[Vo]: Re: Langmuir Missed Cold Fusion Adatoms
Had Langmuir been familiar with D2-Palladium in 1932, who knows? He's all around it in this 1932 (39 page pdf) lecture on surface phenomena http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/1932/langmuir-lecture.pdf Fred
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jones Beene wrote: Advanced biofuels, on the other hand, like butanol and algoil are here to stay. Sure, as soon as we can grow them on Mars, I suppose. Here on planet Earth we barely have enough room to grow enough food. - Jed http://www.pnm.com/news/2006/073106_biomass.htm Albuquerque: PNM and Western Water and Power Production have signed a 20-year agreement to deliver renewable energy from a new 35 megawatt biomass power plant. The plant will go into service in early 2009 and will be located in Torrance County, near Estancia, N.M. The plant will be sited on 50 acres adjacent to Tagawa Greenhouses, which will utilize waste heat from the facility to heat the greenhouse and potentially increase production. More. http://www.technologyreview.com/Energy/18138/page1/ Relatively high oil prices, advances in technology, and the Bush administration's increased emphasis on renewable fuels are attracting new interest in a potentially rich source of biofuels: algae. A number of startups are now demonstrating new technology and launching large research efforts aimed at replacing hundreds of millions of gallons of fossil fuels by 2010, and much more in the future. Algae makes oil naturally. Raw algae can be processed to make biocrude, the renewable equivalent of petroleum, and refined to make gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and chemical feedstocks for plastics and drugs. Indeed, it can be processed at existing oil refineries to make just about anything that can be made from crude oil. This is the approach being taken by startups Solix Biofuels, based in Fort Collins, CO, and LiveFuels, based in Menlo Park, CA. Alternatively, strains of algae that produce more carbohydrates and less oil can be processed and fermented to make ethanol, with leftover proteins used for animal feed. This is one of the potential uses of algae produced by startup GreenFuel Technologies Corporation, based in Cambridge, MA. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2006-01-10-algae-powerplants_x.htm Even though it's early yet, and may be a long shot, the technology is quite fascinating, says Barry Worthington, executive director of US Energy Association in Washington, which represents electric utilities, government agencies, and the oil and gas industry. One key is selecting an algae with a high oil density about 50% of its weight. Because this kind of algae also grows so fast, it can produce 15,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre. Just 60 gallons are produced from soybeans, which along with corn are the major biodiesel crops today. Greenfuel isn't alone in the algae-to-oil race. Last month, Greenshift Corporation, a Mount Arlington, N.J., technology incubator company, licensed CO2-gobbling algae technology that uses a screen-like algal filter. It was developed by David Bayless, a researcher at Ohio University. http://www.greenfuelonline.com/press_releases.htm
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
http://www.aps.com/general_info/newsrelease/newsreleases/NewsRelease_358.html November 30, 2006 Phoenix, AZ - Algae bioreactor system connected directly to smokestack of APS' Redhawk 1,040 megawatt power plant recycles greenhouse gases into renewable biofuels PHOENIX, Ariz. and Cambridge Mass. - Arizona Public Service Company (APS) and GreenFuel Technologies Corporation have announced that they have successfully recycled the carbon dioxide (CO2) from the stack gases of a power plant into transportation grade biofuels. The announcement was made at the Platts Global Energy Awards ceremonies today in New York. Using GreenFuel's Emissions-to-Biofuels algae bioreactor system connected to APS' 1,040 megawatt Redhawk power plant in Arlington, Ariz., GreenFuel was able to create a carbon-rich algal biomass with sufficient quality and concentration of oils and starch content to be converted into transportation-grade biodiesel and ethanol. We estimate that this process can absorb as much as 80 percent of CO2 emissions during the daytime at a natural gas fired power plant, said GreenFuel CEO Cary Bullock. Unlike typical agricultural biofuel feedstocks such as soybeans or corn which have a limited harvest window, algae multiply every hour can be harvested every day. - Original Message - From: Frederick Sparber To: vortex-l Sent: 4/2/2007 4:31:32 AM Subject: Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza Jones Beene wrote: Advanced biofuels, on the other hand, like butanol and algoil are here to stay. Sure, as soon as we can grow them on Mars, I suppose. Here on planet Earth we barely have enough room to grow enough food. - Jed http://www.pnm.com/news/2006/073106_biomass.htm Albuquerque: PNM and Western Water and Power Production have signed a 20-year agreement to deliver renewable energy from a new 35 megawatt biomass power plant. The plant will go into service in early 2009 and will be located in Torrance County, near Estancia, N.M. The plant will be sited on 50 acres adjacent to Tagawa Greenhouses, which will utilize waste heat from the facility to heat the greenhouse and potentially increase production. More. http://www.technologyreview.com/Energy/18138/page1/ Relatively high oil prices, advances in technology, and the Bush administration's increased emphasis on renewable fuels are attracting new interest in a potentially rich source of biofuels: algae. A number of startups are now demonstrating new technology and launching large research efforts aimed at replacing hundreds of millions of gallons of fossil fuels by 2010, and much more in the future. Algae makes oil naturally. Raw algae can be processed to make biocrude, the renewable equivalent of petroleum, and refined to make gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and chemical feedstocks for plastics and drugs. Indeed, it can be processed at existing oil refineries to make just about anything that can be made from crude oil. This is the approach being taken by startups Solix Biofuels, based in Fort Collins, CO, and LiveFuels, based in Menlo Park, CA. Alternatively, strains of algae that produce more carbohydrates and less oil can be processed and fermented to make ethanol, with leftover proteins used for animal feed. This is one of the potential uses of algae produced by startup GreenFuel Technologies Corporation, based in Cambridge, MA. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2006-01-10-algae-powerplants_x.htm Even though it's early yet, and may be a long shot, the technology is quite fascinating, says Barry Worthington, executive director of US Energy Association in Washington, which represents electric utilities, government agencies, and the oil and gas industry. One key is selecting an algae with a high oil density about 50% of its weight. Because this kind of algae also grows so fast, it can produce 15,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre. Just 60 gallons are produced from soybeans, which along with corn are the major biodiesel crops today. Greenfuel isn't alone in the algae-to-oil race. Last month, Greenshift Corporation, a Mount Arlington, N.J., technology incubator company, licensed CO2-gobbling algae technology that uses a screen-like algal filter. It was developed by David Bayless, a researcher at Ohio University. http://www.greenfuelonline.com/press_releases.htm
