Global warming

[corduroygt]

Economic suicide is still better than the alternative, ACTUAL suicide, which it would be if we wreck the climate of this planet, the only place within reach capable of sustaining human life.

That's pure alarmism. Earth will still be perfectly capable of sustaining human life with far more CO2 than today's. It's just the cost of moving/protecting against floods vs. cost of taxes in the next 20-25 years that should be considered and since nothing major's going to happen in the next 100 years, and by then we should be purely running on alternative energy, we're safe.

 

[Squilliam]

Biofuels that stem from algae, on the other hand, use only a fraction of the land of even the most efficient plant-based biofuels, and it doesn't even have to be arable land! It is rather expensive at the present time, but it is also the only biofuel option that can potentially be produced in sufficient volume to replace gasoline/diesel.

Given the fact that you'd have to convert it to petrol because of the clean air rules, how much would that process cost because the fact remains that none of the hybrids on sale in any quantity and only a fraction of the car fleet actually use diesel.

I would say a bigger issue to the actual production is the fact that rather than having an industry working together, all the improvements in the strains are patented which slows down the adoption altogether since it isn't so easy to combine the best traits from different forms of algae. At least from the light reading on the subject I have done. The best thing IMO would be for everyone to sign cross patent agreements in order for them to get the best strain out there and let the best producer of that strain win.

 

[Grall]

That's pure alarmism. Earth will still be perfectly capable of sustaining human life with far more CO2 than today's.

Sustaining present industrial civilization, no, since most of our big cities and lots of farmland and so on would disappear under water.

It's just the cost of moving/protecting against floods vs. cost of taxes in the next 20-25 years that should be considered

Floods, droughts, storms, pests, diseases, rising ocean levels... Like 8 out of every 10 major metropolitan area is located on a sea border or waterway, we can't wall in hundreds of thousands of kilometers of sea and rivers (which will also rise of course as ocean levels go up). Many cities are inside hurricane/cyclone regions and would get hit in a two-pronged attack. Then imagine when we start getting cases of malaria and dengue fever in Europe and north America... The insects are already busy migrating our way.

It's not just ONE cost that will rise (floods), but many, should we fail to stop this threat.

since nothing major's going to happen in the next 100 years, and by then we should be purely running on alternative energy, we're safe.

There's far too much at stake to make such a casually irresponsible wager. The price's much too high if you're wrong, while the costs are transitory at best when moving to a sustainable energy cycle.

So you won't be able to enjoy high-powered, gas-fueled muscle cars anymore, should you feel such a desire. Boo hoo ho, cry me a river. Nobody needs muscle cars to survive, and "because I want to" (or worse, "I have the right to") is not a valid argument. It's the irrational reasoning of a child.

 

[corduroygt]

Sustaining present industrial civilization, no, since most of our big cities and lots of farmland and so on would disappear under water.

Such bullshit. Water levels are rising VERY slowly, it'll be a very long time before we see any significant impact that effects life in the US in any way. Sorry I don't give a shit about places that I don't live in. We'll be off of oil way before that happens.

So you won't be able to enjoy high-powered, gas-fueled muscle cars anymore, should you feel such a desire.

I have enjoyed such cars plenty and don't feel the need any more. But if I wanted, I could buy one again. Price of gas is going to be enough to put a stop to sales of such cars anyway. We don't need to have more tax on our gas, especially since China/India are actually subsidizing the cost of gas domestically. We're not going to get it either, at least not until algae biofuel production ramps up.

 

[eastmen]

Algae is the only biofuel source that makes sense in the long term. It may be expensive now, but most of that is in terms of R&D. Once we get good at developing algal biofuels, that cost should come down significantly.

switch grass is also effective. Corn is 1.75 barrels of ethonal produced per barrel of oil . Switch grass aproaches 3.75 barrels created per barrel of oil.

Oil costs for both can come down by switching to more effective vechicals for planting and cultivating.

Switch grass also brings other benfits , no more harmfull fertilisers and checmials since its basicly a weed that will grow no matter what. Its also a buffer crop that will absorb alot of the run off from other crops. The grass actually leaves the soil in better condition than before it was planted. Since it is a weed it can be grown in many more partso f the country and wont affect our food crop

 

[KimB]

Given the fact that you'd have to convert it to petrol because of the clean air rules, how much would that process cost because the fact remains that none of the hybrids on sale in any quantity and only a fraction of the car fleet actually use diesel.

Well, algae can be used to form any sort of biofuel you like. As for the cost, well, I don't think anybody knows for sure what it will boil down to. But I strongly suspect it will drop below the cost of gasoline from fossil fuels easily within ten years.

I would say a bigger issue to the actual production is the fact that rather than having an industry working together, all the improvements in the strains are patented which slows down the adoption altogether since it isn't so easy to combine the best traits from different forms of algae. At least from the light reading on the subject I have done. The best thing IMO would be for everyone to sign cross patent agreements in order for them to get the best strain out there and let the best producer of that strain win.

Yes, that is a potentially significant problem.

 

[Grall]

As for the cost, well, I don't think anybody knows for sure what it will boil down to. But I strongly suspect it will drop below the cost of gasoline from fossil fuels easily within ten years.

