Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Our member Duane Oyen left an interesting comment on an earlier thread:
| Duane Oyen: BSA, since I am the original anti-Jerry Taylor/Robert Bryce/Jim Woolsey nut here, have you explored Robert Zubrin's ideas at all? That is by far the simplest, most market-oriented route to getting off of the petroleum IV line. Once you have pure fuel flexibility, you can use any approach- CTL, you name it. Oil extortion only works when the underlying market is tight or questionable, so that you are dependent on all sources. If the marginal source of supply is made even more marginal, the underlying demand drops and speculation is no longer worthwhile. What makes biomass less useful is the fact that its transportation to central processing facilities is more costly and energy-intensive than the relative value of the feedstock. If instead, every person could pre-process any type of carbon, the way a few years ago every Target or Wal-Mart had its own 1 hour photo-developing machine instead of just central labs, the resultant crude (from grass clippings, newspapers, etc.) would be processable at any refinery. And almost anything can work with basic pyrolisis, let alone advanced methods of cracking the carbon. · Jul 30 at 1:47pm |
I confess that I hadn't explored Robert Zubrin's ideas, but now I have. Zubrin wants Congress to require that all new cars be flex-fuel--that is, capable of running on ethanol as well as gas. He claims this would cost only another $100 per vehicle. (Is that true? Seems implausible to me--wouldn't you have to completely redesign a lot of cars, retool plants, etc?)
Zubrin writes:
Filling stations don't want to dedicate space to a fuel mix used by only three percent of all cars and consumers are not interested in buying vehicles for which the preferred fuel mix is extremely difficult to find.
He thinks this is one of those problems the government should solve by passing a law. If you build the cars, he believes, the free market will take care of the rest.
I wonder. Is there some other reason consumers don't want cars that run on ethanol? What's the down side to his suggestion?
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Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
I think that the two major factors which will prevent Zurbin's vision are;
1) Scale - There just isn't enough bio mass out there to provide the necessary level of energy flow to fuel the American Economy.
2) Net Energy Effect - Ethanol requires more energy to produce than Oil does to refine. The net gain in energy is currently questionable at best as all of the energy variables are still not being included when one advocates the benefits gained in the production of ethanol.
I'm an economist by education but have worked as an engineer and project manager, so my overall expertise is limited on the subject, but I have looked into it as best I can and those two issues seem to be the real hindering factor as regards bio fuels.
jd
Jun '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
The best solution, that isn't quite there yet, is producing batteries that are very powerful, very durable, and very cheap. We already have the distribution system for charging batteries. If the batteries were cheap enough, and standardized enough, you could drive into a fueling station, swap out your car's battery pack, and drive on. Then, it's other people--people with a lot of advanced degrees--that figure out the best way to obtain the energy to make the electricity. Not your problem. You just drive.
May '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
I've passed the topic on to some retired oil men. It will likely be at least a few days before I get a response.
May '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Folks, don't glide over the primary point and slide back into the usual "alcohol is a scam" Right mindset. This is not about ethanol. Politically-motivated corn ethanol programs are among the most wasteful corporate welfare projects. Zubrin's book runs all the numbers (he is a PhD rocket scientist, he knows volatile fuels).
It is about, primarily, methanol- simpler (CH3OH, a single carbon), more flexible, easier to produce, uses any carbon feedstock, etc. Nobel laureate George Olah wrote an entire book about just that fuel and why it is so useful.
You can put a pre-processor in any landfill, and essentially "mine" garbage dumps. You can grow salt-tolerant plants in brackish water in Louisiana swamps. You can plant portions of desert with brush. Put a pre-processor to break down the wood chips next to the garbage tubs behind the papermills. Anything that is left over from any biological process is useful- as long as you don't have to ship it in that form off to a central facility. The whole point about pre-processing is that it changes the nature of the first stage of the industrial food chain from centralized to distributed.
Jun '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Setting aside recycled fuel sources, ethanol’s biggest economic impact is to raise the cost of food production in two ways: 1) turning food crops such as corn into fuel crops, and 2) taking land out of food production and turning it over to the production of fuel. This is a very bad idea. As for recycling bio-elements to produce fuel the equation is not necessarily energy in equals energy out as the recycling process might for political reasons ad value in that society would have another means of dealing with its waste. That said, there is still no getting around the cold economic fact of price. As energy prices rise other sources of hydrocarbon become more economic to produce and market, shale oil and tar sands for example. The Alberta tar sands can now be converted profitably into conventional petroleum at a surprisingly low per barrel cost. I hesitate to quote the number as I have no certainty that it is correct. What we as a society seem to be chasing is a dream that does not properly allow for market forces that will absolutely dictate our energy future.
May '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Folks, don't glide over the primary point and slide back into the usual "alcohol is a scam" Right mindset. This is not about ethanol. Politically-motivated corn ethanol programs are among the most wasteful corporate welfare projects. Zubrin's book runs all the numbers (he is a PhD rocket scientist, he knows volatile fuels).
