Here's a story about the coming gas shortage

J.C.A._3

It wasn't Yankee Vermont, it was Yankee Rowe Station . Western Ma. kinda near the border .

A mind is a terrible thing to baste !

Unknown

From E S magazine

http://www.esmagazine.com/CDA/ArticleInformation/features/BNP__Features__Item/0,2503,102580,00.html

Tony Conner

Every Fuel...

...will move pretty much in unison. If gas goes up, big plants that can fire gas and oil, will fire whatever is cheaper. If that happens to be #2 oil - up it goes, too.

I sure don't want a return to the old days where you could belch anything up a stack, but I don't think the green-types have really thought out the consequences of their push toward natural gas. This is particularly true of utility plants - I don't think people realize just how much gas these things can and are swallowing. I worked at one central station (2,000 megawatts) that fired heavy oil, in all four main boilers. Those boilers were 15 stories high. 32 oil guns per boiler, about 7 feet long. Each boiler made 3,600,000 lbs/hr. There's about 1,000 BTU/lb of steam, when figuring boiler output. Five oil storage tanks that held 35,000,000 gallons, EACH. That was enough oil to run all 4 boilers, flat out, for 40 days. Flip that heavy oil number into the equivalant for natural gas. Now figure how many houses that much gas would supply with heat and hot water for a year. And that's JUST ONE generating station in North America. There is simply no way that there are enough gas reserves, let alone the distribution system in place, to make this happen. But I have no doubt whatsoever that vote hungry politicians on both sides of the border will try.

This is like the Chinese curse - "May you live in interesting times."

Mike T., Swampeast MO

Natural gas seems to be highly manipulated in ways that don't reflect supply-demand.

All the states seem to be in some sort of "limbo experiment" between regulatation/deregulation.

CA is supposedly "deregulated" but I believe they FORCE suppliers to sell them natural gas at levels the suppliers say do not reflect the cost. While I can understand why they felt they had to do this--the crazy and illegal manipulation of supply by Enron and others that CONTINUES--it leaves us poor saps who have been tradiationally supplied with natural gas paying MORE than the true reflection of cost to make up the difference.

Missouri is supposedly "deregulated" as well with energy costs "overseen" by the Public Service Commission. They and the utilities claim that the vast majority of our natural gas bill reflects what the utility pays for gas--with ZERO profit margin. However, whenever they change this segment of the price it varies GREATLY by what county or city in which you live--even when served by the SAME gas pipeline and the SAME utility. I've sincerely tried to figure out how this can be when that utility is supposedly purchasing gas for its entire system and it just leaves my head spinning. More than anything it seems to reflect the socio-economic profile of where you live. If a relatively good economy with little political clout you pay through the nose--if a poor area you get a "break." If a big city, you pay less because the utilities will do ANYTHING not to loose such a large, concentrated market.

hot_rod

the problem is

when it comes down to the cheapest fuel to generate electricity coal wins hands down. it's are most abundant domestic fuel source. Unfortunatly Bush rolled back allowable emmissions to help stimulate the economy. I think 9 eastern States immediately sued the feds over this decision.

Allowing the emission standards to be relaxed for all industry, as well as power generators really changes the environment, weather patterns, etc.

The AMA has figures that track large increases in respiratory illnesses that run concurrent with the relaxed emissions. So you get abundant, affordable power with health and environmental (acid rain) trade offs.

It's a tough and growing problem, right up there with water in the West. Don’t see any easy answers on the horizon.

hot rod

Tony Conner

There Is No...

..."free lunch" when it comes to generating power. Even things that are considered "green", like solar and wind power have some serious downsides. Huge installed cost for a little bit of generating capacity. Solar panels have to be close together to minimize land requirements, so basically, no sunlight reaches the ground - nothing grows. Nothing can grow to shade the panels anyway. No sun, no power. Windmills also need a lot of space, are noisy (they're really just fans running in reverse), and have the little known "flicker factor". Sunlight shining through the rotating blades gives a strobe light effect. Very annoying if it's coming in your window. No wind, no power. To get any amount of power from hydraulic generators, you're into daming rivers and flooding huge areas. Nuclear power - problem child of the electrical generating industry. A bottomless pit for money, here in Ontario. Billions and billions of dollars to refurbish 20 year old plants that they still can't get on line. Unbelieveable engineering, construction and maintenance costs. Not to mention security, in light of recent world events. Waste that nobody knows what to do with (even after 50 years of working on it), and ... best of all - nobody, anywhere, has actually decommissioned and dismantled a nuclear power plant at the end of it's useful life. The intital cost estimates are astronomical and involve decades. If past history is any measure, they'll be off by a factor of at least 4.