I suspect algae-based fuel costs a lot right now because nobody's put it into large scale production yet. Since you can grow the algae off of raw sewage, untreated salty seawater and things like that there's no reason it should cost a lot; feeding those suckers is basically free. Beyond the construction costs of the facility that is, and that hardly needs space age materials or anything remotely exotic.

 

[corduroygt]

I suspect algae-based fuel costs a lot right now because nobody's put it into large scale production yet. Since you can grow the algae off of raw sewage, untreated salty seawater and things like that there's no reason it should cost a lot; feeding those suckers is basically free. Beyond the construction costs of the facility that is, and that hardly needs space age materials or anything remotely exotic.

I've read that extracting the fuel is the hard and costly part, but I might be wrong.
Again, I hope Chalnoth is right and it becomes cheaper than oil in 10 years (due to process being cheap, not due to oil getting expensive I hope )

 

[KimB]

I've read that extracting the fuel is the hard and costly part, but I might be wrong.

As I understand it, algae is no more difficult to extract energy from than any other method. In large part the expense comes in because if you really want the full benefit of using algae, you have to genetically engineer the algae to produce the precise molecules you want to make use of. That process is very expensive.

But I don't think it's expensive to just grow a bunch of algae and throw them into your typical bioreactor.

Again, I hope Chalnoth is right and it becomes cheaper than oil in 10 years (due to process being cheap, not due to oil getting expensive I hope )

Well, oil will continue to get more expensive in the coming years. So yes, that will be a big part of it.

 

[Mariner]

Which one is more likely to happen first though?

1. We'll be able to develop algal biofuels cheaply.
2. We have batteries that are light, don't use rare materials, and can recharge in 5 minutes

Also all this stuff would be at least 20 years out.

Balls. I just lost a long post due to a browser crash!

To summarise my dearly departed post:

1. Billions upon billions of dollars are being invested into battery technology with real advances in electrode and battery designs being made year on year. Enormous amounts of research into this stuff is also going on in Universities across the globe and, if you look around, you'll be surprised how many business spin-offs from academic research are already in existence. Rather less investment is occuring into algal biofuels so better batteries will be here long before we see algae-oline on sale at a service station.
2. Within about 5 years (definitely nothing like the 20+ years you imagine), I expect Li-ion batteries to be greatly improved compared to current technology. Capacity around twice what it is now, cheaper prices, better cycling, faster charging (to a point). Li-ion batteries don't contain much in the way of rare materials (Lithium isn't going to run out despite what some alarmists might have you believe). A range of 200 miles should be more than enough for vast majority of people. In the longer term, plenty of research is also being made into attempting to create rechargeable Li-Air and Li-S batteries which have the potential to increase range enormously.
3. For the few who require longer ranges or even if you wish to go on a longer journey, lightweight genset engines will be able to burn fossil fuels or, when properly developed, algal biofuels/biobutanol/cellulosic ethanol etc. etc. For example, Lotus have already developed a 1.2 litre 35kW genset which weighs just 56 kilograms. You could easily design a space in the boot (or trunk if you're a Yank ) into which one of these could be installed as necessary. Other slightly more outlandish ideas I've seen include a genset trailer!
4. Assuming that a 5 minute recharge is necessary because people won't be willing to change their current routine of filling up once or twice a week is just nonsensical. When (not if) electric cars become enormously cheaper to run than ones run using fossil fuels, people will be quite happy to go to the minor trouble of plugging their cars in when they get home each night. For what it is worth, battery chemistry which allows faster charging (20 minutes or so) is already here but, unfortunately, only at a relatively low energy density compared to other Li-ion types.

I anticipate that, within the next 5 years, one of the two cars in my household will be electric only. Not a hybrid which is just a stopgap.

 

[Sxotty]

Which one is more likely to happen first though?

1. We'll be able to develop algal biofuels cheaply.
2. We have batteries that are light, don't use rare materials, and can recharge in 5 minutes

Also all this stuff would be at least 20 years out. By then, if rising fossil fuel prices haven't taken care of the CO2 problem, then you can have taxes on it. Having CO2 taxes when there is no other alternative to oil is economic suicide, and it's not going to happen.

Since number 2 is already true...I guess you have your answer.

 

[corduroygt]

Since number 2 is already true...I guess you have your answer.

Could you point me to such batteries? I've never heard of them.
Also, 5 minute recharge is a must, How else are you going to on a long trip?

 

[Sxotty]

The batteries I am testing currently can do a 50C recharge. C-rate relates the time a charge/discharge takes. A 1 C-rate means that it takes 1 hour. So 50C mean 1.2min to recharge the battery.

5 minutes is a breeze for these.

You forgot to include cheap. That is the problem. They aint cheap.

Battery costs and rare earth metals is often a red herring. There is a lot more than just the raw materials cost. Material nano-structure, purity of electrolyte and so on are all important. The form factor of the battery matters as well. Larger prismatic style pouch cells are more energy dense, but less robust than sealed can cells. For example a similar chemistry battery to the one I mentioned if you increase the per cell capacity by 3 times the c-rate decreases by 5 times. It is still a 6 min recharge. If you increase the cell capacity further to 14x then the rate falls by 8 times. The reason the fall is not is great is that the larger cells both have a similar packaging and so on, whereas the small one doesn't. Plus there can be changes in electrode thickness and so on to target different characteristics.

