Coal…

[pgk pgkParticipant @pgkpgk17461]

I hada 6kw and a 3kw reversible aircon put in here a couple fo years ago and questioned the fitter over how thin the power cable was and was stunned by the low current draw he demonstrated.

reading further it seems most H2 is currently from fossil sources. logically if costings permit then hydrolysis from spare renewable capacity could be a way to go. As to the sun not shining all the time.. that rather depends where you are.. it's always daytime somewhere. If the infrastructure as there for transfer of power.. cables, pipes, bottled H2 then again logic suggests solar power from deserts and siting tidal or wind where it's at its height..

What concerns me most about solar is when all those panels need recycling.

[Dod MoleParticipant @georgeclarihew]

To throw a strange one in to the PV solar generation question.

Why is there no  research into lunar panels to cover the times the sun dont shine

 

Edited By George Clarihew on 28/04/2017 22:10:15

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

If we're going for alternative ideas what about nano-hydro? Say my house is 25 ft * 25 ft, annual rainfall in my neck of the woods is 34", that's 1775 cu.ft of water, which weighs 49.4 tons. Height to gutters is 17ft or so, so the energy released by rain falling off the roof is 1,882,920 lbs ft per year. Sounds a lot, but it's only 0.71 kw.hr. Probably more than can be harvested from moonshine, let's stick to drinking it.

On a more serious note, the heat pump chaps could try intercepting the hot water going down the drain and somehow diverting it to their cold source

[Dod MoleParticipant @georgeclarihew]

Posted by duncan webster on 29/04/2017 17:59:11:

If we're going for alternative ideas what about nano-hydro? Say my house is 25 ft * 25 ft, annual rainfall in my neck of the woods is 34", that's 1775 cu.ft of water, which weighs 49.4 tons. Height to gutters is 17ft or so, so the energy released by rain falling off the roof is 1,882,920 lbs ft per year. Sounds a lot, but it's only 0.71 kw.hr. Probably more than can be harvested from moonshine, let's stick to drinking it.

On a more serious note, the heat pump chaps could try intercepting the hot water going down the drain and somehow diverting it to their cold source

All it needs is to make rain a practical stored energy source.

Keep the 49.4 tons in a tank on a platform at the 17 feet attach the platform geared to a lowering device braked by the load and you have a pretty powerful reserve of energy for when its not sunny or windy

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

I thought I'd made it clear that I was being whimsical. 0.71 kw.hr per year is not quite enough energy to make 1 cup of tea per week, or to run the average fan fire for 18 minutes.

To make rain a useful source of energy we need a very large catchment (many tens of square miles), and a lot of fall. Llyn Trawsfynydd covers 1.9 sq. miles, it's catchment area is much bigger. It holds 40 million tons of water, and is about 750 feet above the turbines at Maentwrog hydro station, which produces 30MW on full chat. It can't do full chat continuously in summer as it doesn't rain enough (even in Wales!). Much of the potential for similar schemes has already been tapped, and I can't see us getting away with building more dams in the Scottish Highlands.

There is a proposal to put a hydro station on the Mersey at Woolston, the entire flow of the river will generate 500kw. You'd need 4000 such schemes to replace one Fiddler's Ferry. Even so I support it. There are similar schemes for the Weaver, the main attraction I suppose is that the weirs are already in place having been put in to make the rivers navigable

[Barnaby WildeParticipant @barnabywilde70941]

Way to go . . . http://www.derwent-hydro.co.uk/our_sites/

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

Yes Duncan. However, the hydro station at Maentwrog, plus the one below Snowdon, apart from being small and unobtrusive, also run a large part of North Wales, due to the low population and lack of industry. The 6 kW water turbine at C.A.T. in Machynlleth can run the entire Centre on its own; lights, display screens, cafe, tills, Everything, yet it is only about 1 metre cubed and no pollution!

Geoff

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

Yes Duncan. However, the hydro station at Maentwrog, plus the one below Snowdon, apart from being small and unobtrusive, also run a large part of North Wales, due to the low population and lack of industry. The 6 kW water turbine at C.A.T. in Machynlleth can run the entire Centre on its own; lights, display screens, cafe, tills, Everything, yet it is only about 1 metre cubed and no pollution!

Geoff

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Posted by Geoff Theasby on 30/04/2017 06:26:30:

Yes Duncan. However, the hydro station at Maentwrog, plus the one below Snowdon, apart from being small and unobtrusive, also run a large part of North Wales, due to the low population and lack of industry. The 6 kW water turbine at C.A.T. in Machynlleth can run the entire Centre on its own; lights, display screens, cafe, tills, Everything, yet it is only about 1 metre cubed and no pollution!

