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Around The Country Without Gasoline
IronChefMorimoto writes "Autoweek has an interesting write up on an Australian man's 16K mile trek around the United States using anything but gasoline to power his variety of alternative fuel vehicles. Featured are bio-diesel Hummers and RVs, a solar-powered canoe, and an excrement-powered scooter." Note that if your car generates electricity, you could conceivably make a few bucks selling juice to the grid at peak hours.
Really? He's got a pooper scooter?
Better yet, ride a bike around the country. Bio-powered. Some emissions, but nothing the environment can't handle. :)
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
One can save a lot of money and trouble by just biking from coast to coast. Takes about 9 weeks, from what I hear.
I guess a world without gasoline would be nice, but the BP commercials on CNN have me feeling better about fueling up. ;)
Anyone going to watch 13 episodes of this guy? Please say no.
People have been travelling great distances without gasoline since prehistoric times.
Hell, Columbus crossed the Atlantic Ocean without it.
Unknown host pong.
...that powering your scooter with shat would be useful. Think about it, go to a rest area while driving down the road and "fill up"!
Friends help you move...
REAL Friends help you move dead bodies... ^_^
be a merry prankster, use hempseed oil ! CNN article
excrement-powered scooter
I'm sure it's gets shitty mileage.
Disconnect your television. Do your own research. Draw your own conclusions. They're probably lying. Don't be a sheep.
It's great that he's not using fossil fuel. But how well does it scale?
Sure you can use VB to do most any coding chore. But do you want to use it for enterprise system?
I found most interesting that the only vaguely technical discussion of biodiesel in the puff-piece was a bit of bashing:
What the article neglects to mention is that the dino-diesel sold in California also wreaked havoc with older diesel engines, and all left-coasters have already done the trivial job of modernizing their fuel systems.How does the Slashdot Effect happen given that no slashdotters ever RTFA?
Is there a properly placed hole in the seat of that scooter?
I've driven and worked on passenger car diesels exclusively for the past ten years. They're robust and reliable, but you can't just fuel them on anything. They run terribly on gasoline!
The most critical part of the diesel is the fuel pump and injectors. They run at 3000-5000 psi with very low volume per stroke, so leakage cannot be tolerated. The fuel has to be filtered extremely well (sub micron). My worry with biodiesel is that it might plug filters due to microbial growth [always a problem in diesel], or the vegatable oil hydrolyze into organic acid plus glycerol. The organic acids will cause corrosion of the injector pump plungers and injector tips. Not good at all. The fuel will also have different rubber swell characteristics, so you may get fuel leaks. I'd try this first on a imetal-to-metal Mercedes with simple to replace rubber rather than a Peugeot or VW with a fuel-lubricated pump and that main O ring soaking in fuel.
I expect vegatable oil could be made to work with additives: a biostat, acid neutralizer plus seal swell control. But it would have to remain a separate product becauase petroleum oil and vegatable oils aren't miscible. If you wanted a blend, you'd need an emulsifier, and the results might be too viscous.
From the article: "The "Human-Powered Car," meanwhile, has four seats with everyone cranking to make it go." Yabba Dabba Do!
That said, and despite the fact that many people have made it around the US without gasoline (through running, walking, cycling, etc endeavors), I think it's great that someone's highlighting the other ways we can get around. I was a bit concerned about the biodiesel's eating natural rubber (how much oil does it take to make synthetic rubber? I wish I knew...), but over all the variety of vehicles he used seems promising. I'd love to try a solar-powered canoe!
Live free or die
This would require a redesign of the vehicles as they are not capable of acting as such now, but it seemed very logical to me, and worth the relatively minimal additional cost of a better out-plug and some software to charge the utility money for using your electiricity and to prevent them from draining your battery do nothing.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Ever see forest gump?
an excrement-powered scooter.
Stranded in the middle of nowhere? no problemo: one pit stop at Taco Bell, wait 20 minutes, find a discreet corner behind the Taco Bell building, open the tank and presto, you're good for another 100 miles.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
I thought the idea was to cut down on emissions. Hardy har har.
Pea...tear...Griffin? Yea, yea, Peter Griffin.
They guy should have just found a really long hill. That would have been awesome: Around the US without any gas, all downhill!
Sooo.. I don't really see the point of V2G. The article makes it sound like the energy comes for free from the car. You're just going to be draining the battery, having to use more of the gasoline engine's power the next time you drive to replentish it. So wheres the advantage? It's probably much easier to make one big, efficient, clean generating station than rely on millions of little generators.