It is about, primarily, methanol- simpler (CH3OH, a single carbon), more flexible, easier to produce, uses any carbon feedstock, etc. Nobel laureate George Olah wrote an entire book about just that fuel and why it is so useful.
You can put a pre-processor in any landfill, and essentially "mine" garbage dumps. You can grow salt-tolerant plants in brackish water in Louisiana swamps. You can plant portions of desert with brush. Put a pre-processor to break down the wood chips next to the garbage tubs behind the papermills. Anything that is left over from any biological process is useful- as long as you don't have to ship it in that form off to a central facility. The whole point about pre-processing is that it changes the nature of the first stage of the industrial food chain from centralized to distributed.
May '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
The increased cost is 1) changing fuel line hoses to withstand corrosive methanol contact, 2) re-programming the fuel system to recognize what the fuel is based on the emission control sensors already in the tailpipes of modern vehicles. The tooling costs are no different or higher than the standard new model re-tooling process that you do for every new car. The development costs are mostly incurred already.
Most important- with the one least intrusive government act (far less than the CAFE standards), you move this into the true free market, where everyone chooses what to put in her tank, as fuels all compete.
Remember- you don't need to replace petroleum. All you need to do is introduce enough added supply of alternatives into the system at the margin (think marginal tax rates) to break the market control that the oil people now possess. Brazil runs on about half oil (lots of which they pump themselves) and half alcohol, according to the last piece I read on that.
BTW, if this is not about ethanol- but if short term corn demand increases, by the next growing season you plant fallow land instead of being paid not to.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
If it were economically viable, people would be doing it. Simple as that.
Jun '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
One method of making biofuel, turning algae into oil, wouldn't compete directly with food production, but is not done efficiently enough yet. That be a significant source someday.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
1 of 3
Latest figures for Petroleum use is roughly 135 billion gallons of Gasoline fuel the American Economy
1 Bushel of Corn = 2.7 Gallons of Ethanol
1 Acre land = 138 bushels of corn
Therefore 1 Acre land = 375 Gallons Ethanol
1 Gallon Gasoline = 115,000 BTU
1 Gallon Ethanol = 76,000 BTU
Therefore 1.51 Gallons Ethanol = 1 Gallon Gasoline
Therefore 1 Acre land = Energy of 248 Gallons Gasoline
Therefore 482 Million acres of land is required to produce enough Ethanol to replace Gasoline.
Total Agricultural Land used in the U.S. = 435 million acres. (That's food folks, one does not have to give up eating to refine gasoline.)
So; where do we get the doubling of Agricultural land from?
Even to go to a Half/Half Ethanol mix will require an additional 217 million acres of land. Which old growth forest do the Greens suggest we cut down to provide that land?
Oh, I know, we'll grow it in the desert areas that we're not using for Solar panels.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
2 of 3
And of course all of the agricultural equipment for tending the crops will consume energy in their production.
And where do we get the water for that land? (Heck we can't even get water for the land that's growing food already.)
Clearing that land will require energy consumption.
Infrastructure for watering the land will require energy consumption.
Ethanol is highly corrosive, therefore we need to replace all of the underground tanks at these various and sundry gas stations that don't want to provide ethanol because too few vehicles can run on it. Wait a minute; didn't we do that in the mid 90's?
Energy will be required to replace those tanks. As well as increased Energy consumption due to the shorter life cycle of the tanks increasing the replacement cycle.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
3 of 3
If not the end result will be in increased pollution of groundwater when underground storage tanks leak. You see Soil bacteria love ethanol, If gasoline that contains ethanol leaks, the bacteria in the soil will preferentially metabolize the ethanol instead of the gasoline hydrocarbons. As a result, the subsurface plumes of gasoline will not be degraded and will spread farther out, potentially poisoning more wells.
We'll also need to replace the infrastructure of Pipelines, which means more energy consumption to do that.
If pipelines are not replaced then we need to transport Ethanol via Truck or Tran for the long distance. (I know, trucks deliver gasoline to the station, but it is transported long haul via pipeline, then short hauled via truck.)
Trucks and Trains use energy for transporting the Ethanol.
And please don't tell me about the "stimulus" to the economy of all of this or I'll write another tirade on opportunity cost.
May '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
JaydDee, stop parroting Pimentel's stuff. I said- read my lips- this is not about ethanol. I'll say it again. This is not about ethanol- and it explicitly rejects government ethanol projects or subsidies.
Michael, don't quote CATO to me- their stuff on energy is sympathetic to Pimentel and based on Ayn Rand government that basically charges tolls to walk on the sidewalk. Jerry Taylor uses the same rationale to explain why we should not have any nuclear plants either.
Pimentel's own study was grossly dishonest and had the same kinds of assertions and assumptions built into it as the global climate scammers used for the economic, paleoclimate reconstruction, and public health sections of IPCC-4.