(BTW you can go even higher in short bursts, and the small cells can do 80C for the entire battery retaining 90% of original capacity, which means 10% goes to resistance and heating).

 

[corduroygt]

What is the Whr/kg for the 6 minute battery you're using? There's also the issue of how to prevent people from electrocuting themselves, since handling something that can put a lot of kWh in a short amount of time means dealing with high voltages and currents in charging stations.

 

[rpg.314]

Let's see how economists predicted the next 5 years of the world economy in 2004 and how accurate they were.

Fine, ditch economics. What do you have to say about astronomy and geology.

 

[Sxotty]

It isn't just the energy going into the car. It is the energy going into the charging station. You would need new transformers, new lines, and so on. We are not just waiting on one thing... There really isn't that much worry about electrocution since the power won't flow unless connections are secure. Also the current standards could not even handle this kind of power flow anyway.

The energy density is lower a bit less than 100 whr/kr. But that is another problem. If you increase the potential of a cell (it operates at higher voltage) then you decrease stability of the electrolyte and the cell breaks down. So basically the way they increase energy density is to increase voltage which leads to shorter lifetimes. Having a high voltage means you get a high energy density to start, but after 5 years you will lose a lot of capacity. Having a lower voltage means a lower energy density, but less degradation. The whole thing is a bit tricky.

 

[Gubbi]

What is the Whr/kg for the 6 minute battery you're using? There's also the issue of how to prevent people from electrocuting themselves, since handling something that can put a lot of kWh in a short amount of time means dealing with high voltages and currents in charging stations.

Yeah, and it's amazing people don't set themselves on fire everytime the fill up their car.

Cheers

 

[KimB]

Let's see how economists predicted the next 5 years of the world economy in 2004 and how accurate they were.

I can't believe you're going to try to tarnish the reputation of climate science with economics. They are completely and utterly different fields that have almost nothing to do with one another.

Geez. That's about as pathetic an attempt at an argument as I've seen.

 

[Frank]

Well, the thing is, AGW tends to amplify basically every sort of weather-related natural disaster. It makes storms in general stronger (including hurricanes and snowstorms). It makes droughts more common/severe, because the water that does fall is more concentrated in storms than spread out.

Now, it is fundamentally impossible to point at a specific event and say that was caused by AGW, but we can say it makes some things worse on average (hurricanes), and some things more frequent (droughts, fires).

THIS is what I reject.

A "theory" that claims everything that happens as proof of its existence.

Or, in other words: a religion. Not: "God did it, stupid!", but "AGW did it, stupid!"

I want some proof. And, as corduroygt nicely illustrated, just massaging and overwriting all historic data to "fit the current model" every time that is considered "a necessary action to better fit our goal" isn't doing it for me.

I mean, is any of the original data still around? It has been "improved" so many times by now, that we should throw it all out and try to gather a completely new set instead.



I like the OpenSource model for science, where you publish all your data, methods and programs used. So it can be reviewed, improved upon and falsified, if needed. Which isn't happening with AGW.

After all, science shouldn't be about picking sides, but about free travel of ideas and data.

 

[Frank]

Sustaining present industrial civilization, no, since most of our big cities and lots of farmland and so on would disappear under water.

Well, not if the farmers have shovels or live over here, where we have dikes. Or can get the funding for them in the US

Really, most of the flooding (if it happens) will be from rivers, not oceans. And the seasonally flooded part around a river has been the best farmland for thousands of years. That's where farmers build their farms.

And farms are easily relocated.

Floods, droughts, storms, pests, diseases, rising ocean levels... Like 8 out of every 10 major metropolitan area is located on a sea border or waterway, we can't wall in hundreds of thousands of kilometres of sea and rivers (which will also rise of course as ocean levels go up). Many cities are inside hurricane/cyclone regions and would get hit in a two-pronged attack. Then imagine when we start getting cases of malaria and dengue fever in Europe and north America... The insects are already busy migrating our way.

It's not just ONE cost that will rise (floods), but many, should we fail to stop this threat.

Like, it would cost something like 0.0001% of the GNP to raise all those dikes at the same time, so that would get the government fired and hanged for having to double the taxes?

If you need to infuse the economy by handing out free money, I can think of worse investments.

There's far too much at stake to make such a casually irresponsible wager. The price's much too high if you're wrong, while the costs are transitory at best when moving to a sustainable energy cycle.

Do you worry about your house suffering a catastrophic failure and crashing down on you, or being struck by lightning? Because that's more likely to effect you within your lifetime.

Or how about a traffic accident?

So you won't be able to enjoy high-powered, gas-fueled muscle cars anymore, should you feel such a desire. Boo hoo ho, cry me a river. Nobody needs muscle cars to survive, and "because I want to" (or worse, "I have the right to") is not a valid argument. It's the irrational reasoning of a child.

Like, AC being a basic requirement?

Btw, I know you're not from the US.