Selling energy back to the grid is a good idea but only if that energy was generated in a fundementally better way.. Like farmers selling energy generated from burning methane from their manure pit, or some guy with a windmill in his backyard.
But what's the point of getting energy from cars? That energy was generated by burning fossil fuels (usually) so why bother?
Note that if your car generates electricity, you could conceivably make a few bucks selling juice to the grid at peak hours.
This is a terrible idea. Just think about where your energy is coming from and how much you are losing by converting it to electricity. This second law stuff leads to pollution and a waste of energy (unless you have some rare source of energy which doesn't pollute, like the sun).
This is sounds clean and groovy, but just like hydrogen-powered cars, is dirty and wasteful.
Note that if your car generates electricity, you could conceivably make a few bucks selling juice to the grid at peak hours
Like many good ideas, though, this one is illegal without an EPA Permit
What?
You thought that environmental laws only regulated things that you believe to be "bad"?
Welcome to the Law of unintended consequences!!!
I noticed that he has a dog with him in many of the pictures. However the article never mentioned its name! The author must not be a dog person.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
and an excrement-powered scooter
...and finally...
So...many...jokes...AHHH...can't hold 'em in.
1.) This whole scooter thing sounds like it's fully of s*it.
2.) The Excrement Powered Scooter - A ride for the asses!
3.) So, I guess you could say the "ass" milage he gets on that thing is 30 miles per dump.
4.) Did you hear about the new excrement powered scooter? No. Well...it's really not all that it's cracked up to be.
Thank you! I'll be here all week.
I'm pretty sure the parent post was meant as a joke, but this is actually a serious business. The reason for this guy's adventure, and other adventures into alternative energy sources, is very real: Prince Bandar and his Saudi friends are currently in control of America via a proxy named George Bush. If you've seen Farenheit 9/11 you know what I'm talking about. At last night's convention John Kerry addressed this in his speech by saying "I want an America that relies on its own ingenuity and innovation -- not the Saudi royal family." When he says "ingenuity and innovation", these kinds of oil-alternative projects are exactly what he's talking about. So, let's hope that this publicity stunt helps pull more attention towards the most important counter-terrorism initiative we have: alternative energy.
In other news, have you guys noticed how stingy Gmail is getting with invites? I only have two left, so here's a challenge for only the smartest: prove that "Murder is Wrong" using only known facts and science (no imaginary men or "God" talk allowed). Please steer clear of circular arguments and proof by definition. First three correct proofs get gmail invites (and remember to include your email address). Good luck!
If guns kill people, then CmdrTaco's keyboard misspells words.
As someone who's done a lot of canoeing (human-powered, not motorized), I wonder how stable the pictured solar powered canoe is. Those panels sticking up like they are look likely to cause the canoe to flip over if they were to catch a strong gust of wind.
There's massive amounts of untapped fuel under most cemeteries in the form of human flesh. It's doing nothing but rotting there, why not put it to good use as a fuel/energy source?
.. reported on a bullshit-powered website!
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
The fact of the matter is the rest of the world (US, Europe, China, Russia...etc) doesn't really know if OPEC is telling the truth or not as to how much oil *really* is left in the ground. For all we know, there may only be 5 years left at current rate of consumption. And when looking at this from a national security standpoint, this is very very BAD.
We can't risk letting the middle east hold the US hostage to our ever-growing demand on oil. Sure, oil is clean burning when done properly with a maintained turbine or tuned engine, but it IS running out. And it is of my optionion that the Pentagon knows this. Why else would the be so frantically filling up our emergency reserves?
I'm willing to wager that we will be forced into spending more research and development on alternative fuels. And Shell and Exxon know this. I'm sure well start seeing them work on bio-fuel projects and refining them into usable plastics. Time will tell....
Life is not for the lazy.
With whole oil thing the middle east actually is the primary supplier to EUROPE not the U.S. we get most of ours from south america, africa and canada
We are mourning the death of at least 15 people and hundreds wounded because of a serious gas explosion in Belgium, gasoline should be the last of our worries now!
Give me a fucking break.
Prince Bandar and his Saudi friends are currently in control of America via a proxy named George Bush. If you've seen Farenheit 9/11 you know what I'm talking about.