[Vo]: Fw: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
When reading these reports I notice press release at the end. Why do I get a mental picture of a cow with several sucklins feeding off her in a pasture around Menlo Park or Cambridge? Maybe it's because our local coal fired power plant ( Sam Seymour plant,one of 25 of the worse in USA) kept promising to install stack cleanup for decades and now they are rumored to retire the unit in favor of two new coal fired units that will absolutely positively have no stack emissions... honest Injun, trust me, would I lie. highest priced hired public relations top guns of the State of Texas. Had our local beer drinker at the Dime Box saloon run the numbers on Bio-fuels.. yep!.. net increase in available fuel delivered after accounting for fuel and combined energy used in producing the Bio-fuel.. zero, zilch !! Once was an itinerant peddler used to come thru town peddling cake soap made from sawdust.. never made but one sale. Once was all it took, like the girl that accidently spread her skirts and sat in poison ivy. Richard
[Vo]: Attacks against cold fusion published
The usual garbage. See: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-0703300070mar30,1,1977.story?ctrack=1cset=true I wrote to the author. A short version of this was published by the Salt Lake Tribune, which has published previous attacks: http://www.sltrib.com/News/ci_5569842 I added a comment to this one, with the same content as the message to the author at the Chicago Tribune. - Jed
[Vo]: ORMES questions
I had a serendipitous event last Thursday night. I met this Chem E. He was talking about remediating the waste out of a nickle mine. I mentioned ghost gold, he replied, ORMES. I mentioned Joe Champion's theories, he mentioned LENR. He knows about BLP too. I wanted to discuss the matter further, but he has a commitment to his partners. He did mention a theory of everything. I searched it, as far as I can tell, it applies to particle physics. He said that a researcher at the U of M is working on it. --- http://USFamily.Net/dialup.html - $8.25/mo! -- http://www.usfamily.net/dsl.html - $19.99/mo! ---
[Vo]: Article: Algae eyed as next biofuel source by '08
SUBJECT: Article - Algae eyed as next biofuel source by '08 The following article ought to bring warm cockles to Jones' heart. See: http://www.thenewstoday.info/2007/04/02/algae.eyed.as.next.biofuel.source.in.rp.by.08.html http://tinyurl.com/2lbcnf Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Fred, ... chances are, the biofuel skeptic will chose to opine that Albuquerque must be on Mars, since earthlings without a spell-checker could never get there from here g
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Frederick Sparber wrote, in a message about algae: Jones Beene wrote: Advanced biofuels, on the other hand, like butanol and algoil are here to stay. Sure, as soon as we can grow them on Mars, I suppose. Here on planet Earth we barely have enough room to grow enough food. As I said in a previous message, my remarks only apply to plantlife grown outdoors in North America. I said: Growing algae in tanks is another matter. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Can someone help clarify: What is the algae's food source? Surely there's more to this recycling equation than just supplying the little critters CO2. How difficult or easy will it be to supply all the required nutrients to make an economical go of this? Most of these articles seem to skim over the little fiddly bits. Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com Frederick Sparber wrote, in a message about algae: Jones Beene wrote: Advanced biofuels, on the other hand, like butanol and algoil are here to stay. Sure, as soon as we can grow them on Mars, I suppose. Here on planet Earth we barely have enough room to grow enough food. As I said in a previous message, my remarks only apply to plantlife grown outdoors in North America. I said: Growing algae in tanks is another matter. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jed Rothwell wrote. To: vortex-L@eskimo.com Date: 4/2/2007 8:47:38 AM Subject: Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza Frederick Sparber wrote, in a message about algae: Jones Beene wrote: Advanced biofuels, on the other hand, like butanol and algoil are here to stay. Sure, as soon as we can grow them on Mars, I suppose. Here on planet Earth we barely have enough room to grow enough food. As I said in a previous message, my remarks only apply to plant life grown outdoors in North America. I said: Growing algae in tanks is another matter. Jones Beene did a Google satellite view of the area where the Colorado River enters the Gulf of California last year. Enough Algae Bloom biofuel potential to run all the trucks and cars in the USA for months, not to mention the algae bloom on Lake Meade a few years ago. Fred - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Plenty of available nitrogen (NOx - SOx) and mineral ash from coal-fired power plants, plus recycle of potassium and phosphate and iron etc., from burning of the algae residues, Steven. Fred - Original Message - From: Steven Vincent Johnson To: vortex-l@eskimo.com Sent: 4/2/2007 8:57:38 AM Subject: Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza Can someone help clarify: What is the algae's food source? Surely there's more to this recycling equation than just supplying the little critters CO2. How difficult or easy will it be to supply all the required nutrients to make an economical go of this? Most of these articles seem to skim over the little fiddly bits. Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com Frederick Sparber wrote, in a message about algae: Jones Beene wrote: Advanced biofuels, on the other hand, like butanol and algoil are here to stay. Sure, as soon as we can grow them on Mars, I suppose. Here on planet Earth we barely have enough room to grow enough food. As I said in a previous message, my remarks only apply to plantlife grown outdoors in North America. I said: Growing algae in tanks is another matter. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jones Beene wrote. Fred, ... chances are, the biofuel skeptic will chose to opine that Albuquerque must be on Mars, since earthlings without a spell-checker could never get there from here g Not hard to find on a map of Bernalillio County NM, Jones, once you figure out how to spell Burn-ah-Leo. My spell checker offered Bengali and Bernoulli. :-) http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=enq=bernalillo%20county%20nmie=UTF-8oe=UTF -8um=1sa=Ntab=wl Fred
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jed Rothwell wrote: As I said in a previous message, my remarks only apply to plantlife grown outdoors in North America. I said: Growing algae in tanks is another matter. That is an artificial distinction. You definitely do NOT need, nor even want tanks. In fact there are already plans and suggestions from NREL that almost every power plant in the USA which now burns coal or natural gas could and should be piping CO2 into an adjoining algae pond. The cost of earthmoving to create large ponds is well known and de minimis. Most power plants are located far removed from urban areas with plenty of buffer land which is perfect for such ponds. Hot water is a plus for algae, allowing full year-round growing. If every power plant could convert even half of its normal CO2 emissions into algoil, then this is a huge step forward towards eliminating Arab oil, and might actually benefit the consummer in several ways. 1) less direct CO2 emission - near neutral net emission 2) self-sufficient production of transportation fuel in the USA 3) lower net cost of electricity, when the algoil is sold a profit. It is no coincidence that the huge recent sale of power-plants in Texas, alluded to by Richard, will coincide with this shift towards algoil production by power companies (formerly oil drillers). Jones