So, here we are, looking at nasty, dirty, stinky old coal. If you want any amount of electricity, at anything approaching a reasonable cost, coal is it. Only let the biggest plants, with the best pollution control burn it. Let the smaller industrial plants burn bunker C. Save the #2 oil, natural gas, and propane for residential/small industrial and commercial operations, and vehicle fuel. Take the money that is being poured down the nuclear rat hole, and use it to fund research into other power generation technology.

munchkin-man

Excelent dilog gentalmen

J.C.A._3

Mr. Conner...

I believe there have been a couple of reactors de-commisioned thus far in the states. 1 was Hanford(?) Washington, on government land, with only slightly less than disasterous results.The 2nd was right here in New England, Yankee Vermont Station . I believe they got the reactor vessel out of the ground/containment building , and got held up trying to transport it anywhere . (the details seem to have mysteriously dried up in the media)

I may be wrong, and it may sit in pieces at the Hanford site also, but I remember a whole lot of hoopla while trying to get it moved. Remember when "nuclear power is going to be too cheap to meter" was a slogan ? See the fiasco called LILCO. The puppy never even got fuel before it was shut down and dismantled. Too cheap for me and the rate payers on L.I. ? I think not !Just check out any power bill from pre 1984 to what they pay now, they're STILL paying for it . Chris

Tony Conner

I'm Not Sure...

...that they'be been dismantled, I think they're just decommissioned, and sitting there, idle but quietly glowing. My definition of dismantled is actually torn down, the site cleared, and all of the waste disposed of. And the site is now safe for someone else to build something on it.

There's always lots of confusion in the media about power stations. I remember that the media info on the plant I worked in was routinely garbled. The local paper pretty much always confused "efficiency" and "availability". Efficiency, of course being output energy over input energy, while availability was the percentage of time that a given unit (a unit being one boiler, one turbine, one generator and several units comprising a plant) was available to generate power. It might not have actually been running at all in any given 100 days, but if it was capable of running on all 100 days, if required, then it had 100% availability. They're both percentages, and the media treated them as interchangeable. But they're measuring totally different things.

And I do in fact remember that battle cry of the nuke power proponents of the '60 - "Power too cheap to meter!" 40 years after first hearing that, I can't help but notice that they've come up a little short on that one.

Steve Ebels

This may be the best arguement yet

For a boiler like a Viessman VB-2. You can burn oil, LP or natural gas by merely changing the burner. Gives you the flexibility to shut one fuel source off and use another if the circumstances would warrant. I pity the fools with the "free" boiler from the gas company.

Steve "still paying $.52 a therm" Ebels

[Deleted User]

Sounds like a good time...

to dust off the old solar applications manual:-)

ME

PJO_2

Another thought...

Wallies,

I haven't seen the word "conservation" used yet...IMHO it is the lack thereof that is the largest reason we are, as a nation, in this mess in the first place. We got spoiled on "cheap" energy (vs. the rest of the world), and that played a mojor factor.

Combined with a steadily improving use of renewables, conservation is the best way to improve our energy problems in the long term from a political, environmental, and cost standpoint. As the percentage of renewable use grows, the start-up costs will slowly come down...a slow process yes, but a necessary one IMHO.

Renewables also includes the use of recycled sources (biomass/biodiesel, trash to steam, and that cool plant in Phila. that takes turkey guts and makes oil). All of these should be pursued I believe...the problem, as usual, is cost.

I do agree that coal is by far our most abundant and cheapest resource for this problem...I also agree it is probably our most pollutive. My cousin was the leader of the Adirondack Council for several years, and the devestation from years of acid rain was incredible.

Some power plants use scrubbers on there coal-fired stacks, but it's done only because of emission requirements and is expensive...could this technology be improved further to have that mix of generous resources and clean emmisions? I would think it's been taken to the limit.

I also agree with the thoughts on nuclear power...something that takes thousands of years to break down just isn't my cup of tea :-)

Conserve and slowly increase renewables...that's the ticket. Just my $0.02...take care. PJO

Eric Taylor_35

Trouble ahead?

Probably not.
There is no real shortage of fuels. The shortage is due to the inability of our infrastructure to supply it. That inability stems from so many things that it boggles the mind. But we are working on it.

I hate to sound cleche, but our technology will save us. Fuel cells, fusion power, and better fission plants are on the way. As well as cleaner burning methods and more efficient distribution and generation systems.