Yes, I know what you're talking about. And if you actually believe that Farenheit 9/11 was in anyway truthful, or based on any facts at all... come on now. F9/11 is a clever propaganda piece. And like most propagana, there is no room for truth.
If F9/11 is a documentary, then Jackass is a documentary too. Actually, Jackass was much more of a documentary than F9/11.
Casual Games/Downloads
should have taken the airline, they haven't burned gasoline since the DC3.
With respect to that arctile about V2G:
"In Soviet Russia, car powers you!"
-kaplanfx
Visualize Whirled Peas
I have to stop at the Taco Bell and "gas up".
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
It sounds like some qualifying statements were left out from this projection.
This seems to suffer from the frictionless pully/surface phenomenon that most highschool physics problems require for a solution.
Politicus
The article describes a non-solution to a non-problem.
the military's humvee replacement is going to have 4 electric motors, one on each wheel, a generator, and a diesel engine to power the generator, and enough batteries to drive the vehicle without the generator (for stealth)
because the vehicle has 4 motors, it doesn't have to do a 3 point turn, it just puts one side forward, the other side in reverse, and it turns in place.
this vehicle is also supposed to be more fuel effiecient.
the solution to gasoline, is probably going to be hydrogen, we'll never run out. I've heard of people with hydrogen cars producing their own hydrogen from solar panels at their houses. (cheaper than paying through the grid)
Not rubber -- definitely you want something with newer-type synthetics. Natural rubber will be eaten by biodiesel, eventually. Synthetics will remain unharmed. (Everything since, oh, 1994 is made with synthetics... no?)
Biodiesel is not at all equal to vegetable oil - the glycerine is already removed... (see www. biodiesel.org for the technical dope). Blends just fine with petrodiesel - improves its characteristics.
If you like diesels you should definitely try biodiesel - biodiesel definitely ain't just "anything" - it'll run same as on petrodiesel and probably better. Will clean your engine to boot (a schoolbus fleet in Michigan kept careful track for a couple years and reported $$ savings, in spite of slightly higher per-gallon cost, due to lessened maintenance costs).
Good luck!
Do the math, the parent to this says he only has TWO left, yet the first THREE correct proofs get an invite? With intellegence like this it shows why you believe Farenheit 9/11 is a documentary, when it is really more of a one sided comment by a man of less intellegence than even the media would have you believe George Bush has.
Troll Bait? Only as much as the post it is a reply to.
Blah, blah, blah, I can't hear you. When I find out that it's cheaper to use my wife's car to power my house all day than it is to use electricity off the grid, I'm going to do it.
When the automakers figure out that they can sell more cars this way, they are going to do it.
When GE sees the market going that way, they are going to sell equipment that makes it easy to do. They will tell the US military that distributed electric generation will make the country more resilient and they will be right.
The fact that everyone running their cars more will make more pollution and degrade everyone's standard of living will be lost in the money. If the surplus comes simply from driving around, it's not a big deal and we are all winners. If it encourages people to stop buying big Stupid Urban Vehicles that make as much smog in two commutes as a VW running all day, we will still be better off. One way or another, the idea is going to be hard to stop.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
And if you actually believe that Farenheit 9/11 was in anyway truthful, or based on any facts at all...
...
Well, you don't have to agree with Moore's conclusions, but you can't accuse him of not basing them on facts. That's just silly.
Do I get an invite if I don't think murder is wrong? :D
I got into an interesting argument with a fellow anthropology major[1] about this -- She says that "'Murder is Wrong' is the only 'cultural absolute'", and I say that it's a useless definition, as the definition for 'murder' changes between cultures. You could abstract the statement out to say, 'Killing is wrong in some context in any given culture.', but the definition is still useless -- every single culture has prohibitions on something, and knowing that all cultures have some sort of prohibition against killing in certain contexts is worth Fsck-All, because the definition is so vague.
It's like saying that the corner grocery store is a walk lasting between ten minutes and two years away, maybe. Utterly useless to anyone wanting to get to the grocer.
[1] Note that I'm considering a switch to biochem, mainly because I really hate all the fscking hippies in the Anthro department who can't understand that we aren't going back to teepees and granola.
--
I Hit the Karma Cap, and All I Got Was This Lousy
I think bio-diesel has been around.....since the first diesel engine. Petroluim is just cheaper and there is more of it around.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
I hope the V2G hookups have a key on the door or require a latch from inside the car (like most gas doors). Stealing power could become a problem...so could shorting out the electrical system (similar to putting sugar in the gas tank).
