. . . it would violently explode if it received the slightest damage!
Not necessarily
The mechanical stresses from great pressures will not cause much movement when decompressed, and so will not create an explosion, if the substance is very stiff (which is a reason liquids rather than gases are often preferred fluids for high pressure testing of piping systems)
The stored chemical bonding energy will not be explosively released by "the slightest damage" if the substance is metastable. (see other posters' comments about diamonds)
Mechanical energy spent is Force x Distance. A hundred billiion Pascals represents a lot of force, but I doubt the tiny diamond anvil moves very far in creating that force, so I'm guessing that most of the energy stored comes in the form of changed chemical bonds rather than a spring. Just because chemical energy is formed under great pressure doesn't mean it will necessarily release when the pressure is removed. As other posters point out, diamonds do not spontaneously decompose, even though it takes great pressure to form them. Also TFA does not make clear whether there is any reasonable way to harness the stored energy at all.
From the Abstract, which makes no mention of energy storage, let alone practical uses of energy:
The application of pressure, internal or external, transforms molecular solids into extended solids with more itinerant electrons to soften repulsive interatomic interactions in a tight space . . . . These simultaneously occurring molecular-to-non-molecular and insulator-to-metal transitions of XeF2 arise from the pressure-induced delocalization of non-bonded lone-pair electrons to sp3d2 hybridization in two-dimensional XeF4 and to p3d5 in three-dimensional XeF8 through the chemical bonding of all eight valence electrons in Xe and, thereby, fulfilling the octet rule at high pressures.
My son has a job developing for a major financial company. They do development on MS Windows desktops and deploy on Linux servers. It works just fine for them: (Admittedly, there's not much of a user interface requirement for those apps)
I agree that borrowing has been way too easy lately, but not that it has been too cheap. Historically (going way back, except for the 70's/80s), mortgages, e.g. have been around or below 6%, but required significant down payments. The 10%, 5%, and even 0% downpayments, even "ninja" non-documentation loans, and the euphoria about housing prices always rising, are what contributed to the bubble.
But that's not the problem now. In part thanks to the bank bailout, the banks have money, but they're very skittish about loaning it out, and they are not meeting demand. Under those conditions, the government guarantee is using stimulus funds to stimulate the economy, as intended.
OTH, by using the money on JUST solar collectors to be added to existing fossil fuel plants, . . .
You can't JUST add solar collectors to an existing plant. You need to add a whole generating system, as the solar thermal most likely runs at different temperatures and pressures than the existing plant, not to mention the control problems of integrating the two. Also, you can't JUST stuff the collectors in to any existing plant, as you need a lot of acreage to capture enough sunlight.
That's an awfully low maintenance cost, especially for 250,000 miles. Also, you haven't figured the cost of money. And you need to spend on insurance, plus a few other things that I can't think of off hand. The IRS number is pretty accurate for the average driver.
Because in the experience of engineers, off-the-shelf mechanical/electrical equipment installed outdoors is usually expected to have an economically useful life of about 15 years, give or take. Of course, custom made equipment may last longer (or shorter)
You're mostly correct.
The Arizona power plant will be solar thermal generation.
But the Colorado and Indiana projects will be solar panel manufacturing plants.
This 2 billion is corporate welfare -- the 2 billion goes toward building plants, and the owners of the plants will now be making themselves money at the expense of the public.
It's a government guarantee of 2 billion in loans, not a government grant of 2 billion dollars.
The companies are figuring that they'll make money from the investment, but they can't get loans in this economy. If they do make money, it won't cost the government much, and in the meantime, it will create some badly needed jobs.
Some of the jobs will be temporary construction jobs, but some will be permanent, especially the project for the solar panel manufacturing plant expansion.
Assuming the information I have read is correct, greenhouse gasses are caused by nature far more than man. I can't find the reference, but recall a study published last year that showed the bovine population - both dairy and meat - producing more greenhouse gasses than all of mankind.
If you think dairy and meat production farming are "nature", you are mistaken. I've read about some evidence that man-made climate change might date back to the invention of agriculture - partly because of deforestation and partly due to the methane byproducts of farming.
Methane is a much more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, but it is also much more short-lived in the atmosphere. Therefore carbon dioxide has a greater greenhouse potential in the long run
The evidence is overwhelming that human activities are releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that is warming the earth. Beyond that, there is room for debate. However, do not underestimate the amount of disruption to local climates that a "small" amount of global warming can produce
. . . anything in there about how Viacom uploaded their own material so they could bust youtube for it?
