings in the conversion, though.
 
FlagDUDE08 said:
Is the unit price comparable? Would there be any sort of performance deficiency, similar to the claims of how natural gas may be cheaper, but doesn't put out as much?
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Its 80% of gas at 1.90 a gallon with rebate.
Cost 7000 to do the conversion. I drive 30000 or more a year at 14 MPg
 
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Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

reports have been circulating this week about a breakthrough in fusion research.

U.S. scientists replicated the power of the sun, if only for a fleeting moment, creating a miniature star that has rekindled hopes that nuclear fusion could one day offer a source of cheap and boundless energy on Earth.

In experiments done at a U.S. Department of Energy laboratory last fall and published in a scientific journal Wednesday, researchers blasted the world's most powerful laser at a target the size of a small pea. It triggered a fusion reaction that unleashed a vast amount of energy—for a fraction of a second.
"For the first time anywhere, we've gotten more energy out of the fuel than what was put into the fuel" when using this technique, said Omar Hurricane, physicist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and lead author of the study in the journal Nature.

The research is a long way from achieving what's known as ignition, where the overall setup generates more energy than it consumes in a self-sustaining chain reaction and without which fusion power wouldn't be practical. In the experiments, much of the energy from the laser was dissipated and didn't reach the fuel.

But the latest result marks a step forward for the U.S. project after years of setbacks and false promise. And it offers a concrete model for what a commercially viable nuclear-fusion reactor might look like.
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I asked my brother about these results, since he works in magnetic containment fusion research. His reply was:

I find most of the reports on inertial fusion a bit deceptive. They seem to indicate that we are getting close to realizing inertial confinement fusion as a likely commercial power source. Very few articles I have seen discuss the energy gain in a broader systems context. They usually talk about the conversion of laser energy absorbed by a target into fusion energy production. What is neglected is that only a tiny fraction of the laser energy directed at the target is actually absorbed. Taking another step outward when you start to look at the efficiency of the laser drive, only a small fraction of the electric power into the laser system is converted into energy directed at the target. When you start looking at the conversion of energy out of the wall outlet into fusion energy production the conversion is on order of 0.0001~0.001 at best. There is still a long way to go before that technology will be heating and lighting residential houses. Still every step forward, no matter how small inches us closer to that goal.

Reporting on magnetic confinement fusion isn't that much better, although conversion efficiencies along the way are much better, so the gains needed to get a magnetic confinement fusion device on the grid has no where near as far to go.
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Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

5mn_Major said:
Not sure why they're even trying. Our resident engineering experts have deemed it an impossibility that there will be any meaningful breakthroughs in this area. They should know that.
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Who's that?

As far as I'm concerned, fusion is the only conceivable power source that could enable our civilization to continue to progress for more than the next 500 years or so. As great as fission is, fissionable material is unfortunately a finite resource, too. On the other hand, if we can devise a fusion process that generates enough energy to 1) split water to "mine" hydrogen, 2) build and maintain the fusion plant, 3) power the reactor, and 4) have some useful energy left over to supply to "customers," then you have a virtually limitless power source.

Every pair of H atoms that convert to an He atom releases 4.8*10^-19 joules of energy. Annual energy usage in the world is approximately 5.2e20 J, so each year, we would need to turn 1.1e39 atoms of hydrogen into 5.5e38 atoms of helium to extract that much energy. Of course, we also have to extract enough energy to run the plant - let's say that actually consumes 99% of the power (only 1% efficient), so we'd have to tack on a couple zeros - we'd need to create 1.1e41 atoms of helium. Each atom of helium comes from splitting one molecule of water, so we'd "burn" 1.1e41 molecules of water each year, which is 3.2e15 kilograms of water each year. That sounds like a lot (and it is), but there are 1.4e21 kilograms of water on earth. Therefore, it would take us 430,000 years to use up all the water on earth - not to mention all the OTHER sources of hydrogen (hydrocarbons, other compounds in the earth's crust, etc). If we can get off of fossil and fissile fuels (several hundred years available at best), and on to hydrogen fusion, then we'll have given ourselves an extension of 429,500 years to come up with the next great thing - quite a difference!
 
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Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

LynahFan said:
Who's that?

As far as I'm concerned, fusion is the only conceivable power source that could enable our civilization to continue to progress for more than the next 500 years or so. As great as fission is, fissionable material is unfortunately a finite resource, too. On the other hand, if we can devise a fusion process that generates enough energy to 1) split water to "mine" hydrogen, 2) build and maintain the fusion plant, 3) power the reactor, and 4) have some useful energy left over to supply to "customers," then you have a virtually limitless power source.