I remember a VIZ comic strip called something like "Mickey's monkey-spunk moped". He had to travel around zoos wanking off monkeys to fuel his scooter. I don't /think/ I have imagined it.
Nope: actually you can read it here (see archive)
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
stratjakt, you write,
"Biodiesel doesn't have anything to do with cutting down emissions. You're still burning hydrocarbons."
Uh, you're just wrong. Biodiesel 101 (biodiesel.org):
The overall ozone (smog) forming potential of biodiesel is less than diesel fuel. The ozone forming potential of the speciated hydrocarbon emissions was 67 percent less than that measured for diesel fuel.
Sulfur emissions are essentially eliminated with pure biodiesel. The exhaust emissions of sulfur oxides and sulfates (major components of acid rain) from biodiesel were essentially eliminated compared to diesel.
Criteria pollutants are reduced with biodiesel use. Tests show the use of biodiesel in diesel engines results in substantial reductions of unburned hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, and particulate matter. Emissions of nitrogen oxides stay the same or are slightly increased.
Carbon Monoxide -- The exhaust emissions of carbon monoxide (a poisonous gas) from biodiesel are on average 47 percent lower than carbon monoxide emissions from diesel.
Particulate Matter -- Breathing particulate has been shown to be a human health hazard. The exhaust emissions of particulate matter from biodiesel are about 47 percent lower than overall particulate matter emissions from diesel.
Hydrocarbons -- The exhaust emissions of total hydrocarbons (a contributing factor in the localized formation of smog and ozone) are on average 67 percent lower for biodiesel than diesel fuel.
Nitrogen Oxides -- NOx emissions from biodiesel increase or decrease depending on the engine family and testing procedures. NOx emissions (a contributing factor in the localized formation of smog and ozone) from pure (100%) biodiesel increase on average by 10 percent. However, biodiesel's lack of sulfur allows the use of NOx control technologies that cannot be used with conventional diesel. Additionally, some companies have successfully developed additives to reduce Nox emissions in biodiesel blends.
Biodiesel reduces the health risks associated with petroleum diesel. Biodiesel emissions show decreased levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) and nitrated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (nPAH), which have been identified as potential cancer causing compounds. In Health Effects testing, PAH compounds were reduced by 75 to 85 percent, with the exception of benzo(a)anthracene, which was reduced by roughly 50 percent. Targeted nPAH compounds were also reduced dramatically with biodiesel, with 2-nitrofluorene and 1nitropyrene reduced by 90 percent, and the rest of the nPAH compounds reduced to only trace levels.
While I haven't watched TFM, I can tell you that we did not go over there for oil, hell we get more oil from canada than we do from over there.
Take a look at the way that the proponents expect to actually use V2G capabilities before you say that. Study here; pointers to that and other documents here.
Sustainability and energy independence essay
You don't even have to read much about the Iraq conflict to realize what an un-American clusterfsck that is. For extra credit, look up which congressmen actually voted against giving Bush a blank check to wage perpetual war for elite interests. This should reveal exactly how democratic the US political system actually is.
Politicus
no he just chose which facts to use, and slanted them as much as possible. and used flat out false information. and ......
what are his conclusions, bush sucks. thats all that guy has going for him, if Gore would have been elected, it would be Michael who?
yes i am aware of his other works, but honestly no on gave a crap about him until bush.
the only way in which the cocept of murder can be given an objective treatment is through evolutionary biology. Its the natural selection principle. A society or even a group of individuals living in loose co-operation will not survive if they kill each other. its only going to hurt everybodys chances of survival, and hence their chances of reproduction. thus, a murderous group will leave behind fewer descendents than say a harmoniously co-existing people. That is why it is considered a "sin" in almost all civilizations. Legitimizing murder means dooming the society. thats the only reason it has been deemed wrong.
(Please note that there isnt a gene for murderous tendencies... its the outcome of various behavioral processes. it may well act on the level of social behaviour rather than at the gene level.)
Hope this is correct ;) my email address is my slashdot nickname at yahoo.com.
According to AC Propulsion, the profit potential from the use of batteries to provide regulation services to the grid could pay for the batteries. Even if it doesn't pay for all the battery deterioration, so long as it pays for more than its share it reduces the cost of using the vehicle.
Sustainability and energy independence essay
Let the time traveling begin!
According to the article, he uses ethanol at some points. When used in cars, it is acutally called E85, which is a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline...