No, no need to. In fact, in order to find in favor of Youtube's summary judgement motion (which decides the case without a trial) the judge had to assume all of the disputed facts in Viacomm's favor.
Summary judgement cannot judge matters of fact, only matters of law. The judge decided that the safe harbor provisions of law do not allow Viacomm to sue even if what they alleged is true. (note, however, that the judgement implied that there might still be other issues left open for trial)
I would expect the CFD program that would suit this class is something that takes a simple grid input for the surface, simple initial conditions, then runs the flow and plots streamlines or vectors.
I don't believe there are "simple initial conditions" for CFD software.
To shut down these wells they have to do exactly the same procedure that failed on DeepWater Horizon! The fact is, the risky operation is in sealing it off, not continuing to drill.
As I understand it, the moratorium on new drilling means just that, no new drilling. Wells already in production aren't being shut down. If the moratorium is lifted, new wells would go through the shutdown procedures that failed at the Deep Water Horizon when the exploratory phse is done in order to turn it .
If the moratorium remains in effect, those 33 previously permitted new exploratory wells would not be drilling, would not penetrate into the oil reservoir, and, where they've already started drilling, shutdown would be much easier - hell, they're probably already shut down.
Remember when Walmart also had a strong "Buy American!" policy?
No. At the time Walmart started their strong "Buy American" advertising campaign, they were already starting to buy from/set up overseas manufacturers with cheap labor practices.
Lithium chloride is already commonly used in absoprtion refrigeration and in dessicant systems. It has not proved a health problem.
One problem it does have: If the heat balance gets slightly off, the equipment "rocks up", that is, you end up with pipes full of solid lithium chloride. If this system were to be deployed widely to residential and other non-technical customers I could see it happening fairly often. Have fun with that.
TFA didn't really describe the refrigeration cycle being used, but it sounds like the only innovation is the hydrophobic membrane used in the heat exchanger. My guess is that the dessicant removes moisture, which raises the temperature of the air but lowers the wet bulb, and a direct and/or indirect evaporative cooler then reduces the tempeature to reasonable levels. This is nothing new, but is somewhat unusual because it's much easier to buy an off-the-shelf refrigeration system that is cheaper to buy and install and needs comparitively little maintenance.
TFA was isleading in some ways. For one, they muddle the difference between evaporative cooling and dessicant drying. Evaporative cooling adds moisture to the air, exchanging sensible heat for latent heat, reducing the temperature but not significantly changing the overall heat content of the air. Dessicant dehumidification absorbs water out of the airstream which relases heat, raising the temperature of the air in exchange for reducing the latent heat of the air. These are two totally different processes, they can't both happen "all in one step". For another, the dessicant cycle requires heat and the evaporative cycle requires water. Neither of those is free, and, pretty charts not withstanding, TFA offers no explanation of how this system saves money, energy, or.the environment. (not saying it doesn't, just that the same natural thrmodynamic limits apply to both mechanical cycles and this cycle, and TFA dioesn't explain how this works better than a good mechanical refrigeration cycle) Also, any new A/C system is not going to have CFCs or HCFCs, those aren't allowed in new systems any more. (the new refrigerants still have some global warming potentials, though)
You should realize that heat flow is a two-way street. Using low -e glass to trap heat in the summer is a good thing, it reduces the amount of black body radiation of the hot outdoors that gets indoors.
You miss the part where they also need to be able to mine and refine zinc and copper.
The power comes from galvanic action of the dissimilar metals; the potato is just the electrolyte/salt bridge.
This is truly a non-solution (pun un-intended) to the overall problem of generating electricity from batteries, just an observation that boiling the potatoes makes them a better salt bridge than raw potatoes, with no comparisons to salt bridges of batteries currently in use and no insight into obtaining or storing the energy in the first place.
Slashdot Mirror
. . . it would violently explode if it received the slightest damage!