Geoff

So that's the answer, get rid of the population and the industry and we've solved the problem. Sounds a bit extreme to me.

6kw will just about boil a kettle and run a fan fire at the same time. My domestic supply is 15 kw and it works even in a drought

Edited By duncan webster on 30/04/2017 10:43:27

[KWILParticipant @kwil]

No its just we have too many people overall.

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

The Christchurch(NZ) city council uses biofuel produced at the main sewerage plant to (A) power a large ex marine diesel engine to run a generator to power the sewerage works, and it is also used to fuel vehicles owned by the counc

Ian S C

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by duncan webster on 30/04/2017 10:14:54:

Posted by Geoff Theasby on 30/04/2017 06:26:30:

…

So that's the answer, get rid of the population and the industry and we've solved the problem. Sounds a bit extreme to me.

…

Climate change could achieve just that whether we like it or not.

The polar ice caps are melting scary fast at the moment and, if it continues, sea-levels will rise by about 70 metres. That completely drowns London and most of our major cities. Birmingham will be OK, but I'm not sure how they'll squeeze all the refugees in!

There's much to be said in favour of Nuclear Power. Cleaning up is expensive, but it's looking as if the mess left by burning billions of tons of fossil fuels will be far, far, worse.

We live in interesting times!

Dave

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 30/04/2017 12:31:03:

 

Climate change could achieve just that whether we like it or not.

The polar ice caps are melting scary fast at the moment and, if it continues, sea-levels will rise by about 70 metres.

Take a couple of deep breaths. That's the worst case scenario if all the icecaps totally melt, which is unlikely to happen this millenium. Even the IPCC predicts less than 1 metre sea level rise by the end of the century, and similar results in the foreseeable centuries after that. So it woiuld take 7,000 years to rise 70m at that rate. And we will almost certainly have blown ourselves off the face of the earth by some other means by then. Mr Trump is giving it a good try already.

 

Agree with you on nuclear power though. The big problem is going to be when a billion or more people in the emerging middle classes, and even the poor people, of the developing nations all want electricity in their homes in the not too distant future. The coal being burned now is nothing compared with what it would take to power up what are now developing nations.  And that is going to happen in just a few decades. There is no way the existing solar panel and wind turbine factories could keep up with demand to do it by other than coal fired power. But a nuke station can be built in about 10 years and power a whole developing nation.

Edited By Hopper on 30/04/2017 12:55:41

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

The problem with Nuclear Power stations is that, if you build one, it provides you with the essential ingredient to turn a fission bom into a fusion one.

Then you have a real problem.

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

The supply of raw Uranium isn't that good, so we need either fusion or fast breeders in the medium term if we are to keep nuclear. Fast breeders are not good, Pu is a horrific toxin even if it weren't radioactive. It provides a use for all the depleted Uranium, but not the one I'd like. And fusion still seems 50 years off. We need to use less power. Which is why DAB radio is a technology in the direction against the curve – it uses much more power than analogue. How many DAB radios last 3 months at 8 hrs a day on a pair of AA batteries like my analogue FM radio?

Regards

Richard.

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Hopper on 30/04/2017 12:50:31:

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 30/04/2017 12:31:03:

Climate change could achieve just that whether we like it or not.

The polar ice caps are melting scary fast at the moment and, if it continues, sea-levels will rise by about 70 metres.

Take a couple of deep breaths. That's the worst case scenario if all the icecaps totally melt, which is unlikely to happen this millenium. Even the IPCC predicts less than 1 metre sea level rise by the end of the century, and similar results in the foreseeable centuries after that. So it woiuld take 7,000 years to rise 70m at that rate. And we will almost certainly have blown ourselves off the face of the earth by some other means by then. Mr Trump is giving it a good try already.

…

Edited By Hopper on 30/04/2017 12:55:41

Yes that's most probably right.

However, although a millennium seems like a long time to us and our "three score years and ten", it's a mere blink in time when you consider the big picture. Humans have already been around for about 100,000 years and they were descended from human-like apes dating back a further million years or so. Those apes were only a recent development – it took about 2 billion years of evolving life to get to them.

As individuals we are pathetically mortal. But our genes live on through our children, with luck for millions of good years yet. In that sense I worry about what might be left to my descendants in 20 or 30 generations.