But I'm having enough trouble trying to organize a trip of my own around the United States... in a gasoline-powered car, no less.
...if you become a quadrplegic due to being in an accident with a car. So what if the auto operator is automatically presumed to be at fault, that's cold comfort when you have to fed like a baby because you can no longer take care of yourself.
Fear of being road pizza'd by an H2 is a reasonable feeling on a bike. But there are people trying to do something about it.
Critical Mass is a pro-bike social movement that tries to empower bicyclists. Check it out:
http://www.critical-mass.org
Here, in Brazil, it's common to see dual-fuel cars around. (There are commercial names like "flexpower" or "total flex").
:-)
Gasoline AND Organic Alcohol. In the same car. Mixed together in any proportion.
We have been using Alcohol in cars since the 70's. Nowadays, we can choose the best ($$) fuel in the gas stations.
And it's alcohol, because of Iraq and Saudi Arabia troubles.
Largely to avoid paying 80% tax on the fuel in the UK. You can use several pure vegetable oils in most recent diesels (which don't use rubber seals) with minor modifications. In fact you can buy kits and do it yourself.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Moore has flat out admitted that the movie is a work of art, not entirely factually correct. I really feel sorry for anyone who is so misled as to think some propaganda piece like Farenheit 9/11 is the truth.
Yep. Here's a nice map showing where the US gets its oil imports. The top four sources are Canada, Mexico, Venezuela and Saudi Arabia, each at about 15%. Which one is the top source varies from month to month. Other Middle East sources -- Iraq, Kuwait, UAE -- add up to about 15% as well. Summing up, about 50% comes from the Western Hemisphere, about 30% from the Middle East, and the other 20% from places like Africa, the North Sea producers, and Indonesia.
Your 'Murder is Wrong' thing is stupid.
Absolutely a definition of wrong is proof enough.
Unless you rather argue the concept of wrong itself,
murder is wrong because of what wrong means.
Or perhaps the use of the English Language is off-limits in your little game, too.
gmail invites? give me a break.
Slashdot Eds Link Anonymous Posts With Logged Posts
They Are Vermin Feeding On Each Other's Feces.
I Hate \.
Shaun and his team visited us last year in Portland, and I wish them the best of luck getting their program picked up.
We have a fairly decent FAQ on our site about biodiesel, I've noticed a lot of questions and some misinformation, especially in the AutoWeek article.
We only need to invent a cheap material which is superconducting in room temperature and we have a wonderful way to store energy (not to mention transfering it).
"Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead." (John Maynard Keynes)
If we moved away from an oil economy, tens of millions of Arabs would die. The entire Middle east is based arround Oil. Their only natural resource, they have limited education, and cant even compete with the far east on pure numbers of people.
Stop buying oil and you relegate the middle-east to that of a sub-saharan economy, or worse. No doubt it will be Americas fault too.
"we aren't going back to teepees and granola." Supply and Demand. Teepees and granola, afaik are an largely unmet demand. This could mean the first entrepeneur to market them will profit. well mabye not the granola[that exists]...but teepees. Course...neohippies may not always be the richest in the world... So to sum up
1. Sell Teepees and Granola to annoying anthro-hippies
2. Profit!
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
You're right about the demand side of the equation, but not about the supply side. Kitchens have a natural incentive to get rid of the grease (i.e., it's trash to them); oil-producing companies have no such incentive. Therefore, the supply-demand equilibrium is still going to hit at a lower price for grease than it does for crude oil.
Human being (n.): A genetically human, genetically distinct, functioning organism.
On the subject of killing. I know, it's OT but WTF (anymore anachronisms I can use now?).
.
Murder, at least as society defines it now, was perfectly acceptable in Japan for many centuries. The samurai class could walk down the street and the samurai could draw his sword and cut any person down, usually lower caste or lower than them, just to "test his blade". This was fine with most people. Eventually it became unacceptable and one band of samurai went to work to put a stop to it. Instead of going one on one with a person they would go in like a band of wolves and take the samurai who were doing this and cut them down. Their style consisted of I'm going to kill you even if it kills me.
Also, murder was acceptable at certain levels if it retained their honor, or the honor of the clan/family. But using the definitions of murder at that time
Ok, if you want a scientific approach to the "Murder is wrong" then that would actually be a good thesis that a person could write this on. I think that anybody who could feasibly write a thesis on either 'Murder is wrong' or 'Murder isn't wrong' using only science and facts. I think that if you could prove either then maybe you could accomadate the most logical thesis.