Not necessarily
The mechanical stresses from great pressures will not cause much movement when decompressed, and so will not create an explosion, if the substance is very stiff (which is a reason liquids rather than gases are often preferred fluids for high pressure testing of piping systems)
The stored chemical bonding energy will not be explosively released by "the slightest damage" if the substance is metastable. (see other posters' comments about diamonds)
Mechanical energy spent is Force x Distance. A hundred billiion Pascals represents a lot of force, but I doubt the tiny diamond anvil moves very far in creating that force, so I'm guessing that most of the energy stored comes in the form of changed chemical bonds rather than a spring. Just because chemical energy is formed under great pressure doesn't mean it will necessarily release when the pressure is removed. As other posters point out, diamonds do not spontaneously decompose, even though it takes great pressure to form them. Also TFA does not make clear whether there is any reasonable way to harness the stored energy at all.
From the Abstract, which makes no mention of energy storage, let alone practical uses of energy:
The application of pressure, internal or external, transforms molecular solids into extended solids with more itinerant electrons to soften repulsive interatomic interactions in a tight space . . . . These simultaneously occurring molecular-to-non-molecular and insulator-to-metal transitions of XeF2 arise from the pressure-induced delocalization of non-bonded lone-pair electrons to sp3d2 hybridization in two-dimensional XeF4 and to p3d5 in three-dimensional XeF8 through the chemical bonding of all eight valence electrons in Xe and, thereby, fulfilling the octet rule at high pressures.
My son has a job developing for a major financial company. They do development on MS Windows desktops and deploy on Linux servers. It works just fine for them: (Admittedly, there's not much of a user interface requirement for those apps)
I agree that borrowing has been way too easy lately, but not that it has been too cheap. Historically (going way back, except for the 70's/80s), mortgages, e.g. have been around or below 6%, but required significant down payments. The 10%, 5%, and even 0% downpayments, even "ninja" non-documentation loans, and the euphoria about housing prices always rising, are what contributed to the bubble.
But that's not the problem now. In part thanks to the bank bailout, the banks have money, but they're very skittish about loaning it out, and they are not meeting demand. Under those conditions, the government guarantee is using stimulus funds to stimulate the economy, as intended.
Arizona - Solar thermal generating plant.
Colorado - Solar panel manufacturing plant.
Indiana - Solar panel manufacturing plant.
OTH, by using the money on JUST solar collectors to be added to existing fossil fuel plants, . . .
You can't JUST add solar collectors to an existing plant. You need to add a whole generating system, as the solar thermal most likely runs at different temperatures and pressures than the existing plant, not to mention the control problems of integrating the two.
Also, you can't JUST stuff the collectors in to any existing plant, as you need a lot of acreage to capture enough sunlight.
That's an awfully low maintenance cost, especially for 250,000 miles. Also, you haven't figured the cost of money. And you need to spend on insurance, plus a few other things that I can't think of off hand. The IRS number is pretty accurate for the average driver.
Because in the experience of engineers, off-the-shelf mechanical/electrical equipment installed outdoors is usually expected to have an economically useful life of about 15 years, give or take. Of course, custom made equipment may last longer (or shorter)
You're mostly correct.
The Arizona power plant will be solar thermal generation.
But the Colorado and Indiana projects will be solar panel manufacturing plants.
no one would be building solar plants yet, . . .
That's odd, I just worked on a small project for a new solar power plant in Chicago, so, obviously, someone is building solar plants already.
This 2 billion is corporate welfare -- the 2 billion goes toward building plants, and the owners of the plants will now be making themselves money at the expense of the public.
It's a government guarantee of 2 billion in loans, not a government grant of 2 billion dollars.
The companies are figuring that they'll make money from the investment, but they can't get loans in this economy. If they do make money, it won't cost the government much, and in the meantime, it will create some badly needed jobs.
Some of the jobs will be temporary construction jobs, but some will be permanent, especially the project for the solar panel manufacturing plant expansion.
Assuming the information I have read is correct, greenhouse gasses are caused by nature far more than man. I can't find the reference, but recall a study published last year that showed the bovine population - both dairy and meat - producing more greenhouse gasses than all of mankind.
If you think dairy and meat production farming are "nature", you are mistaken.
I've read about some evidence that man-made climate change might date back to the invention of agriculture - partly because of deforestation and partly due to the methane byproducts of farming.
Methane is a much more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, but it is also much more short-lived in the atmosphere. Therefore carbon dioxide has a greater greenhouse potential in the long run
The evidence is overwhelming that human activities are releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that is warming the earth. Beyond that, there is room for debate. However, do not underestimate the amount of disruption to local climates that a "small" amount of global warming can produce
. . . anything in there about how Viacom uploaded their own material so they could bust youtube for it?
