Ed, Thanks for the link. The fuel cell has obviously got a place (most transport experts put it about 20/30 years away) but, unfortunately for those who are enthusiastic about it, it isn't a primary energy technology. As I mentioned to Harry a day or two ago, fuel cells need hydrogen, and hydrogen is, in energy terms, an expensive resource.
At the present time, hydrogen can only be obtained cheaply from (cheap) oil or gas, or by electrolysis of water needing (relatively expensive) electricity, the latter being derived in turn from oil or gas. Fuel cells would mean a clean and desirable transport technology but an expensive one. Even when fully developed, fuel cell forms of transportation or whatever will probably be at least 20 times more expensive than using petroleum fuels (at whatever the prevailing price of fossil fuels). However, hydrogen will undoubtedly be able to be made (very cheaply) from custom-made bacteria and this will depend on the research I referred to when I mentioned Craig Venter's Institute (below). Craig Venter's first objective will be a basic bacterium containing a minimum number of genes which will be able to replicate when supplied with an energy source (preferably sunlight), and basic organic elements (carbon, oxygen and nitrogen from the air), water (the biggest resource problem) and small traces of other minerals. (He'll also have to ensure that the bacterium is not mobile and is in a form preventing it infecting the natural ecosystem.) This is the difficult step -- finding the minimum 'chassis' on which to build specialised 'bodies' for different production purposes. Once this basic stage has been achieved, it is then (I am sure) that regiments of genomic scientists will be involved in designing all the millions of variant bacteria that will be able to make products to replace most of those made today by today's fossil fuel+mechanics+electricity methods. (So long as the key resource, water, is available, this will be as fully dispersible as agriculture is today.) Best wishes, Keith At 08:58 15/12/02 -0500, you wrote: >> We're going to have to work hard (intellectually) to develop alternative >> energy technologies in order to survive in decent condition. The only >> research group in the world that I'm aware of so far that is starting out >> on the necessary R&D trail is Craig Venter and Hamilton Smith's Institute >> for Biological Energy Alternatives in Rockland, Maryland. (It is >> significant that, within weeks of Venter's plans being announced, the US >> government piled in with sufficient intitial funding even though IBEA is >> legally an independent charity.) No commercial corporation has yet, to my >> knowledge, realised the importance of this at least at board level, but we >> can be sure that dozens, scores, and hundreds of research teams will be >> pursuing the same trail (genomic production methods) before very long. >> Certainly China, with more than 20,000 genomic researchers already, will >> not be long in following suite -- and very possibly overtaking America. >> >> Keith Hudson > >Keith, I know very little about this kind of thing, but Ballard Power >Systems of Vancouver have been doing some interesting things in developing >fuel cell engines. For example, see: >http://www.evworld.com/databases/shownews.cfm?pageid=news300802-03 > >Ed ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------ Keith Hudson, General Editor, Handlo Music, http://www.handlo.com 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath BA1 5HX, England Tel: +44 1225 312622; Fax: +44 1225 447727; mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ________________________________________________________________________