I know, like those terms are so 90's...
solar-powered canoe
maybe i haven't gotten out in a bit, but last time I checkced canoes were huamn-powered
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the primary purpose of a battery in a car is just to start the engine. (Not counting trivial uses like remote keyless entry.) While the car is running, all the electricity to power the systems comes from the alternator. The battery is actually a drain on the alternator while the car is running, because the alternator is constantly recharging the battery.
With a few minor changes, it should be possible to tap into the battery while the car is off, and still leave enough power for a good unlock and start session, wouldn't it? Of course, you're only getting ~ 12.2V, but any bit helps, right?
Bicycling doesn't have to be that dangerous -- it's not, where I live -- but we need more real bike paths, physically separated from roads used by cars. As the Supreme Court may someday recognize, "facilities that are not separate are inherently inequal!"
I used to bike almost everywhere(I LOVED IT - its the Most FREEing Experience going). I rode for about a year and 1/2 and now I can afford a bus pass and I can get where I want to go faster! Now IF the manufacturers - DA Da Da - made a bike SEAT that IS Comfortable and SOFT - Instead of Rock Hard then I would consider riding it a LOT More!!! I Absolutely would. I tried a really nice seat once and it was really soft but was tooo big and it didn't last long. My seat now is somewhat soft to the touch but when I sit on it, it is rock hard to my bones under you know where!!! And it just really gets to you and Stresses you till it hurts tooooo much and you STOP riding it a lot! www.iamscruelty.com www.ustibet.org(Boycott "Made In China" products www.killercoke.org
The only people really benefitting from the petro-dollars are the royal families, which are using the money to keep the populace oppressed.
Wal-mart sells gel-filled bicycle seat covers (the same size as the seat, not big wide ones) for five bucks or so.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
My god, the fiber, the fiber!
~~~
Click here, you know you wanna!
Do I get the third of the two invites if I prove the problem unsolvable? That is an allowable solution, isn't it?
:)
If we're going to communicate about this, you will have to define murder and wrong. Both of these are socially constructed. Here are some examples:
-When I sell pesticides that will kill 1 in a million, that's not seen as murder by some, which is great for my bottom line. Some "enviro-wackos" claim that it's premeditated, if random murder. Sort of like having vehicles released that will explode is seen as morally repugnant, the same has not been decided with regards to pesticides.
-When I start a war that will kill over 10,000 people, I'm showing leadership and moral courage. Some believe that you shouldn't kill even in self-defense.
-Terminating a foetus before birth is held as murder by some. Others disagree or skirt around the issue. Is it murder if the child is not yet born? (and is it allowed to think it's murder while still being pro-choice?) Churches were not always as uppity about the topic as they have recently become... and in some cultures killing a child before its first year/month was not frowned upon.
-If I am a city planner and I create an auto-driven development plan, hundreds could succumb from asthma. Some will complain, but the growth prospects will gain me kudos.
-I used to be a vegetarian, but now eat animals. Is killing an animal murder? If so, what of the non-humans killed by pesticides?
-Murder assumes a life, and we are nowhere near agreement as to when it starts or which qualify as important. Some think that murder in large enough numbers is to be rewarded if it's people that are different from us and have indicated aggression. Others would only condemn as murder an act that can immediately cause death - unlike e.g. the pesticide example, or selling weapons.
-Duels have now been outlawed, but were honourable in some cultures.
BTW, I'm not necessarily taking the obvious side on any of the above issues, just pointing out that life, murder, and ideas of right and wrong are different based on society and time.
My working definition of murder is whatever form of killing a society deems wrong at a certain point in time. If you do not accept that definition, you should come up with another one
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
With enough people doing this - there would always be a source of electricity available, and the price would be set - exactly - by supply and demand.
If this were to be done on a large enough scale, with some solar, wind, and ($RenewableOption3), you could avoid large scale electricity generation completely - including the power lines required, and you make use of the vehicles which spend most of their time idle. Heck, with a fuel cell car and a Hydrogen line the cars could be plugged in to both (while at work say), produce electricity for the building, while ending up completely fueled at the end of the day.
(Or - build cities that you can walk in and abandon the car. http://www.arcosanti.org/)
Or, as I'd say without the lame /. subject line limits, Biodiesel is the future if we have the wits to grasp it.