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jones Beene wrote: That is an artificial distinction. You definitely do NOT need, nor even want tanks. There are tanks in most of the prototypes now on line, such as this one: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/08/worlds_first_ca.php In fact there are already plans and suggestions from NREL that almost every power plant in the USA which now burns coal or natural gas could and should be piping CO2 into an adjoining algae pond. In the U.S. outdoors it is too cold in winter for algae to grow naturally. (I have several ponds and streams, and I am quite familiar with the stuff.) You need to keep it warm, and exposed to sunlight. Therefore, a growing pond would have to be covered or heated with waste heat from the generator plant. I said tanks but I had in mind covered ponds or the plastic bags now being used for this application. There is plenty of waste heat at plants, not to mention CO2, so that is a promising technology. But you cannot have ponds thousands of hectares wide in natural conditions that are heated and that produce algae year-round in natural conditions (that is, without massive infusions of man-made heat or CO2). Algae grown at fossil fuel generator plants is probably a great idea, but it cannot begin to supply all of the liquid fuel we need for transportation (14,080 GWh/day). Naturally, it could if we were to reduce liquid fuel demand by a factor of 5 or 10, which we could easily do with plug-in hybrid cars. In a plug-in hybrid world, something like algae from fossil fuel plants would fit in perfectly, because it would reduce CO by half. That is to say, assuming the algae recovers all of the CO2 from the fossil fuel plants, it would end up using the same oxygen twice before finally converting it to CO2. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
I wrote: Lake Meade, on the Colorado River, has a surface area of 620 km^2. That's 620,000,000 square meters. It is arid, and solar energy reaching the ground in North America arid places is about 500 W at peak, or 1.5 kWh/m^2/day. I believe natural algae photosynthesis efficiency is . . . what? 2% overall? So that comes to: 18,600,000 kWh or 18.6 GWh. This is 86% of the output of a typical U.S. nuclear reactor . . . I could be wrong about that 2%. I am sure that algae grows better in the heated, CO2 enriched ponds next to fossil fuel plants, that Jones Beene discussed. In Chapter 16 of my book, I computed that plants grown under ideal conditions in the Japanese food factories convert as much as 15% of the light energy into food. This is light in a narrow wavelength of PAR, and the atmosphere is enriched with extra CO2. I doubt that a heated outdoor pond -- even one supercharged with CO2 -- is as good as the food factory, so I suppose algae is somewhere between 2 and 15%. It would be way better per square-meter than using Lake Meade or some other unheated natural body of water. However, if you want to tap solar energy, I think it would be more efficient and cost-effective to make a 620 km^2 solar-electric generator plant collection space. This is ~20% efficient, so it would be equivalent to ~8 U.S. nuclear plants. You could put ~100 km^2 near Las Vegas, and another ~200 km^2 near Los Angeles, and you would eliminate their daytime demand for electricity, which is high because of air conditioning. Transportation consumes 26.52 quads, so if you could magically convert nuclear electricity into transportation energy, it would take 325 reactors. I meant convert it into gasoline directly. You can use the nuclear electricity in railroad commuter trains or plug-in hybrid cars, and these are far more efficient than gasoline-powered internal combustion engine-only cars. I suppose ~200 standard U.S. nukes that produce 16 quads per year would be roughly enough for a fleet of hybrid plug-in cars and trucks. You still need liquid fuel for long distance transportation, so you use ~200 nukes for electricity plus fuel from the algae grown at the ~250 existing fossil fuel plants (nuke equivalent; actually we have more than 250). You might use waste heat from the nuke plants, but there is no ready source of enriched CO2 next to them. No fossil fuel, and they tend to be far from cities, so no garbage or sewage either. - Jed
[Vo]: 41% efficient solar cells
I wrote: However, if you want to tap solar energy, I think it would be more efficient and cost-effective to make a 620 km^2 solar-electric generator plant collection space. This is ~20% efficient, so it would be equivalent to ~8 U.S. nuclear plants. In December 2006, Boeing-Spectrolab announced a 40.7% efficient cell that costs $3,000 per kW of capacity. That's remarkable. I did not know these things were so advanced. See: http://www.energy.gov/news/4503.htm Ed Storms has emphasized that it would be better to reduce the cost per watt of solar cells, rather than increase efficiency. This one appears to do both. This kind of conversion efficiency is far ahead of anything that can be achieved with plant-life photosynthesis. That would give you the equivalent of 16 nuclear plants in the 620 km^2 desert area. That's a 25 km square. There are plenty of stretches of vacant land that large in U.S. desert areas. It is a shame solar energy is not available at night. The Correas claimed that the solar energy they tap comes right through the earth. I asked them why, in that case, they did not try testing it underground. They insisted on muddling up the test by running their devices in sunlight, which they did not measure, thus mixing the two putative energy sources together. This is like running a cold fusion cell with a lit candle underneath the cell, without even measuring the candle flame energy. I suspect that their results are entirely caused by ordinary solar energy. - Jed
[Vo]: Congress seeks documents in Purdue cold-fusion probe
Here is an AP story describing the latest attempt to bully cold fusion researchers. I suspect someone like Robert Park is behind this. - Jed - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Congress seeks documents in Purdue cold-fusion probe Associated Press INDIANAPOLIS Purdue University has become the target of a congressional inquiry nearly two months after a university panel cleared allegations of research misconduct against a scientist who claimed to have produced nuclear fusion in tabletop experiments. A congressional subcommittee has given Purdue until Thursday to turn over copies of its findings into the allegations raised last year against Rusi Taleyarkhan, a professor of nuclear engineering. Purdue announced Feb. 7 that an internal inquiry found no evidence supporting those allegations and that no further investigation of the allegations is warranted. School officials, citing a Purdue confidentiality policy, have declined to discuss what the inquiry found.
