Re: Energy - The Big Picture
I like the big picture approach, but this analysis is too oversimplified. The cost of making millions of wind turbines or thousands of nuclear reactors cannot be estimated as a straight-line projection of today's costs. Mass production on that scale would reduce the unit cost by a huge margin -- maybe even by a factor of 10. It is conceivable that the direct cost of energy derived from wind would be cheaper than today's fossil fuel energy. It almost certainly would be cheaper when you factor in the cost of pollution and war. In North America, the cost of wind turbines would fall dramatically, but then as the best sites for towers -- with the most wind -- filled up, the cost of wind powered electricity would gradually rise. I do not think that northern Europe would ever run out of good offshore wind sites in the North Sea, assuming the population and the demand for electricity does not grow much. The cost of nuclear power reactors would probably fall even more dramatically (in percentage), because in order to implement something like this you would need a radically new equipment, such as the pebble bed modular reactor. If both wind and uranium fission were developed, I doubt that nuclear plants would ever become as cheap as wind turbines per megawatt of capacity, because they would always require elaborate safety precautions and so on. I doubt that the cost of uranium would be a major factor because there is a huge supply of it and sooner or later someone will figure out how to recycle it or how to make an effective breeder reactor. A sane energy policy for the U.S. would begin by emphasizing conservation because despite 30 years of improvements, conservation is still the best, fastest and cheapest way to reduce U.S. dependence on OPEC. There is still a great deal of low hanging fruit -- especially with automobiles. Last week my 10-year-old Volvo station wagon needed an expensive valve job. It turned out it cost 4000 bucks! Anyway, I thought about getting a new car and I spec'ed them out. My car gets ~20 mpg city and 30 mpg highway. I was disgusted to find that the new station wagons get 18 mpg city and 26 mpg highway! Apparently this is because they are all-wheel-drive AWD -- which I assume means four-wheel-drive. A few of the old front-wheel drive models still get 30 mpg. This is crazy. Who the heck needs four-wheel-drive in suburban Atlanta for crying out loud?!? There are probably not more than a hundred people in greater Atlanta who actually do drive off-road a few times a year, and it is ironic that I happen to be one of them, but as my mother used to say, any car will do. My mother drove anything with wheels starting in the Model T Ford era, including WWII trucks. The people I know who actually live in the countryside do not own SUVs. They drive a Volvo or a VW bug into the woods to collect firewood. On the few occasions when really need to get someplace off in the woods we borrow a 35-year-old tractor from the neighbor. *That*, by golly, is off road. - Jed
Re: Energy - The Big Picture
Last week my 10-year-old Volvo station wagon needed an expensive valve job. It turned out it cost 4000 bucks! Anyway, I thought about getting a new car and I spec'ed them out. My car gets ~20 mpg city and 30 mpg highway. I was disgusted to find that the new station wagons get 18 mpg city and 26 mpg highway! Apparently this is because they are all-wheel-drive AWD -- which I assume means four-wheel-drive. A few of the old front-wheel drive models still get 30 mpg. This is crazy. Who the heck needs four-wheel-drive in suburban Atlanta for crying out loud?!? Just for your information Jed, my Forester, which is AWD, gets 25 mpg at 7000 ft in the city and over 28 mpg at 70 mph. Also the Prius (front wheel drive) get 45 mpg in the city and 55 mpg at 75 mph. Soon several SUV models will be hybrid with good gas mileage. Last year I would see another Prius every few few weeks. Now, I expect very soon collisions between two Prius will become common. Ed There are probably not more than a hundred people in greater Atlanta who actually do drive off-road a few times a year, and it is ironic that I happen to be one of them, but as my mother used to say, any car will do. My mother drove anything with wheels starting in the Model T Ford era, including WWII trucks. The people I know who actually live in the countryside do not own SUVs. They drive a Volvo or a VW bug into the woods to collect firewood. On the few occasions when really need to get someplace off in the woods we borrow a 35-year-old tractor from the neighbor. *That*, by golly, is off road. - Jed
Re: Energy - The Big Picture
Edmund Storms wrote: Just for your information Jed, my Forester, which is AWD, gets 25 mpg at 7000 ft in the city and over 28 mpg at 70 mph. That's still not as good on the highway as my '95 Volvo station wagon, which is a great hulking vehicle capable of carrying more stuff than most SUVs. Actually, it is rated at 30 mpg highway, but it does better when I'm driving. (Most SUVs have lots of room but very limited cargo capacity measured in weight, so people overload them without realizing it, and this causes accidents. Their brakes are particularly unsuited for heavy loads. See: High And Mighty.) If I lived up north where there is snow I would get an AWD vehicle. My sister, who lives out in the middle of nowhere in Virginia, has something similar to the Forester. - Jed