No, no need to. In fact, in order to find in favor of Youtube's summary judgement motion (which decides the case without a trial) the judge had to assume all of the disputed facts in Viacomm's favor.
Summary judgement cannot judge matters of fact, only matters of law. The judge decided that the safe harbor provisions of law do not allow Viacomm to sue even if what they alleged is true.
(note, however, that the judgement implied that there might still be other issues left open for trial)
For a not-so-randomly selected opinon.
Read and judge for yourself.
I would expect the CFD program that would suit this class is something that takes a simple grid input for the surface, simple initial conditions, then runs the flow and plots streamlines or vectors.
I don't believe there are "simple initial conditions" for CFD software.
To shut down these wells they have to do exactly the same procedure that failed on DeepWater Horizon! The fact is, the risky operation is in sealing it off, not continuing to drill.
As I understand it, the moratorium on new drilling means just that, no new drilling.
Wells already in production aren't being shut down.
If the moratorium is lifted, new wells would go through the shutdown procedures that failed at the Deep Water Horizon when the exploratory phse is done in order to turn it .
If the moratorium remains in effect, those 33 previously permitted new exploratory wells would not be drilling, would not penetrate into the oil reservoir, and, where they've already started drilling, shutdown would be much easier - hell, they're probably already shut down.
Learn from history:
Read up on Noriega and Panama
Read up on Sadam Hussein and Iraq
Lesson:
It's dangerous to befriend the Bushes.
Remember when Walmart also had a strong "Buy American!" policy?
No. At the time Walmart started their strong "Buy American" advertising campaign, they were already starting to buy from/set up overseas manufacturers with cheap labor practices.
Your own quotation of Schultz " . . . acknowledge and redress their errors . . . " contradicts your characterization of it as "It's ok BP. . . ".
The dessicant is easily re-used: Simply heat it to drive the water out and reuse it.
Your point is well taken, but your math is off.
Efficient mechanical A/C: EER 14 = COP 4
Efficient absorption A/C: COP +/-1
You don't even want to think about the building code issues having to do with using a flammable refrigerant.
Lithium chloride is already commonly used in absoprtion refrigeration and in dessicant systems. It has not proved a health problem.
One problem it does have: If the heat balance gets slightly off, the equipment "rocks up", that is, you end up with pipes full of solid lithium chloride. If this system were to be deployed widely to residential and other non-technical customers I could see it happening fairly often. Have fun with that.
TFA didn't really describe the refrigeration cycle being used, but it sounds like the only innovation is the hydrophobic membrane used in the heat exchanger. My guess is that the dessicant removes moisture, which raises the temperature of the air but lowers the wet bulb, and a direct and/or indirect evaporative cooler then reduces the tempeature to reasonable levels. This is nothing new, but is somewhat unusual because it's much easier to buy an off-the-shelf refrigeration system that is cheaper to buy and install and needs comparitively little maintenance.
TFA was isleading in some ways.
For one, they muddle the difference between evaporative cooling and dessicant drying. Evaporative cooling adds moisture to the air, exchanging sensible heat for latent heat, reducing the temperature but not significantly changing the overall heat content of the air. Dessicant dehumidification absorbs water out of the airstream which relases heat, raising the temperature of the air in exchange for reducing the latent heat of the air. These are two totally different processes, they can't both happen "all in one step".
For another, the dessicant cycle requires heat and the evaporative cycle requires water. Neither of those is free, and, pretty charts not withstanding, TFA offers no explanation of how this system saves money, energy, or.the environment. (not saying it doesn't, just that the same natural thrmodynamic limits apply to both mechanical cycles and this cycle, and TFA dioesn't explain how this works better than a good mechanical refrigeration cycle)
Also, any new A/C system is not going to have CFCs or HCFCs, those aren't allowed in new systems any more. (the new refrigerants still have some global warming potentials, though)
Using low-E glass traps heat in the summer.
You should realize that heat flow is a two-way street. Using low -e glass to trap heat in the summer is a good thing, it reduces the amount of black body radiation of the hot outdoors that gets indoors.
The power comes from galvanic action of the dissimilar metals; the potato is just the electrolyte/salt bridge.
This is truly a non-solution (pun un-intended) to the overall problem of generating electricity from batteries, just an observation that boiling the potatoes makes them a better salt bridge than raw potatoes, with no comparisons to salt bridges of batteries currently in use and no insight into obtaining or storing the energy in the first place.