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Pollution, Bloom, or not, Jed, all of the water from watershed runoff contains algae. Figure out how much algae is available per unit volume after you've allowed for feeding aquatic life and available natural plant nutrients. Cost effective harvesting using stream (gravity) flow since maximum production is near the surface, doesn't seem intractable. Fred [Original Message] From: Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: vortex-L@eskimo.com Date: 4/2/2007 10:44:46 AM Subject: Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza Frederick Sparber wrote: Jones Beene did a Google satellite view of the area where the Colorado River enters the Gulf of California last year. Let me amend that: my statement applied to plant life grown outdoors on land in North America, not in water. However, the huge algae blooms in water in rivers and in the ocean are caused by pollution, so let us hope we eliminate them in the future. I suppose they might be harvested in the meanwhile, but the long-term goal should be to get rid of them. Enough Algae Bloom biofuel potential to run all the trucks and cars in the USA for months, not to mention the algae bloom on Lake Meade a few years ago. Well, you would have to find a way to keep the bloom there permanently, which might not be easy, and I am sure it would violate National Park rules. It might mess up the generators, too. But let's check the numbers. Lake Meade, on the Colorado River, has a surface area of 620 km^2. That's 620,000,000 square meters. It is arid, and solar energy reaching the ground in North America arid places is about 500 W at peak, or 1.5 kWh/m^2/day. This is outdoors, so we are talking about natural algae, not a bred or domesticated species or genetically altered version. (Most domesticated species are inherently weak, and cannot survive in the wild.) Also, production will be seasonal. I believe natural algae photosynthesis efficiency is . . . what? 2% overall? So that comes to: 18,600,000 kWh or 18.6 GWh. This is 86% of the output of a typical U.S. nuclear reactor (900 MW running 24 hours = 21.6 GWh). That's an impressive amount of energy to be sure, but the U.S. consumes 384.7 million gallons/day of gasoline for transportation. See: http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/quickfacts/quickoil.html According to an on-line energy converter, that comes to 14,080,020,000 kWh, so it is too low by a factor of 800. http://www.onlineconversion.com/energy.htm This estimate seems wrong to me. I have double checked these numbers, but I do not find the error, but this seems to indicate it would take 651 nuclear reactors to supply liquid fuel for automobiles. That's ~200 more generators of all types than the U.S. presently possesses. Looking at it another way, the Annual Energy Review Diagram 1 shows that in the U.S. nuclear plants contributes 8.15 Quads per year. There are about 100 nuclear plants. Transportation consumes 26.52 quads, so if you could magically convert nuclear electricity into transportation energy, it would take 325 reactors. Taking into account the comparative inefficiency of internal combustion engines, perhaps it would take twice as many, after all. Lake Meade is the largest man-made body of water, and we would need 800 more like that, all filled with noxious gunk. You can see from this how horribly inefficient internal combustion gasoline based transportation is. Compared to other major energy consuming technology, such as lightbulbs and power generators, automobiles are stuck about 50 to 100 years behind the times. Rather than trying to supply these ridiculous machines with liquid fuel, it makes far more sense improve the efficiency of the machines, and reduce or eliminate their need for liquid fuel. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Congress seeks documents in Purdue cold-fusion probe
This makes no sense at all. The sonofusion work has no hope of being practical and the issue of reproducibility is trivial. Why would Congress get involved? If the oil industry were worried about cold fusion, many methods much closer to a practical device than this one are being investigated. Why are they not being targeted. Ed Jed Rothwell wrote: Here is an AP story describing the latest attempt to bully cold fusion researchers. I suspect someone like Robert Park is behind this. - Jed - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Congress seeks documents in Purdue cold-fusion probe Associated Press INDIANAPOLIS – Purdue University has become the target of a congressional inquiry nearly two months after a university panel cleared allegations of research misconduct against a scientist who claimed to have produced nuclear fusion in tabletop experiments. A congressional subcommittee has given Purdue until Thursday to turn over copies of its findings into the allegations raised last year against Rusi Taleyarkhan, a professor of nuclear engineering. Purdue announced Feb. 7 that an “internal inquiry” found no evidence supporting those allegations and “that no further investigation of the allegations is warranted.” School officials, citing a Purdue confidentiality policy, have declined to discuss what the inquiry found.
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jones Beene wrote. Jed Rothwell wrote: As I said in a previous message, my remarks only apply to plantlife grown outdoors in North America. I said: Growing algae in tanks is another matter. That is an artificial distinction. You definitely do NOT need, nor even want tanks. In fact there are already plans and suggestions from NREL that almost every power plant in the USA which now burns coal or natural gas could and should be piping CO2 into an adjoining algae pond. Don't leave out waste heat from nuclear power plants heating algae ponds, Jones. Plenty of sequestered CO2 to pipe to them, and it would help reduce cooling tower water usage, too. Fred The cost of earthmoving to create large ponds is well known and de minimis. Most power plants are located far removed from urban areas with plenty of buffer land which is perfect for such ponds. Hot water is a plus for algae, allowing full year-round growing. If every power plant could convert even half of its normal CO2 emissions into algoil, then this is a huge step forward towards eliminating Arab oil, and might actually benefit the consummer in several ways. 1) less direct CO2 emission - near neutral net emission 2) self-sufficient production of transportation fuel in the USA 3) lower net cost of electricity, when the algoil is sold a profit. It is no coincidence that the huge recent sale of power-plants in Texas, alluded to by Richard, will coincide with this shift towards algoil production by power companies (formerly oil drillers). Jones
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Frederick Sparber wrote: Pollution, Bloom, or not, Jed, all of the water from watershed runoff contains algae. Yes. Way too much. We should be trying to reduce that. Figure out how much algae is available per unit volume after you've allowed for feeding aquatic life and available natural plant nutrients. Cost effective harvesting using stream (gravity) flow since maximum production is near the surface, doesn't seem intractable. This sounds like a large scale project that may hurt the ecosystem, especially if we curb the pollution that causes algae blooms, and reduce the amounts to natural levels. The amount you should leave to feed aquatic life is easily computed: it is exactly the amount that nature has been providing for millions of years before we got into the picture. Species are evolved to eat that much. As soon as we get back of the picture and stop polluting the water, we should also stop harvesting the stuff. We should also stop harvesting wild fish, by the way. We should only eat domesticated ones grown by us. In other words, it is not a good idea to remove millions of tons of food from the ecosystem food chain for any reason, whether the food will be eaten by fish (algae) or by people in Mexico (corn). I think it would be far better to tap solar energy with less invasive devices, such as wind turbines and solar-thermal collectors. Again, the reason boils down to the fact that natural photosynthesis is inefficient; it takes a lot of sunlight to produce a little chemical fuel. The latest solar cells are 400 times more efficient per square meter than the best naturally occurring photosynthetic conversion. Therefore, they will have a smaller impact on the ecosystem. Unnatural photosynthesis in a heated pond charged with CO2 from a fossil fuel plant is an entirely different story. It is far better to start with, and you might improve it with domesticated species of algae. I have read there are some that might be far more efficient. U.C. Berkeley has engineered a stain that might be 100,000 times better at producing hydrogen than natural algae. See: http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/02/70273 Domesticated species are often more efficient, but as I said previously there is an inevitable trade-off: they cannot survive in the wild. They are weak. For example, in food crops, we redirect most of their metabolism to producing grain, which weakens their natural defenses and other adoptions. If you plant human bred corn (maize) in the middle of a meadow in the woods, it attracts too many herbivores, and the seeds fall so thickly around the plant the next generation does not survive. Natural corn -- the type that was first domesticated by native Americans -- had smaller cobs with fewer grains. