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PeakOil is You

PeakOil is You

Question about electricity generation

Discussions of conventional and alternative energy production technologies.

Unread postby JackBob » Tue 14 Sep 2004, 06:01:08

kevin wrote:I agree with JackBob, except for one point-

Replace the electric water heaters with solar heating systems... no problem. Solar thermal systems are by far and away the best investment in terms of solar energy.

HOWEVER,

They most definitely do not last as long as PV panels. Most PV panels now are covered by a 25 year performance warranty (80% output after 25 years). A huge majority of the PV produced in the 60's and 70's are still working. I have several customers with this equipment.

The evacuated tube systems that I've installed are overkill for domestic hot water systems. A regular flat plate collector works very well, if sized and installed correctly.

Remember, comparing solar thermal systems with solar electric systems is apples and oranges. They do two different things.

Solar is still cool! 8)


I'd be interested in knowing more about the evacuated tube systems. Our cottage currently has an oil-fired AGA (cooking plus domestic HW)plus an oil-fired central heating boiler which we rarely click on. I am wondering if the tube systems would provide enough hot water for domestic AND central-heating rads - any links that might take me further or any personal experience?

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Unread postby JackBob » Tue 14 Sep 2004, 11:35:38

kevin wrote:I agree with JackBob, except for one point-

Replace the electric water heaters with solar heating systems... no problem. Solar thermal systems are by far and away the best investment in terms of solar energy.

HOWEVER,

They most definitely do not last as long as PV panels. Most PV panels now are covered by a 25 year performance warranty (80% output after 25 years). Solar is still cool! 8)


Ah, Kevin. I re-discovered the url where I was reading about the vacuum tube systems at http://www.solaruk.net

Good news is they have a 25 year guarantee as well.

JackBob[/url]
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Unread postby kevin » Tue 14 Sep 2004, 15:24:44

Great!

There are a couple more manufacturers around- www.sunda.com, I think is the link to the evacuated tube mfr. that we have used in the past.

I wish you luck with your search!
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Re: Hubberts Peak for Natural Gas

Unread postby DavidM » Wed 15 Sep 2004, 19:16:01

Anonymous wrote:
DavidM wrote:With Natural Gas, since it is lighter than air, it has a natural tendency to push itself out of the ground and into our drilling equipment.


NG is not lighter than air. NG is produced through formation pressures. The rest of what you wrote is essentially spot on, but I had to correct this little portion.


Natural Gas is lighter than air. At least the natural gas that is delivered to most of our homes (assuming it is uncontaminated). Natural Gas for delivery in the US is approximately 95 percent methane by weight with the remaining 5 percent being split amongst ethane, propane and carbon dioxide. Methane has a molecular weight of 16g/mol. Air has an average molecular weight of 29g/mol. Therefore Natural Gas is clearly lighter than air. (Not as light as Helium however)

If you fill a baloon with Natural Gas and release it into our atmosphere it will float away - that of course is the best proof that it is lighter than air.
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the magic of the large grid

Unread postby JoeW » Thu 16 Sep 2004, 14:18:35

cyotha wrote:Explain why it's necessary to distribute electricity in a system so interdependent that human error by a few guys in Ohio can cause a blackout for the Northeast.


the size of the grid is important. if each of us had our own generator running 24 hours/day (like power plants do), most of this energy would be wasted while we are at work, away on vacation, whatever. the grid makes power generation more efficient. the further you can deliver the power, the more efficient you can make the whole system by delivering the generated power to the places that need it at just the right time.
Energy traders make a lot of money by figuring out who is going to need power, when they are going to need it, and how much they need. They buy and sell energy based on everything from historical trends to the latest weather forecast.
To you and me, we flip the switch and the light goes on. But there is much more going on behind the scenes to make the whole deal as efficient (and as profitable) as possible. It costs money to generate power, and no company likes to waste money. Ideally, every watt generated would get used at the other end of the wire, and there would be no loss due to the parasitics involved in transmission (resistance, capacitance).
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Unread postby small_steps » Fri 24 Sep 2004, 22:07:09

cyotha wrote:Hey, thanks for the suggestion.

Power System Analysis and Design
by J. Duncan Glover, Mulukutla S. Sarma


List Price: $128.95

Unfortunately the only textbooks I can afford to spend $128 on are the ones for my required classes. It looks like I have enough math but I would have to learn electric network theory first. Hm; nope, not worth it.