On the other hand there must have been puritans on the Titanic who kept fit, avoided carnal pleasures, and refused the sweet trolley, much good it did them…

Dave

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Whilst not trying to minimise the care with which plutonium must be handled, it isn't actually much different from other heavy metals in terms of chemical toxicity. Although it is radioactive, it is an alpha emitter, and so can be very easily shielded, plastic bag for instance. Where it is a problem is if it gets into the lungs by inhalation, or into the bloodstream, when the alpha radiation can damage internal organs. This doesn't mean we can treat it lightly, as it degrades slowly into other elements which are beta and gamma emitters. Even so it's not the killer element some would have us believe. To quote wikipedia "There were about 25 workers from Los Alamos National Laboratory who inhaled a considerable amount of plutonium dust during 1940s; according to the hot-particle theory, each of them has a 99.5% chance of being dead from lung cancer by now, but there has not been a single lung cancer among them."

The oft quoted Three Mile Island 'disaster' had very little radiological impact: "The average radiation dose to people living within ten miles of the plant was eight millirem, and no more than 100 millirem to any single individual. Eight millirem is about equal to a chest X-ray, and 100 millirem is about a third of the average background level of radiation received by US residents in a year." A financial disaster yes, but hardly a public health disaster.

To make bomb grade plutonium you have to design a special reactor, a commercial PWR would be pretty useless. How to do it is fairly well known, our not building more commercial stations won't stop rogue states.

Yes Nuclear Power has to be handled carefully, but remember Bhopal, where some estimates suggest 8000 deaths within 2 weeks, and a further 8000 have died since. Hydro isn't without its risks. In 1975 the Banqiao dam in China burst, resulting in 26,000 dead from flooding, 145,000 dead from subsequent famine and epidemics, 11 million homeless.

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

Pu is such an intense alpha emitter Pu dust eats its way through that plastic bag you mention in a matter of weeks by breaking the bonds between the constituent atoms. Not nice stuff.

Regards

Richard.

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

If I had a choice, I would still take my chances with a few smuts every time, against more Chernobyl's,

Fukashima's ,Windscale's, 3 Mile Island's ,etc.

[not done it yetParticipant @notdoneityet]

I would still take my chances with a few smuts every time, against more Chernobyl's,

Especially if they are situated downwind of everywhere! Now, what are our prevailing winds? SW by any chance?Apparently not tsunami proof either? Not happened lately but about 2-400?years ago, there may have been a bit of a 'surge' along the SW coast due to part of an island (or Ireland)

falling into the sea somewhere, after a rather large earthquake?

Check out: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsunamis_affecting_the_British_Isles

It does happen ….. Only needs to happen once ….

[warwick wilton 1Participant @warwickwilton1]

I hope that I have been doing my part. I operate and maintain a 73 year old hydro power station that produces on average 10 gig watts per year. and most of the time I am on my own. and in todays world of accounts it would not be economical to install so what is the real cost of renewables.

[Anthony KnightsParticipant @anthonyknights16741]

All the talk about CO2 emissions made me look on Wikepedia and find out the composition of Earth's atmosphere.

I was amazed to find that just 0.04% of our atmosphere is CO2. At the risk of being vilified (like the scientists of old who said that the Earth was spherical and went round the sun) I ask how can such a relatively small amount of gas be responsible for all the alleged man made climate change? Note how that has changed from "Global warming".

From what I've read, the Earth has been warming up (apart from the odd dip) since the last Ice Age. Still, I suppose the Government needs some excuse to increase our taxes. In my opinion, the biggest threat to the planet is over population.

[Russell EberhardtParticipant @russelleberhardt48058]

Posted by Anthony Knights on 01/05/2017 07:57:22:I ask how can such a relatively small amount of gas be responsible for all the alleged man made climate change? Note how that has changed from "Global warming".

**LINK**

Russell.

[J HancockParticipant @jhancock95746]

In 1977 I was recording CO2 in the atmosphere at around the 280ppm,Retiring in 2005, it was around 340ppm.

Since then ('77), we (UK) have de-industrialised, and Max. Demand is roughly where it was back in 1977.

However, trips to the Far East from 1967 to date show massive increases in electricity demand as they try to

emulate our climate, with air-conditioning. No guesses needed to know what is powering that demand, coal.

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

Melting polar stuff doesn't bother me. Where I live in the UK used to be under a mile of solid ice 10,000 years ago

Compared to the ice age the ice that remains now is nothing more than that last sliver of ice you see on a rum and coke, the bit that melts away really fast, (that surface area to volume ratio thing still applies at planetary level)

The only thing that stays the same is that things change

Edited By Ady1 on 01/05/2017 09:26:32

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