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Frederick Sparber wrote: Don't leave out waste heat from nuclear power plants heating algae ponds, Jones. Plenty of sequestered CO2 to pipe to them, and it would help reduce cooling tower water usage, too. Where is sequestered CO2 near a nuclear plant? As I said, they build these things far from cities, and also far from fossil fuel plants. Or are you suggesting they should pipe CO2 from a fossil fuel plant a few hundred kilometers away? That might work. I suppose it does not take much energy to pump the gas. I must say though, I would much prefer to see them tear down the coal-fueled plants and build nuclear plants or wind turbines. I suppose you can pump CO2 from natural gas-fired plants, which will be with us for a long time to come, alas. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Congress seeks documents in Purdue cold-fusion probe
Edmund Storms wrote: This makes no sense at all. The sonofusion work has no hope of being practical and the issue of reproducibility is trivial. Why would Congress get involved? If the oil industry were worried about cold fusion . . . I do not think this has anything to do with the oil industry. Robert Park and other enemies of cold fusion have frequently spoken out against sonofusion. They think it is another form of cold fusion. You have to realize, they have read nothing and they know nothing about either field of research, so they get the two confused. Alternatively, this might have been engineered by Taleyarkhan's jealous academic rivals, who were the ones behind the original witchhunt at Purdue. They believe that sonofusion exists, but they want the credit for it. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jed Rothwell wrote. Frederick Sparber wrote: Pollution, Bloom, or not, Jed, all of the water from watershed runoff contains algae. Yes. Way too much. We should be trying to reduce that. Figure out how much algae is available per unit volume after you've allowed for feeding aquatic life and available natural plant nutrients. Cost effective harvesting using stream (gravity) flow since maximum production is near the surface, doesn't seem intractable. This sounds like a large scale project that may hurt the ecosystem, especially if we curb the pollution that causes algae blooms, and reduce the amounts to natural levels. The amount you should leave to feed aquatic life is easily computed: it is exactly the amount that nature has been providing for millions of years before we got into the picture. Species are evolved to eat that much. No problem there, Jed, we switch to eating fish and clams/mussells which frees up corn for E-85 production. :-) As soon as we get back of the picture and stop polluting the water, we should also stop harvesting the stuff. Yes, otherwise it ends up in the ocean and rots. We should also stop harvesting wild fish, by the way. We should only eat domesticated ones grown by us. In other words, it is not a good idea to remove millions of tons of food from the ecosystem food chain for any reason, whether the food will be eaten by fish (algae) or by people in Mexico (corn). I think it would be far better to tap solar energy with less invasive devices, such as wind turbines and solar-thermal collectors. Again, the reason boils down to the fact that natural photosynthesis is inefficient; it takes a lot of sunlight to produce a little chemical fuel. The latest solar cells are 400 times more efficient per square meter than the best naturally occurring photosynthetic conversion. Therefore, they will have a smaller impact on the ecosystem. Unnatural photosynthesis in a heated pond charged with CO2 from a fossil fuel plant is an entirely different story. It is far better to start with, and you might improve it with domesticated species of algae. I have read there are some that might be far more efficient. U.C. Berkeley has engineered a stain that might be 100,000 times better at producing hydrogen than natural algae. See: http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/02/70273 Blue-Green Algae is practically everywhere (airborne) as is CO2. As long as the water is warm and nutrients, NOx, and sunlight adequate you can see the O2 bubbles come off as the algae proliferate in a container. Domesticated species are often more efficient, but as I said previously there is an inevitable trade-off: they cannot survive in the wild. They are weak. For example, in food crops, we redirect most of their metabolism to producing grain, which weakens their natural defenses and other adoptions. If you plant human bred corn (maize) in the middle of a meadow in the woods, it attracts too many herbivores, and the seeds fall so thickly around the plant the next generation does not survive. Natural corn -- the type that was first domesticated by native Americans -- had smaller cobs with fewer grains. Tis far better to plant Cannabis in the woods, I hear, even though it's agains the Law I fear... Unanimous. (at Berkely?) Must be a full moon out there. Fred. Fred - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
Jed Rothwell wrote. Frederick Sparber wrote: Don't leave out waste heat from nuclear power plants heating algae ponds, Jones. Plenty of sequestered CO2 to pipe to them, and it would help reduce cooling tower water usage, too. Where is sequestered CO2 near a nuclear plant? As I said, they build these things far from cities, and also far from fossil fuel plants. Or are you suggesting they should pipe CO2 from a fossil fuel plant a few hundred kilometers away? That might work. I suppose it does not take much energy to pump the gas. That 1040 Megawatt Arizona Public Service natural gas fueled power plant is about 50 miles west of Phoenix. So is the 3,900 Megawatt Palo Verde Nuke Plant. CO2 from ethanol plants and other sources is easy to compress to liquid for transport by truck, rail or pipeline (even as a mix with natural gas in off season). I must say though, I would much prefer to see them tear down the coal-fueled plants and build nuclear plants or wind turbines. I suppose you can pump CO2 from natural gas-fired plants, which will be with us for a long time to come, alas. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Possible problem with LENR-CANR. Please check. CANCEL
Cancel alarm. Reset. It seems to happen with any Acrobat file, anywhere on the web. It must be an interaction with Internet Explorer and PDF Plus! IE is a can of worms. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
not in all of the us. a lot of empty ground is here in the southwest, and algae will grow year round. Also, large ponds that are heated... that waste heat goes straight up, and will change wehather patterns. On 4/2/07, Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Jones Beene wrote: That is an artificial distinction. You definitely do NOT need, nor even want tanks. There are tanks in most of the prototypes now on line, such as this one: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/08/worlds_first_ca.php In fact there are already plans and suggestions from NREL that almost every power plant in the USA which now burns coal or natural gas could and should be piping CO2 into an adjoining algae pond. In the U.S. outdoors it is too cold in winter for algae to grow naturally. (I have several ponds and streams, and I am quite familiar with the stuff.) You need to keep it warm, and exposed to sunlight. Therefore, a growing pond would have to be covered or heated with waste heat from the generator plant. I said tanks but I had in mind covered ponds or the plastic bags now being used for this application. There is plenty of waste heat at plants, not to mention CO2, so that is a promising technology. But you cannot have ponds thousands of hectares wide in natural conditions that are heated and that produce algae year-round in natural conditions (that is, without massive infusions of man-made heat or CO2). Algae grown at fossil fuel generator plants is probably a great idea, but it cannot begin to supply all of the liquid fuel we need for transportation (14,080 GWh/day). Naturally, it could if we were to reduce liquid fuel demand by a factor of 5 or 10, which we could easily do with plug-in hybrid cars. In a plug-in hybrid world, something like algae from fossil fuel plants would fit in perfectly, because it would reduce CO by half. That is to say, assuming the algae recovers all of the CO2 from the fossil fuel plants, it would end up using the same oxygen twice before finally converting it to CO2. - Jed -- That which yields isn't always weak.