Look up a bit of background on Pimentel- he is a wacko enviro who believes that the world's population has to be reduced by half to ensure green sustainability. We don't need energy as long as we get rid of people.
Biomass feedstock pre-processed in situ specifically rejects irrigation of the fields. You use all carbons in whatever form.
May '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Michael Tee: If it were economically viable, people would be doing it. Simple as that. · Aug 1 at 9:25am
Not true. There are many economic technologies and processes that are not invested in because of the threat that cartels will fight the competition by lowering price until the threat is gone, then raising them back up. Other technologies require removal of government favoritism in order to allow them to be deployed (half of medicine is like that, BTW- it is massively more costly than necessary).
The internet required government to get it started and put the infrastructure in place. The flat screen TVs you see today exist in large part because of the programs of 20 years ago when DARPA issued large grants for their "flat panel displays" program to support the C4 electronic battlefield initiatives and H-U-D aviation systems- I was there when it was going on. Digital TV was directed by government policy, and now frees up RF spectrum so that all of the other RF communications systems have sufficient bandwidth available.
I repeat- kill the ethanol subsidies to ADM, remove the tariffs against cheap industrial sugar. This is not an ethanol project.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Point 1: I am NOT Parroting Pimentel's stuff. While I used information he provided regarding leakage of Ethanol, the rest is my own analysis based on U.S. Government figures. It is simple math, and if Pimentel did the same math there is a reason they look alike, math is math.
Point 2: Zubrin paints a pretty picture, but it is with fantasy paints.
The weight of a bushel of corn is roughly 56 pounds. That translates to 2.7 gallons of Ethanol (21.6 pounds roughly)
Most people produce less than 100 pounds of waste per week. So each person can pre process roughly enough carbon mass for 5.4 gallons a week, assuming all waste can be converted which it can not.
Again, where do we get the LAND for added agricultural production for Alcahol?
Environmentalists will place roadblocks for every acre that is attempted to be added. Cost, cost and more cost.
Where do we get the added water for the Agriculture?
Check in the Sacramento Valley about how well that's working out.
More fertilizer going into the "biosphere" will become the next groundwater challenge, don't think for a minute it won't.
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Keep going, this is fascinating ...
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
1 of 3
As I said, my background is engineering and Project Management. So I think like a project manager, something congress and other eggheads should try.
The real problem with Zurbin's ideas is that in the end something has to come from someplace, and more often than not, in the form of a tradeoff.
In slide 16 Zubrin says that ethanol is increasing the corn supply and it is not a Zero Sum Game.
However, California Department of Agriculture says the increased output of Corn for ethanol has come at the cost of lower yields of Fruits, Nuts and depletion of Groundwater supplies.
Increasing the yield of one crop does not a disproof of Zero Sum provide.
On slide 18 he shows Total Farmland, and how Actually cultivated land is less than the total. Just because it is not cultivated does not mean it isn't in use for purposes of agriculture.
Again, cows eat grass on some of that NOT cultivated land, which means the land for corn will have a tradeoff.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
2 of 3
Then on slide 20 comes the real Bait and switch. Brazil Did it!
Um, maybe.
Note his chart ends in 2006
Brazil's Crude Oil Consumption is as such
2003 2,199,000
2004 2,199,000
2005 2,199,000
2006 1,610,000
2007 2,100,000
2008 2,372,000
2009 2,372,000
And they imported oil in what quantities?
2006 572,600
2007 379,400
2008 648,800
2009 648,800
2010 632,900
hey, after 2007 it goes back up, What happened?
A combination of cheap oil and droughts - which caused poor harvests and less ethanol - led Brazilians back to oil.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
3 of 3
Again I have to mention scale, Brazil produces only about 5 billion gallons of ethanol per year, U.S. demand is around 135 billion gallons per year. And what about drought, or another natural disasters, or even Environmental mandates? (We've seen them twice in Klamath Falls, Oregon, and San Joaquin Valley, California. That only shifts who gets to pull an embargo.)
A final note, Flex Fuel technology is not yet perfected, there are issues with the engines running E85, especially in Colder climates like winter in New York or Minnesota.
While the picture is rosy in the slide show, we'd be better off drilling up some of the crude we have on hand and developing the shale and sand tars that are quite plentiful. In those we have the existing technology and the necessary scale to handle America's Real Energy needs.
Jul '10
Re: Changing the Energy Trump Suit: Some Questions
Final Note:
George S. Patton once said, "Strategy and Tactics will win a battle, but Logistics will win the war." Ref: The Red Ball Express
Ethanol will be a logistical nightmare, it already is and we're only dabbling, to tackle on the necessary level to eliminate crude oil imports.
Let something become economically viable and it will replace crude oil as an energy source almost overnight.
Never forget, at the turn of the century, had the Federal Government mandated the source for America's Transportation Future, they would have mandated Steam!
Get Government and Environmentalists out of our way and we can do just fine with what we've got.