I'm drunk tonight, so I'll speak bare truth and you can make of it what you will. I'm an American and this is my point of view, so if you're euro then I could care less, except to point out that the fucking French have more progressive nuclear and biodiesel policies than we could hope to have here.
Biodiesel is almost as efficient an energy storage medium as dinodiesel (10% lower energy density). Unlike Hydrogen (also an energy STORAGE format, not an energy SOURCE) it can be stored and distributed using EXISTING infrastructure, doesn't require high-pressure or highly expensive storage containment. When some teenage fuckhead wraps his coupe around a tractor-trailer, it's less likely to burn than gas, where a high-pressure hydroden container would be... interesting.
The pollution issues with biodiesel are lower than with standard dinodiesel, and in 2 years when the U.S. legal limits on diesel sulfur content drop to low levels (see bullets below), car manufacturers can filter out biodiesels small issues without the filters being compromised by sulfur.
Biodiesel doesn't release any carbon that didn't recently come out of the atmosphere. It's a net zero fuel in carbon terms, garbage out, but only from garbage recently in. When you burn petrofuels, you release carbon that's been buried for millions of years.
Biodiesel can be manufactured in a number of ways. The original Diesel engine ran on peanut oil; almost any oil seed can be used to generate biodiesel, as can turkey guts and algae. People complain that solution X won't create enough biodiesel to meet the need, but we could make 10% come from source X, 40% from source Y, 50% from source Z and be done with it.
In 50 years, it will become vital to have an alternative to dinofuels. The question of oil reserves pales next to the socioeconomic pressures that millions of welfare-state arabs will pose. Consider Saudi Arabia. Work is considered "beneath" everyone, so foreigners are imported to do most of the work, and unemployment among the citizens (and I use that term loosely) is rife. Converting to a productive society is almost impossible; the world bank won't fund projects because the state welfare level is too high, and any change to a dynamic (capitalist) society would threaten the current ruling caste. Young men are channeled into madrasses because there is no other path for them. If you think religion is the opiate of the masses, consider a society consisting completely of addicts.. An economist once said that revolution is inevitable once the merchant class exceeds 10% of the population. A fool could tell you that revolution, bloody revolution, is inevitable when the crop of dissatisfied young turks currently being grown ripens, and the natural reserves of oil that support a welfare state begin to wane.
The oil economy will cause bloody flux within our lifetimes. Will it catch us by suprise or will we shift to independence before then? Biodiesel, solar power, nuclear, we've got to turn to it before it becomes a crisis if we want to survive. Of course petrofuels are cheap - they're accepting the investment of dead dinosaurs millions of years ago. You see any dinos volunteering to become fuel today? I didn't think so. It's always cheaper to take advantage of dead shit that's turned into fuel, but you can't always bank on dead shit working for you. Maybe it's more expensive to push for biodiesel today, but in 50 years when the conflagration of the Middle East makes today's wars look like sandbox games, we'll either be glad we pushed for independence or sorry we didn't.
Okay, you
Don't feed the troll, it just encourages them. And that's not Seth FINK-EL-STEIN either.
Has it not occurred to anyone that biodiesel is not such a good thing?
Or is inhaling high concentrations of aerosolized heavy oils and grease prefereable to relatively lower concentrations of soot?
Fuel
In vino vici
"AC Propulsion's first car to transmit excess power was this all-electric VW Beetle, before it was totaled. "
GOTTA love the caption on the picture of the first car to sell electricity back to the power grids!
I check my gas milage regularly. My truck (Chevy s10 with 4.3l v6) gets 23 mpg at 65MPH towing a boat, and 19 mpg at 55MPH unloaded. I've checked these conditions often enough to not belive there is any statistical problems with them.
My car (geo metro) gets 44mpg in the normal mix of city/hiway that I drive to work. I've recorded 49-51 at constant hiway speeds (55 or 65), but don't have enough samples to make any comment on what speed is best.
Sure you sure wind resistance goes up by cube of speed? I recall it only being square, but I'm not sure where to look that up anymore.
um.. if you REALLY think any person with a chance of being elected by one of the two major parties is actually going to change the status quo in any form at all, especially a form that might affect the oil money/lobbyists who no doubt helped get him that chance... you're crazy. that's the government s unspoken Main Goal - to maintain the status quo that has proven profitable to the people who "donate" to the politicians who keep it running that way.