[Vo]: Re: Possible problem with LENR-CANR. Please check.
Jed, I just test downloaded a paper by Ed Storms and another by Schwinger both usng save target as and directly opening them in IE ver 7.0.5730. No problem - no messages like yours.
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
leaking pen wrote: Also, large ponds that are heated... that waste heat goes straight up, and will change weather patterns. Well, we are only talking about doing this with waste heat from generators, and that already goes straight up. It is mostly released in the form of steam from the large conical cooling towers that many people mistakenly believe are nuclear reactors. (By the way, this steam kills millions of birds, many more than wind turbines do.) Still, this is a point well taken, and it might be a good idea to reduce evaporation from ponds, especially in arid places. In the photos of algae production in power plants that I saw recently, the algae was grown in large plastic bags exposed to sunlight. This would prevent evaporation. I cannot find those photos, but they are out there . . . somewhere. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Possible problem with LENR-CANR. Please check.
Since you mention this problem, I would like to remind those who own a PC that all of these problems can be eliminated by getting an iMac that runs both system OS-X and Windows. The Mac can be used on the internet with Netscape, which avoids most of the nasties and the Windows version can be used for everything else, if you insist. Microsoft is not the only game in town anymore. Ed Jed Rothwell wrote: I use mainly the Firefox browser version 2.0.0.3. I recently installed Windows Internet Explorer 7, which is an abomination. I need to use occasionally for websites that do not work otherwise. Just now I tried to download a paper from LENR-CANR.org. It gave me the following message: This website wants to run the following add-on: IE PDFPlus OCX from 'Zeon Corp. (unverified publisher)'. If you trust the website and the add-on and want to allow it to run click here . . . This happens with papers converted recently using the program PDF plus!, and also with papers compiled years ago using the original Acrobat program. If anyone else here is using Internet Explorer 7, or some other version, please try to download a paper and let me know if it gives you this message. I have never heard of PDFPlus OCX from 'Zeon Corp. I hope this is not some sort of virus that has invaded the website, and I hope this warning does not frighten off readers. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
True, however, in terms of weather patterns, a small temperature over a large area has more effect than large but concentrated. see el nino. On 4/2/07, Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: leaking pen wrote: Also, large ponds that are heated... that waste heat goes straight up, and will change weather patterns. Well, we are only talking about doing this with waste heat from generators, and that already goes straight up. It is mostly released in the form of steam from the large conical cooling towers that many people mistakenly believe are nuclear reactors. (By the way, this steam kills millions of birds, many more than wind turbines do.) Still, this is a point well taken, and it might be a good idea to reduce evaporation from ponds, especially in arid places. In the photos of algae production in power plants that I saw recently, the algae was grown in large plastic bags exposed to sunlight. This would prevent evaporation. I cannot find those photos, but they are out there . . . somewhere. - Jed -- That which yields isn't always weak.
[Vo]: Nuclear power plant scandals in Japan
In recent weeks, Japanese television and newspapers have reported that over the past 29 years there have been as many as 97 accidents and near-accidents at 12 Japanese nuclear power plants that were covered up. The most severe of these were criticality accidents that occurred when the control rods fall down to the bottom of the container in a particular type of reactor. Apparently the mechanism that raises and lowers the rods sometimes loses its grip, and the rods fall out of the core. One incident lasted for 37 hours. The government is now talking about tightening up oversight and preventing future occurrences but until yesterday there was no mention of fining the companies or punishing the people who participated in the cover up. I think that if something like this happened in the US, several top executives would be taken away in handcuffs in the so-called perp-walk. All this began when there was an accident recently that was not covered up. A government accident investigation panel was convened, and somehow the investigation got out of hand and revealed more than they intended. I say this because reporters found out that a government official who is one of the principal members of the panel knew about some of the incidents for the last 29 years, and did nothing. There has not been much about this in the U.S. newspapers. There has been a lot of irresponsible behavior in Japanese society lately, such as these coverups and Aneha incident in 2005. Aneha is an architect who designed many buildings without enough supports to withstand a magnitude 5 earthquake. One structural engineer interviewed on the news looked at the blueprints and photos and said, Never mind an earthquake; frankly, I am surprised they have not fallen down already. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construction_Accounting_Statement_Forgery_Problem - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Nuclear power plant scandals in Japan
Ah. The story has progressed since I last heard about it. They have now revealed 97 incidents at nuclear power plants, 128 incidents at thermal (fossil fuel) plants, and 81 at hydroelectric plants. Those power company managers have been busy little bees all these years. Here are some recent reports in English: A comment about the privatization of Los Alamos and how it relates to this cover up. I do not see the connection but this is pretty funny: http://lanl-the-corporate-story.blogspot.com/2007/03/criticality-accidents-in-japan-and-lanl.html This blog is a follow-on to LANL: The Real Story. Privatization at LANL is a fait accompli, soon to befall LLNL. The real content will be up to you, the thoughtful Readers, including those from soon-to-be quagmired LLNL. . . . The latest from the Yomiuri: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20070330TDY04001.htm http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20070331TDY02010.htm '100 workers present at criticality accident' The No. 2 reactor at Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power station went critical in October 1984, as about 100 workers were still within the reactor container during a regular checkup, it was revealed Friday. Ten electric power firms, Japan Atomic Power Co. (JAPC) and Electric Power Development Co. reported to the government Friday of 306 cases of cover-ups of problems and data fabrications at nuclear, thermal and hydro-electric power stations throughout the nation. According to the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency of the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, the 12 companies reported 97 cases at nuclear power stations, 128 cases at thermal power stations and 81 cases at hydraulic power stations in their reports detailing cases relating to cover-ups of troubles and data fabrication. . . . - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Nuclear power plant scandals in Japan
This is astounding. The Japanese version of the Yomiuri article includes some details not translated into English, which are even worse. Japanese text here: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/national/news/20070330it12.htm Last para, translated by me: Included in the 306 incidents listed in the report are several cases from different power stations in which operators repeated the same fraudulent accounting numerous times, and these are each counted as one case. The actual number of incidents in which rules and regulations were bent and inappropriate procedures were followed probably numbers in the thousands, at least. Japan is a nation prone to cover-ups and obscurity, but this scandal takes the cake. - Jed
[Vo]: Re: Possible problem with LENR-CANR. Please check.