Tecnhology and infrastructure improvements cost money though. Lots of it. Who pays? We do.

What scares me is when the lights go out in a large metropolitan area for extended periods of time. People just go nuts and lots of bad things happen. The state of the grid is pretty bad now with better times just over the horizon, but the problem will get worse before it gets better.

Eric

hot_rod

Solar indeed

From Solar Today mag www.solartoday.org

Orville, California has a half megawatt system running their sewer treatment plant. One of the 10 largest PV arrays in the country. They are installing solar power on their city hall, police and fire headquarters, city corp. yards, and State Theater. PG&E's Self generation Incentive program rebated over 2 million of the cost. They earn credit on excess power and tap into the "sunny day credits on rainy days. The energy bill was cut by 80%!

Three acres of panels are built over an old rubble field dreged from the Feather River during gold mining dredging operations.

San Francisco voters passed prop B allowing 100 million to finance renewable resources. The Moscone Center will get a 675 KW system installed on it's roof. San Franscisco plans on becoming the countries largest producer of solar electric power. Interesting for a city known for it's fog!

Every issue of Solar Today is filled with interesting, large, and small, scale solar installations around the world. Seems every issue gets thicker. A good sign

hot rod

Luke Lefever

I don't know that our technology will save us... each increase in complexity requires more "energy" to manufacture or maintain. The second law of thermodynamics... (entropy) the universe tends towards disorder. Each time that we try to impose more order (higher efficiency), we are requiring ourselves to input more maintenance energy to fight physics. Sometime when you're bored- read some of Jeremy Rifkins works, one titled "Entropy" in particular, his most recent one, titled "The Hydrogen Economy" and others. Sometimes simpler is simply better. It is such a good discussion- I figured why not look at the problem from the most basic point of view-- the laws that govern the function of the universe. Just my $.02.

Luke Lefever
Lefever Plumbing & Heating, Inc.
Elkhart, Indiana

Unknown

Here is ANOTHER one...

http://www.dieoff.com/page230.pdf

hot_rod

Seen the figures

on the increase in world population lately. Even if you believe there isn't an energy shortage today, it certainly is getting closer. Who do you suppose will feed this world population, keep them in the basics, like water. It all takes energy.

Keep in mind the recent hydrogen "silver bullet" is a bit misleading. Hydrogen is more a transport medium than an energy source. If it has to be generated by fossil or nuclear powered plants, then stored and piped or transported by diesel fueled trucks, really not such a good "replacement" option.

No, I don't think the sky is falling, really! But we sure need to start planning before the wells run dry. We can't keeping shocking and awing, and borrowing every countries oil:) Or will we?

hot rod

Jackchips

One of

the greatest things about the USA is our ability to overcome adversity. The nay-sayers, doomsday-sayers and all the other negative-sayers won't solve a thing but will sure upset many people who do not follow current and past events.

We were OUT of oil in the 70's but somehow there is now enough for probably 50 more years. Does anyone really think we won't find a solution before then?

I love solar and the folks who are trying to perfect it more, but the reality is it still can not exist on it's own. It seems closer and closer that we, the taxpayers, won't have to continue to subsidize it and that will be another great day in America.

Tony Conner

I Think...

...that if people's standard of living falls, and/or their jobs are lost or threatened because of electrical prices, that'll put a whole new spin on things. It won't be just the electrical bill at your house that jumps, the increase will touch every good and service that has an electrical component in it's cost. The price of EVERYTHING goes up. Think about one of the most basic - food. Pretty much everything that is refrigerated relys on electric motors driving compressors. Dairy, meat, frozen vegetables, etc. We do work at a turkey processing plant. There are rooms full of big ammonia compressors, driven by electric motors. Their power cost NOW is huge. Everybody that buys a turkey pays for the plant's electricity. Now fan that out. Milk, butter, fish, beef, bacon, peas, corn, beer, etc. What if YOUR factory shuts down because it can't compete due to high electrical costs? The potential for some ugly dominos starting to fall is actually pretty real.

But everybody HATES coal...for now.

Eric Taylor_35

speaking of refrigerators

Why do I have to use electricity to run my fridge in the winter? I burn gas to heat my house and then use electricity to remove that heat from the fridge. 6" away from the fridge on the other side of the wall its 20 degrees outside. How about a small glycol loop with a tiny pump to reject that heat to the outside? Just run the compressor on warmer days to supplement.

I've just added a couple hundred smackers to the cost of the fridge, but when you look at how much electric they use I bet the return wouldn't more than a few years.