Re: Energy - The Big Picture DRAFT #2
Horace, You may be care to send this to Gustav GROB email: info at uniseo.org. He may have an interest, as well as an influence to see something productive happen with your ideas. Steve
Re: Energy - The Big Picture DRAFT #2
At 9:24 AM 3/6/5, Steven Krivit wrote: Horace, You may be care to send this to Gustav GROB email: info at uniseo.org. He may have an interest, as well as an influence to see something productive happen with your ideas. Steve I appreciate the notion, but I barely have time to read vortex and float a few potential memes as they come to mind on occasion. Too many commitments, too much research to do. Assuming research into potentially ideal energy solutions like cold fusion is to be suppressed, then a logical consequence must be to implement interim solutions using existing technology, or technology readily developed using existing engineering principles. Superficially at least, it appears supplying the world's energy needs renewably is technically and financially feasible, and a superior approach in the long run to consuming carbon basd fuels. A push for a global renewable energy supply is possibly a reasonable response to the suppression of research. A huge amount of work is required to do this in a planned fashion. The alternative to building teams to do this work is to float the ideas and let capitalism take its merry course to success. Regards, Horace Heffner
Energy - The Big Picture
Table 1 - Current energy plant capital cost in $/W Gas turbine 0.5 Wind 2.0 Solar tower 2.5 Nuclear 6.0 One MBtu is equivalent to 33.43 watts expended for a year. Multiplying the above values by 33.43 we can thus obtain energy plant cost in $ per MBtu/yr assuming a plant life of one year. Table 2 - Current energy plant capital cost (in $ per MBtu/yr, or $T per quad/yr) Gas turbine 17 Wind 67 Solar tower 83 Nuclear 200 The above values have to be multiplied by 10^9 to obtain cost in $ per quad/yr. So, the above numbers represent the current cost in trillions of dollars per quad/yr energy creation capacity. Thus multiplying the values of Table 2 by 400 we have the cost of plant capacity to provide current world energy needs of 400 quads: Table 3 - Current energy plant capital cost in $T to supply world needs Wind 26,800 Solar tower 33,200 Nuclear 80,000 If we discard nuclear energy as not cost effective, and assume half solar and half wind energy production, we have 30,000 $T capital cost to provide all the worlds energy needs by renewable means. Assuming a 3 percent cost of capital (reasonable assuming value of energy inflates too) we have an annual cost of 1500 trillion dollars to produce the 400 quads. That is (10^6)(1500x10^9)/(400x10^15)$/MBtu = $3.75 per MBtu. If we triple the cost to include cost for novel energy transportation and storage methods, we have a cost of $11.25 per MBtu. This is very competitive with the DOE 2003 costs of energy, as shown in Table 4. Table 4 - Current costs of energy in $/MBtu Electric 25.20 Methane9.10 Heat. Oil 9.25 Propane 13.46 Kerosene 11.41 It appears the job of converting to renewable energy can be accomplished starting now, especially where long trades are not required. The capital cost will ultimately be on the order of 90,000 trillion dollars, but invested over the, say, 20 years required to accomplish the plant development it will be about 4,500 trillion per year. At $12/MBtu, the world energy requirement costs about 4,800 trillion dollars per year. The capital to achieve the conversion can be obtained by doubling the cost of energy for about 20 years. Considering most of the energy is consumed on the continents in which it is produced, the cost could be substantially less than that estimated, possibly by as much as 60 percent less. The powerful effect of economy of scale has not been applied either. Unfortunately, as with a national renewable energy policy, all that is missing is the political will to make it happen. It is even less likely to happen on a global basis than a national basis. However, emerging capitalists should have their noises in the air. The smell of money is there. They may well wipe out those unable to think in any terms other than big oil. The future is likely another example of survival of the fittest and the adaptable. Any corrections would be appreciated. Regards, Horace Heffner
RE: Energy - The Big Picture
--- On Sat 03/05, Horace Heffner [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: It appears the job of converting to renewable energy can be accomplished starting now, especially where long trades are not required. The capital cost will ultimately be on the order of 90,000 trillion dollars, but invested over the, say, 20 years required to accomplish the plant development it will be about 4,500 trillion per year. I assume you mean American trillion, i.e., 10^12. In any case, long term conversion of energy sources needs to be analyzed this way. This is very enlightening. M. ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web!