Hi Jed, I have d/l'd several papers using WIE 7, and there was no problem. Norman - Original Message - From: Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: vortex-L@eskimo.com Sent: Monday, April 02, 2007 9:34 PM Subject: [Vo]: Possible problem with LENR-CANR. Please check. I use mainly the Firefox browser version 2.0.0.3. I recently installed Windows Internet Explorer 7, which is an abomination. I need to use occasionally for websites that do not work otherwise. Just now I tried to download a paper from LENR-CANR.org. It gave me the following message: This website wants to run the following add-on: IE PDFPlus OCX from 'Zeon Corp. (unverified publisher)'. If you trust the website and the add-on and want to allow it to run click here . . . This happens with papers converted recently using the program PDF plus!, and also with papers compiled years ago using the original Acrobat program. If anyone else here is using Internet Explorer 7, or some other version, please try to download a paper and let me know if it gives you this message. I have never heard of PDFPlus OCX from 'Zeon Corp. I hope this is not some sort of virus that has invaded the website, and I hope this warning does not frighten off readers. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: Congress seeks documents in Purdue cold-fusion probe
On 4/2/07, Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I do not think this has anything to do with the oil industry. A spring wind blows on the house of cards. Terry
Re: [Vo]: Nuclear power plant scandals in Japan
On 4/2/07, Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Japan is a nation prone to cover-ups and obscurity, but this scandal takes the cake. The value of 'face' exceeds that of 'truth'. Terry
Re: [Vo]: Biofuel Bonanza
What does big-oil fear more than Nancy Pelosi and the Dem-wits? Answer: the resourcefulness of the American farmer, backed by voter anti-tax sentiment in support of this 'local hero'. And now with aquaculture and depleted fishing resources - they also are fearing the emergence of low-cost sea-based aquaculture (algae harvesting). Oil prices cannot go much higher than $3.50-4.00 at the pump now, because of this looming price-cap - placed on oil NOT by the legislature (which would like to see it go even higher) but by the farm lobby and good-old capitalist profit-motive ... ...together with the clear realization in DC that that if the farmer and aquaculture get 'over the hump' and into full production and employment, then each will have the necessary voter bloc constituency - which can and WILL eliminate most taxes for the domestic product only, putting big-oil and big government spenders at competitive disadvantage. Part of the PR problem for algoil starts at the top. Vital info has been accumulated by NREL, but is not being released in a timely fashion. They are not comfortable with a massive shift of resources into aquaculture. However, discovery of this profit potential (in alternative fuel) is almost impossible to obfuscate. What we see now, in the recent boom in ethanol production will shift next year and beyond into a boom in aquaculture and biodiesel. There is little chance of turning back that trend --unless LENR, ZPE or hydrino-tech comes to the rescue. The late/great 300+ page study on algae - crammed full of disinformation from DoE is now 10 years old, and NREL was supposed to have a timely update with revised comparisons on the yield of the newer strains of algae, which are superior (as expected) and best techniques - but no one can find this revision online. Is this deliberate interference ? ...ah shucks, probably just being held-up a bit by Petro-insider consultants as it is very damaging to 'bidness' as they say in Dubai. At 10 years old, when crude was under $20 or about a fourth of what it is now - biodiesel from aquaculture was not then seen by DoE as competitive - so consequently they did NOT plan for it aggressively (as they should have). They even said: Even with assumptions of $50 per ton of CO2 as a carbon credit, the cost of biodiesel never competes with the projected cost of petroleum diesel. That was their erroneous conclusion then! One hopes that we will not repeat that error and will plan aggressively and encourage the shift away from OPEC for the next ten years: which is based firmly biodiesel from aquaculture. Yields are up to 10,000 time higher per acre than soybeans, for instance. BTW this report does admit that 100% self-sufficiency is possible through aquaculture - but hardly a dent can be accomplished from agriculture alone (soy and corn). That never competes conclusion is what big-oil wants you to remember in 2007, but my-my -- look how a few oil-Wars change everything which was valid then, as now the wholesale price of petro-diesel at the pump in 2007 is actually higher than biodiesel in many places. The cost estimates for the ASP program developed in 1995 showed that algal biodiesel cost would range from $1.40 to $4.40 per gallon based on long-term projections - three times more than petro-diesel then. They also allude to the 'full-tax' or 'less-tax' implications. That is the very consideration which puts government at odds with citizens. Voters will pay modest taxes on biodiesel for road improvement but not massive taxes for sponsoring oil-wars or other pork. Yes that is a gross over-simplification of the embedded dynamics, but it gets to the crux of the problem. We, the citizens, want self-sufficiency and are willing to vote for the US farmer (or aquaculturist) in any way which will get us there, even if it means lower taxes for Hawks to wage war with. The current price of biodiesel has lived up to that estimate (actually below the low end of that estimate), but 2007 numbers for petro-diesel are much higher than DoE estimated then. The next ten years will be even harder to estimate, because biodiesel from algae itself will probably lower the rigged-price which the Arabs and OPEC can extort. They can and will sell oil any price necessary to ruin or stifle the competition, so we must protect biodiesel from predatory pricing and we can use one-sided taxes to do that. However, this will probably lower overall tax revenues -- so there is the problem in a nutshell. Duh! Average price per gallon in the USA, from DoE two years ago: Biodiesel (untaxed but from higher priced soy, NOT algae) $2.27 Diesel (taxed) $2.24 Gasoline (taxed) $2.11 Ethanol (untaxed) $1.86 I filled up today in California with regular gasoline at $3.25. I wish I had a diesel and would even pay more for biodiesel - but look at what little choice the consummer has in that regard. Forty percent of autos in Europe
Re: [Vo]: Nuclear power plant scandals in Japan
