Hydrogen – the Net-Negative Energy Option

Photo sourced [here]

 by Viv Forbes 

The same people who promoted intermittent energy (wind and solar) have trumped that with their latest green energy fad – hydrogen fuel.

Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe; it fuels the sun and is the third most common element on Earth. But it is so reactive that it is seldom found in its elemental state - it combines strongly with other elements such as oxygen to form water or with carbon to form methane. It is an essential component in all acids, alkalis, hydro-carbons and organic materials.


To extract hydrogen from natural compounds such as water, methane or coal requires very large inputs of energy. Most commonly hydrogen is produced from methane gas using heat and steam, or by electrolysis of water using large quantities of electricity.

Hydrogen can be used to power rockets, cars and engines of all types. However the energy used to produce the hydrogen can never be fully recovered from the energy in the hydrogen. It is thus NOT a source of energy – it is merely a storehouse for energy - a battery.

It is possible to produce hydrogen from water using electricity from nuclear or hydro-carbon fuels, or even intermittent green energy. The hydrogen gas could then be transported to cities as a clean energy source for cars, thus reducing pollution from petrol/diesel vehicles.

But hydrogen is a very dangerous gas. It has tiny lightweight molecules which have low energy density and are difficult to compress, contain and store. It also forms an explosive mixture with air. To provide a network of hydrogen car-fuelling stations, or to suggest hydrogen as a domestic gas, is inviting explosive disasters in the suburbs – (imagine the Health and Safety regulations!)

Inviting explosive disasters in the suburbs?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=MMB2VR0087w

Even the impractical electric cars have benefits compared to the hydrogen car. Electricity is safer and the supply network is easier and essentially in place. Moreover, electric cars do not reduce the oxygen content of city air - every tonne of hydrogen fuel consumes eight tonnes of oxygen to produce nine tonnes of water vapour. So instead of urban smog, we may get urban fog.

And to suggest that hydrogen can provide base-load power tops all green energy idiocy.

Hydrogen is a Net-Negative Energy Option.

Viv Forbes,
Rosewood    Qld   Australia
forbes@carbon-sense.com


Photo sourced Wikipedia

Renewables NOT Renewable

by Viv Forbes

Horse Hollow wind farm

 

There is an incessant chorus from the green gospellers glorifying “renewable” energy and warning disbelievers that continued use of carbon fuels will damn the world to eternal fires of global warming.

Their ire is focussed on carbon dioxide, one very minor but beneficial atmospheric gas which is accused of causing more of everything bad: pollution and extreme weather, droughts and floods, snowstorms and hurricanes, malaria and mosquitos, icebergs and glacier retreat, heat waves and blizzards, declining polar bears and multiplying cane toads.

 
 

We are told that using “renewable” energy will prevent all these disasters and produce cheap “clean” electricity. Four points are relevant:

First, carbon dioxide produced by burning coal, oil, gas, diesel, petrol or wood is not a pollutant in the atmosphere, not the key driver of global warming or climate change, but a boon to all plants (and thus all life). It is clean and green. There is thus no environmental or climate justification for punitive taxes on carbon dioxide, or for really silly stuff like emissions trading or carbon capture and burial.

Second, wind and solar power have a role in remote or mobile applications and in domestic hot water generation, but are an unreliable and high cost addition to grid power. Because of their intermittent and unpredictable supply characteristics, the large areas of land required to collect significant energy, and their need for back-up generators or huge batteries, they can seldom compete in a fair market with coal, gas, nuclear or hydro power. Nothing anyone can do will change these natural characteristics.

Third, those who wish to use “renewable” energy or to become independent of the grid are free to do so, and this should continue. But green energy should not be molly-coddled with subsidies from taxpayers or other users, nor protected by extra taxes on carbon energy, taxpayer loans, mandated market shares or propped up prices.

Finally, there is one killer point that has recently emerged.

The data collected shows that renewables will barely generate sufficient energy over the life of the facilities to recover the energy used to manufacture, construct and maintain those facilities.


Google has long supported green energy and had a dream to power all of their energy-hungry computers and air-conditioned data centres with “renewables”. It was revealed recently by their own technical advisers that this dream is a delusion. The fatal flaw discovered is that wind/solar energy may not reduce life-time emissions of carbon dioxide and is unlikely to ever be cheaper than coal. The data collected shows that renewables will barely generate sufficient energy over the life of the facilities to recover the energy used to manufacture, construct and maintain those facilities.


Most so called “renewable” energy relies on the sun, and is better referred to as “in-exhaustible”. But at any point on Earth, wind/solar is more accurately called “intermittent energy”. And to build plants to extract electricity from the sun using wind or solar collectors is a zero-sum game or worse – they may not produce enough energy to recoup the energy cost of replacing those facilities.

Wind/solar energy thus fails its central justification – it is not renewable.



Viv Forbes,
forbes@carbon-sense.com


For those who would like to read more:

Google Green tried hard to make green energy work:
http://www.google.com/green/energy/

But Google Engineers now say renewable energy won’t work:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/11/22/shocker-top-google-engineers-say-renewable-energy-simply-wont-work/

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/renewables/what-it-would-really-take-to-reverse-climate-change

http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/11/22/Renewable-energy-so-useless-that-even-greenie-Google-gave-up-on-it

Troubles at world’s largest solar plant: production down, gas usage up:
http://breakingenergy.com/2014/10/29/at-ivanpah-solar-power-plant-energy-production-falling-well-short-of-expectations/

The Catch22 of Energy Storage:
http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/

Large amount of steel & concrete used for a wind turbine base. photo sourced [here]

When life gives you lemons

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade jet fuel

An Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology researcher hopes to use a chemical found in lemons and other citrus fruits to make clean, renewable jet fuel. Dr Claudia Vickers is modifying baker’s yeast to produce a synthetic form of the natural chemical limonene at AIBN, based at The University of Queensland.

“Limonene is a volatile chemical that is best known for contributing to the smell of citrus fruits,” Vickers said. “It was first identified in turpentine oil in the late 1800s and is now used as a flavour and fragrance in foods, household cleaning products, and perfumes. It also holds promise as an anti-cancer agent.”

Vickers said the environmental benefits of using limonene as a fuel were particularly exciting. “It might sound unlikely, but limonene one day could be a renewable, clean source of aviation fuel,” she said. “Fifty per cent of a 747’s weight on take-off is its fuel.

Limonene extracted from citrus peel had been used successfully as a jet fuel component in demonstration flights in the past. “However, large-scale limonene production from citrus peel is impractical,” Vickers said. “Producing it in yeast should provide a route to much greater yields of limonene which are easier to extract.”

Limonene yields from the modified yeast are not yet high enough to be commercially viable, but Dr Vickers has plans to further modify the yeast for improved yields. The same technology could be used to make a variety of other sustainable products from limonene, including rubbers, plastics, and paints.

The feasibility research had the backing of industry partners including Boeing , Virgin Australia , Mackay Sugar , IOR Energy and US biotech company Amyris.

A United States Department of Agriculture report predicts “green chemicals” produced using biomass will represent 22 per cent of the chemical market by 2025. A short video on Dr Vickers and her limonene research can be seen here

Article sourced from Friday Offcuts
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