Re: Energy - The Big Picture
In reply to Horace Heffner's message of Sat, 05 Mar 2005 18:23:50 -0900: Hi, [snip] Table 1 - Current energy plant capital cost in $/W Gas turbine 0.5 Wind 2.0 Solar tower 2.5 Nuclear 6.0 One MBtu is equivalent to 33.43 watts expended for a year. Multiplying the above values by 33.43 we can thus obtain energy plant cost in $ per MBtu/yr assuming a plant life of one year. Table 2 - Current energy plant capital cost (in $ per MBtu/yr, or $T per quad/yr) Gas turbine 17 Wind 67 Solar tower 83 Nuclear 200 The above values have to be multiplied by 10^9 to obtain cost in $ per quad/yr. So, the above numbers represent the current cost in trillions of dollars per quad/yr energy creation capacity. The costs started off in dollars and got multiplied by 10^9, so they are be in billions, not trillions of dollars per quad/yr generation capacity. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk All SPAM goes in the trash unread.
Energy - The Big Picture DRAFT #2
The following is an attempt to put into perspective the problem of obtaining the world's energy needs by carbon free renewable means. Table 1 - Current energy plant capital cost in $/W Gas turbine 0.5 Wind 2.0 Solar tower 2.5 Nuclear 6.0 One MBtu is equivalent to 33.43 watts expended for a year. Multiplying the above values by 33.43 we can thus obtain energy plant cost in $ per MBtu/yr assuming a plant life of one year. Table 2 - Current energy plant capital cost (in $ per MBtu/yr, or $B per quad/yr) Gas turbine 17 Wind 67 Solar tower 83 Nuclear 200 The above values have to be multiplied by 10^9 to obtain cost in $ per quad/yr. So, the above numbers represent the current cost in billions of dollars per quad/yr energy creation capacity. Thus multiplying the values of Table 2 by 400 we have the cost of plant capacity to provide current world energy needs of 400 quads: Table 3 - Current energy plant capital cost in $T to supply world needs Wind 26.8 Solar tower 33.2 Nuclear 80.0 If we discard nuclear energy as not cost effective, and assume half solar and half wind energy production, we have 30 $T capital cost to provide all the worlds energy needs by renewable means. Assuming a 3 percent cost of capital (reasonable assuming value of energy inflates too) we have an annual cost of 1.5 trillion dollars to produce the 400 quads. That is (10^6)(1.500x10^12)/(400x10^15)$/MBtu = $3.75 per MBtu. If we triple the cost to include cost for novel energy transportation and storage methods, we have a cost of $11.25 per MBtu. This is very competitive with the DOE 2003 costs of energy, as shown in Table 4. Table 4 - Current costs of energy in $/MBtu Electric 25.20 Methane9.10 Heat. Oil 9.25 Propane 13.46 Kerosene 11.41 It appears the job of converting to renewable energy can be accomplished starting now, especially where long trades are not required. The capital cost will ultimately be on the order of 90 trillion dollars, but invested over the, say, 20 years required to accomplish the plant development it will be about 4.5 trillion per year. At $12/MBtu, the world energy requirement costs about 4.8 trillion dollars per year. The capital to achieve the conversion can be obtained by doubling the cost of energy for about 20 years. Considering most of the energy is consumed on the continents in which it is produced, the cost could be substantially less than that estimated, possibly by as much as 60 percent less. The powerful effect of economy of scale has not been applied either. Unfortunately, as with a national renewable energy policy, all that is missing is the political will to make it happen. It is even less likely to happen on a global basis than a national basis. However, emerging capitalists should have their noises in the air. The smell of money is there. They may well wipe out those unable to think in any terms other than big oil. The future is likely another example of survival of the fittest and the adaptable. Any corrections would be appreciated. Regards, Horace Heffner
RE: Energy - The Big Picture
At 10:39 PM 3/5/5, Michael Foster wrote: I assume you mean American trillion, i.e., 10^12. In any case, long term conversion of energy sources needs to be analyzed this way. This is very enlightening. Thanks for the correction. I shouldn't post when I'm so short of time. Regards, Horace Heffner
Energy - The Big Picture DRAFT #2
I wrote: However, emerging capitalists should have their noises in the air. The smell of money is there. I wrote: However, emerging capitalists should have their noses in the air. The smell of money is there. Regards, Horace Heffner
Re Energy - The Big Picture DRAFT #2
I wrote: However, emerging capitalists should have their noises in the air. The smell of money is there. I meant to write: However, emerging capitalists should have their noses in the air. The smell of money is there. However, a little noise probably couldn't hurt if that's all it is. Regards, Horace Heffner