Terry Blanton writes: Japan is a nation prone to cover-ups and obscurity, but this scandal takes the cake. The value of 'face' exceeds that of 'truth'. This looks like straight out criminality to me. They did not want to turn off the reactors, pay a fine, or deal with the B.S. of regulators poking into their business. One of the documents uncovered was described by the reporter as saying, in summary, we know that safety is our responsibility, and we are going to have to write regulations and do what needs to be done. We are the experts in reactor safety. Let's keep the government and the public from poking around and telling us how to run our business. In the previous nuclear accidents in Japan, the level of cover-up and audacity of the lies was breathtaking. After a reactor fire, I recall they gave the news media a video showing the insides of the reactor building looking fine. The message was: See? It's all fixed. Nothing to worry about. Go away. It turned out the video was made before the fire, and the place was a shambles far worse than they had described previously. Their behavior reminds of the government in the Soviet Union around 1970. They are so used to lying it is second nature to them, and they have forgotten how to tell the truth. The nuclear power industry would never get away with that kind of thing in the U.S. The situation in Japan was well described by Alex Kerr, in the book Dogs and Demons: Tales From the Dark Side of Japan. The Aneha construction scandal and this nuclear power scandal is even worse than anything he described -- or than I ever imagined. This is a nation culture rotten to the core. Of course, this kind of thing never continues indefinitely. Sooner or later, societies either reform and become healthy again . . . or they go extinct. The people may survive, but the culture vanishes, the way Japan's pre-modern culture did after 1868. Commentators and newspaper articles often praise the Japanese for preserving their traditions but it does not look that way to me. When I read about how my relatives lived in 1902, or 1860 -- what we ate, the kind of books we read, our jobs, marriages and concerns -- it sounds a lot like my present culture. We still wear pants and suits, but Japanese people never wear kimonos anymore. We Americans Europeans are the ones who honor tradition, and know about the past. In Japan the past is a foreign country, and people have no roots. It is sad. - Jed
Re: [Vo]: ORMES questions
Know who at U of M? Zak On Apr 2, 2007, at 7:32 AM, thomas malloy wrote: I had a serendipitous event last Thursday night. I met this Chem E. He was talking about remediating the waste out of a nickle mine. I mentioned ghost gold, he replied, ORMES. I mentioned Joe Champion's theories, he mentioned LENR. He knows about BLP too. I wanted to discuss the matter further, but he has a commitment to his partners. He did mention a theory of everything. I searched it, as far as I can tell, it applies to particle physics. He said that a researcher at the U of M is working on it.
Re: [Vo]: ORMES questions
there are many theories of everything. gut instinct, you know. On 4/2/07, thomas malloy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I had a serendipitous event last Thursday night. I met this Chem E. He was talking about remediating the waste out of a nickle mine. I mentioned ghost gold, he replied, ORMES. I mentioned Joe Champion's theories, he mentioned LENR. He knows about BLP too. I wanted to discuss the matter further, but he has a commitment to his partners. He did mention a theory of everything. I searched it, as far as I can tell, it applies to particle physics. He said that a researcher at the U of M is working on it. --- http://USFamily.Net/dialup.html - $8.25/mo! -- http://www.usfamily.net/dsl.html - $19.99/mo! --- -- That which yields isn't always weak.
Re: [Vo]: Nuclear power plant scandals in Japan
The reply-to was not vortex-L@eskimo.com as I had expected, not an attempt at anonymity. Never the less I believe that the Horror of Chernobyl, reports of up to 1 Million dead and continuing impact is perhaps great enough to put Nuclear down the list a bit in terms of preferred power sources, Coal is never so devastating as that, coal is only worse if you assume Nuclear goes without a hitch. It's not a cost effective source of power either, it requires government subsidies last I heard. I'm not here to defend coal and oil, they are awful. (And indeed if man made CO2 from fossil fuels are indeed responsible for global warming then I must agree it it worse especially when in theory Nuclear can be safer than it currently is) But there is Hydro, Ocean (Tide, Wave and temperature differential), Solar and Wind, each of which could solely be used to power the world if fully tapped and in the case of Hydro engineered. (and if the energy was stored and transmitted efficiently to where these sources were not available) However on a more practical note I believe that Free Energy is possible with solid state electrical equipment where the energy is either created or tapped from a vast unseen reservoir. Oh, of course I agree that Fossil fuel funds terrorism, but we may disagree on which oil funded men commit Terrorism, but let's not go back there. On 4/3/07, Jed Rothwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: One of my correspondents, who may wish to remain anonymous, wrote to me: I was always uncomfortable whenever conventional Nuclear energy was proposed as clean and safe. The accidents and close calls and contaminations happen everywhere there is Nuclear power, it isn't safe. I would like to share my response. Naturally, I have mixed feelings about nuclear power. I think everyone on Vortex does -- this is a technically knowledgable group and we all know that a large machine can be dangerous, and there are always pros and cons. Having said that, I have to ask: It isn't safe compared to what? It is lot safer than coal, which spews millions of tons of radioactive garbage, and is probably destroying the world with global warming. It is safer than oil, which pays for terrorism. Okay, it is a more dangerous than wind power, but unfortunately there is not enough wind in Georgia or Japan to make a significant contribution. I feel angry at these Japanese managers and technicians partly because they have betrayed their profession -- they have betrayed us, and people like Mizuno, who trained in nuclear technology. They may even have destroyed the future of nuclear power in Japan, which is bad news for global warming. Engineers are supposed to tell the truth! And if only they *had* honored the truth, and openly reported the problem the first time, the following accidents would not have happened. Suppose the first time those rods fell out of the stack and into the bottom of the containment vessel they told the regulators, told the public, and most important, warned the other operators with the same kind of reactor. The problem would have been fixed instead of re-occuring time after time, and being covered up. The sequence of events that destroyed the Three Mile Island reactor happened twice before at other plants made by the same company. Twice before the valve jammed open and there was no sensor to properly warn the operators. In both cases the problem was discovered before it led to serious consequences. A low-level NRL regulator took notice, wrote it up, and tried to have the equipment and control board modified to keep it from happening again. But no one listened, and the third time the problem went all the way and melted about a third of the core. If only the information had been brought into the light, and taken seriously, the accident never would have happened. It could have been avoided easily, with some simple modifications. Keeping these kinds of secrets is a violation of ethics of engineering and scientific research, and a horribly stupid thing to do. - Jed