Eric

Eric Taylor_35

Hydrogen

Those trucks will be hydrogen powered too! The next 20 years will see an explosion of fuel cells in all areas of energy applications. I can't wait untill I have a 10kW fuel cell in my home supplying both heat and electricity from natural gas. The efficiency goes up over 85% for combined heat and power applications. Not to mention that a large percentage of electricity is lost in transmission and distribution from the power stations. I can also pump my excess power back into the grid and my neighbors can use it as long as the utility company pays me a generation charge for supplying it. I can also pump some of the hydrogen from my residantial fuel cell into a tank to fill up my car right in my own driveway!

I don't agree that the population is growing as fast as it used to. China is actually on the decline due to their recent regulation and people in this country are waiting longer and longer to have kids due to careers and such.

No folks, I'm not worried about running out of fuel. I'm more worried about us destroying ourselves and not being around to use the fuel. I try to have faith in the human race as a whole, but it gets difficult at times to say the least.

Happy Fourth!

Eric

Tony Conner

Hydrogen...

...makes natural gas look like tap water, as far as being a fuel goes. If I remember correctly, there's about 60,000 BTU/cubic foot, vs about 1,000 for natural gas. Hydrogen has an explosive range of about 75% when mixed with air, vs a much narrower range for gas when mixed with air. Not only does it pack a tremendous punch, but it'll burn/explode over an air mixture range that is FAR bigger than natural gas. This is very "interesting" stuff to handle.

You have seen how people store & handle gasoline for their lawn mowers, right? You really think that it's a good idea to let the average homeowner do anything at all with hydrogen? I look out my window, and I can't see even one neighbouring house where I'd want the guy who lives there to handle hydrogen under any circumstances.

Eric Taylor_35

BOOM

You do have a point there. The masses are asses. However hydrogen is lighter than air. As long as any handling and storage is done outside, then any leaks from connecting transfer hoses and such will just shoot skyward. Stationary fuel cells don't store hydrogen as a rule. They convert it as needed from hydrocarbon fuels. Mobile fuel cells (cars and trucks) are looking at both onboard reforming of liquid hydrocarbons and compressed hydrogen storage. Both are on their way to the market right now. If I were to compress and store hydrogen on my property for my car, you can bet that I'm going to do it outside just like propane or LPG storage. It is definately doable though.

Eric

J.C.A._3

My biggest question ....

Where does the Hydrogen come from ? Is water going to be the "next commodidity" ?

Frank Zappa put it most bluntly, "Hydrogen is not the most abundant element in the universe, STUPIDITY far surpasses it ".

Hydrocarbons or water ? It all ends up boiling down to who makes the most money off it , and rest assured , it isn't going to be Joe Regular. JMHO.

Happy 4th gentleman . Chris

Eric Taylor_35

Both

Frank Zappa is most likely correct on that one.

Hydrogen can be obtained from both hydrocarbons and water. Water is separated to H and O by electrolysis (sp?). An electrical current is passed through the water and H is released from one electrode and O is released from the other. If my memory serves me, the apparatus is called Hoffman's This is how solar cells can be applied to fuel cells. In fact, there is a tour bus line in Europe that is doing just that. The solar array produces hydrogen which is compressed and stored in tanks for the fuel cell powered busses. Clean and green, but they spent a few bucks on that one!

Hydrocarbons can be reformed in a different process involving heating it in the presence of a catalyst and no oxygen. Sounds dangerous, but its not that hard. Some fuel cells operate at temperatures high enough where direct reforming is possible. The hydrocarbon fuel is reformed right in the cell stack and no separate reformer is required. Neat stuff.

I haven't heard of anyone reforming coal. That one seems a bit tricky to me, but it should be possible.

There is loads of information on the web about hydrogen and fuel cells. A little googling makes for lots of reading.

Some keywords:

SOFC Solid Oxide Fuel Cell(s) (tubular or planar)

PAFC Phosphoric Acid Fuel Cell(s)

Direct Methanol

On Board Reforming

Have fun!

Eric

Art

Alaska has the gas and oil

We have the gas and the oil in Alaska.
Call your Senator and tell them to open up ANWAR for oil exploration. Also tell them you want the natural gas pipeline built from Alaska to you guys via the Alaska highway route. We have lots of natural gas up here. We also have lots of oil up here. The original hole has been flowing since 1977 through a 48 inch pipeline. And it is still flowing, however it has slowed down alot.
ANWAR has the biggest promise of finding a major oil discovery in North America they say.
Art