china/India – Cop 26

[Sam Longley 1Participant @samlongley1]

Posted by Ady1 on 15/11/2021 15:52:25:

I think worse is coming, a lot worse

The big corporations are ramping up the mining of seabeds which will be disasterous

Why?

[Phil H1Participant @philh196021]

Posted by JasonB on 15/11/2021 12:51:45:

Best all give up running those Locos on coal too

Yep, big tender with a big battery driving an electric motor with the sound of steam hissing away. Who would know the difference?

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

The 'arts-grads ' and their pseudo 'engineer/ scientists' orchestrating this disaster ,have not the slightest understanding of the Laws of Thermodynamics, or the order in which it is necessary to achieve their objectives.

They are trying to achieve the end result first , before providing the steps to get there.

All we can do is watch the catastrophe unfold , it will be 'interesting'.

[Nigel McBurney 1Participant @nigelmcburney1]

I think it is utter stupidity destroying the coal burning power stations,we need working alternatives, relying on solar and windpower sources is silly for the UK ,we have lots of coal why not carry on burning it the best clean way available,at least retain it just in case.our coal burning is so small compared to the three worst countries,why get so bothered about our emission.the middle ages showed up that the uks natural resources could not feed the population as there were not enough windmills and water mills which rely on wind and rain to provide our basic food and the coming of steam power saved us, and towards the end of windmills many of them had big diesel engines to provide power when the wind stopped. And what about burning oil,oil will still be required there will still be a need for lubrication products,plastics, and loads of other products made from oil. The "greens" will be the first to wail and moan when they switch a light on and it does not work or their mobile cannot be charged and their is no electric todrive their heat pump. Boris and his mates were bonkers to ban the sale of i/c engined cars only 8 years into the future, only today plans are announced to stop further building of HS2,its no good having wild dreams it was obvious at the start of HS2 that costs would spiral,nearly al civil engineering is wildly underestimated so that a start is made then it is too late to stop it when true costs are published,I cannot see the uk having a reliable electricity supply in ten to fifteen years time,we model engineers will be fack to treadle lathes and candles to see by and use files to shape our metal. Though all this fuss about climate change is really a pain in the backside, I think the real future problem is too many mouths to feed and plastic in the food chain wwhich will get really serious.

[Harry WilkesParticipant @harrywilkes58467]

Posted by JasonB on 15/11/2021 12:51:45:

Best all give up running those Locos on coal too

Nah if you cant beat em join them fire up the coal fired power stations why should we force up prices in this country when there are those who are unwilling to

H

[File HandleParticipant @filehandle]

The one thing that is always avoided is reducing the human population. Many so called greens point out that the rate of increase is slowing, but that is still an increase when in reality it needs to be reducing.

Edited By Keith Wyles on 15/11/2021 18:33:41

[larry phelan 1Participant @larryphelan1]

Lynne,

I wish you luck with that one.

[Russell EberhardtParticipant @russelleberhardt48058]

Posted by Keith Wyles on 15/11/2021 18:33:15:

The one thing that is always avoided is reducing the human population. Many so called greens point out that the rate of increase is slowing, but that is still an increase when in reality it needs to be reducing.

Edited By Keith Wyles on 15/11/2021 18:33:41

Agreed. Governments are afraid to mention it. The Chinese tried it some years back by restricting couples to only one offspring but they gave up on it.

Russell

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

The Chinese abandoned their reproduction-limiting policy for a reason: it was producing a very unbalanced population with too high a proportion retired to be supported by too small a proportion still working. The effects are still with the nation, though will gradually ameliorate.

It produced some other, very unpleasant social problems, though whether they were ones that would worry the government there I do not know.

'

Ady –

The South of England is not "all 'fracked' out" – to use that horrible American slang instead of the technical terms I would expect on an engineering forum.

No hydraulic fracturing has been carried out in the region, certainly not even in my county of Dorset, which holds the nation's largest on-land oil- and gas- field. Nor is the ground-water "full of hydrocarbons" except possibly in a few isolated areas where it may occur naturally.

(Two small spas established near Weymouth in the 18C, to exploit the contemporary craze for "taking the waters", did not last long because the water apparently tasted too horrible even to do you good. It was tainted by sulphur compounds from the Kimmeridge Clay under the local aquifer. I believe the occupants of the surviving spa house can still take the waters, but I don't suppose they do! The area's public water-supply is from clean Chalk and Limestone aquifers.)

I am as concerned as you though about the other point you raise – sea-bed "mining", or more accurately simply ocean-floor dredging.

[Anthony KnightsParticipant @anthonyknights16741]

I have just been reading up on green house gasses. Apparently water vapour is a major contributor ( about 30%) to global warming and if it wasn't there the ambient temperature would be about -18 degrees centigrade. If we are going to burn large quantities of hydrogen, creating water vapour, will this not offset the reduction in CO2 emissions and we will be no better off?

