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[E. Lee Dickinson]

Mac Kerr wrote on Sun, 11 May 2008 15:14

I admit I know little about modern car engines, but after the battery recharges, isn't there excess electricity available from the alternator? It keeps on spinning whenever the engine is running. If that's the electricity that's used for the electrolyzing, how are wasting fuel? Of course you are wasting fuel by hauling around the extra weight of the water and associated gear. I don't buy that this will have a net gain.

Mac, you know how a generator bogs down when you fade the lights up? Same deal. If you add electrical load to the alternator, it takes more fuel to make it spin.

[E. Lee Dickinson]

Phillip Graham wrote on Sun, 11 May 2008 18:34

Marjan Milosevic(MarjanM) wrote on Sun, 11 May 2008 18:21 I dont know about the device in question but... My very close friend is a real "nut", and for more than a year he is working on some kind of device that will convert the normal petrol engine to run on water. As he explained to me there is a way to separate HH form O with some different electrolyze (combining 4 different frequencies applied to the steel plates) and he already succeeded in achieving this. According to some science literature hydrogen has more calories when burning than petrol and he made some calculation that with 2 liters of distiled water you can run around 100 kilometers. He is now working on the injector part where hydrogen will be injected to the cylinder. Knowing him, either he will do that or he will blow up his garage Regards Marjan The direct electrolysis of water is very inefficient, there are better ways to "thermochemically crack" water. Also, the volumetric energy density of gasoline is much much better than hydrogen, so your friend had better revisit his calculations.  Gasoline is about 35MJoule/Liter, and highly compressed hydrogen (600+ ATM pressure) is about 5MJoule/liter.  That is a seven-fold difference...

Yeah, but Phil, he's not talking about compressed hydrogen, he's talking about hydrogen electrolyzed from water. When I spent a semester soldering (without understanding) the voltage monitoring systems for a fuel cell in Virginia Tech's hybrid vehicle team, I often overheard the engineers around me lamenting that "There's more hydrogen in a cup of water than in a cup of compressed hydrogen."

[John Roberts {JR}]

Patrick Tracy wrote on Sun, 11 May 2008 17:45

Is it more efficient when braking to dump momentum as heat or to regenerate it as electricity?

Rhetorical?

Quote:

The reasons that we don't have electric vehicles are political, economic and social, not technical.

Electric cars are currently limited by marginal battery "technology", then poor economics. Many people are willing to suffer the poor economics to be green so I don't see any social stigma.

The folks in the trenches are gambling that they are close enough with battery technology and production is ramping up. We'll have electric cars in a few years and I hope they do have the batteries under control.

Quote:

Afforded to us by whom? There are other technologies in existence, but many have the potential for decentralized production which may not benefit those who currently control our energy.

I'm not sure what this is about? Harvest methane gas from Tom's chili?

Quote:

Umm, yeah, but my point is that the grid is there if we decide to find other sources of energy. There's no real reason that the source must be combustion other than the substantial economic momentum for doing it that way. There is energy everywhere and all we really have to do is be creative about extracting it. The grid can even make decentralized generation like home photovoltaic more efficient by allowing those generating excess to supply those with a shortfall.

The real merit of grid in combination with decentralized photovoltaic, wind, or whatever, is the ability to use the grid for excess energy storage, essentially running the meter backwards. Utilities actually like this because they can reduce investment to meet peak demand as excess PV energy is mid day when they need it.

Of course it is easier to clean a handful of coal burning plants than 100,000 tailpipes. Nuclear energy is even cleaner.

Quote:

Yes, the laws of Newtonian physics are clear, but in the quantum world what you say isn't necessarily so. Even within your constraints there are lots of other ways to use the energy all around us. I'm not talking about cold fusion or anything equally questionable, I'm talking about leveraging our solar thermal, photovoltaic, wind, geothermal, tidal etc. technologies into a practical system of generation. I think it can be done on a technical level but it's the political and economic forces that resist the change.

Quantum physics?? The energy economy is very simple and very basic physics. The politicians in Washington seem equally confused and quick to blame everybody else for our current situation.

It's the local NIMBY refusal to base nuclear plants or deal with disposal issues. "I have seen the enemy and it is us" (Pogo).