This is incorrect. Having grown up on a farm, and currently living in a farming community (I could hit a field of soybeans from my front door with a frisbee), I can unequivically say that no corn or soybeans are left in the fields to rot due to government price-controls. (a few small patches of corn are raised as forage for game in wildlife reserves, but that quantity is insignificant.)
What the government DOES is pay the farmer to NOT PLANT the cash crops AT ALL, thereby saving large amounts of cash on the costs of the chemicals and fuels necessary to cultivate those crops, and instead to plant a simple "cover" crop which, by it's existance, helps to choke out the inevitible population of weeds that would arise in an open, fallow field, and discourages erosion by covering the bare soil. This cover crop (usually a simple grass, like oats, which can be planted quickly and without complex equipment) is then, yes tilled into the soil to rot, thus discourageing erosion over the winter and enriching the soil for the next year, when a cash crop WILL be grown there.
Should the demand for crop oils rise significantly (as expressed in the price paid for them on the open market) then the farmers will respond by raising oil crops and high-oil varieties of crops in larger quantities to meet that demand. As usual, sucessful farmers react to market pressures (whether natural or artificial (government induced)) in order to maximize their ROI (sometimes that means selling the land to a developer of subdivisions, but I digress.) Unsucessful farmers tend to be those who fail to react to market pressures, and soon cease to be farmers.
What is the difference between a small revolutionary change and a large evolutionary change?
Mod this man up!
-bZj
.sig
This is the process that Discover magazine published two articles about (one intoduction in May of 2003, and a one-page update in July of 2004)
Anything Into Oil.
Anything Into Oil (update.)
The first application that this process is being put to is the disposal of slaughterhouse waste (blood, guts, and bones) by turning them into fertilizer and fuel oil (at 85% energy efficiency!) I find this highly exciting, as it promises a future where an individual human's bio-load on the planet may be reduced by the reprocessing of the waste that he produces into resources that then don't need to be drawn from non-renewable sources.
I anxiously await reports of sucessful full-time operation of their 200-ton-a-day plant in Carthage, Missouri this Fall.
What is the difference between a small revolutionary change and a large evolutionary change?
Link to a reliable source for your info please?
Seems like a bit pollyanna-ish of an idea. Cars that create distributed electricity... well maybe. But I'm skeptical whether it's practical for a utility-wide scale. There's just not that much energy storage in an auto battery. I would like to know how they figured 10,000 MW from 1 million cars. I am skeptical of this number. Perhaps if/when fuel cell vehicles are commonplace, then this idea does make sense as running a fuel cell theoretically results in no pollution. Until then, it is much more efficient to produce grid power using centralized powerplants or renewables. Infernal combustion autos are at best 22% efficient, which is a lot worse than the oldest coal power plant at 33% efficiency.
All of the oil produced worldwide is part of a big pool of available oil. It's a commodity. The US uses X barrels of oil, irrespective of who exactly produced it. Which country supplies the actual oil is dependent far more on the economics of shipping the oil to us than anything else.
If oil production were reduced by any producing country, all the oil globally goes up in price. If oil demand by the US went down, global oil prices would drop, not just those of the countries directly shipping oil to us.
So the idea of making any kind of energy policy solution based on which countries actually ship oil to the US is kind of broken.
And why the hell am I commenting on a post that is over a week old, anyway?
-Lep
I am allowed to criticize you: you are not allowed to criticize me. Sorry, that's just how things are.
An excellent question, my friend. Your observations are spot on -- if terrorists were to (for example) set off a nuke taking out Saudi Arabia's main terminal facility, all oil globally would go up in price. Someone asked where US imports came from currently -- I had looked it up for other reasons recently and could give some numbers.
The larger reason to be interested in oil in general is that most economists greatly underestimate how dependent the developed countries' wealth is on the availability of energy. When they talk about factors of production, they list labor and capital and a few others, but they don't typically list energy. And yet, people in those countries are as productive as they are (which makes their countries rich) because they apply huge amounts of energy to the production processes. And there's no substitute for energy. You can't switch to different raw materials and get away from the energy requirements. You can't substitute more people for it and still maintain the output per person. You can't have extreme specialization and large economies of scale unless you have the necessary energy for transport.
You can put together a case that argues that within a few years, global oil production will reach an absolute peak and begin to decline. A similar argument can be made that global production of natural gas will peak within 20 years. Conservation will only take you so far. How will the enormous energy demands of the developed countries be met in 20 years?