I have also been investigating heat pumps. These appear to be refrigerators working in reverse ( unless someone has been breeding Maxwell's demons). These apparently lower the ambient temperature outside and can even ice up. Indeed one article says that if extracting heat from a body of water, one should ensure there is enough water to prevent it becoming frozen. If we have millions of these operating, will we not end up cooling the planet down? A good thing initially, but in a couple of hundred years, might we not have a Global Cooling Crisis? Glad I won't be around.

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

If heat pumps actually worked then why not dip a giant one into the gulf stream on the west coast and use the heat extracted to generate electricity

Scale it up so its more efficient

If it can't get to 100 degrees then top it up with a wee boost of gas heat

I've got a feeling that they're actually pretty useless

[John OlsenParticipant @johnolsen79199]

Heat pumps do work, but only within the laws of thermodynamics. So we can put say a 1kW electric radiator in our room, and get exactly 1kW of heating from it. Or we can use that 1 kW to run a heat pump, in which case we might get something like 3kW worth of heating in our room, for an input of 1 kW of electricity from the mains and 2 kW of cooling the great outdoors. But in the long run, all of the heat in our room will escape outdoors, and either way we will have used 1kW times the number of hours we ran either system of actual power that had to be generated somewhere. So no, the planet will not be frozen down, but we might be able to get by with less power used for heating. The actual output from the heat pump will depend on how cold it is at the outside end, the above example would be typical enough for where I live, where the air temperature outside rarely drops below freezing, but you will get less in a very cold climate. Heat pumps are pretty good but TANSTAAFL still applies. There is a practical limit to how cold the outside end can be allowed to get, since it has to be able to provide energy to evaporate the working fluid. Allowing it to be covered in ice will not help the heat to flow in. (Remember that even freezing point is a long way above absolute zero, so there is still heat available at freezing point, provided it can flow to your outside end.)

Pumping heat to a high temperature to generate power comes under the same general classification as pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. An ideal heat engine running off such a heat pump would generate just enough power to run an ideal heat pump, with no heat or mechanical energy able to be spared for actual use. Of course ideal heat pumps and heat engines are not actually possible.

There is an idea for how to extract energy from heat in the oceans, it would rely on the difference in temperature between the surface, especially in the tropics, and the deep ocean. But there is only a small temperature difference to work with, and done on a large scale it might interfere with ocean currents. This should be a particular concern to you guys in the UK, since the only reason the place is inhabitable is because of the Gulf stream.

John

[File HandleParticipant @filehandle]

Anthony, the green hydrogen is made by the electrolysis of water, so burning it just recreates water. thus will have zero greenhouse effect. It has the potential to store excess renewable electrical energy for later use. It also makes use of the existing gas pipelines.

The downside is that the electrolysis does need a lot of energy, again we are back to thermodynamics.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Nice summary/realiity-check, John 

… I would like, if I may,  to pick one short section to quote for emphasis:

[quote] There is a practical limit to how cold the outside end can be allowed to get, since it has to be able to provide energy to evaporate the working fluid. Allowing it to be covered in ice will not help the heat to flow in. (Remember that even freezing point is a long way above absolute zero, so there is still heat available at freezing point, provided it can flow to your outside end.) [/quote]

That’s why I wrote, in another recent thread: … my limited exploration of the subject leads me to believe that if I had a stream conveniently running through my property, a ‘water-source’ heat pump would be ideal … but otherwise, the cost/benefit analysis doesn’t seem to work. [yet]

MichaelG.

.

Ref. https://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/postings.asp?th=174752&p=7

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 16/11/2021 08:33:09

[Tim StevensParticipant @timstevens64731]

The term 'beardy wierdy' reminds me of the names applied to Jews in Nazi Germany. And with the same level of science, logic, and humanity behind it. I'm glad I have no grandchildren to inherit the mess you are promoting.

Sorry, but there it is – Tim

[Ex contributorParticipant @mgnbuk]

IIRC both China & India stated an intention to reduce coal usage over a defined period, so just because they won't commit to doing what we did & dump their existing coal generating capacity before there was an alternative in place doesn't mean that they are not doing anything.

Alternative sources of affordable ME sized tooling (but still a lot more expensive than China & India) would include the likes of Poland & Czech Republic, but I seem to recall reading that Poland is more coal dependant than either China or India !

An other aspect that rarely seems to be mentioned WRT "Globalistaion" is shipping emissions – according to one transport source quoting 2018 figures " Shipping currently accounts for nearly 3% of global CO2 emissions – higher than those of Canada, Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, France or the United Kingdom. "

And the recent hot air generation exercise in Glasgow avoided taking into account military emissions, which are apparently around 20% of the total.