Every pair of H atoms that convert to an He atom releases 4.8*10^-19 joules of energy. Annual energy usage in the world is approximately 5.2e20 J, so each year, we would need to turn 1.1e39 atoms of hydrogen into 5.5e38 atoms of helium to extract that much energy. Of course, we also have to extract enough energy to run the plant - let's say that actually consumes 99% of the power (only 1% efficient), so we'd have to tack on a couple zeros - we'd need to create 1.1e41 atoms of helium. Each atom of helium comes from splitting one molecule of water, so we'd "burn" 1.1e41 molecules of water each year, which is 3.2e15 kilograms of water each year. That sounds like a lot (and it is), but there are 1.4e21 kilograms of water on earth. Therefore, it would take us 430,000 years to use up all the water on earth - not to mention all the OTHER sources of hydrogen (hydrocarbons, other compounds in the earth's crust, etc). If we can get off of fossil and fissile fuels (several hundred years available at best), and on to hydrogen fusion, then we'll have given ourselves an extension of 429,500 years to come up with the next great thing - quite a difference!
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WARNING: Scientific Content Above :p


Is it just a situation where we have no way to contain/control the reaction or is the problem coming up with enough energy initially to get the thing started or both?
 
Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

To clarify, resident engineers have been claiming that solar "is still not going to be viable in the first world market, though" (when a country considerably further north than us today has 15% of its electricity demand coming from solar) and cars will never truly achieve more than 70mpg (even though cars now have mpg north of 100). But we must remember that its really difficult to see a year or so into the future.
 
Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

5mn_Major said:
To clarify, resident engineers have been claiming that solar "is still not going to be viable in the first world market, though" (when a country considerably further north than us today has 15% of its electricity demand coming from solar) and cars will never truly achieve more than 70mpg (even though cars now have mpg north of 100). But we must remember that its really difficult to see a year or so into the future.
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What country "considerably further north than us today has 15% of its electricity demand coming from solar?"
 
Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

RaceBoarder said:
WARNING: Scientific Content Above :p


Is it just a situation where we have no way to contain/control the reaction or is the problem coming up with enough energy initially to get the thing started or both?
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Definitely both. We've known how to kick off *uncontrolled* fusion reactions since the 1950s - most US nuclear weapons today are fusion types. Getting enough power to start the reaction is achieved by a fission reaction in a nuclear weapon, which is itself "uncontrolled." There are probably "controlled" ways to kick off an "uncontrolled" fusion reaction, but nobody had bothered since the fusion was going to be uncontrolled anyway... Developing a fusion plant requires developing both a controlled kick and a controlled reaction.
 
Re: 5 dollar gas...are we ready?

5mn_Major said:
To clarify, resident engineers have been claiming that solar "is still not going to be viable in the first world market, though" (when a country considerably further north than us today has 15% of its electricity demand coming from solar) and cars will never truly achieve more than 70mpg (even though cars now have mpg north of 100). But we must remember that its really difficult to see a year or so into the future.
Click to expand...
Someone said solar can't work, and you heard, "fusion can't work"? I think we're done, here.
 
LynahFan said:
Who's that?

As far as I'm concerned, fusion is the only conceivable power source that could enable our civilization to continue to progress for more than the next 500 years or so. As great as fission is, fissionable material is unfortunately a finite resource, too. On the other hand, if we can devise a fusion process that generates enough energy to 1) split water to "mine" hydrogen, 2) build and maintain the fusion plant, 3) power the reactor, and 4) have some useful energy left over to supply to "customers," then you have a virtually limitless power source.

Every pair of H atoms that convert to an He atom releases 4.8*10^-19 joules of energy. Annual energy usage in the world is approximately 5.2e20 J, so each year, we would need to turn 1.1e39 atoms of hydrogen into 5.5e38 atoms of helium to extract that much energy. Of course, we also have to extract enough energy to run the plant - let's say that actually consumes 99% of the power (only 1% efficient), so we'd have to tack on a couple zeros - we'd need to create 1.1e41 atoms of helium. Each atom of helium comes from splitting one molecule of water, so we'd "burn" 1.1e41 molecules of water each year, which is 3.2e15 kilograms of water each year. That sounds like a lot (and it is), but there are 1.4e21 kilograms of water on earth. Therefore, it would take us 430,000 years to use up all the water on earth - not to mention all the OTHER sources of hydrogen (hydrocarbons, other compounds in the earth's crust, etc). If we can get off of fossil and fissile fuels (several hundred years available at best), and on to hydrogen fusion, then we'll have given ourselves an extension of 429,500 years to come up with the next great thing - quite a difference!
Click to expand...

Do you really think it would be a good idea to burn through 99.9% of the water on earth?
 
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