That "PowerWorld Simulator" looks pretty cool though.


your campus library may have a version of this book or something similar- you have already paid for it in this regard, take a hour or two and familiar yourself
-it should answer your questions
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Unread postby funkywizard » Fri 01 Oct 2004, 16:17:41

cyotha wrote:The large grid? There are 3 grids in the continental U.S.: the Western, Eastern, and Texas Interconnects. They grew out of smaller grids that over time, were interconnected. Hawaii has its own grid. Alaska has one main grid that connects the most populated areas (Anchorage, Fairbanks), but it also has some minigrids, and most of the state depends on diesel generators.


Here in Alaska the Anchorage-Fairbanks intertie is reletively new and not really a good thing. It has caused more power problems for fairbanks than we had before, with spikes, sags, and all sorts of problems that make it entirely stupid to run a computer with less than $100 worth of power conditioning / backup equipment. So much for progress.
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Unread postby Kingcoal » Fri 01 Oct 2004, 23:01:34

Laurasia wrote:I am convinced that the only way to go is to find a way to live WITHOUT electricity. I think solar and wind power will be good as temporary stopgaps for household use (not for industry - that's probably finished) but eventually the solar panels will cease to function (20 years is the guarantee on a lot of them), the storage batteries will be 'kaput' in a much shorter time, and the windmills will require spare parts; all of these things will be irreplaceable. So, the only thing to do is bite the bullet.
L.


It sounds like you've been reading dieoff.org.

The largest use of oil by far, and more importantly, the majority user of the light sweet stuff (conventional oil) which is now post peak, is transportation. The power grid will be kept on for a long, long time - even with industrial loads. However, putting gas into your car will probably become more and more uneconomical. Trucking, shipping and air travel will be hurt severely. This might actually open some opportunities for localized manufacturers and cottage industries. We might be actually making things in America again instead of shipping raw materials into China and shipping finished products back.

The huge failure is the complete lack of a replacement for oil distillates used as fuel. Electronics has made very large advancements and in the coming years super efficient and inexpensive photovotaic cells will become available allowing the average homeowner to sell electricity back to the grid as well as power their own house. Going off grid is the most stupid idea I've ever heard of.
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Unread postby jato » Fri 01 Oct 2004, 23:21:37

Going off grid is the most stupid idea I've ever heard of.


Don't you think running out/low on natural gas is going to collapse the grid?

Can we bring LNG online fast enough? Do we have the money to do so? How much will natural gas cost then?
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Unread postby MarkR » Sun 03 Oct 2004, 06:06:56

Don't you think running out/low on natural gas is going to collapse the grid?


Currently, the grid in the US and UK, and a number of other countries is rather over-dependant on NG.

However, this transition to NG has been relatively recent - prior to this coal was the dominant primary energy source, and most of the plants are still there. They have just been 'mothballed' and allowed to gather dust because they are too expensive to maintain, given the price differential of coal and NG.

Should NG supply shortages be a problem, then there is a lot of spare coal capacity that could be brought online within a few months. Yes, these plants are old, inefficient and pump out huge quantities of nasty gases - but they may be the only thing that stops the grid collapsing if we run out of NG.
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Unread postby Aaron » Sun 03 Oct 2004, 07:56:15

If any of these primary energy sources existed in some vacuum of isolation I would agree that declining oil supplies would have little impact on future electric grid prospects.

However, this is not the case.

It's not that falling stocks of oil directly impact our ability to produce and distribute electricity, but rather as a secondary impact. Not just the oil-powered machines which build and maintain these facilities, but the way they are interconnected to one another through the economies of the world.

Even if we suppose that agriculture required NO oil based energy to continue production, it's a mistake to assume this means that food prices remain stable.

It's the sum of all oil subsidized goods & services that has the impact.

It is somewhat daunting to begin adding up oil dependent processes which represent the overhead of just about every industry including agriculture. (& electricity production)

The direct oil subsidy in agriculture is obvious and massive of course... From planting to fertilizing and pest control, to harvesting, processing, and moving these products to market, oil energy is involved at every step.

Less obvious are the indirect oil dependencies.

Imagine a list of all the things and activities we all use to accomplish what we do each day. Right down to the toilet paper you use to wipe away the last remnants of yesterdays agriculture, almost everything you can name, has been subsidized by oil energy.

This is the central, and often overlooked, problem with post peak oil supplies.

We tend to forget that everything made from oil, everything powered by oil, everything transported by oil, must become more expensive as oil becomes more expensive.

So fine... we can produce electricity from coal or nuclear, or solar, or the energy fairy for that matter.

But the toothbrush you use before going to work at the power plant required oil energy to create, distribute and sell. Oh yes... and it's made of oil BTW.

This is true of just about everything in our modern world.

Oil has made almost everything relatively cheap...
The problem is, of course, that not only is economics bankrupt, but it has always been nothing more than politics in disguise... economics is a form of brain damage.

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