Air source heat pumps appear to be a solution that will not be appropriate for most. Experience with 3 stand-alone units heating the offices at work suggest that they are not particularly reliable (2 out of the 3 have failed) & are prone to icing up in our damp winters. We have a fan heater on standby to assist the ASHPs in winter. A central heating ASHP unit installed by my employer in a new build house designed to use it was great when it worked, apparently, but it failed every 2 years (compressor) & repairs were almost as much as a new unit. He sold the house & the new owner replaced the ASHP with a gas boiler fed from an LPG tank (no mains gas) when it failed for a second time on him.

Nigel B.

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

I have asked my Belgian friends many times, none know of any plans Belgium has to make gas boilers redundant and heat-pumps mandatory in the future.

[Grindstone CowboyParticipant @grindstonecowboy]

I seem to have noticed an increase in gas boiler adverts recently – getting rid of stock, or am I just cynical? Might just be the time of year.

Interestingly, the one for Worcester Bosch states they are hydrogen compatible (or some such phrase), so presumably there are plans to add hydrogen to the gas mix.

Speaking of hydrogen, I was watching an old episode of Top Gear yesterday which featured a hydrogen-cell powered Honda (now no longer produced), which to me would seem to be the best idea of all if they can get fuel distribution sorted out. Link here to the Wikipedia article for the vehicle.

Rob

Links to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_Clarity#Honda_FCX_Clarity_(2008%E2%80%932014)

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by J Hancock on 18/11/2021 09:07:18:

I have asked my Belgian friends many times, none know of any plans Belgium has to make gas boilers redundant and heat-pumps mandatory in the future.

I don't think anyone in the world plans to make heat-pumps mandatory – they're just one way of filling the energy gap. If they happen to suit your home, all well and good, otherwise look for something else.

Belgium doesn't have any plans to make gas boilers redundant because the EU are still discussing how best to implement the change. They've rejected discontinuing gas boilers from 2025 as too difficult to achieve in that timescale. Instead, they've set policy requiring member states to phase boilers out rather than set hard targets. It's because some European countries are better placed to reduce gas consumption than others.

Consider also if the supply of gas is reliable! Is it smart for Belgium or anyone else in Europe to rely on it? A good proportion of Natural Gas enters Europe from Russia via Belarus, where this week it was again used a political lever: “We heat Europe, and they are still threatening us that they’ll shut the borders,” said Lukashenko in an emergency meeting with his top ministers on Thursday. “And what if we cut off [the transit of] natural gas to them? So I would recommend that the leadership of Poland, Lithuanian and other brainless people think before they speak.” (Guardian report 11Nov)

There's much to be said in favour of replacing imported coal, oil and gas with locally sourced Wind, Tidal, Solar, Hydro and Nuclear.

Dave

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

?????/

Just what type of heating will builders be choosing to install in new builds when they are no longer allowed (mandated ) to use gas boilers in 2030/5 ish.?

Heat pumps are the latest wheeze by the State.

[Grindstone CowboyParticipant @grindstonecowboy]

A friend works for a large construction/services company, and he tells me they are taking out gas boilers they installed only three years ago from schools, replacing them with heat pumps. Mainly because there are government grants available for the change. He also mentioned they are having to double the number of radiators too.

When installing replacement boilers (which they are being asked to do for some commercial properties in advance of restrictions coming in around 2025 (which are not applicable to domestic systems)), it is becoming apparent that the amount of gas coming through the mains is inadequate – they are finding there is an unacceptable drop in pressure, such that it falls below the manufacturer's safe lower limit. Apparently the "solution" is for the gas suppliers to reduce the pressure in surrounding properties – the proper fix would be to replace the aged cast-iron main with something larger, but in one case that would involve digging up the Mancunian Way (one of the main routes into Manchester), so that's unlikely to happen.

Rob

[larry phelan 1Participant @larryphelan1]

China and India are doing what Europe, and England did years ago, so nothing new there.

What,s sauce for the goose, is sauce for the gander.

History repeats itself.

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Posted by J Hancock on 15/11/2021 14:32:44:

Anyone have a view on the 'effect' of the massive movements of water which have taken place over the last 100 years ?

For example , the Aral sea has disappeared , the 3 Gorges has appeared , as has the Hoover dam , Aswan , etc etc.

The area of the earth is ~510,000,000 sq km, 71% of which is sea/ocean, so 362,100,000 sq km. The Hoover dam holds 2,480,000 cu.m of water, so if you emptied it into the sea the sea level would rise by 6.8 * 10^-9 mm, so you'd need to build a lot of dams to make any difference. That's 6.8 picometres, a hydrogen atom is 120 picometres.

All data from t'internet

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

Thank you DW, with that knowledge I will sleep well tonight.

[Tim StevensParticipant @timstevens64731]

Dear J Hancock

Heat pumps are the sort of 'wheeze' that your mum and dad kept in the kitchen so your baby food didn't go off. Don't just be grateful, try to understand. Sillyness should have been given up with the baby food.

Cheers, Tim

[Author]

Posts