JR

[Charlie Zureki]

Patrick,

I thought my comments were self explainitory, not to upset or anger anyone... I understand the politics involved in the fuel debate, I was only answering as to the question, why we've used petroleum... Because until recently, it has been a cheap source of energy, and frankly, other than Nuclear, it has been one of the few sources of energy we could put into the practice of using.
I understand solar energy and the products used to capture it.
I am all for using it, and the other sources as well, Nuclear, Wind, etc... But again, Solar has been cost inefficient until recently. And, I understand the concept of one's selling the surplus to the Utility... I corrected someones Math equation from the previous Thread, explaining that their Math was flawed in the Amount of energy their system would produce.

And, finally the Laws of Physics do not change... whether I discuss them or anyone else....    Quote:"I talking about leveraging our Solar thermal, photovoltaic, wind, etc...."

 All of the above make energy from: Mechanical, Chemical or Thermal.

Yes, things will have to change, but...maybe they're raping us on fuel costs to afford the ability to provide Energy derived from other forms when the Petrol runs out.

Hammer

[Ian Hunt]

"maybe they're raping us on fuel costs to afford the ability to provide Energy derived from other forms when the Petrol runs out."

Yeah, well I have a really nice bridge for sale, interested?

[Charlie Zureki]

 Phil,

We could debate Fuels for Fusion or Fission till the cows come home, the only point that I was trying to make was that one of the biggest users of petroleum products is to generate Electricity; Which could be generated by other sources.

 Regarding Gasoline Pumps,  I worked on a  side project for a company that made meters years ago. The meter was a Coriolis meter, which measured mass-flow, it had no internal moving parts like turbine, displacement, piston,etc... and could be used(when calibrated) to measure liquid/ slurry mixture,low density to high, high to low viscosity.  Extremely more accurate than even vortex shedders.
That is when I realized that Gasoline Pumps were measuring volume and not mass.  Some Tankers (probably all now) were converting their fleet to Mass Flow meters to get more accurate reading when selling to the retailer Retail pumps did not have mass flow meters, pretty certain they still don't.  

Volumetric expansions : V= V sub0(1 plus B[delta t])

Do the math and see if there couldn't be a substantial difference.

Cheers

Hammer

[Patrick Tracy]

I guess I was reacting to what seemed to be an attitude that "it can't be done." Probably overreacting. I do appreciate my less logical expressions being pointed out.

I would say that there seems to be a viable battery technology that has been left out of most conversations of this sort, flywheels developed by Jack Bitterly and others. They circumvent the whole issue of chemistry as energy storage. They don't need replacing every couple of years. They charge as fast as they discharge making regenerative braking efficient.

Even if that particular technology doesn't pan out there are endless ways of manipulating energy. It's our willingness to accept the status quo that is the biggest obstacle to a better solution than simply burning stuff that's been laying around. I don't accept that the only reasonable energy sourced is fossil fuel.

[Ian Hunt]

Bravo Patrick

There has been a tendency here to embrace the status quo, Oil Supply Shortages? hey lets dig up more and the extra cost of the dig will come out of the research for alternatives!

But Hey, we could all follow the advice of another poster and "stop those people from using too much oil"

God forbid the possibility that we are "those people"

[Charlie Zureki]

 Ian,     , that's what I meant to end with..


And no.. I don't need any bridges, Thanks
 

 Hammer

[Phillip_Graham]

E. Lee Dickinson wrote on Sun, 11 May 2008 19:40

Yeah, but Phil, he's not talking about compressed hydrogen, he's talking about hydrogen electrolyzed from water. When I spent a semester soldering (without understanding) the voltage monitoring systems for a fuel cell in Virginia Tech's hybrid vehicle team, I often overheard the engineers around me lamenting that "There's more hydrogen in a cup of water than in a cup of compressed hydrogen."

But you have to put the energy into electrolyzing water to begin with.  This makes the hydrogen in the water nothing more than a battery, and a lousy one.  The hydrolysis of water, and subsequent consumption of that hydrogen is most definitely NOT a net positive process.

Petroleum's big plus as an energy source is that it is already here.  If we had to directly synthesize petroleum, it would be embroiled in just as much debate as any other technology.

As soon as you exhaust the inherent supplies of any energy source (eg petroleum) you are faced with manufacturing a replacement, and potentially on a global scale.

Hopefully this makes sense...